The Know (2 page)

She smiled to herself and applied another layer of No. 7 sugar-pink lipstick. If she had a good earn tonight she would take tomorrow off and enjoy herself. She was due a break anyway.

She was listening to Bob Marley singing ‘No Woman No Cry’, and singing along softly as she carried on applying the thick makeup that was a prerequisite of her job. She made a point these days of not looking too closely at herself; gone was the time when she’d taken a real pride in her appearance. The life had caught up with her, and the money that had once been plentiful was now only adequate. In fact, if she wasn’t such a lazy bitch she might even consider getting a real job though it was a bit late in the day for anything like that; her criminal convictions would rule out most respectable avenues of work. It was a vicious circle really.

She sighed heavily and dragged once more on her cigarette. In her wildest dreams she had never thought this would be her life, but it was and her natural resilience made her accept that fact. In repose she looked haggard, the deep lines on her face more pronounced, but there were still traces of the pretty girl she had once been. Suddenly, looking at her reflection, she wanted to cry. Instead she finished her drink and forced a smile.

Now that was much more like it. If she wasn’t careful she would scare the punters off! She could hear Kira laughing in the lounge and instinctively she smiled too even though she couldn’t work out what was being said. Her youngest was a happy kid, always laughing and joking. Her son Jon Jon came into the room then with another large vodka and Coke.

‘Get that down the old Gregory, Mum. Need a lift?’

Joanie shook her head.

‘That’s OK. I’m going in with Monika.’

He laughed. ‘I meant, do you want a few Valium?’

Joanie grinned.

‘I get worse, don’t I? No, thanks, and I would appreciate it if you didn’t go offering them about to all and sundry. You will get a capture, son, mark my words.’

Jon Jon didn’t answer; he was too busy admiring himself in the dressing-table mirror.

She took a deep drink and spluttered.

‘Bloody hell, Jon Jon, what’s in this - rocket fuel?’

‘Smirnoff Black Label. Carty gets it from the docks.’

Joanie sipped the drink and smiled.

‘Just what I needed.’ She was telling the truth though her son wasn’t aware of that. He smiled back, and she looked at him and marvelled at this boy of hers. She knew how much he hated her work and yet he had brought her in a drink before she left the house since he was nine years old. Even though he had been ridiculed all through his schooldays because she was a brass, a tom, whatever epithet people wanted to call her, and hated what she did with a vengeance, he accepted the necessity for it and respected her as his mother.

‘Be in now, won’t you, for Kira? It’s Jeanette’s turn to go out, remember.’

He nodded.

‘I don’t need you to keep reiterating everything, Mum. I always do me bit, don’t I?’ He left the room with the affronted dignity of a seventeen year old who knew far better than his own mother.

For all the talk about him he was a good kid even if she was the only one who could see it. The police hated him; he was their first call for anything and everything that happened on the estate. Jon Jon was a little fucker when the fancy took him, but if they could see him reading! He read everything he could lay his hands on, and the words he knew! Joanie’s pride in her errant son knew no bounds.

Her pride in all her children was unwavering despite the things that were said about the Brewers, herself included. She knew the talk and ignored it; they were just trying to survive like everyone else, and being the kind of person she was, Joanie let most of the gossip go over her head. It had never really bothered her - or at least that was what she pretended to people, making a joke of her job, being the first to mention it and consequently making herself a legend in her own lunchtime. She was also renowned around and about for being able to handle herself in a row, and that helped. She had chinned more than a few of her neighbours over the years and consequently people were wary of her and civil enough to her face. Why wouldn’t they be? She was a soft touch for a few quid and always lent a friendly ear; she could also keep things to herself and knew most of the local gossip, the
truth
behind it as well. But she never let on; Joanie knew she could cause more than a few rows if she ever opened her trap.

She also ran every catalogue going and all the women bought from her, especially for Christmas and birthdays, so she also knew everyone’s financial status. Which was exactly what most of the tear ups had been over: non-payment of debts. Joanie prided herself on never owing a penny to anyone, and she did not like people taking advantage of her good nature.

She also read Tarot cards for a small fee and that alone brought her status up in the community because everyone wanted to know
if
, or more importantly
when
, they would get away from this dump and what the state of their love life would be in the future. As most of the men hereabouts only lasted a few weeks her readings were in great demand. The thought made her smile. Women amazed her, ever the optimists. But then, as she knew herself, they had to be.

All in all she had her own little niche here and she enjoyed it, as much as she could enjoy anything. Life, Joanie believed, was what you made it, and she made it as good as she could given the circumstances. Happiness, she had always told the kids, was just a state of mind.

Slipping on a tight black mini-skirt and a black see-through blouse, she pushed her feet into impossibly high heels and strutted into the lounge, all tits, backcombed hair and perfume.

‘Oh, Mum, you look beautiful!’

Kira’s voice was tremulous with admiration. She loved makeup and perfume, and her mother’s over-abundance of both made her seem exotic and stunningly lovely to her youngest daughter.

‘Thanks, darling. Now, you got your money, ain’t you?’

Kira nodded, her bright blue eyes still drinking in her glamorous mother.

‘You smell lovely and all.’

‘She won’t when she gets back. She’ll smell like the men’s lavs in Soho.’

This caustic comment was from Joanie’s daughter Jeanette.

Joanie grinned.

‘Been there a lot, have you, love? Only you seem to know the place well.’

Jon Jon and Kira laughed. Joanie laughed with them though inside the comment had hurt, but as usual she shrugged it off. She understood better than anyone did what her kids had to deal with on a daily basis because of her job, and made allowances accordingly. She lit a cigarette and tidied her hair absent-mindedly as she smoked and watched out of the window for Monika’s arrival.

