Fireflies (25 page)

Leroy heard the man step closer and then he lit a cigarette. ‘You may as well face up to it, Leroy. You won’t be getting out of here alive. You’ve come here to die my friend. Or rather you’ve come here for me to execute you. That’s when the fun will start. Well it will for me anyway but for you it might not be so much fun. More like the unbearable torments of hell. You think you control the streets. You think you can take whatever you want and give absolutely nothing back. Well let me tell you, Leroy, it isn’t going to happen anymore because I’m going to pick you all off one by one and teach the Gorton boys a valuable lesson in an eye for an eye’.

The man paused whilst he took a drag on his cigarette. Leroy was breathing rapidly and was totally consumed with terror. He didn’t recognize the voice of the man but he sounded like he was probably white.

‘Do you know what, Leroy? I was so keen to get down here and fill you in on what’s going to be happening during your last hours on earth that I forgot to bring an ashtray. Still there are always other places to stub your fag out’.

The man grabbed Leroy’s penis, pulled back the foreskin and stubbed his cigarette out on the end. He kept it there grinding the hot tobacco into the sensitive flesh. Leroy struggled once more in his restrained position. He was desperate to get away from the onslaught of sudden pain and could feel himself crying. He tried to scream but the tape across his mouth muffled the sound.

‘Try and get some sleep now, there’s a good boy’ said the man. ‘You’ll need some rest whilst you contemplate your last night here on this earth’.

Leroy was hungry but the need for food and especially water was being savagely repressed by the pain that felt like it was tearing his muscles apart. He’d barely been able to sleep but when his body had given in to the need for some kind of close down he’d immediately woken up again with a start and started crying when he remembered the situation he was in.

It was true that he’d been a pretty bad boy in his time. But the Gorton boys had been his crew. More than that they’d been his family and they’d been his future. Everyone had expected him to fail at school. And he had failed. So he’d taken up arms against that same system that had predicted and orchestrated his failure. He’d beaten people up. He’d beaten up young children who’d disrespected the laws of the Gorton boys. He’d answered his mother back. He’d answered his grandparents back.  He’d never told his mother just where or how he made his money. But he’d give anything to be able to tell her now.

Every time he tried to move, even a slight movement of his arms or legs, his body almost seized up with pain. He’d pissed himself. He’d had to. He’d had no choice. He could smell the pool of urine on the floor below him. It was stone cold wherever he was and yet he’d been sweating. It felt as if his legs would snap away from the rest of his body at any moment. His shoulders felt like they were on fire as they struggled to keep his arms fixed in their sockets.

He heard the door open and his body almost went into spasm with fear. 

‘So how was your night?’ asked the man. It was the same voice as before. ‘Sorry. That really was a silly question. I’ll shut up and get on with preparing your painful means of death’.  

Leroy heard the man walk behind him. Oh Christ what was he going to do to him? He couldn’t help pissing himself again.

‘Oh the waterworks’ said the man. ‘Still, I can’t say I blame you. You must be terrified. Well you should be because this is really going to hurt’.

Leroy started crying. He could feel the tears roll down from underneath the thick tape across his eyes and across his cheeks.

‘Oh’ said the man. ‘I suppose you want your Mum now, don’t you? Well don’t worry. You see I’m filming this whole thing and I’ll be sending a copy of the DVD to your dear, sweet Mummy. The DVD won’t show me of course. I
pause the camera when I come into the room. Now, in the best traditions of all executioners I’m now going to let you have your final words’.

The man walked up and ripped the tape from Leroy’s mouth. Leroy let out a loud scream and was finding it difficult to breathe.

‘It’s a good job nobody can hear you’ said the man. ‘Now, what do you want to say?’

‘Please,
man … please don’t do this. I’ll do anything … ‘

‘Did you give any of your victims the right to a final few words? I don’t suppose you did’.

‘I’m … I’m sorry’

‘Oh sorry is a bit late, my friend’.

‘Why are you doing this to me?’

‘Because you and the rest of the Gorton boys have got away with too much for too long’.

‘I’m begging you, man’.

‘Oh this is getting boring!’ said the man who then taped Leroy’s mouth up again. He watched Leroy try to struggle and got great satisfaction from seeing him twist and contort with frustration and terror.

Leroy heard some kind of mechanism twisting behind him and then the cold metal he’d been feeling against the back of his neck began to move forward and force his neck up against the metal collar. He flinched. He was finding it difficult to breathe.

‘Do you know what a
garotte is, Leroy? Well you’re strapped to one right now. I turn the wheel at the back here and you can feel there isn’t much room for maneuver so it’ll take about four or five twists for it to break your neck. Then you’ll be dead. Each twist will increase the pain you feel and you’ll struggle more and more to breathe. Goodbye Leroy. You could’ve had a truly meaningful life but as it turns out your life was pretty pointless really. Better luck next time. Now here’s the second twist and with it you’re just that little bit closer to death’.

ALL ABOUT SIMON

Just because a man is fifty-one and unmarried doesn’t mean to say he’s gay. People don’t say that about fifty-one year-old unmarried women. They feel sorry for them and say things like ‘oh it’s a shame she never met the right one’ or ‘it’s a shame he was married because she’s never got over him’. But they never say that about fifty-one year old unmarried men. They whisper about them and assume they must be some kind of sexual deviant. Or they imagine some kind of deep seated personality deficiency that stops them from forming normal relationships with women. They think they probably sit in their house late at night downloading child pornography. In other words, women can get away with being unmarried and single at fifty-one and indeed, at any bloody age. But fifty-one year old unmarried men don’t get away with it. They’re condemned to one unfounded assumption after another.

