Black Wood (22 page)

Laura didn’t want to be seen as a fake.

She walked up the vennel between the hardware shop and the butchers, coming out directly across from the top chippie, not because it was better – in her opinion, they were both about the same, although she did think the staff in the top one were a bit friendlier – no, it was the top one because it was on the Back Street, the bottom one on the High Street – the High Street being lower than the Back Street, despite the name. Work that one out, if you can. These were things that were just known: to the locals, anyway. She had no idea how newcomers were supposed to find out about these things.

She decided on a chip roll, left open, loads of salt and sauce. The sauce was a runny brown vinegary concoction, the recipe secret and apparently only available on the east coast of Scotland. But as she’d never been to the west coast, let alone to a chippie over there, that was something she couldn’t confirm. Maybe this was where the newcomers would come in handy.

She wandered slowly out of the shop, fingers already coated in the slimy brown sauce as she fed the chips from the top of the open roll into her starving mouth.

‘You’d think you’d not eaten for a week,’ she muttered to herself. Her stomach groaned in response.

Rather than walk back down to the High Street and go the way she’d intended, she decided to take a short cut up behind the library, round the back of the row of houses that lined Tesco’s. After that, it was just a short walk home. There was only that one little dark bit that linked the library to the houses: the bit where the trees were too closely packed, blocking out the light. According to the
Banktoun Mail and Post
there were plans to thin these out, but so far nothing had happened because apparently the people who lived in the houses liked the fact that the trees blocked the roof of the Tesco back entrance from their gardens. Laura didn’t fully understand this, as all the houses had high fences – but, as was usual in Banktoun, people liked to make a fuss before they agreed to any change.

Christ, she couldn’t wait to get away from the place. She’d already started browsing through the UCAS handbook, trying to decide where to go to uni. Her mum and dad wanted her to go to Edinburgh so she could stay at home.

Fat chance!

She was already thinking much further afield; the London campuses looked particularly appealing. There weren’t many who were considering London, which suited her fine too. There was nothing
wrong
with her friends, but she had designs on a bit more of a cosmopolitan life. Funny, for a girl who’d never been further than her mum’s sister’s in Dunfermline, barely across the Forth Bridge.

She walked round behind the library, only vaguely aware of the light becoming dimmer, the last of the sun disappearing behind the trees.

Once she’d eaten enough of the chips to enable her to sandwich the roll shut, she nibbled round the edges, then rolled the greasy chip paper into a ball.

Maybe it was because she was distracted, daydreaming about her future life at uni, or maybe it was because of the noise of the paper being scrunched and her munching on the chip roll, but she never heard the footsteps until they were right behind her.

But she heard the panting, felt hot breath on the left side of her face as a black-clad arm snaked around her chest, grabbing tightly, almost pulling her off her feet.

It took longer than expected for her fighting instinct to kick in.

The remains of the roll flew from her hand as she bent forwards and to the right in one sharp move, her right elbow shooting back as she shrunk down and away, trying to slide out of her assailant’s grip.

He gripped tighter, pushing his weight into her back. Shoved her up against the wall. Hard. Her face scraped across the rough stone as she tried to wriggle free. He tried to pin her there with a knee on her back, a hand against her head.

She moved fast, felt the skin ripping on her cheek as she dropped lower, managing to free her elbow and jab it back into him as hard as she could.

He made a small yelp of pain and only then did she realise that she’d forgotten to scream.

‘Help,’ she screamed. ‘Help! Attack!’

His grip loosened slightly and she felt a burst of adrenalin surging through her body.

She was ten feet tall.

Sliding out of his grip, she spun round and gave him her best uppercut, but he moved just at the point of connection and it ended up glancing off the side of his face, hitting his cheekbone with a sickening crunch.

But it felt wrong. She hadn’t hit it hard enough for it to break.

He staggered back from her, a low muffled moan escaping from behind the wool of the balaclava, and she aimed a low kick towards his knee. But he’d found his way again and lunged towards her, and she ended up stumbling forwards as her foot missed its target, knocking her off balance. She ducked back from him and swiped at the side of his face, the bit she thought she’d broken.

