In the Dark (5 page)

Theo nodded, watched the baby guzzling for a minute. ‘He's seriously hungry, man.'

‘The powder's not expensive,' Javine said.

‘I know.'

‘You get it in bulk, same as nappies.'

‘I didn't mean that.' Theo turned back to the TV. ‘It's good, you know? A good sign.'

They watched most of
EastEnders
while the baby finished, and when Javine took him through to the bedroom Theo put the food in the microwave and took out the plates and forks. King prawn and mushroom for her; chilli beef for him. Egg fried rice and prawn crackers, cans of lager and Diet Coke. Some other soap on Sky Plus while they ate off their laps; that one up north with the farmers and shit. Theo couldn't keep up.

‘Gemma was talking about going out one night next week,' Javine said. ‘Some new club in Peckham. Says her brother can get us in.'

‘Yeah, OK.'

‘Sure?'

‘I said.'

‘I'll leave the bottles in the fridge.'

Theo pushed some rice around. ‘Maybe I could ask Mum.'

Javine sniffed and said ‘fine', meaning that it wasn't.

‘Only if something comes up, you know?'

‘Whatever.' Javine let her fork clatter onto the plate. ‘But I don't think one night would hurt you, and I think it would be a good idea to save the babysitting up with your mum a bit more, until we really need it, yeah?' She stood and started to gather up the plates. ‘Like if the two of us ever go out together, you know?'

‘I get it, it's cool, OK?' He finished his beer. ‘No need to get riled up, man.' It wasn't cool, not really, but what else was he going to say? Nearly six months since the baby had arrived and he knew that the park or the playgroup was as exciting as her life got. Gemma was the only friend she'd made since he'd brought her back here and he knew she'd left plenty else behind.

Javine carried the plates into the kitchen. ‘You want tea?'

Theo and his family had moved from Lewisham to Kent five years before, when Theo was twelve. The old man had swapped his job on the Underground for one on the buses and they'd upped sticks to a place in Chatham with an extra bedroom for Theo's little sister, Angela, and air that was a bit less likely to aggravate her asthma. Everyone was happy. It was near the sea, which the old man had liked, there was bingo and a decent boozer over the road, and though there was a bit of trouble at school to start with, Theo and his sister had settled down quickly enough.

He'd met Javine at one of the big arcades. She and a mate had started giggling when he'd bent over a pool table. Later on they'd shared a joint or two outside and talked until chucking-out time.

Then, the previous summer, when Javine was three months pregnant, they'd had to make the journey back the other way. Theo's grandmother on his father's side had refused to move with the rest of the family, and when the stubborn old mare suffered a stroke, there was nobody else around to look after her. One day the air had tasted of salt; the next they were all back in the same shitty low-rise they'd been living in four years earlier.

Stupidest thing of all, the old woman was as fit as a fiddle now, had started to perk up as soon as she had her family around her again. It was Theo's old man who had got sick. Coughing up blood in their front room, and dying one afternoon in front of the horse racing, while Lewisham Hospital tried to find him a bed.

‘Theo?' Javine was shouting now, from the kitchen.

‘Yeah, tea sounds good,' Theo said.

Javine wasn't the only one who'd left friends behind when they'd come to south London. Theo still thought about Ransford and Kenny a lot, and Craig and Waheed from football. They'd stayed in touch for a while after he'd moved back, but things had just seemed to drift after the baby. Since he'd caught up with Easy and the others again.

Not that he'd caught up in every sense.

It was because he'd gone away; that's what Easy told him. That's why he'd lost his place; why Easy had a better slot with the crew even though Theo was older. Just bad luck, bad timing, whatever.

Theo's mobile chirped on the table.

Javine shouted through from the kitchen: ‘That'll be Easy or your mum.'

‘You reckon?'

‘Who else?'

