Twenty-Six

Eugene parked the hackney just beyond the house. He waited for the morning sun to come over the scheme and watched Leek come out the gate and lumber towards the bus stop. The young man dug his hands into his overall pockets, the weight of the tool bag digging into his right shoulder. From where Eugene watched him, he looked like a half-shut penknife, a thing that should be sharp and useful, that was instead closed and waiting and rusting.

When Leek was gone, Eugene used the key she had given him. When he went into the house, she was snoring in that thick way he had come to despise. Her knew her head was backwards off the edge of the bed, and that her larynx was struggling to cope under the clogged bile of last night’s drink. He stood outside the door and knew he wouldn’t stay today. Some mornings he had found that if he timed it correctly, he could find her after the drink of the previous day had left her and before she had soaked herself in fresh sadness. Then she would be small and a little pitiful, but she would be present, charming even, a thing he could look after like a spindly plant he wanted to coax towards the sunlight.

As he passed along the hallway, there were small sounds from the other bedroom, neat footsteps, the sound of Shuggie’s fingers searching through his tidy pencil case. Eugene went into the kitchen and placed his bags on the counter. He filled the fridge with fresh liver and butter, and at the back of the small pantry he stacked four tins of tomato soup and four tins of sweet custard, like he had been doing every morning. It sat before him now, a wall of overflowing rations, the shelf groaning under the weight, and it made him feel better somehow.

He made tea and toast for himself and for Shuggie. He left Shuggie’s on the carpet outside his bedroom door and then sat at the kitchen table alone. There was yesterday’s newspaper, but it had been a slow night, and he had read it forwards and backwards already. He had even read the agony column, which he enjoyed reading and found truly insightful, but would never admit to anyone. Agnes’s paper was split open to the classifieds: jobs wanted, caravans for sale, and lonely hearts. She had been circling ads in her fat bingo marker, and as he drank the tea he glanced at them.

The pages of house exchanges were soaked with ink. She had circled anything that sounded far away from here, and Eugene was surprised not to feel saddened by it. Since Gartnavel Hospital, he had watched how she paced around like a caged animal, and when she wasn’t picking at her arms, she’d pick at the window paint, the bed frame, the loose threads on the settee. He had come up behind her one morning and had needed to hold her tight, almost crush her between his arms, until the picking anxiety left her. Now, from the bleeding ink, he could see she was picking a different scab. She had told him how she longed for a house in a more central, less-insular scheme. He had been rubbing her back one morning as she told him she wanted to live somewhere she could have her anonymity back, a place her pride could be restored. Then she added timidly, somewhere Eugene could live with her like he was her man. He had said nothing then, he just continued to rub her back until she grew restless and picky and moved away.

Eugene knew that if you asked the council to find you another house in another neighbourhood, they would place you on a long waiting list. Even the truly desperate had to wait for years for a council house, and if you already lived in one, you became very low priority. The wait to be rehoused was interminable. So, if you already occupied a council house, the better approach was to try to execute a straight swap of houses, off the books, on the fly. The council didn’t mind this; it cleared the backlog, and anything that kept the complaining masses from filing through the chamber doors was welcomed. In their view, exchanging one house for another only moved the problem around, but at least it kept it from their desk.

Eugene stretched and tried to straighten his hunched spine. There was an old gas-bill envelope next to the newspaper. She had been writing an advertisement and then scratching it out, again and again, till the wording was perfect. He could see Agnes had spent a long time thinking of the phrasing of her request, and that she had gotten slowly drunker as the evening wore on. When she was closer to sober it read almost pitiful and pleading, and later as she slid towards spitefulness it sounded more demanding. She had eventually taken all the versions and cut them into one. In thirty words or less she had made Pithead sound lovely, a pastoral and friendly place, neighbourly and thriving. In the ad she stated she was willing to consider any offers. Eugene thought, had it been a lonely hearts ad, she would have been both desperate and a liar.

He drained the dregs of his tea and stood up to leave. If he left now, she might never know he had been, and he could sleep peacefully in his own bed. He turned to go, but the boy was in the doorway. Shuggie was neatly dressed, his school bag lashed tight across his body. He saluted Eugene, as had become their way. “Night shift clocking off, sir. ”

Eugene put down his money belt again. He tried not to sound too deflated as he returned the limp salute. “Aye, day shift reporting for duty. ”

“I don’t like ye when ye’ve got a drink in ye, ” was how he told her they were finally done.