The estate was a hive of activity as usual: kids running round, radios and stereos blaring, car engines revving - it looked like a bad day in Beirut.

But it was home to them and they liked it there, or as much as you could like it anyway.

She sighed.

‘Late for her own funeral, Monika.’

Kira laughed.

‘Her, Bethany and me are going to the pictures tomorrow.’

‘That’s nice, love.’ Lighting another cigarette, she bellowed, ‘Do us another drink, Jon Jon.’

He poured her another in the kitchen as he watched his microwave chips rotating. He was stoned and suddenly starving. He took another puff on his joint and walked back into the lounge with his mother’s drink, the stench of skunk hanging round him.

‘No wonder they call it skunk - it stinks.’

He smiled lazily.

Jeanette, who’d disappeared into her bedroom, came out and Joanie sighed.

‘You ain’t going out like that, are you?’

Jeanette had a full woman’s body and a child’s face. The combination was lethal. But both girls took after Joanie. Even Kira had a little pair of tits on her and she was only eleven. Tonight Jeanette was dressed like her idol Britney and she looked like sex on legs.

‘You look gorgeous!’

Kira was once more in raptures.

‘Is that your mate’s new top?’

‘No, it fucking ain’t, it’s mine.’

Kira’s face fell.

‘I was only asking.’

‘Well, don’t, all right?’

Jeanette had no time for her little sister and it showed; she just saw her as a nuisance.

‘Don’t talk to her like that, you rotten little mare. And anyway, she has a point. If it ain’t your mate’s, where the fuck did you get it?’

‘She’s been thieving again up the high street.’ Jon Jon spoke quietly and the room went quiet. ‘You’ve been out on the grab, ain’t you?’ he challenged.

Jeanette tossed her long curly brown hair over one shoulder.

‘So what if I have? What’s it got to do with you? You ain’t me fucking dad.’

Jon Jon took a step towards her and Kira planted herself between her brother and sister.

‘Don’t start fighting, please!’

Joanie finished her drink and slammed the glass down on the scuffed wooden table.

‘All right, that’s enough. Why do I always have to walk out that door in a two and eight, eh? Once, just once, let me go to work in a bit of peace.’

Jon Jon poked his sister in the chest none too gently as he growled, ‘Watch yourself, girl.’

She laughed.

‘I ain’t scared of you, mate!’

He stared into her eyes and Joanie watched as her daughter’s bravado turned to real fear.

‘Well, you should be, Jen. You should be very scared.’

Kira was visibly upset now. It seemed as if the whole room was charged with malice and all of them were affected by it.

The front door flew open then and Monika stumped in, overweight and sporting the most amazing Afro in recorded history.

‘I been bibbing away down there,’ she shouted. ‘You ready, girl, or what?’ She scratched one large boob as she adjusted the elasticated top she was wearing. ‘Bloody thing, it’s killing me.’

‘Try buying one that fits next time,’ Jeanette said sarcastically, without thinking.

Before Monika could answer Kira piped up with, ‘I think it looks . . .’

Everyone, including Monika, said ‘lovely’ with her and once again they were all laughing.

Kissing the kids, Joanie went to work feeling more light-hearted.

 
Kira walked out of the flat and down the steep concrete staircase to the communal washing lines below. No one used them any more so it was a place for the kids to hang out. On the plus side you could hear the music from certain flats so at least you had a few sounds as you sat around jawing.

The overflowing bins were also housed down there so the smell, especially in summer, could get overwhelming. Last winter a newborn baby had been found in one of the large bins, barely alive. The kids had heard its mewling and retrieved it from the dustbin, called the police and were heroes for a few days. The mother of the unfortunate child had left the area after a near lynching from the neighbours and the child had been fostered out. It was still a major topic of conversation for them all, months after the event, and their parents didn’t mind them hanging round here so much now.

Kira loved it here, it was her favourite place. Unlike most of the other girls she didn’t live under a loose rein, was not able to sit out till all hours, so made a point of enjoying the time she did have with her mates. It was a bone of contention between her and her brother and mother that she was not allowed the same freedom as everyone else, but she was shrewd enough to know she was fighting a losing battle. Her mother had lost the war with Jeanette, she was not going to lose it with Kira. Consequently, she was watched far more closely and had come to accept and to understand why this was so. Basically she was a good kid anyway and did as she was asked. Tonight, as she settled herself on the low wall, she was happy enough.

 
‘Little’ Tommy Thompson watched the girls as they sat and chatted. His balcony overlooked the washing lines and he had a good view of them. He liked watching the kids, they made him laugh with their antics, especially Kira and her friends. He waved down, smiling, and the girls waved shyly back.

He had moved to this area a few months previously with his father. At thirty-eight, Tommy was cripplingly obese and unable to work because of that. And, as his father had always pointed out to anyone who would listen, he wasn’t the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree either.

Tommy hated his father, and every fresh nasty comment sent him running to the fridge. ‘Morbidly obese?’ his dad would say. ‘
Anyone
would be morbid around him.’ Tommy kept meaning to find out what this meant but he never had; he was always forgetting things. He hadn’t liked to ask the doctor either because his dad was sitting there with him every time and Tommy had learned just to listen, to let his father talk. It was how it had always been even when his mum had been alive.

He moved his huge bulk in the chair. This heat was a killer for him and he knew he smelled. He could catch the sweet odour himself every time the wind blew through the flats. It was like a vacuum here because of the way the blocks were situated, and out on the balcony was the coolest place to be. Consequently Tommy spent a lot of time out there.