And Blue Skies From Pain (21 page)

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Authors: Stina Leicht

BOOK: And Blue Skies From Pain
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“Are you sure of him?” the driver asked.
Frankie nodded. “That I am.”
“All right,” the driver said. “Davy, get over.”
Cigarette smoke perfumed with stale whiskey and beer huffed out from the car’s interior as the front seat flopped forward yet again, this time to make room for Liam. The poor bald bastard in the front passenger seat muttered a half-hearted protest about being flattened. Settling into the back seat with a queasy knot forming in the pit of his stomach, Liam waited for a sign of what was to come. He nodded a greeting at the dark stocky man in the black wool hat sitting next to the window. He looked to be in his mid-twenties in spite of the heavy moustache that met with the thick sideburns on the sides of his sullen face. Thick wavy hair brushed the shoulders of his coat.
Frankie shoved in the laundry bag. It slammed Liam in the cheek, and he abandoned the conversation—or the worry over the lack of it—for the moment and worked to keep the heavy bundle from wrecking one and all. Once the bag was positioned to allow Frankie room, Frankie climbed in. Liam tried to shove the bag down onto his feet, but there wasn’t space. Seeing his struggles, Frankie grabbed it and pulled the thing onto their laps. The door slammed, and the driver waited just long enough for the passenger seat to thump upright before taking off. The balding, lumpy man in the front passenger seat rolled up his window. The driver flipped a switch, and the Cortina’s heater got serious.
Liam frowned. “Is something burning?”
“Ah. That’d be the heater,” the driver said. “My youngest dropped something down inside the vent. Bit of food. Can’t clean the fucking shite out.”
“Oh.”
I’m smelling Fallen everywhere now?
Liam thought.
“Where were you headed, Liam?” Frankie asked. His voice was quiet and measured. It barely rose above the strains of The Eagles’s lead guitar.
“The Falls Road,” Liam said. The car’s heater combined with the lack of wind gusts began to loosen the tension in his muscles. His teeth slowed their clattering, but the shivering didn’t.
“Ah, good. We were off to Davy’s place in the New Lodge first and then the Falls,” Frankie said. His wholesome face seemed utterly devoid of subterfuge. “I’m forgetting myself. Introductions. This here is Davy.” He motioned to the sullen man with the moustache.
Davy continued his staring for four heartbeats. It was the longest anyone had held his gaze since Liam could remember. Davy’s hard brown eyes revealed nothing of what he saw. Then he sniffed as if smelling something he didn’t much care for, nodded, and turned to look out the fogging window.
“And up front, that’s Michael,” Frankie said.
Michael waved—an expression of drunken satisfaction on his chubby face now that he was no longer being flattened.
“And our driver there is Lucas,” Frankie said.
Lucas transferred the cigarette he was holding to his mouth and then lifted the fingers of one hand off the steering wheel by way of a greeting. Liam had a view of curly brown hair, a partial profile with a strong chin, and the gray wool scarf covering the back of the man’s neck.
“This here’s my mate Liam. We were in Malone together,” Frankie said. “Was Best Man at his wedding. I haven’t seen him in… fuck… When was the last time I saw you?”
Liam swallowed. The juxtaposition between unease and relief from the freezing weather threw stark shadows in his mind.
How much does Frankie know?
“Was a few months after the wedding. You helped shift boxes from my father-in-law’s car.” It hadn’t been easy getting the containers of Mary Kate’s Uni books up three flights of stairs. He’d been grateful of Frankie’s assistance. However, Mary Kate hadn’t cared for Frankie, and if Liam were honest there’d been good reason at the time. Soon Frankie had stopped ringing, and life had quickly moved them in different directions. “We met a few times at the pub.”
“Oh, aye. I remember now. You left early. A lovely bird took quite the shining to you. What was her name? Marie? That’s it. Marie. A redhead too. You weren’t having any of it, and I had to smooth things over as I recall. Proper and married, you were. Although, it wouldn’t have mattered much to her.”