Eugene had come by, as he had taken to doing, at the end of his night shift, knowing it was the best chance to find her sober. Some nights, without undressing, he would lie with her in the warm bed, and they would talk about the funny punters he had seen or the shiny things she wanted for the house. If she was not too hungover, he would unzip his trousers and roll on top of her then. Agnes would try to push the sleep from her limbs and ignore the painful rubbing of his sheriff’s belt on her belly. He would shove away at her, and before long they would both want it to stop. With a grunt he would roll off her and kiss her on the cheek. He would say he was too jumpy to cuddle, and already dressed he would go sit in the dark kitchen and wait for her with the lights off. Agnes would get up and cook him something hot in the black frying pan and make him two mugs of strong black tea. She would set both mugs in front of him at the same time, side by side, and watch as he drank them in the one go, scalding hot, like they were glasses of water. They would talk a little longer, about nothing really, and he would slip her some money, just a few notes, enough for a loaf and perhaps some hairspray. Then he would kiss her, their first proper kiss of the visit, and he would go home to his own house and his own grown daughter and get into his own bed.

Agnes waited until he had rolled on top of her one night, and as he shoved his way into her, she asked softly, “Genie. When I get a house exchange, will you move in with us? ”

Eugene stopped his thrusting, and she felt him slip out of her. His thick face was flushed round the edges. The look of boyish concentration dissolved as his features hardened themselves, preparing her for disappointment. “No, ” he said simply, sliding out from between the warm sheets.

Agnes felt so embarrassed that she couldn’t sit up. For a long time she just lay there in the dent they had made. She listened as he went to the kitchen, and she heard him pull out his chair and wait for the service. It took all the strength she had to raise herself. She poured herself on to the floor as though she were boneless. When she got into the kitchen he spoke first.

“I don’t like ye when ye’ve got a drink in ye. ”

She knew what he meant. He had said it not as if they were lovers coming apart but as if he had thought about it and was resigning from a job he hated.

She wanted to tell him she didn’t much like him when she didn’t have a drink in her, but she didn’t. She didn’t have the strength to lie. There was no face left to save. Instead, she pushed two link sausages around in the pan until they burst. Then she made him two identical cups of dark tea, with the tea bag left in. He drank them, and then he left.

Shuggie never saw Eugene again.

Agnes’s boys could tell something was different. It was like how you can tell when a bonfire has petrol in it instead of just wood. In a fury, she drank herself into a sadness with lager, and when she was done with being sad she changed to vodka and made herself angry again.

For weeks the door swung back and forth, with Jinty and Bridie and Lamby and all the others who brought bags full of drink. For two weeks Shuggie stayed away from the school and tried to keep her contained in the house. He locked the doors and ran all the outside messages. When she fell asleep sitting up in her chair, Shuggie took out his schoolbooks and tried not to fall so far behind.

“I’m getting out of here, ” spat Agnes one afternoon. “Phone me a taxi. ”

“But where? ” Shuggie asked, looking over the top of his textbook.

“Don’t ask me where! ” she screamed. “Anywhere, anywhere away from here. Away from you. ”

He tried not to flinch. “But what will I tell the taxi man? ”

“Tell him I want the lights, the action. ” She smacked her lips. “Tell him to take me to the bingo, for fuck’s sake. ”

Shuggie picked up the phone and pretended to dial the number. He pressed 111-1111. He waited a moment and then blethered cheerfully into the empty receiver. “Taxi? Yes, please, Bain, that’s right. The big bingo. OK, thanks. ” He gently placed the receiver back on the cradle. Clearing his throat, he said, “The taxi man said it will be at least half an hour. ”

Agnes was already by the front door, her hand tugging on the handle. She danced from foot to foot like she needed the bathroom. “Fuck! ” she squealed like a spoilt child. “Does nobody want me to have a life? ”

“Mammy, ” soothed Shuggie, “your hair is sticking out on the one side. You can’t go out like that. Come away in, and we’ll fix it. ”

“No! ” she spat, running her fingers through the tangles.

“Come on, you can have another wee drink. ”

At that Agnes let the leather bag slide from her shoulder on to the floor. She stumbled along the hallway. When he got her back into her chair, her head was already bobbing sleepily on her shoulders, as if she were on a very bumpy bus. On his knees at her side he poured her a tall mugful. He used more vodka than Irn-Bru. He handed it to her. She drank it like water. Her eyes sprang open.

