Evil Relations (35 page)

I sit with Dad beside the fire, expecting to hear about his night’s adventures. But today his news is different: there’s a fiddle going on down near Smithfield Market in the centre of Manchester, and he wants both of us to go there this evening. Apparently a fish factory is taking on casual labour – no ‘cards in’, just cash-in-hand and a nice little supplement to the dole. The hours are ten at night until the foreman allows us to clock off; it might be a short shift or a long one, but the wage is a set amount. Dad is well pleased at having heard about the chance of some work and asks me if I’m in. After a moment’s thought I tell him I am, deciding to put my day with Dylan and the bottle on hold.

Later, Dad tells me more about his plan: we’re to turn up clean-shaven and tidy, in freshly laundered work clothes, and hopefully impress the foreman. Maureen gladly gets on with the washing, and by mid-afternoon she has a collection of shirts, trousers and underclothes all clean, ironed and ready to wear. She makes a pack-up of cheese and onion sandwiches for us both, adding a flask she’s bought specially from the chemist and filling it with tea. At the door she hands us each some of our dole money from her purse and wishes us good luck with a smile that almost reaches her eyes.

We hit Manchester a couple of hours earlier than ten o’clock. Dad fancies a couple of pints first and, knowing that it’s casual labour, he wants to weigh up the opposition. Close to the factory is a pub known by locals as the Little George. Dad’s walking accelerates as the lights come into view. He leaves me behind to make my own way through the snug and across the cigarette-strewn wooden floor. The place is packed to the rafters with Friday night career-boozers, laughing and shouting themselves hoarse. I stand by myself for a minute, trying to figure out where Dad’s gone, until I catch sight of him at the bar, ordering two pints of his beloved Chesters Mild and wearing a wicked, mischievous grin that makes him look like a proper nutcase.

Then I notice the landlady standing behind the bar and my mouth falls open: I love this pub – it’s the best ‘free house’ in the world and a thing of beauty in itself.

The landlady places the pints on the bar and opens the flap-top on the counter, ignoring the punters bellowing for more beer as she comes towards me open-armed. The air is squeezed out of my lungs as she wraps her arms around me and kisses my cheek, taking me straight back to my childhood. When the Duchess steps back to look at me, clutching my face in her hands, I have to hold back tears of pure joy. Behind her, at the pumps, is Uncle Bert, grinning as widely as Dad. I catch my breath and shake my head, delighted at the thought of the Duchess as landlady of the Little George.

She gives my hand a tight squeeze before returning to her station. Dad and Uncle Bert are already deep in conversation, but every minute or so the Duchess glances up from pulling pints to smile at me. Now I understand how Dad got to hear about the fiddle near here – Uncle Bert must have told him.

I join Dad at the bar and we slowly drink three complimentary pints each. As ten o’clock approaches, the Duchess sees us to the door and I get another terrific hug and kiss. Then we’re off, heading down the street, sucking Dad’s Polo mints, which we both hope will hide the smell of beer. I’m expecting to be interviewed beforehand in an office, but when we reach the huge metal roller doors, I realise this is a different kettle of fish (literally) altogether: every single down-on-his-luck deadbeat scruff in the city shuffles close to the shutters, waiting for the foreman to appear.

Suddenly the shutters clatter open and a man comes out, carrying a wooden box and a clipboard. I squint at the neon brightness of the factory. Inside, the floor is stacked with large boxes filled with ice – the freezing air rushes out and catches us all full in the face, forcing our shoulders up to brace against it. But more overwhelming still is the nauseating smell of industrial-strength disinfectant and fish.

Dad grabs me by the wrist and pushes through the crowd, ignoring the shouts of ‘Who the fuck do you think
you
are?’ and ‘Arseholes.’

The foreman gets up on his box and surveys us all. We look up at him as if he’s about to deliver the Sermon on the Mount, not a shift in a fish factory. Grasping our desperation, he plays along, massaging his own ego.

‘You,’ he points to an upturned head, then pauses as if considering. ‘You’ to another and ‘you’ to a third. This sadistic employment ritual continues for as long as it pleases him before he finishes quickly, ‘You, you, you and you.’

