Fan (15 page)

7th January 1989
FA Cup Round 3

28th January 1989
FA Cup Round 4

19th February 1989
FA Cup Round 5

In the morning he took his bag to reception, asked the girl to change his room. The shift manager appeared.

‘We don’t want any trouble,’ he said.

‘I’m not giving you any trouble,’ said Finchy. ‘What trouble am I giving you?’

‘Those men,’ said the shift manager.

‘I don’t know who they are,’ he said. ‘I don’t know who they are or what they want. I just want a different room, one with a window that opens, on the ground floor if you’ve got one.’

They gave him what he wanted. He half expected the police to come knocking, half expected to have to deal with that on top of everything else, but the shift manager obviously thought better of it. It was one thing getting the police involved, it was another making yourself a target. Anyway, no police came knocking on his door.

Kick up old stones.

Scuff your Sambas.

See what’s underneath.

He staggered into town, seeking fresh air, keeping his wits about him, sidled into the marketplace, wondering if the sandwich van would still be there. And it was, a small bit of the past clinging to the present. He joined the queue, eager now for a taste of the old days in the form of a bacon and egg bap.

‘Look who it isn’t,’ said a voice.

He wheeled about, expecting the big fucker, expecting a fist in the mush. But it wasn’t the big fucker. It was a face he instantly recognised, a face he’d often thought about over
the years, his old neighbour from the sorting frames.

Spence. Once of twenty walk. A piece of piss.

Spence. Cocky, self-assured, difficult bastard.

Finchy smiled all the same. He couldn’t help himself. After all these years…

‘I heard you were about town,’ said Spence.

‘Who told you?’

Spence shook his head.

‘You should know I never reveal my sources.’

He winked.

‘Back for a funeral but a non-attender. Staying at the North Hotel but not always in attendance there either. Likely to emerge from a terrace on Broughton Street in dawn’s early light … causing much astir…’

‘How the fuck…?’

‘That’s my delivery, you daft bastard. I saw you coming out of the place.’

‘And the other stuff?’

‘Common knowledge, mate, for a local postie with an ear to the ground.’

‘Fucking hell,’ said Finchy. ‘Some things never change.’

‘Nope,’ said Spence.

‘It’s hardly headline news though, is it?’

Spence shook his head.

‘It might be if those Eastern Europeans get hold of you.’

‘Aye, well,’ he said. ‘They’ve got their facts wrong.’

‘You should be used to that sort of thing, though,’ said Spence. ‘Remember that young lad’s ex?’

Finchy reached the front of the queue, ordered his breakfast sarnie.

‘Not sure, mate,’ he said.

‘Yeah, you do,’ said Spence. ‘Lad was only with us five minutes and you were on his missus.’

‘He dumped her,’ said Finchy. ‘She was fair play. Besides, that was fifteen years ago.’

‘And here you are again.’

It was ever thus. He couldn’t read the bloke, couldn’t tell if he was joshing or serious. And that was Spence. Spence all over. An expert at feeding a bloke a line and reeling him in. Finchy almost took the bait but this was Spence for fuck’s sake, seeking a rise as always.

Even now.

‘You’re still at it then.’

Finchy looked Spence in the eyes, searched for a weakness, received only the same cocksure grin.

‘Yep,’ he said. ‘Still at it after all these years.’

‘Still bowling?’

‘Still bowling.’

‘Still enjoying a beer at the Nag’s?’

‘Every now and then,’ said Spence. ‘Perhaps we’ll see you in there before you head back?’

‘Perhaps,’ he said. He took a step backward.

‘You’re not rushing off?’

‘Going to meet an old friend,’ said Finchy.

‘You’re not going to eat your sarnie?’

‘Aye,’ he said. ‘I’m eating my sarnie.’

Finchy bit into the sarnie, felt the gritty texture of the bacon and the warmth of the egg yolk as it ran down his throat.

‘Well then, don’t be shy,’ said Spence. ‘Spill the beans.’

‘Fuck off, mate,’ Finchy said. ‘Whatever I tell you I might as well sing from the rooftops.’

Spence shook his head.

‘That hurts,’ he said. ‘That really hurts.’

And once upon a time he’d have fallen for that, back in the day. But he was older now, a little bit wiser, more used to giving it to the lads and lasses at school than receiving it.

The queue shifted forward. Spence ordered his sarnie, sucked the air in through his teeth.

‘After all these years,’ he said.

‘Here we are all over again.’

‘Not the same though, is it?’ said Spence. He looked around him.

Finchy shrugged.

‘The place has changed,’ said Spence. ‘It’s lost something.’

‘I’m not sure it had much to lose,’ said Finchy.

‘You don’t mean that,’ said Spence. ‘You think you do but you don’t.’

‘You’re right,’ said Finchy. ‘I don’t mean it. I had some great times here. I wasn’t unhappy, only at the end. What about the PO? Are the same blokes still working at the office?’

‘When did you go? 90? Aye, a few. Some moved on to pastures new. Some went the other way. We lost a couple to drink, one to the big C. You should drop in on the place, say “hello”, have a chinwag about those murders.’

Cunt.

Finchy held out a hand and Spence took it. They stood there locked together in the marketplace, the same location, the same people, a different time.

‘Pop into the Crown,’ said Spence. ‘See who you remember and who you don’t.’

‘I will,’ said Finchy. ‘I will.’

Finchy turned to go, made it all of ten yards.

‘They never did catch the bastard,’ shouted Spence. ‘Fucking strange that, don’t you think?’

Finchy almost turned around, almost succumbed, but he held himself in check, walked away from the van and over the road between the traffic. He was a hundred yards further on when he saw the steps of the old pub in front of him.

Her pub.

So many things were gone and so many things remained.

