Foster pulled him back into his arms, burying the man’s head inside his velvet tux.
Behind us on the steps to the door, Mrs Foster and a few guests stood shivering.
“What’s going on, love?” she said, her teeth and glass chat tering.
“Nothing. Everyone go back and have a good time.”
They all stood there on the steps, frozen.
“Go on. It’s bloody Christmas!” shouted Foster, Santa rucking Claus himself.
“Who wants to dance with me?” laughed Pat Foster, shaking her skinny tits and turning everyone back inside.
Shaw stood there, sobbing into Foster’s black velvet jacket.
Foster whispering, “This isn’t the time, Bill.”
“What about him?” said the man in the claret shirt.
“Just get him out of here.”
The other man in the red shirt took my elbow and started to lead me down the drive.
Foster didn’t look up, whispering into Shaw’s ear, “This is special, special for John.”
We walked past them, down the drive.
“You drive here did you?”
“Yeah.”
“Pass us your keys,” said Claret.
I did as I was told.
“That yours?” said Red pointing at the Viva, up on the pavement.
“Yeah.”
The men smiled at each other.
Claret opened the passenger door and lifted up the seat. “Get in the back.”
I got in the back with Red.
Claret got in behind the wheel and started the engine. “Where to?”
“New houses.”
I was sat in the back wondering why I hadn’t even bothered to try and get away, thinking maybe it wouldn’t be as bad as all that and how it couldn’t be any worse than the beating I’d taken at the Nursing Home, when Red hit me so fucking hard my head cracked the plastic side window.
“Shut the bloody fuck up,” he laughed, grabbing me by the hair and forcing my head down between my knees.
“If he were a nig-nog, he’d make you suck his cock,” shouted Claret from the front.
“Let’s have some fucking music,” said Red, still holding my head down.
“Turn it up,” shouted Red, lifting me back up by the hair, whispering, “Fucking puff.”
“Is he bleeding?” shouted Claret over the music.
“Not enough.”
He pushed me back towards the window, gripped me by the throat with his left hand, sat back a little way and rabbit-punched me on the bridge of my nose, sending hot blood across the car.
“That’s better,” he said and gently laid my head against the cracked glass.
I looked out at the centre of Wakefield on the Saturday before Christmas, 1974, the warm blood trickling from my nose to my lips and down on to my chin, thinking it’s quiet for a Saturday night.
“Is he out?” said Claret.
“Yep,” said Red.
Bowie gave way to Lulu or Ferula or Sandy or Cilia,
“Here?”
“Why not.”
The car stopped, the Little Drummer Boy gone.
Claret got out and held up the driver’s seat as Red tipped me out on to the ground.
“He’s fucking gone, Mick.”
“Aye. Sorry, like.”
I lay face down between them, playing dead.
“What we supposed to do? Just leave him?”
“Fuck no.”
“What then?”
“Have some fun.”
“Not tonight Mick, I can’t be arsed with it.”
“Just a bit, eh?”
They took an arm each and dragged me across the ground, bringing my trousers down to my knees.
“In here?”
“Aye.”
They pulled me through the tarpaulin and across the wooden floor of a half-built house, splinters and nails ripping through my knees.
They sat me on a chair and bound my hands behind my back, pulling off my trousers over my shoes.
“Go bring car over here and put lights on.”
“Someone’ll see us.”
“Like who?”
I heard one of them go out and the other one come in close. He put his hand down inside my underpants.
“I hear you like a bit of cunt,” Red said, squeezing my balls.
I heard the engine of the car and the room was suddenly filled with white light and
“Let’s get it over with,” said Claret.
“Joe Bugner!” said a punch to the gut.
“Coon Conteh!” said another.
“George fucking Foreman,” said one across the jaw.
“The Ali Shuffle,” a pause, me waiting, then one from the left, one from the right.
“Bruce fucking Lee!”
I went flying back on the chair on to the ground, my chest fucked.
“Fucking puff,” said Claret, bending down and spitting into my face.
“We should fucking bury the cunt.”
Claret was laughing, “Best not mess with George’s foun dations.”
“I hate these fucking brainy bastards.”
“Leave him. Let’s go.”
“That it?”
“Fuck it, let’s just get back.”
“Take his car?”
“Get a taxi on Westgate.”
“Fucking hell.”
A kick in the back of the head. A foot upon my right hand. Lights out.
The cold woke me.
Everything was pitch-black with purple borders.
I kicked the chair away and pulled my hands out of the binding.
I sat up in my underpants on the wooden floor, my head loose, my body raw.
I reached across the floor and pulled my trousers to me. They were wet and stank of another man’s piss.
I put them on over my shoes.