‘Yes, but you are gay, Simon’ said Harry who was sitting next to him in the taxi. ‘So what’s the fucking point of all this?’

‘I was comparing myself to Damien, Lucy’s new boyfriend. He’s fifty and unmarried but nobody whispers about him being gay’.

‘That’s because he has relationship history’ said Harry who’d never quite been able to work out why his mate Simon had been on the receiving end of such bad luck. He was an intelligent man for sure, not a geek or a boring bastard, but someone with a thoughtful eye on the world. But his personal life had always been like a speeding car crashing against a brick wall. ‘Damien has been in two long-term relationships with women both of which lasted for years and that’s normal for unmarried straight men of his age. They’ve normally had a couple of long-term serious relationships with women that didn’t work out in the end but at least they had them. You haven’t had any serious relationships’.

‘Don’t mince your words’.

‘But it’s the truth, Simon, and I think the last thing you need at the moment is for me to give you warm words that don’t mean shit’.

‘I’ve had sex’ said Simon in the way people claim to have eaten suchi. ‘I’ve had more than my fair share of other people’s boyfriends and husbands. I’ve been quite good at being the other woman. The only way I’ve ever been able to keep anybody is by them calling the shots and me not being able to rely on anything. There’s always been someone else ahead of me in the queue for first prize. I was always the bit on the side. I would’ve loved to have had a crack at feeling what it’s like to come first in someone’s life’.

‘You sound like it’s all over, Simon’.

‘Well it feels like it is, Harry’.

‘You’ve had some fun though’.

‘Oh I’ve had some fun but could you have got through your life just on fun?’

‘Point taken’.

‘Thank you’.

‘Well you did get investigated by the clap clinic that time’

‘And even then I was given the all clear’ Simon lamented. ‘I’m so bloody insignificant I couldn’t even catch a sexually transmitted disease. I was the only one in the chain who wasn’t infected’.

‘I wish you’d been able to find someone, mate’ said Harry. ‘We all do. We all think you deserve to have someone and we wish we could make it happen’.

‘There was Mitch’.

‘Yes, but he wasn’t gay or even curious’ said Harry. ‘He couldn’t have given you what you needed’.

‘You knew what we were like when we were together’.

‘Yes but it was a
bromance’ Harry pointed out. ‘Like you and me have always been’.

‘I wonder what Mitch is doing now’.

‘There’s no point in you wondering that, Simon. You’ll only make yourself feel worse. You’ve got to get through today and then move on with your life’.

Simon had heard all this before from his friends. They all went on about how he’s got to look on the positive side but it was alright for them. They all had someone to look on the positive side of things with. They all had someone to help them through the bad times. But he didn’t and he was lonely. He had plenty of friends. He was swimming in bloody friends even though some of them lately had somewhat disappeared from view. But every time he’d ever wanted to move beyond the limits of friendship and follow through on his desires it was never possible for one reason or another. And the older he got the more difficult and the more painful it became to put on the brave face and bury his disappointment deep down inside where nobody else could see it. Other people seem to be able to find love so easily and yet for him it remained as impossible a dream now as it had been thirty years ago when he was first started out on the adult stage of his life’s journey. He’d really had enough of it all. He’d been worn down by life. He’d turned into the kind of man who everybody comes to for advice on their relationship but who never has one of his own to talk to them about. In that way he was a bit like a Catholic priest advising married couples. Perhaps he should’ve gone into the
priesthood. At least then he’d have been able to blame his single status on the fact that he was already married to God.

‘Anyway’ said Simon. ‘Next time I’m going to come back as a girl in Australia who marries a big hunky farmer in the outback’.

‘Except that it wouldn’t work out like that for you, Simon’ said Harry. ‘You’d come back as some poor girl in Africa who has her switch twitched with a rusty knife when she’s too young to resist’.

‘So you’re telling me there’s no hope for me in this life or the next’.

‘Simon, I’m saying you’ve made some big mistakes and you’ve also been dealt some pretty cruel blows’ said Harry. ‘But you’ve got to concentrate now on getting the best out of the rest of this life instead of fantasizing about what you’d like to happen in the next because there are no guarantees for any of us. We’re all just doing the best we can’.

‘Easy for you to say when you know what it feels like to be loved’.

‘I know, Simon, I know. I’m just trying to … ‘

‘…we’re almost there’ said Simon who could see the county court building that appeared to him in the middle distance like a scaffold. He’d wanted to cut Harry off because if he’d sprouted some bullshit about not knowing what’s around the next corner he might’ve hit him.

‘I’ll pay for this’ said Harry. ‘You’ll be shelling out enough today as it is’.

‘Thanks, Harry.
Nearly seven hundred quid to go bankrupt. There must be an irony there’.

‘And you do know that I’d have you come and stay at mine until you got on your feet again but with me and April only just starting out … well you know’.

‘Yeah, I do. I don’t want my nose rubbed in gooseberries as well as everything else’.

‘Now come on, cheer up. In a year’s time, or even less than that, you’ll be looking back on this period with a renewed sense of self-belief and optimism’.

‘Yes, Harry. And Cheryl Cole can sing’.

‘April really likes you, you know’.

Simon wondered why the fuck Harry was telling him that. Did he think that knowing his straight best mate’s new girlfriend liked him would somehow help him over the fact that he was about to go bankrupt for a mountain of debt? He genuinely liked April and they got on really well but she’d been gushing to him the other day about how Harry was so attentive and so passionate and never stopped telling her how much he adored her and loved her. Well bully for fucking you, Simon had thought. Nobody had ever told Simon that they loved him, not even his own father. He’d love to know what it felt like.