The scrub was still there, the bank, the ditch. He lingered a while, not knowing what the fuck to do, staring at a patch of grass, tangled weeds, unkempt shrubbery. No swings at least, the swings resigned to history, just the concrete foundation where they had once been fixed to the earth, fractured now, forlorn, crumbling to dust. On the other side of the car park, irony of ironies, a new health centre. He started towards it, head full, slipped down the alley at the side, expecting one world, discovering another.

No fucking rabbit runs.

No deadland to get lost in.

Not here.

A wire fence separated the scrub from the adjacent car park. He walked around its edge, knowing where he wanted to get to, knowing how it used to be, met a wrought-iron fence instead, a cluster of new buildings beyond, freshly tarmacked streets, a row of pleasant little dwellings. In 89 it had been the back end of everything, sandwiched between Edwardian terraces, sixties’ council houses and an industrial estate floundering in its own decay. In 89 it had been a netherworld, a cut-through lined with trailing brambles, covert nettles, dumped baby carriages, tyres, petrol cans, shit. He’d navigated his way through it all on Saturday mornings, a grand way to start the day, to save himself five crucial minutes, to get to the station on time, to get to London and Birmingham and Liverpool and Manchester. A carrier bag full of sarnies, a bag of crisps.

Fred Perry polo shirt.

Stone Island jeans.

Adidas trainers.

A creased tenner in his back pocket.

Life and how to live it…

Staring about himself in the scrub he noticed it was raining.

He skirted the fence, searching for a way through, followed it to a factory yard, stood there as the rain fell like tears, looking fucking maudlin and mislaid until some bloke came out for a ciggie and spotted him. At thirty fucking three years of age he turned tail, embarrassed, retreated the way he’d come, anxious, upset, struggling to contain it all, another anchor lost to the tide.

He was half an hour late reaching the pub. Jeff was already at the bottom of his first pint.

‘Ever the punctual Finchy,’ he said. ‘Ever the fucking punctual.’ Then, ‘What happened to you?’

‘I took a short cut. It didn’t work out.’

‘They never do, mate,’ said Jeff. ‘Anyway, what’re you having?’

A nervous fucking breakdown
.

‘Whatever you’re having.’

Jeff drifted to the bar, left him damp and forlorn at the table, returned a minute later with a pint of draught.

‘Give this a go,’ said Jeffery. ‘Our latest special. And sit fucking down, for Christ’s sake.’

He listened to Jeff for an hour, listened to his talk about beers and brewers, the difference between one and the other, the miles on the road, the changing landscape of the hospitality business, but he wasn’t fucking with it. In the end he just came out with what was on his mind, put it all out there for examination.

‘Earlier on I spent fifteen minutes staring at a patch of earth. I might have stayed there all day if I wasn’t meeting you.’

Jeff shifted in his seat.

‘A patch of earth?’

‘Where they found that lass.’

‘Lass?’

‘For fuck’s sake, that barmaid, Tracey what’s her name?’

Jeff shrugged.

‘You know,’ said Finchy. ‘Around the corner from your mam’s gaff. It was big fucking news at the time…’

‘Seriously?’ asked Jeff.

‘Seriously what?’

‘You want to talk about that?’

‘Aye,’ he said.

Jeff shook his head.

‘For fuck’s sake.’

‘What do you remember about it?’

‘Fuck all, mate. Barmaid at The Bell. Found in a car park. Boyfriend a suspect…’

‘It wasn’t the boyfriend. He had an alibi.’

Jeff shrugged again.

‘I can’t remember jack shit about those days if I’m honest, not unless somebody reminds me.’

‘I’m reminding you. We were set for holiday. National Express. Newquay.’

Jeff laughed, perked up a notch.

‘I remember Newquay, mate. Crazy golf. Footy on the beach every fucking day. Chasing around the bars after fanny at night. Some bird from Bristol in the sack. Dirty cow…’

Jeff grinned, lost in a moment.

‘Fucking hell,’ said Finchy. ‘You remember some random tart but you can’t remember a thing about a murder on your doorstep.’

‘I remember the tape across the street. I remember that. And I remember every fucker in town on about it. She used to walk past my front window every fucking day. I remember those legs. Every fucker remembers those legs.’

‘Do you remember what you were doing that night?’

He laughed.

‘Fuck me, are you serious?’

‘Yes,’ said Finchy. Deadpan. Dead straight.

‘It was a Friday,’ said Jeff. ‘I was probably rat-arsed somewhere with my old boss. Friday nights straight on the piss after the office shut. If I was anywhere I was there.’

‘Not with the lads…’

‘Not on Fridays. It was out with the boss or home for some nosh and a good night’s kip. Saturday was my day with the boys. One session a week with them was enough.’

A look across the table.

‘What’s all of this about, anyway?’ asked Jeff. ‘One minute it was Forest, now it’s a fucking murder mystery. We were meant to be having a good old spot of reminiscing.’

‘I started thinking about how we used to play in those bushes when we were kids and how I used to cut through that way when I was trying to catch up with you fuckers on a Saturday morning. It’s all fenced off now.’

‘You’re a mad fucker. No wonder you’re piss wet through.’

‘I wanted to have a wander, get a feel for it all.’

‘It’s a business park, mate. One or two new builds thrown in for good measure.’

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘But it wasn’t, was it? It was never a fucking business park.’

Jeff shrugged.

‘You hark on about those times like they were better, like a bit of scrub’s more appealing than some level-headed investment. Anyway, fucking hell, let’s get back to football before I top myself. What else have you got on the list?’

Finchy swallowed a mouthful of ale. Perhaps Hopper was right. It was no fucking good and it wasn’t fucking fair either, springing shit like that on whoever he came across. He wiped the spittle from his mouth.

‘The incident at Donnie station?’