I count 20 heads chosen to enter the freezing factory. Us two smart-arses with our shiny faces and brand-new flask haven’t even been given a passing glance. My shoulders drop and I feel sorry for Dad, whose plan has crash-landed without a single survivor. I think to myself how among all the deadbeats we must stick out like a couple of sore thumbs, maybe making the foreman suspicious that we’re actually undercover dole investigators waiting to expose the fiddle. Dad’s idea of scrubbing up has had the opposite effect of the one he’d counted on: he’s as well-groomed as if he’s off to a Sunday morning service at church, with polished shoes, neat hair and even his favourite Lester Piggott tie – all this just to lump frozen fish around a factory for 12 hours.

I think longingly of the Duchess and the Little George.

Our crowd of human leftovers grudgingly begins to disperse. I suck on another Polo mint, shuffle my feet with the rest and feel embarrassed enough for everyone. Then I hear a voice shout, ‘’Ere, ’old on a minute, Stan!’ and before I know it, Uncle Bert is heading straight for the foreman. He takes him to one side, out of earshot, and I watch curiously as Stan listens, nodding his head a couple of times and flipping through some papers on his plastic clipboard. Uncle Bert shakes his hand in farewell and walks by, muttering out of the side of his mouth, ‘Behave yourselves.’

Stan is still at the mercy of his own little ego, purposely delaying his next move. He stands with the clipboard under his arm for a good minute or two, looking us up and down. I don’t think I give him much of a problem, but he seems perplexed by the bloke stood next to me in his shiny shoes and souvenir jockey neck-gear. Then he calls us over with a mere crook of his finger and we stand straight to attention while he announces with exaggerated authority: ‘You do ten till finish, get paid at the end, half-hour break at three, no tea breaks. I’ll be round during the night to get your names, now get your heads down and keep at it.’

Dad is bursting with pleasure. The only thing he doesn’t do is bloody salute.

The work turns out to be even harder than I imagined. Throughout the night juggernauts arrive and we unload heavy boxes of ice and fish, sort orders, package them, and load them onto the lorries ready for dispatch. I’ve soon seen enough fish to last me a lifetime and am frozen silly. But Dad is a revelation, finding a strength and energy I never knew he possessed, working like a man half his age. Stan patrols the floor continually, pointing out more boxes to pack or unpack, and Dad answers him with an immediate ‘Yes, sir’ and ‘Right away, sir.’ I carry the boxes and grit my teeth: it’s a side of him I don’t wish to see.

Not having a minute to think makes the shift pass quickly. Only once does Stan abandon his patrol, and a regular worker remarks that he’ll be across the road, having a liquid lunch at the Little George.

When morning comes, I’m exhausted. We all have a quick swill under the cold tap and queue up outside the office. I make the mistake of lighting a cigarette and a dozen deadbeats pounce, begging for a nicotine hit. I feel sorry for them, knowing they have another long day ahead like this one. Dad and I add our names to the list on Stan’s desk and the foreman reaches into a tin box, counting out two separate piles of notes. When he speaks to Dad, his tone is friendly and familiar, no doubt thanks to Uncle Bert’s generosity across the road: ‘Right, Jack, what I’ve done is paid you and the lad here at the regular rate, not as casuals. I can fix you up with a couple of weeks’ work starting Monday night. Be here at ten, but come in through the side door – don’t bother waiting outside with that pile of shit. And come in earlier if you fancy a pint.’

I think: 12 hours ago we were stood with ‘that pile of shit’ and, to be honest, it didn’t feel that bad. Even a pile of shit has to do something to get through the day.

Dad and I travel back to Hattersley on the bus. I’m knackered but content, pulling hard on a cigarette while Dad reads the racing page of his beloved
Daily Mirror
. Now I’ve got a few extra quid in my pocket, I’m glad I gave up my dole day with whisky and Dylan. But ten minutes into the journey I begin to feel nervous. Dad hasn’t noticed, but I’m aware of more people joining the bus and shooting us disgusted looks. Nobody takes the double seat in front of us, or the one behind. Paranoia freezes my blood and I feel tiny beads of sweat forming on my upper lip. I wait for the inevitable jeers and shoves, but then I see a woman screw up her nose and reach into her pocket for a handkerchief as she edges down the aisle. A daft smile spreads across my face as I realise that the problem isn’t the usual, but instead is caused by the work: we stink to high heaven of fish, and between us we’re managing to pollute the entire bus. Relief thaws my veins and I cheer up immediately. As we disembark, Dad tells me he’s going to buy himself a new duffle bag for our pack-ups and we stroll quickly home, whacked but satisfied.

