He could just storm out in a huff, but it would only makethings worse later. He would try and smooth things over and then try and thinkup an excuse for going out later.
“Sorry, my love,” he said, in what he hoped would be acalming tone. “What’s for tea?”
“I’m doing a stir-fry,” she said grumpily. “It’ll be readyin about half an hour.”
“I’ll go and have a shower then,” he said. “Where are theboys?”
“Upstairs in their room, I think. They said they had homework,but knowing them they will be playing on that bloody console again.”
Kent headed up the stairs and looked in on the boys. As Debshad correctly surmised they were engrossed in some sort of football game,judging by the roar of the crowd coming from the TV.
“Hey, boys, how’s it going?” asked Kent.
The shrill sound of a referee’s whistle came from thescreen, along with a roar of disapproval from the crowd.
“Oh, you dirty bastard,” exclaimed Jack, his eldest, justturned sixteen. “That’s got to be a penalty.”
“Bollocks, you dived,” replied the fourteen-year-old Luke.
Neither had even bothered to acknowledge Kent’s presence.Was he now invisible and inaudible as well as going mad?
“Language, boys,” he added, raising his voice in an attemptto be heard over the deafening roar from the crowd. He didn’t like hearing his offspringswear, despite this being mild compared to some of the colourful language Kent usedin the pub.
“Hi, Dad,” said Jack.
“Sorry, Dad,” added Luke.
Neither had even bothered to look up. There was a howl ofanger from the crowd and Kent was sure he heard someone shout out somethingabout the referee being a wanker. These games were getting very realistic thesedays. It reminded him of his days in the Met when he had been put on policingduty at a few Millwall home games. They hadn’t been occasions for the faint-hearted.
“YES!” shouted Jack. “It is a penalty.”
And that was as far as their acknowledgement of his presencewent. With a sigh, he walked along the landing towards the bathroom, ready forhis hot shower.
“Hahaha, loser!” he heard Jack shout amid a massive cheer.He had clearly scored the penalty. The cry of loser hit home. He may as wellhave been shouting it at his dad, the way Kent was feeling right now.
He was going to have it out with that angel the next day.How dare he play games with him like this? Before that, he had some serious drowningof his sorrows to do in the pub. And if Debs didn’t like it, she’d have to putup with it. She couldn’t expect him to stay in the house all the time now justbecause he hadn’t got a job.
After much grumbling from Debs, who hadn’t thought much of hislame explanation that he needed to ‘get back out there and make contacts’, hefound himself in the nice comforting atmosphere of Tuesday night in The Red Lion.
He liked Tuesdays. There was no noisy disco and no hordes ofyoung people to annoy him. It was the quietest night in the pub and there wasnever a problem getting a stool at the bar alongside the pub’s regular drunks.
He enjoyed the banter that went on between him and the localsbut had never felt fully comfortable with the situation. Although it was rarelymentioned, the fact that he was a policeman was never forgotten. The otherswere just that little bit too guarded around him for his liking and he knew theywere careful what they said.
The exception was Andy Green, one of the town’s biggestalcoholics, who was in The Red Lion every night. He never missed an opportunityto have a dig at Kent but it never got out of hand. Andy could be a pain in thearse, admittedly, but he knew what the limits were and didn’t cross them.
Kent was pretty tolerant of Andy as he found a lot of hisantics amusing, plus it was always handy to have someone around with a drink problemfar worse than his own. It made his level of drinking acceptable by comparison.
Maybe now Kent wasn’t in the police anymore they would be a littlemore accepting of him. It wasn’t like he could arrest them for anything anymore,was it? He would find out tonight. How would they react when he broke the newsthat he was no longer the local D.I.?
Kent was relieved to reach the pub just as it looked like theheavens were about to open again. He pulled open the large, wooden door andstrode inside. He made his way across the large stone flagstones that formedthe flooring of the front part of the pub and headed for the bar.
The Red Lion was a very old pub – 17th-century, so he hadbeen told. The original wooden beams across the ceiling were testimony to that.Kent wasn’t particularly tall, only about five foot nine, but even he hadbashed his head on them on occasion. He had complained to the landlord, Craig,about it once but he had just claimed that it wasn’t his fault because people hadbeen much shorter in the old days.
He could see that the place was quiet, even for a Tuesday. Helooked around, taking in the scene. There couldn’t have been more than about halfa dozen people in there. Apart from a couple of young lads playing pool and a teenagegirl in an outrageously short skirt, there were just a few regulars at the bar.They were all familiar faces, the usual suspects as he liked to call them.
Andy was there, of course, in his usual attire of ancient bluedenim jacket and matching jeans. Kent noticed that his rapidly thinning hairlooked even more greasy and unkempt than usual. He didn’t look as if he’dwashed for days either. He knew Andy had lost his job a few months ago and itseemed he had really let himself go since then. Was this what happened afterredundancy? Did people just give up?
Nobby the Professor, the pub’s self-proclaimed bettingexpert, was also there, complete with the Racing Post on the bar. Adapper, well-dressed man with an immaculately groomed beard, he was deep inconversation with Craig about the