“It did to me.”
“Never did understand why Mary Kate went in for the likes of you. She’s—she was quite the ride.” The familiar easy smile on Frankie’s face vanished and was replaced with genuine concern and sorrow. “Heard about what happened. Terrible thing, that. Rang soon as I heard, but your ma said you’d gone home to Derry after the funeral.” The sympathy was raw in his voice.
Liam blinked. The weight of old grief was worsened by the fact that the Frankie Donovan Liam had known had been anything but serious. A mixture of warmth and gratitude knotted in his throat. No matter what, Frankie had been a good friend.
And if you were a real friend in turn, you’d leave now. People die around you
—
even the ones you don’t kill.
The thought cut deep enough to make him wince. He swallowed the now painful lump.
“Are you just back, then?” Frankie asked.
Unsure of how much he should say, Liam nodded. “Oh, aye. Was staying with friends until I found a place.”
“And where is this new place of yours?” Davy asked. His eyes narrowed.
Liam froze, but before his weary brain could form a good lie Frankie came to the rescue.
“That’s no concern,” Frankie said. “As he’ll be staying with me tonight.”
“No need. Drop me off at Divis Street,” Liam said. “I can walk from there.”
Frankie shook his head. “Wouldn’t hear of it. We’re having a few pints, you and me. It’s been too long.”
Checking his watch, Liam said, “It’s half past four in the morning, Frankie. I’m fucking knackered. Can we do it another time?”
“I insist,” Frankie said and then leaned in to whisper. “You’d do the same for me. Stop your arguing.”
Liam let out the breath he was holding and then nodded.
Only for a wee bit. Enough to sleep. Clean up. I’ll find somewhere to hide tomorrow. Leave Frankie out of it. He’s got troubles enough.
With the exception of a short argument over which tape should go into the player next—Abba or Elvis Presley—the journey to the New Lodge carried on without further conversation. When they stopped in front of a tidy-looking row house off Dover, Davy crawled out of the car. Lucas waited for Davy to get inside the house before driving away.
“Poor sod,” Lucas said, breaking the tension. “It’ll take more than a few nights at The Pound to see him through, so it seems.”
Michael said, “One night with your cousin Delores, and he’ll be set to rights.”
Lucas shook his head. “She’s settled down. Engaged.”
“More is the pity,” Michael said.
Lucas turned the Cortina around and headed south. Michael turned up the volume as Elvis launched into “Way Down” and then produced an open bottle of whiskey, passing it back to Frankie who wiped off the mouth of the bottle with his sleeve and took a few sips. He held it out for Liam to take.
“Go on. You look like you could use it,” Frankie said.
Liam accepted the bottle. Three long swallows burned off some of the dark mood. He passed it back to Frankie.
“You up for more, Lucas?” Frankie asked.
“Keep it. The wife will be having a fit as it is, what with us being so late,” Lucas said.
Michael put a hand over the seat to retrieve the bottle. “For a good cause, so it was.”
“Aye,” said Lucas. “My Betty feels for Davy. That’s the only thing keeping me from the sofa tonight. Even so, it’s the straight and narrow for a couple of days. You two are on your own.”
“Come on,” Michael said. “How are we to get to The Pound without your car? We’ll have to find a place to stay the night.”
“Find another friend fool enough to take you. It’ll not be me.”
Lucas stopped at Frankie’s place in the Falls next. Liam crawled out of the Cortina behind Frankie and the laundry bag. Frankie shouldered the bag. Apparently, he’d decided to hold onto it in case Liam had a change of heart. Resigned, Liam waved goodbye to Lucas and Michael as they drove away. In the distance, a dog barked. Liam took a deep breath of sharp Belfast winter and a violent shiver shuddered through him. Frankie’s keys rattled in the door of his ground-floor flat. Although slightly newer, the place wasn’t much different from the one Liam had rented two years ago. It was a shabby white box of an apartment block hastily constructed from cement cinder blocks and steel girders with terraces for the three floors above. Frankie threw open his door. Liam followed him inside, shutting the door and locking it.