“Are you going to fix my hair, then? ”

Sitting on the arm of the chair he began to run the brush through her black hair. Agnes held the mug against her chin and slurped the sugary liquid into her mouth. “Has it been half an hour yet? ” she asked.

“No, Mammy, ” he sighed.

“I was going to go out and get you a new daddy. ”

He ran the thick brush around the side of her hair, and the hairspray cracked and dusted the air like sweet pollen. He liked the way the hair started to soften and feather. “That’s OK. I don’t need a daddy. ”

She shook her head mournfully, like she strongly disagreed. “Has it been half an hour yet? ”

“No, Mammy. ”

“Has it been half an hour yet? ”

“No, Mammy. ”

“I wish you would phone them again. ”

She fell asleep on the chair, her head dipped forward on to her chest, her breath throaty and irregular. As Agnes snored, Shuggie let his shoulders soften. He took the mug from her loose fingers. He knelt in front of her and gently unbuckled the strappy heels, sliding them off slowly, taking care that the buckle shouldn’t rip her new tights. With steady hands he unclipped the mismatched earrings. All these things he returned to her room in the hope that when she woke up she would forget she had been trying to go out.

Shuggie picked up the schoolbook again and, like a loyal dog, sat at Agnes’s feet and listened to her heavy breathing. Through the front window he watched the children start to trickle back from the day’s school, shirt tails out, ties around their foreheads. They were sat together like that for only an hour, when Leek came in from work and slammed the front door shut. Shuggie looked nervously to his mother, then down the hallway to his brother, spook-faced with white plaster dust. Agnes made a sound like a generator starting, and Shuggie laid his head on his knees.

“I want my dig money, ” were the first words out of her mouth.

Leek didn’t answer his mother; he glared straight at Shuggie as if to say what a terrible job he had done keeping her from the drink. He mouthed a silent, nice one, and turned, with a slam, into his bedroom. Through the wall came the crashing guitars of Meatloaf, and Shuggie tilted his head back like a baying dog and shouted into the air, “I did my bloody best. ”

“Give us peace! Who are you to scream like that? ” She jabbed her thumb sharply into her own chest. “I am the man of this house! Me! ” Agnes tottered along the hallway and rapped her rings on the thin bedroom door. The volume went up. Shuggie watched her sink back on her heel and stick her jaw out. He could see the short hour’s sleep had only given her back her fire but not taken any of the poison from her. Agnes rapped the big rings on the door one more time.

There was the sound of a little snib sliding back in its bed. Leek stepped out into the hall. He had changed out of his work clothes and into his best denims, the ones he saved for the gambling machines in the city centre.

“I raised you to answer me when I am talking to you. ”

Shuggie could see Leek was trying to be civil, to placate her. He bit the tip of his tongue before he answered her. “Yes, Mammy. What is it? ”

“What is it? What is iiit? ” Agnes spun around the hall, looking at the ceiling in dramatic disbelief. “You expect me to cook and clean for you all week, and when I try and have a civil conversation with you, all I get is, ‘Yes, Mammy. What is it? ’” Too late Leek opened his mouth to apologize, but Agnes battered on. “I’ll tell you what it fucking is. I’m sat home all day rotting away with baw-jaws there”—she thrust her thumb towards Shuggie—“and you come home and can’t even say two kind words to me. ”

“I’m sorry. ”

“Sorry? Not half as sorry as I am. ” She drew her eyes up and down him, and they stuck on his blue jeans. “Are they new denims? ”

“No. ”

“I’ve not seen them before. They must have cost you a bob or two. Are you going down the pub in them? ”

“Maybe. ”

“What do you mean, maybe? You think I’m that daft? ”

“Aye. I am then. ”

“Well, I only wanted to know. Would you like some hot dinner before you go? ”

Leek blinked; Shuggie winced. “Yes, please. ” Leek fell for it.

