Dark Blood

makes sure he’s standing right under the streetlight, gotta be keen to be seen. Eighteen. Nineteen. Time is money, yeah, but money’s no’ time, is it: otherwise all them rich cunts would buy more of it and never have to die.

Fucking profound that is.

Sparks twitches, jitters, keeping time to the beat no one else can hear. OK, so he likes a wee smoke every now and then, the odd pipe, a wee syringe or two, but who doesn’t? No’ his fault, is it? Nah, Mum was an alky, wasn’t she? And Dad was a junkie. That’s genetics. Gee-net-tick. Tock. Ticktock. Tick-tock.

Stand still you daft bastard and concentrate.

Force the twitches to stop. Stand dead-still under the streetlight.

A car goes past. A seagull screeches.

More silence.

Fucking cold when you’re standing still.

The car does a three-pointer at the end of the road, then heads back towards him. Big black fucker. Headlights for eyes. Staring. Making all them snowflakes shine.

Sparks’s knee twitches.

The big car stops by the kerb right in front of him and the window slides down. Woman looks out: blonde, no’ bad looking. If Sparks wasn’t spoken for, he’d probably do her, you know? But his girlfriend’s a jealous bitch…

Blondie says, ‘Looking for someone.’ Sounds posh, doesn’t she: like something off the telly. English. Nothing wrong with that, long as she’s got the cash.

‘Yeah? Who?’ Sparks tells his knee to stand the fuck still, but it’s off on its own, taking no prisoners.

‘Charlie about?’

‘Might be. Who’s asking?’

She reaches into her jacket pocket and pulls out a couple of notes. Holds them up and peers at them. ‘Charles Darwin and…Sir Edward Elgar.’

Sparks curls his top lip. ‘Fuck’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Thirty quid.’

Nod. Yeah, that’s more like it. He does a quick calculation in his head, totting up the number of wrappers and the change from thirty. Always shite at arithmetic at school, you know? Much better now, yeah, like Carol Fucking Vorderman with the old arithmetic, fractions, and shite like that. Teachers want to make kids better at maths? Learn them how to do a decent drug deal: Wee Jonnie has a sixth of an ounce, and Sarah wants an eighth – how stoned will she be, and how much change does she get from twenty and a handjob?

Blondie’s looking at him like he’s supposed to know the answer to some fucking question he wasn’t even listing to.

Sparks spits a chunky lump of yellow into the snow at his feet. ‘Thirty gets you two.’

Not really: thirty gets you three, it’ll be two for Blondie and one for Sparks. Market economy. Thatcher and Blair’s fuck-you Britain.

The door cracks open and Blondie steps out into the snow. Holds up Elgar and Darwin. ‘How do I know it’s any good?’

He sniffs, spits again. ‘Calling us a lying cunt?’

Blondie looks back over her shoulder. ‘Am I calling him a lying cunt?’

Car’s back door opens and fucking Elvis steps out. ‘Looks like a lying cunt to me.’ Elvis with a Geordie accent. Wye-aye man, am all shook oop, like. Big bastard though.

Sparks takes a step back, but Blondie’s already there. Right behind him. Bump.

He gives a wee squeal, flinching like a spaz. Calm the fuck down and take charge. Sparks clears his throat, turns round and gives her the evil. Asserts his authority. ‘Thirty gets you two.’

Blondie nods, reaches into her pocket and comes out with a pair of leather gloves. Doesn’t want to touch the merchandise, doesn’t want to get her English bitch hands dirty.

While she’s doing it, Sparks sneaks a good hard stare at her tits. Not bad.

Elvis taps him on the shoulder, but Sparks ignores him, keeps his eyes on the perky prize. Licks his lips. Thinks about his girlfriend snaking her way through his bloodstream, bringing the good times with her.

Something hard bumps into his back, just above the waist of his trousers. And then the pain, stabbing out from his right kidney. Waves of jagged ice, throbbing fire. ‘Fuck…’ Knees give way. But a thick arm whips round his throat, squeezing.

Sparks’s dirty fingernails scrabble at the leather sleeve.

Blondie draws back her fist and slams it into his belly.

Breath splutters out of Sparks’s mouth. Then she does it again.

His stomach muscles scream. It’s like being sick a thousand times, all in one go.

Sparks tries to say something. Threat. Plead. Prayer. Doesn’t matter, something. His feet skitter on the slippery pavement, then Elvis’s arm loosens off and Sparks drags in a broken-glass breath.

‘Ayafucker…’

Blondie pats him on the cheek. ‘Who’d you get your stuff from, Sweaty?’