The flat reeked of some sort of hippy incense and old cigarette smoke but was otherwise clean. The furniture consisted of a stained brown sofa and a small television resting on a painted wooden crate. A black telephone sat alone on the green-carpeted floor next to the sofa. Its cord traced a path to the wall near the kitchen. Liam stepped over it as Frankie made his way directly to the refrigerator. The walls were papered with film images and rock band posters, none of them local: The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and Motörhead. A James Bond poster was taped to one wall—obviously stolen from a theatre. Someone had scrawled the word “fucking wanker” across James Bond’s face, leaving the blond crouched at his feet unmolested. There were a few candles and even a potted plant in good health on the window ledge in the kitchen.
Frankie retrieved a fresh can of beer from the refrigerator’s interior. “Whiskey is yours,” he said. “I assume you’ve not changed your unnatural feelings on beer.” The can in his hands let out a pop and fizz. He sipped the foam until it stopped erupting from the top. Then he set it down on the counter and opened one of the bottom cabinets. “Have a seat. I’ll bring the bottle.”
“Frankie, I really should get some sleep.”
If I can.
The truth of it was, Liam dreaded closing his eyes. He knew perfectly well what he’d see when he did.
The hole in him. Was bleeding something fierce. I killed him. I know—
“Sleep. Aye,” Frankie said. “And you will. After you tell me who beat three kinds of shite out of you and then threw you out on the street in the middle of the night.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Oh, it wasn’t, was it?” Frankie asked, entering the sitting room, setting the whiskey bottle and juice glass on the floor and then flopping on the sofa. “Well, then how was it?”
Liam remained standing where he was and sighed.
“If it was anyone but you I’d say this was about the Lord of the Castle coming home before you’d finished with the Mrs., but this is you. And I know better,” Frankie said.
“It’s not worth it.”
“Let me be the one to decide.”
“Come on, Frankie. I’m not a wean. My battles are my own.”
“Aye.” Frankie took another sip of his beer. “It’s been a long time.”
“Aye.” Liam sighed and rounded the sofa. “It has.” He was too tired and too upset to argue. Snatching the whiskey from the floor, he poured three fingers into the juice glass. Whiskey might dull the images—might wipe out the dreams.
Tomorrow. I’ll know for sure tomorrow.
“Tell me it wasn’t the RUC,” Frankie said.
“It wasn’t the Peelers.”
“Good.” Frankie nodded. “It wasn’t the Loyalists either?”
“Have some sense. If it was them, do you think you’d be talking to me now?” Liam drank half of what he’d poured in one go. The whiskey wasn’t terribly good. He swallowed it anyway.
“You owe someone money, do you?”
“I said I didn’t want to fucking talk about it.”
Frankie held up a hand. “Fair enough. Fair enough.”
Finishing off the last of the whiskey in his glass, Liam poured himself another.
“Where have you been all this time?” Frankie asked.
Liam paused.
“You can’t say, can you?”
Liam decided to play along with Frankie’s assumptions. “I shouldn’t.”
“Aye, well. I got nicked,” Frankie said and swallowed more beer. “Few months ago. They couldn’t make anything stick. So, here I am again.”
Liam nodded. “What did they pick you up for?”
Frankie shrugged. “Jewelry shop was burgled. Was in Malone for burglary, you remember?”
“Aye,” Liam said. “Did you do it this time?”
Smiling, Frankie winked and said, “That would be telling.”
“Right.” Liam poured the last of the glass down his throat. The whiskey was getting more tolerable. He poured another glass of whiskey and changed the subject to Gaelic football. It seemed safe enough. Then the two of them got serious about getting ruined.
Chapter 11
 
Belfast, County Antrim, Northern Ireland
December 1977
 
 
 
L
iam slowly surfaced from familiar nightmares of blood, rage and anxiety to the smell of brewing coffee and the feeling that he wasn’t alone. Concern for Father Murray nudged Liam closer to semi-consciousness, but a small cough jerked him to cold awareness. His eyes snapped open, and an explosion of icy terror sent his heart to hammering against his breastbone.

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