Her fist connected again and she realised what the noise was. The crunch.

Plastic. His face was plastic.

She lunged in again, screamed into his face, ‘FIRE! Call 999!’

She made a grab for his face, managed a grip of the balaclava before he swatted her off, swaying back on his heels.

Was he dazed?

She didn’t wait around long enough to find out. She turned and made to run, fear burning through her veins. Then she was down, her foot hitting something slippery on the asphalt before she fell.
Oh Jesus
, she thought,
floored by a fucking chip roll!
She threw out her arms in front of her, but it was too late. She hit her knee, then her face as she crashed down to the ground.

The air left her lungs in a rapid
whump
.

As she lay, she heard a dog barking, a back gate slamming against the fence. Footsteps running. Two sets. A yell. ‘HEY!’

Another voice, quieter: ‘Are you OK, hen? Bloody hell … Trisha, phone an ambulance …’

Then … nothing.

Gray slowed the scooter until he was going slowly enough to edge it in through the gate. He dropped his feet onto the floor, turned off the engine.

Apart from the
tick tick tick
as it cooled down, the street was quiet.

He wheeled his pride and joy up to its space under the front window, where he has dispensed with the niceties of a garden to leave space for the bike and his various other bits and pieces around it. Technically, he was supposed to make the single gate into a double space, request that the council come and drop the kerb. At the moment his driveway was unofficial, but he preferred it that way. Less chance of anyone wandering in to have a look at the Lambretta.

He understood the fascination. With the bike, and with him. Some of the town’s teenagers didn’t quite get his style, his personality when he was off-duty, but he was more than happy to talk to any that did.

He’d been obsessed with the whole Mod culture since he was a boy – his dad had often regaled him with stories of gangs of Mods v Rockers; and Gray would’ve thought they were tall tales, until he started to buy books on it all. The fashions, the fights, the music. The girls.

The drugs.

That was the only part he didn’t embrace. Not because he was a puritan or a party pooper or anything of the like; only because ever since he’d been a kid, he’d wanted to be a copper.

And what could be more Modish than a uniform?

Despite the disappointment he caused for Phil Daniels’ Jimmy in the film, Sting’s portrayal of Ace Face in
Quadrophenia
was a classic. That Brighton Grand bellhop uniform. Gray would never use the word ‘dapper’, but he couldn’t find a better one. He still scoured eBay, looking for the costume. No doubt it was in the house of one of the legends that were Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey. In fact, it was Daltrey’s look he carried off now – nothing over the top, just that hint of a bygone era. Nothing quite as obvious as the so-called ‘Modfather’, Paul Weller.

Somehow he couldn’t see the Big Ham putting up with that much of a hairstyle, despite purporting not to give a fuck about much at all. He’d been counting down the days to his retirement on one of those red and white desk calendars for months now. Gray had to admit he was looking forward to it just as much, if not more.

The only uncertainty was whether he’d still have a job himself. It seemed more and more likely that the station would be closed down, the town’s policing needs served by the county HQ, or whatever it was called now since the forces had merged to create Police Scotland. Gray had bet Callum Beattie that it’d be divided again within two years. A half-baked plan that suited the government’s pockets, and nothing more.

After locking up the bike and covering it with a tarpaulin, he headed inside.

The house always felt stuffy, old. He’d barely changed it since his parents had died – both prematurely, heart attack and dementia, respectively, and one of the main reasons that he kept himself as fit and healthy as he could. Apart from the occasional sausage roll, of course.

The grandfather clock in the hall had long since stopped ticking. In fact, he couldn’t remember hearing it ticking at all since that night, all those years ago. When his parents had left him home alone and he’d decided to entertain a young woman …

Ready to sink into one of his usual melancholy late nights, he flicked on the stereo and ‘Ghost Town’ by The Specials came on. He could relate.