Theo hadn't seen Easy for a week or so; not since their afternoon at the pitch and putt. Not properly at any rate. He'd seen him go past a couple of times in that sick Audi A3 he'd taken to driving around. He'd had it for a year, sitting in a lock-up. Polished the fucker every week, changed the Magic Tree air freshener, all that. But he'd done the decent thing and waited until he was only one year below the legal driving age before actually getting behind the wheel.

Theo had his dad's old Mazda, but the piece of shit had been falling apart for years and there didn't seem much point in getting it fixed. The buses were pretty good as it was, and all the shops were within spitting distance.

Didn't really need a car anyway, not how things were going.

That Audi was one sweet whip, though.

Javine stuck her head round the kitchen door and blew a kiss. ‘A pound says it's your boyfriend.'

Theo threw his empty beer can at her as he moved to pick up his phone. He looked at the screen. ‘You can owe it me.'

When he'd finished talking to his mother, he grabbed his jacket and told Javine he wouldn't be more than a couple of hours. He told her to wait up and squeezed her backside as he kissed her goodbye.

‘This is getting ridiculous,' she said.

‘I can't hurt her feelings, man.'

‘You should think about starting. You're getting a belly on you.'

Theo turned side on, looked at himself in the mirror by the front door. ‘That's all muscle,' he said, rubbing it. ‘And dick, obviously, all wrapped around.'

Javine grinned and said she'd do her best to stay awake, but that she was feeling wiped out. Theo watched her walk into the bedroom, heard her murmur something to the baby just before he closed the front door behind him. Then he walked down two flights of stairs to the first floor, and three doors along to his mother's flat, to eat his second dinner of the evening.

 
They sat in a small, crowded pub behind the Oval cricket ground. The conversation competed with quiz and fruit machines, a jukebox that specialised in eighties stadium rock, and a braying bunch of city types on the adjacent table.

‘There's a decent Indian round the corner,' Paul said.

‘As long as I can have a korma or something.' Helen grinned at the short, blonde woman opposite her. ‘Anything too spicy, this baby could come a few weeks early.'

Her friend laughed. ‘You know, if your waters break in Marks & Spencers, they give you a hamper.'

‘That's bollocks,' Paul said.

‘If they break in a curry house, maybe you get a year's supply of poppadoms, or whatever.'

The man next to her grimaced. ‘Not too keen on Indian.'

‘I'm not fussed,' Helen said.

‘Somebody else decide,' Paul said. ‘I'll get some more drinks in.' It was only supposed to have been a quick one before they ate dinner, but Paul had already put away three pints in twenty minutes. His voice was louder than it needed to be.

‘If we don't go now, we might not get a table,' Helen said.

Paul ignored her and downed what was left of his pint.

Helen looked across at her friend, who shrugged back at her. Helen and Katie had been at school together, and the four of them - Helen, Paul, Katie and her boyfriend Graham - usually got together for a meal out every few months. Paul liked Katie well enough, or said he did, but the boyfriend usually ended up irritating all three of them.

‘Says in the paper they might have a serial killer up in Glasgow,' Graham said.

Paul groaned into his glass.

‘Oh, don't start,' Katie said.

Helen sniggered, reached for her glass of water. This was usually how it kicked off.

‘Nasty one, by all accounts.'

‘Aren't too many nice ones,' Paul said.

Graham shuffled forward on his chair, leaned in close to Paul. ‘I know you've never had, you know,
dealings
with one, but you've met
ordinary
killers, right? What about that one last week in Essex, got off his tits and cut up his mother? Did you have anything to do with that one?' He waited. ‘You must have
heard
something, surely. Seen the reports or whatever.'

Paul stared at him for a few seconds. ‘Why do you get off on this stuff?'

‘I don't . . .'

‘Have you got a hard-on under the table?'

Graham swallowed. It looked for a second or two as if the evening was about to end prematurely, but then Katie piped up: ‘Well, if he has, for God's sake give him a few more juicy details, will you? We need all the help we can get and it's a damned sight cheaper than Viagra.'

Graham leaned into her, reddening. ‘It's interesting, that's all.'

