‘Well, how is this trial any good for her, eh? I think she should go back to school and do her exams. She’ll feel better if she does that, and then she’ll be able to get a job and forget all this. But no, when I suggest it she shakes her head and carries on sitting on that damn sofa.’ She reached for the coffee, took a swig, then put it straight down again as if it tasted disgusting. ‘Tell me how I’m supposed to handle it, Mikey. Tell me what I’m supposed to do.’
‘You have to keep being her mum, that’s all. Helping her and stuff.’
She put her head in her hands. ‘It goes on for ever though. I had no idea.’
He wasn’t sure if she meant the court case or looking after kids in general.
‘We’ve got social services breathing down our necks,’ she said. ‘They even had the cheek to offer me a parenting course – shoving leaflets and phone numbers at me.’
He knew he had to get out of there. ‘Jacko’s downstairs waiting,’ he said. ‘I have to go now.’
She looked up at him. ‘Are you getting Holly?’
‘No, I’m going to work. You’re getting her, remember?’
‘Can you do it?’
‘I’ve got a late shift. I swapped it so I could go to court.’
‘They were supposed to sort out an after-school club. They can’t even do the simplest things.’ She stood up and went to the window. ‘I can’t drink that coffee, by the way.’ Her voice had changed, hard somehow. ‘I need something in it. I want you to tell me where my bottle is.’
‘No, Mum.’
Her mouth was a thin line as she twisted from the window. ‘Don’t look at me like that, Mikey. In case you’ve forgotten, I am actually your mother and this is my roof you live under, so can you go and get it, please?’
‘Mum, don’t do this.’
She glared at him. ‘I don’t have to see where you’ve hidden it. Put a splash in the coffee and hide it away again.’
He wished he had a brother. Even an older sister would be nice. Hundreds of sisters in fact, all older than him. They could take it in turns.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘Just one splash. A really small one.’
She looked so grateful, like some kind of desperate ghost, as he went to fetch the bottle from his room.
Twenty-nine
After saying goodbye to Karyn at the door, they walked in silence down the stairs and across the courtyard. The main gate was shut so they had to climb it. Jacko swung over easily in one clean move.
‘Prat,’ Mikey said, to even things up.
Jacko grinned, licked a finger and held it out, like he’d scored a point.
Everything was making Mikey angry – Karyn and Jacko hooting with laughter about something while he was upstairs wrestling the sherry bottle back from Mum; the fact that they were going to be late for work and he’d be blamed, because Jacko had a perfect track record, so how could it be his fault? Even the air, hot and dry and full of food smells, was pissing him off. He hadn’t eaten anything all day. He’d wanted to get to the pub and have something before his shift started and now there wasn’t time. Everything felt wrong.
‘So,’ Jacko said as they got in the car, ‘Karyn’s on form. I’d forgotten how funny she is.’
‘Yeah, she’s hilarious.’
Jacko frowned as he turned the key in the ignition. ‘You want to tell me what the matter is?’
‘Definitely not.’
‘Come on, Mikey, what’s wrong?’
‘Nothing.’
They pulled away from the estate, past the newsagent’s, the laundrette. A man was standing outside with a plastic cup of something. He didn’t have a shirt on.
Jacko pointed at him. ‘Bet he’s put it in the washer.’
Mikey didn’t think it was funny at all.
‘Why did you say you’d take Karyn out for a drive?’ he said.
‘Why not?’
‘You fancy her?’
‘I was making her feel good.’
‘By coming on to her? Give me a break.’ Mikey shook his head, as if that was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard. He knew he was being a bastard, but he couldn’t stop.
Jacko said, ‘You need to look after her, that’s all I’m saying.’
‘You don’t have to help, Jacko. Really, no one’s asking you to.’
Jacko’s face clouded over. They drove past the post office, past Lidl, towards the edge of town. ‘Listen, man,’ he said, ‘I’m only telling you this because I’ve known your family for ever and I care about you. Ellie Parker’s got nice tits and no one’s popped her cherry, but she’s sending you right off track.’
‘We weren’t even talking about her, we were talking about Karyn.’
‘Same thing.’ Jacko eyed him steadily. ‘You’ve got to stop sniffing round that girl. I saw the way you looked at her in court. You’re losing it.’
‘I’m not losing anything. She was part of the revenge plan, that’s all.’
‘You keep telling yourself that.’
‘I will, because it’s true.’
Mikey wound his window down and stuck his elbow out, furious with Jacko. He was jealous. It was simple. Ellie was a cut above and Jacko wouldn’t stand a chance with her.
They drove in silence for a bit, past fields of pigs standing around in their own crap, past a farmhouse with a table outside, selling pots of jam and new potatoes. Mikey dug about in his pocket for his tobacco and made himself a rollie. He didn’t offer Jacko one. He didn’t seem to notice though, was humming along to some rubbish on the radio.
They were near the coast now. It was a long straight road. They passed a row of cottages with rabbits for sale, firewood, horse manure.
Mikey felt his chest clear as they got closer to the sea. The sky was cloudless. Blinding. He began to calm down.
He waggled the tobacco at Jacko. ‘You want me to make you one?’
‘Thanks.’
He made it nice and thick. He even lit it for him, which was a sign of something brotherly.
‘Maybe we should be lifeguards,’ Jacko said as he took the cigarette. ‘We always wanted to do that, remember?’
It was true, they’d always fancied it when they were kids. The lifeguards had a hut on the beach and a blackboard that said, YOUR LIFEGUARD TODAY IS… and then the names. They always had cool names – Troy, Guy, Kurt. They had regulation red shirts and they sat around looking at girls and occasionally moving flags and yelling at kids to get off the rocks. The tide came in from two directions, so the job did have some responsibility, and there was always something to look at – the skiboarders, the surfers. Sometimes a yacht would sail by, or three RAF planes would zip ridiculously fast along the horizon, followed seconds later by their sound.
‘What do you reckon, Mikey? We’ll get jobs as lifeguards if the cooking doesn’t work out?’
‘We could do that,’ Mikey agreed.
Jacko inhaled a chestful of smoke and blew it out. ‘You and me, man.’
Round the corner they swung a left, and there, sitting on the grass verge, were a couple of girls – map in hand, rucksacks, walking boots, the whole thing.
‘Hey,’ Jacko said as they drove past. ‘Let’s give them a lift.’
‘Let’s not, they look religious.’
Jacko laughed, put the car in reverse and roared back. He pulled in to the verge and leaned across Mikey to the window. One of the girls looked up, then the other.
