The Singer (43 page)

‘I were just about to put cooker on,’ said Kevin. ‘We’ve not got much in, mind. Will a fry-up do you?’

‘Sounds fucking great.’ Steve stood up and stretched, feeling his elbows and knees crack as he did so. He followed Kevin into the kitchen.

‘What time is it?’ he asked. It was dark again outside, but that was no indication at
this time of the year.

‘Four o’clock,’ said Kevin, lighting the gas ring. ‘I tried to have bit of kip, but I couldn’t really settle. Thought maybe a full stomach might help. It must be nearly twenty-four hours since I last had owt.’

‘So,’ Steve attempted to connect events in his head, fuzzy though it was. ‘What happened to you last night then, Kevin? Did you not manage to make it up to Party
of the Year?’

Kevin carefully laid out four rashers of bacon in the middle of the pan, watched them start to sizzle.

‘No’ he said. ‘There was a bit of a to-do in here when you left’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well.’ Now he was slicing the two remaining button mushrooms they had in the fridge as finely as he could manage. ‘Vince and Rachel had a bit of a falling out. An argument, you might say, about
going to that party. He went off on his own and left her here…’

‘Oh,’ Steve nodded, ‘I gerrit. So you had to mop up the tears.’

‘Something like that.’

‘Bad luck, son. Where is she now, like?’

‘Well,’ Kevin carefully flipped the rashers over, scattered his mushrooms into the pan. ‘That’s just it. She’s not here any more. She’s left him.’

‘Right,’ Steve said and yawned. ‘Well, I suppose that’s
no great surprise, is it? I wouldn’t have put up with him half as long as she did. Suppose it’s always at this time of year everything comes to a head. Gone home to her mam then, has she?’

‘That’s right’ nodded Kevin, carefully cracking an egg into a cereal bowl, tipping it in the pan, then doing a second one the same way.

‘Oh! Steve noted his technique. ‘That’s a good idea, Kevin. You don’t
break the yolks that way, do yer?’

‘No,’ said Kevin as he pulled open the door of the cupboard above his head, stood there for a moment with his back to Steve, examining what was in there. His voice sounded a little wobbly for a moment when he said: ‘Oh, great, there’s still some beans in here. Do you want some, Stevie?’

‘Oh aye, and chuck us a bit of fried bread in there if there is any.’ His
stomach was rumbling by now at the smell of the bacon. ‘Thanks, Kevin’

‘That’s all right’ Kevin’s voice was back to normal. He pushed the rashers and the mushrooms to one side, laid down two slices of bread in the middle of the pan to soak up the fat. ‘So did you see Vince at this party then?’

‘No,’ remembered Steve with some surprise. ‘No, I didn’t. D’you know what, I don’t think he even got
there. Maybes he’d been invited somewhere else; somewhere he didn’t want us to find out about. I was gonna say somewhere more posh, but believe me, Kevin, I don’t think there is anywhere more posh than Tony Bloody Stevens’s gaff. Apart from Buck House, mebbe. No, it has to be another woman, doesn’t it? Christ. I don’t know what they all see in him.’

‘Me neither,’ Kevin nodded, flipping the bread
over and then taking a tin-opener to the beans. ‘Nearly done now, Stevie. Do you want to put kettle on, mek us another brew to go with it?’

‘Aye,’ Steve pushed himself off the corner of the doorframe where he’d been leaning, walked over to the sink. Looked down as he was filling the kettle and noticed the burn in the carpet again.

‘Aye,’ he said, motioning at it with his head, ‘were that part
of argument an’ all?’

Kevin nodded.

Steve whistled. ‘All’s I can say is, good job it weren’t round Tony Baloney’s. There would have been fucking hell to pay’ He plugged the full kettle back into the wall, turned it on at the switch.

Kevin took a couple of plates from the rack by the sink. ‘I’ll just put these under grill for a moment, heat them up,’ he said.

‘Your mam did train you well, didn’t
she?’ Steve laughed.

‘Aye,’ Kevin shrugged concession. ‘I suppose she did. Oooh heck, Stevie, I completely forgot – where’s Lynton got to? I’ve not made him any.’

Steve raised his eyebrows. ‘Now there is another story.’

‘Oh yeah?’ Kevin had taken everything out of the frying pan and arranged it on their plates. There was a loud gushing sizzle as he tipped the beans into the hot pan.

‘Poor
old Lynton got his head brayed in last night. By a lass.’

‘You what?’ Kevin spun round with a look of amazement on his face.