I’m so caught up in being able to work at last that I don’t notice what’s happening to Maureen.

We work our shifts, Dad and I, and then sleep most of the day. It escapes me that my wife is slipping into another world. She doesn’t share what she’s done with me because she hasn’t
done
anything. While I’m asleep, she heads out to the shops, where she’s clawed at and spat at, told to fuck off and die, and her kid too. Then she returns with Paul in his pram, stepping out of the lift and into the flat as quietly as she can in case anyone is waiting for her. In the evenings, she makes our cheese and onion sandwiches, fills the flask with tea, hands Dad the duffle bag and closes the door behind us. When we’re gone, she turns off the telly and sits on the edge of the chair I insist is mine and thinks into a night that is as empty as it is endless. She stops hearing the men who skulk in from downstairs with their aerosol cans to spray ‘
Hindley Cunt
’ on the freshly painted door.

The next day she walks past the slogans with our baby son, her eyes blank and unseeing, dead to the hatred that encloses her like a fist.

The final Friday of our fortnight at the fish factory arrives; our last tray of fish has been loaded and dispatched. It’s not the sort of work you can enjoy – too back-breaking and cold for that – but at least it’s a job and the pay isn’t bad. Dad and I haven’t been drinking as we usually would either – just a few pints with Stan before the shift, and that alone has saved us money. On the last night I take in an extra packet of cigs for the deadbeats and in the morning, as we queue outside the office, waiting to collect our pay, I hand them round.

I watch as Stan reaches into his cashbox. After he’s divided the money into two neat piles he glances up at Dad: ‘A word with you, Jack, before you’re off. Can the lad wait outside for a minute?’

Dad nods towards the door, with a worried frown. I gather our pay and wait outside, surprised when I see Dad pulling up a chair. The two men sit and chat for twenty minutes or more, with Dad chain-smoking. He has his duffle bag between his knees and shuffles it awkwardly to one side, as he stands up and shakes Stan’s hand. I think:
thank Christ for that, things must be all right
.

Dad emerges from the office with his duffle bag slung over his shoulder. We walk to the bus stop in silence, but I know something’s up when he doesn’t pause to buy his
Daily Mirror
. We’re halfway through the journey home before he finally tells me what’s going on: Stan was hoping to keep us in work but because of the lull in the fishing season (or something like that), he’s having to drop the casuals, which means we’re finished. I fail to see the problem: we were only taken on for a fortnight anyway.

‘You definitely all right with that?’ Dad asks quietly.

‘Yeah, no worries,’ I tell him truthfully, puzzled by his concern.

He lets out a heavy sigh of relief. ‘Good, because I start regular on Monday morning.’

‘Yeah, right,’ I say disbelievingly. ‘I get the push and you start Monday morning? How does that work then?’

Dad explains that he’s been dropping hints over pints with Stan and has been rewarded with the job of maintenance fitter at the full Union rate and ‘cards in’. The crafty old sod has pulled it off with his two weeks of ‘Yes, sir, right away, sir.’ I’m over the moon and couldn’t be more pleased for him.

Dad is happy now that he knows I’m fine with the situation and tells me to get round the chipper tonight for chips and mushy peas – his treat.

‘Chips and mushy peas?’ I ask, frowning.

He laughs and nods at the duffel bag on the floor. I pull open the cord that keeps it fastened and there, looking up at me, crammed between the empty flask and leftover sandwiches, are three of the biggest lobsters ever hauled from the sea.

I stare at Dad in shock and he grins back at me: ‘Jesus, son, when you were told to go outside I thought I was done for – I thought that bastard had cottoned to me and I was a gonner, but how’s that for a winning bet?’

I can’t remember ever seeing a clear
photograph
of a lobster before, let alone a live one and definitely not with his brothers. Lobster isn’t something you find on the menu in Hattersley as a rule. As we get off the bus, we discuss how the three unlucky lads should meet their maker; Dad has a vague idea that you’re supposed to boil them alive. I can’t do that to them, and neither can Maureen when we show her what’s for tea, so Dad reluctantly agrees to be the one to send them on their way.