Playing With Fire

early twenties had turned him around.

They’d done a fair day’s work when Lenny pulled his rusty old Nissan up outside the terraced house on the estate’s central artery. Street parking wasn’t especially safe in the area, but everyone knew Lenny’s car, and no one dared touch it. Lenny probably thought that was because everyone was scared of him, but Mark thought it more likely because the car was a piece of crap no respectable thief would waste a second glance on. Mark looked around warily as he got out of the car, and it wasn’t because of what Banks had warned him about. He had bad memories of the East Side Estate, and even though he didn’t think Crazy Nick was around anymore, it still paid to be careful. He knew that Nick would kill him if he found him. That was why the boat had been safe. Nick would never think to look anywhere rural like that; if anything, he had even less upstairs than Mark himself.

Mark followed Lenny inside and saw Sal’s look of surprise when he entered. She welcomed her husband with a perfunctory kiss on the cheek and disappeared into the kitchen to make tea. A black cat with half its left ear missing rubbed up against Mark’s leg, then slunk off upstairs.

“Make yourself at home,” Lenny said, pointing to a threadbare armchair.

“Are you sure it’s all right?” Mark asked. “I don’t want to be a bother.”

“Oh, don’t worry about Sal,” he said. “She’ll come around. She always does.”

Mark had seen the expression on Sal’s face, and he wasn’t too certain about that.

Lenny offered Mark a cigarette. “We’ll have a cuppa first,” he said, “just to wash the dust out, then I’ll go get us all some fish and chips and a few cans of lager. Okay?”

Mark reached in his pocket. “I’ve got some money…”

Lenny waved it away. “Don’t be daft. My treat.”

“But-”

“No arguments. You can buy us pizza on payday, all right?”

“Okay.”

Lenny tuned the television set to a snooker game and settled back in his chair. The house smelled faintly of burned bacon and cat’s piss. Mark couldn’t concentrate on the game; he’d never been a big snooker fan, anyway. He couldn’t stop thinking of Tina, couldn’t quite get his head around the fact that she was dead, gone, kaput, and that they’d never again be able to snuggle up to each other against the winter chill in their sleeping bag. His home was gone, too. It might not have been much, but it had meant a lot to them. It was their very own place, an escape from the miserable squat in Leeds, and they’d added a little personal touch here and there – a nice candlestick, a Primus stove to boil water and cook tinned foods on, a framed photo of the two of them on the wall, a mini CD player and a few of their favorite CDs: Beth Orton, David Bowie, Coldplay, System of a Down, Radiohead, Ben Harper.

Tears pricked Mark’s eyes. He couldn’t cry, not in front of Lenny, but he felt like it. What would he do now, without Tina to look after? What was the point of it all? Until he’d met her, his life had been nothing but an aimless mess, and that’s what it would turn into again. He knew people had looked at the way they lived and judged them, but he didn’t care what people thought. One day he and Tina were going to get it all together: home, kids, the lot. Let them laugh. But now… And it was all his fault.

The snooker game droned on. Sal poked her head around the door and said, “Tea’s ready. Can I talk to you a minute, Len?”

Len pulled a long-suffering face for Mark’s benefit, as if to say, Women! Then he dragged himself away from the TV set and went into the kitchen.

When Mark thought of Tina’s stepdad, he felt the voiceless anger boil in him until his hands shook. He had no doubt that Aspern was responsible for Tina’s drug addiction. She had told him that she started doing morphine to dull the pain and humiliation of his sexual advances, and when Aspern caught her at it one day, he started using the drugs as a reward for sexual favors. He’d already given her sedatives before, to make her easier to handle. And he was supposed to be a doctor. The mother knew more than she let on, but she was scared shitless of Aspern, Tina had told him. A mouse. If he so much as raised his voice at her, her lower lip would start to tremble and she’d run away in tears. Tina had nobody to stand up for her. Nobody but Mark. But now it didn’t matter anyway.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he heard Sal saying in the kitchen. “Bringing him here. The kid’s just come out of jail, for Christ’s sake. It’s been all over the news. I knew it was him when I first heard about that fire.”

“I’ve been in jail myself, love,” Lenny said, “but it doesn’t make me a criminal.”

“That’s different. That was years ago. We can’t be responsible for him.”

“Have a heart. The poor kid’s just lost his girlfriend and his home.”

“Home! A clapped-out boat. Lenny, what’s got into you? You’re not usually such a soft touch.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, no doubt he’s spun you a sob story of some sort. Got you thinking he’s the son you never had-”

“Now, wait a minute!”

“No! You wait a minute. You bring him here without asking, without even ringing first to let me know, and you expect me to cook for him, clean up after him? What do you think I am, Lenny, a skivvy? Is that all I am to you? A bloody skivvy?”

“Come on, love.”

“Don’t you ‘love’ me.”

“Sal…”

“Have you thought for just one moment, has it even crossed that tiny little brain of yours, that he might have been the one who set the fire? Have you thought of that?”

“For crying out loud, Sal, Mark wouldn’t do anything like that. Besides, the police let him go.”

“The police are always letting murderers go. Just because they don’t have enough evidence. But it doesn’t mean they don’t know someone did it.”

“Oh, come on. He’s a good kid.”

“Good kid! You won’t be saying that when the bloody house is burning down around you, will you!”

“Sal, I’m not-”

But Mark didn’t hear any more. Tears finally blurring his vision and anger seething inside him, he snatched up his overcoat and dashed out of the door. He was halfway down the street before he heard Lenny shouting after him, but he ignored the calls and ran on, under the railway bridge, away from the town.

The Angel was reputed to have the finest chef east of the Pennines, and he was even rumored to have something of a flair for vegetarian dishes. Thoughtful of Phil to take that into account. Annie had dressed accordingly, toning down her sartorial flamboyance a bit with her little black number in deference to Phil’s decidedly more conservative-but-casual look. She hadn’t worn the frock in ages and felt a bit self-conscious in it. She was pleased to find that it still fitted. The last time she wore it, she remembered, was on one of her dinner dates with Banks. And that reminded her: something he’d said in their brief meeting a short while earlier had rung a bell somewhere, and she wanted to ask Phil about it.

She had also done the best she could to hide her red nose with cunningly applied makeup and had taken Nurofen so she didn’t have to reach for her hankie all evening, although she could still feel that irritating tickle at the back of her throat. From experience, she knew that it responded best to red wine, but they were driving to the restaurant separately and she would have to take it easy on the alcohol. Before she left, she made sure she had her beeper and mobile, though she hoped to hell she wouldn’t have to use either.

Phil was already waiting at the bar, a half pint in front of him, and he waved her over. “They’re just preparing the table,” he said. “Won’t be a minute. Drink?”

“Mmm, I think I’ll just have a grapefruit juice for now, thanks.” That way, Annie thought, she’d be able to have a couple of glasses of wine with dinner.

Phil ordered the drinks without comment. That was one of the things she liked about him. He never questioned you or made a snarky comment the way some people did when you didn’t order real booze, or if you happened to be a vegetarian. All he’d asked her the first time they went out to dinner was whether her reasons for not eating meat were humanitarian or health. A bit of both, she had replied.

“Busy day?” he said.

Annie nodded. “The boat fire. You must have heard about it by now.”

“Yes, of course. Any leads yet, or shouldn’t I ask?”