‘Oh aye.’ Steve poured boiling water into the teapot. ‘Some lass went a bit mental and lamped him one. I don’t actually know why. I had to end up tekkin’ poor sod to hospital, we were in there most of night. Some party, eh?’

‘Oh God’ said Kevin, turning pale. ‘What hospital
were that, Stevie?’

Steve put the teapot down on the table. ‘Fucked if I know. I just called us a taxi when they let him out. I didn’t really tek much in, tell you truth. And after all that, he just wanted to sleep it off. He’s probably so full of sedative he’ll be out for rest of day.’

‘Right,’ said Kevin in a tiny voice, turning the gas off under the beans and piling them onto the plates.

‘By ‘ell, look at that,’ Stevie stared ravenously at the plate.

‘Tomato sauce?’ asked Kevin, going back to the cupboard.

‘Fucking brilliant.’

For a moment, there was silence as they got stuck in, Kevin pouring the tea, Steve banging out as much ketchup as he could over the top of his steaming feast.

‘Fucking hell,’ Steve picked up his knife and fork with relish. ‘How much am I looking forward
to this?’

Kevin never got a chance to answer that. The next minute
there was an almighty crash as a brick came flying through the window, smashing its way into the sink and sending shards of glass across the room.

‘What the—?’ Steve leapt to his feet, outraged. A hammering started at the front door. Along with the freezing cold blast of air from the ruined window came the noise of angry shouting.

‘Right, you, Smith! Ya sneaky English cunt! Your tea is oot!’

Kevin flew under the table, curled himself up into a little ball.

Steve made for the front door, flung it open and stared into the mad eyes of the rat-faced keyboard player from Mood Violet. For a second both of them regarded each other with some shock, the other not being who they had expected to see.

Then Robin started up again.
‘Where is he? Where is your lover boy? You hidin’ him in there or what?’ He tried to look past Steve into the house. ‘Hoy, Smith! I’ve come fer you. And wha’s mine…’

‘What the fuck are you talking about?’ Steve spluttered. ‘You’ve just put a bastard brick through my kitchen window!’

‘Get oot ma way,’ Robin tried to push past him, but Steve’s frame filled the door.

‘You’re not listening to me!’
Steve roared and grabbed hold of the lapels of the Scotsman’s coat, pushed him away from the front door and up against the outside wall. It took all of his might to do it. Robin may have been a foot shorter and three stone lighter but he was possessed with the superhuman strength of the insane.

‘What the fuck are you doing here?’ Steve demanded, pushing his fists further into the bony shoulders,
forcing Robin up against the brickwork, pinioning him there so he couldn’t move his arms.

Robin’s eyeball’s bulged. ‘Get off! Get off!’ he screamed, writhing in Steve’s grip like a sack of ferrets, twisting his head from left to right, trying to find the space to headbutt his opponent. Up close his pitted face and saucer eyes were the picture of dementia. He looked disgusting.

‘Are you gonna
tell me or what?’ Steve bellowed.

‘Vincent Smith!’ Robin said and spat a huge wad of green right into Steve’s face. ‘He’s got mah girrul!’

‘Ugh, you cunt!’ Steve brought his knee up sharply, as hard as he could, into Robin’s groin. The shriek that emitted was enough to wake the dead, but at that end of Ladbroke Grove, no one cared to put their heads out of the window to see what was going on.

Steve let him drop, writhing to the ground, got in another kick to his kidneys.

‘Whass happening, man?’ Lynton was suddenly beside him on the doorstep, his forehead creased, holding onto the side of his face. Panting, Steve opened his mouth to answer.

‘Oh no,’ Lynton said first. ‘Not that fucking bitch from Hell…’

Steve wheeled round. Rocking and swaying on the pavement across the road, her
arms drawn tightly around her chest, was Donna. Or perhaps more accurately, the remains of Donna.

She appeared to be wearing nothing but a satin nightdress with a mohair jumper over the top, hardly enough to keep out the bitter cold. Her legs were bare and scratched to fuck and she wobbled on the concrete in a pair of stilettos. But the most shocking thing about her was her hair. The beautiful
black mane she’d been so proud of now looked like the wings of a half-plucked cockerel. Huge clumps of it had been pulled out from the side and the crown of her head.

She looked at them staring at her and started to laugh – a high-pitched, hysterical noise, hideous to behold.

‘Oh, Jesus Christ and Mother of God.’ Steve’s mind spun back to what he had seen going on in Tony Stevens’s garden.

‘Get back inside,’ he told Lynton. ‘Keep the door fucking locked until I come back in.’

Lynton backed off slowly, his eyes round with horror. He slammed the door shut.