He’d just switched on the kettle when his phone rang, and he toyed with not answering it. But he couldn’t do that. Late-night calls were never someone calling for a chat.

He sighed, clicked the green button. ‘Gray,’ he said, his tone flat.

‘It’s me,’ replied PC Beattie. ‘You’d better get down here. There’s been another one.’

He is surprised to hear that the girl from the woods is still alive.

He overhears his latest foster mother talking to the girl’s mother on the tiny square of grass at the front that they call the lawn. His bedroom is at the front, which makes a nice change. It gives him a good view of the street.

All the comings and goings.

The girl’s house is directly opposite. The parents are always in and out in their little silver car.

Back and forth to the hospital.

‘She’s improving every day,’ the mother says. ‘They think she might wake up.’

So she’s a fighter, then.

He hadn’t expected that. It was the other girl who was the feisty one.

The sexy one.

Still a child, but not for long.

He’d seen something in her eyes. Something hard. Damaged.

Something like himself.

Going to the hospital is a risk.

What if she recognises him? It isn’t likely.

But still.

Is it luck or fate or just coincidence that she is there the first time he visits?

He tells the nurse at the front desk that he’s a friend from school.

Follows the blue line round endless corridors that smell of bleach and boiled cabbage and death.

Finds her standing outside the room. Face against the glass.

‘Hello,’ he says, ‘how is she?’

The girl turns to face him. Her face pink and tear-streaked. She blinks once, her face screws into a look of confusion, then it passes.

‘She’s getting better,’ she says. ‘The nurse said there are signs she might wake up. She’s been wiggling her toes. They thought it might just be spasms, you know? Like she couldn’t control it. But she’s been doing it again today. They’re just doing some tests now, then I’m allowed in … I wasn’t before, but … Sorry … who are you again?’

The boy grins. ‘I’ve just moved in across the road. I’m so glad she’s getting better. I heard all about it and I’ve been so worried …’

‘Me too. I still can’t believe what happened … I …’

Two nurses file out of the room. ‘You can go in now if you like. Talk to her. There’s a good chance that she’s able to hear you …’

The girl turns back to the boy. ‘Are you coming?’

The boy nods and follows her inside.

And so, it begins.

Laura was sitting on her granny’s couch with a cup of tea and a fat lip. She was glad her mum had said it was OK to take a few days off after the attack. Saved her having to lie and pretend to go to school. Davie Gray had called round in the morning, but she’d refused to get up. She’d heard her mum telling him to pop round to Bridie’s to see her later.

Laura had pulled the duvet over her head and groaned.

Why could there not be another policeman come round to question her? Why him? Not only did she feel like a fucking
idiot
for not being prepared, she knew he would be feeling guilty too – for not giving her a lift home.

The attacker was hanging about at the Track. He wasn’t supposed to be in the town, in that stupid little lane that she wished she’d never walked up. One thing was for certain, she wouldn’t be eating another chip roll in a hurry.

She pulled herself up into a sitting position on the worn velour couch, wincing at the pain. Her right knee was swollen to the size of a tennis ball, but the doctor had said it was just fluid and it would be OK. She picked up the mug of tea her granny had left on the small side table next to the couch.

‘Ouch, ah. Jesus.’ Her hands were grazed from the asphalt. Raw, red wounds that her mum had taken the tweezers to, to remove the grit. Every time she moved her hands they wept pus, and picking up a hot mug of tea was practically impossible.

She set the tea back down and leant back into the couch. Her hands instinctively going up to touch her face. The scraped skin felt rough, and it looked awful, but the doctor said there shouldn’t be any scarring. Her lip hurt, though. It was blown up like a balloon, blackened underneath from where her teeth had cut into it. She was lucky she hadn’t smashed them all in. Small mercies.

The thing that hurt most was her pride.

‘Stupid. Stupid,’ she muttered, punching the back of the couch with her elbows. The only body parts she had that didn’t ache.

At least her granny was leaving her alone. She might be an old gossip, but she could see that Laura was in no mood to talk. Maybe Gray would leave her alone too.