Paul got up, grabbed his own empty glass and Katie's, waited for Graham to oblige. ‘Same again, is it?'

Nobody argued, and as Paul inched out from behind the table, Helen gave him a look that said ‘go easy'.

Got back a big, fat ‘fuck off ' smile.

Paul placed his order at the bar, then slid into the gents'. There was a man at the urinals and Paul loitered by the sink until he had left. Then he took out his phone and punched in a number; pressed the handset between his shoulder and his ear and moved across to piss.

The man answered the phone with a grunt, as though he'd been woken up.

‘It's me.'

‘What do you want, Paul?'

‘Can I come and see you tomorrow?'

A pause. The distant clatter of machinery.

‘Why not?'

‘Two-ish OK?'

‘I've got a bit of restoration work on at the minute. You got a pen?'

‘I'll remember it,' Paul said.

‘Where are you? Sounds like you're in a bloody toilet.'

‘Just tell me.'

Paul listened to the address. ‘You thought about what I said?'

‘I've
thought
about it, yeah.'

‘I need this.'

‘Tomorrow . . .'

Paul sighed. Zipped himself up.

‘Bring us a bit of lunch, will you? Something nice.'

Paul turned just as the door opened and Graham walked in. Paul saw him clock the phone and held it up before he put it back in his pocket. ‘Checking out local restaurants on the WAP,' he said.

Graham just nodded and walked quickly into a cubicle.

Paul stared at himself in the mirror as he smacked the soap dispenser and moved his hands under the tap. He splashed cold water on his face before he walked back out into the pub.

 
Theo could manage only half a portion of spicy shepherd's pie made with sweet potatoes and a mouthful or two of green beans.

‘What's wrong with it?' his mother asked.

‘It's fine. I'm just not very hungry.'

Hannah Shirley moved around the table, collecting her own empty plate, and her daughter's. ‘I'll leave yours there,' she said. ‘You might fancy a little more in a minute.'

‘Thanks, Mum.' Theo winked at his sister. ‘It's really nice.'

‘So, how's my gorgeous boy?'

‘I'm pretty good.'

His mother shook her head and tutted. It was the same game they always played. ‘You're
far
too big and ugly. I'm talking about my grandson.'

Theo sucked his teeth, shook his head like he was upset. ‘Yeah, he's doing OK, too.'

‘Just OK?'

‘He's doing great.'

‘Angela drew something for him at school today. Go and get what you drew.'

Theo's sister raised her eyebrows, didn't move until she was told a second time, then hauled herself into the bedroom.

‘How's she doing?' Theo asked.

His mother sat down on the edge of an armchair, began to clean her glasses on her sleeve. ‘Pretty good,' she said. ‘Better, anyhow.'

Angela wasn't coping as well academically as she had been at the school in Kent; was maybe a year or two behind where she should have been as a ten-year-old. They were thankful that at least her asthma was no worse.

‘She's got a real talent for art,' Theo's mum said.

On cue, Angela came back in and pushed a drawing across the table to Theo. A blue sky, a fish-filled sea, and a baby being thrown into the air.

‘That me and Javine?' Theo asked.

‘You can hang it over his cot,' Angela said.

Their mother put on her glasses and came over to look at the picture again. ‘A
real
talent,' she said.

Theo's phone rang and he got to it a second before his sister.

‘Yeah?'

‘You need to keep tomorrow night free,' Easy said.

‘Might be tricky, man. I got Halle Berry coming round.' Angela pulled a face and Theo grinned. ‘She's been begging me for weeks, you know?'

‘I'll pick you up about nine, yeah?

‘I don't know.'

‘You can drive if you want. I
know
you been looking at my whip, man.'

‘What's up? Where we driving?'

‘Just a favour.'

Angela was still staring at Theo. ‘Let me think, all right. Call you later.'

‘I'm the one doing
you
the favour, T, you get me? It's a nice bit of business. Just a couple of hours.'