Robin was still rolling on the ground making gurgling noises. Steve kicked him one more time for luck then ran across the road.

Donna stopped laughing as he approached. She cocked her head to one side and looked at him as if she
was trying to place him.

‘What the fuck’s happening, Donna?’ Steve said, not knowing whether to reach out for her or not. She looked totally destroyed but he had already seen what she’d done to Lynton. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘We’ve come for Vince,’ she said, in the voice of a child. ‘Vince and Sylvana. They are here, aren’t they?’

‘What are you talking about? What’s that mad cunt doing
throwing bricks through my window?’

Donna put her hand over her mouth and snorted. ‘Oooh. That was a bit naughty, wasn’t it? But Vince deserved it, you see. He’s done a very bad thing to both of us.’

She smiled a smile that was as deranged as the face of the Scotsman, her eyes unfocussed, pupils like black holes. Dried, congealed blood stuck to the tufts of hair on the side of her head. Only
one night ago, Steve had been trying to get her into bed. Now it looked like she was more fit for Bedlam. What the bloody hell had Stevens done to her?

Instinctively, he reached to touch her. ‘Get off!’ she shot away from his grasp. She wobbled around for another few seconds, then kicked off her shoes and started running back down Ladbroke Grove. ‘I don’t know you!’ she shrieked as she ran. ‘Get
away from me!’

‘Donna!’ Steve’s mind was now totally in turmoil. ‘Come back! I’m not gonna hurt you! Let me help you, please…’ He started to run after her, but he was so done in from the exertions of subduing Robin on top of the night before that he only managed a couple of yards before he fell back, exhausted.

He couldn’t bring her inside, what was he thinking of? Lynton would do his pieces.

He put his hands on his knees and tried to get his breath
back, tried to clear his head. Glanced back over the road. Robin had managed to get to his feet and was shuffling away in the other direction, listing like a drunkard, catching hold of lampposts to steady his journey. Still Steve had no idea what was going on. Perhaps he was having a nightmare. Perhaps he’d wake up soon.

A police siren
cut through such fanciful thoughts. The blue light flashed past him, the headlights momentarily illuminating Donna, who was still running, running over the railway bridge, running like she was fleeing the hounds of Hell. Fuck knows where she was going to. But a run-in with the boys in blue was the last thing Steve needed now. He turned and went back to the house.

‘Well?’ Tony demanded. ‘Where
is he?’

The desperation in the other man’s eyes made Steve feel sick to his stomach. No, Stevens was far from being a strong man. He was a weak, bullying ponce. Steve had seen the truth of him all right. So he decided to string his answer out.

‘One of his druggie mates dropped by the house. I was out at time so I couldn’t tell you who, but he gave Lynton a number to call. Lucky Lynton was in,
really. Kevin’s been hiding under the bed since the mad Jock smashed our window; he won’t open the door to no one. And I think he’s got a point, don’t you? I don’t really think it’s safe for us to stay in that house much longer. ‘Cos it comes to something when you can’t call police to come and take away the lunatic that’s threatening to kill you on your own doorstep ‘cos if you do, you’re gonna
get evicted. And I’ve boarded up that window for now, but it sort of draws attention to us, don’t you think? That and the nonstop circus outside.’

Tony nodded hastily as Steve spoke, crushing his cigarette out in the ashtray and immediately lighting another.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ he said impatiently. ‘I’ll sort out somewhere else for you soon as I can. By the end of next week, I promise.’

‘I’m sure
you have your contacts,’ Steve said.

‘Yeah.’ Tony’s voice turned slightly menacing. ‘As you have yours, Stephen. Now tell me what’s happened to Vince.’

The two men eyeballed each other for a tense moment, cigarette smoke hanging on the air between them.

‘I don’t like being called Stephen,’ said Steve. ‘It reminds me of my Da. Come to think of it, so do you.’

A muscle jerked underneath Tony’s
left eyeball. Rage blazed in his eyes. But he managed to keep his voice level when he eventually spoke. ‘I apologise, Steve.’ He extinguished his current cigarette more slowly and deliberately than the last one. ‘Now please, just tell me. Where is Vince?’

‘Paris,’ said Steve, leaning back in his seat to regard the effect this bombshell would have. ‘The Flying Scotsman was right. He has run off
with that lass from Mood Violet. He needed someone to go and get her passport for her…so they could elope.’

Tony’s eyes closed and he leaned forwards, putting his head in his hands. It seemed to Steve that he shrunk before his eyes, his shoulders sagging and his chest caving in.