“Aye, I bet you fucking would. Well, you don’t pay me enough to keep hot food on this table. ”

Leek turned his back to her to lift his nylon bomber from the bed. The sight of his sharp shoulder made her furious, and Agnes jabbed her ring finger hard into the middle of his back. It caught him funny; Shuggie saw him twist from the pain. “Don’t you turn your back on me when I am talking to you. Who do you think you are, pal? ” She laced her fingers under her chin like a delicate fan. “All dressed up in your fancy-boy denims. Off up the pub with all your wee woofter mates. You’re nothing but a big old jessie. A big old ponce, aren’t you? ”

Something in the words made Leek look to Shuggie, who had turned the colour of grey ash. Those were the same words Shuggie heard every day on the streets of the mining town. The words he heard in the playground and at the back of the class. Something in that look told Shuggie that Leek knew he was not right.

She was still roaring with the drink, but neither boy heard what she had been saying. The finger came out again and caught Leek in the middle of his bony chest. Something instinctual in him brought his hand up, and there was a loud crack as he swatted her knuckles away. Shuggie could see by the way she curled her sore fingers that it had hurt. Worse than that, it had hurt her pride.

Agnes and Leek were both shaking in anger. “You think you are the man of my house? No way! ” There were tears of fury on her face. She uncurled the finger into his chest again. “Get. Your. Stuff. And get the fuck out of here. You’re papped. ”

“Mammy. ” Leek sounded like a little boy again.

“PAPPED. ”

There was a tremble in Leek’s jaw. Shuggie saw it. It shook a moment, then it stiffened. A kind of locking started in his knees and travelled up his whole body, vertebra by vertebra, till he was standing solid as a stone pillar. Leek’s shoulders straightened, and he held himself tall, taller than Shuggie had ever seen.

Shuggie waited until his mother was hammering a number into the telephone before moving. He slunk along the hallway and slid into the bedroom. Around the walls were the cabinets and shelves Leek had made by hand from old pieces of YTS wood. Beautiful, functional things, rich with inlaid doors and sliding drawers for hidden stashes. Under the bedroom window was a massive plywood unit that housed Leek’s turntables, his speakers, and his records. Into the face of it he had made dozens of little compartments to neatly hold exactly ten albums apiece. The precise and careful hand was gone now as he stuffed his life frantically into black bin bags.

“Shut that fuckin’ door, ” he barked, as Shuggie came in.

Shuggie did as he was told, closing their door gently, easing the ball lock into the socket. Leek was leafing through albums, deciding what to bring and what to discard. Shuggie crossed the room and put his index finger into a belt loop at Leek’s waist. He twisted and twisted until all the blood was cut off from his fingertip. “She’s only saying this to you a’cos Eugene’s done it to her. Just wait. It’ll pass. ”

Leek turned, he twisted his brother’s hand free from his waist. “Jesus, Shuggie! I want to say something to you, and I want you to heed me, not just hear me, OK? ”

The boy nodded slowly.

“Look. You are the man of the house now. So you are going to have to grow up and do some things. You are going to have to look after her money for her. When she cashes the Monday and Tuesday Books, you are going to have to keep a bit back to get you food through the end of the week. Do you think you could do that? ”

Shuggie wanted to say he already did that. That he had done that since he was seven.

“You are going to have to keep her in and keep the rest of those alky bastards out. Unplug the phone when she is not looking; if they come to the door, try and turn them away. Tell them she’s out. That goes double for men, alright? ” Leek was still filling bin bags with the contents of his life; unwanted things no longer of use to him, he threw into the corner. Even in his hurry he made it look easy, as if he had thought about it a hundred times before. “Men will only want to hurt her, take advantage. ” He paused. “Do you know what I mean by that? ”

“Yes. ” He knew all about it, more than Leek could ever imagine.

“Are you going to stick in at the school? ”

“I’ll try. ”

“Well, try harder. Don’t make the same mistake as me, Shuggie. Make something of yourself. ” Leek took a handful of Shuggie’s hair in a tight fist and gently shook his head. “If you are worried about leaving her, then hide all the pills from the bathroom. While you are at it, hide the razors and steak knives as well. Wrap it all up in a tea towel, take it outside, and hide it in the bushes, alright? ”

Leek studied his brother for a moment. “What are you, like, thirteen? ” Leek exhaled upwards into his own fringe. “Shit. Your balls will be dropping soon. Look, it won’t be for that long. Just a wee while longer, till you can go too. ”

Shuggie’s head pulled back on his neck in disgust. “Then who will look after her? ”

“Well. She’ll have to look after herself. ”

“Then how will she ever get better? ”

Leek stopped his packing. He lowered himself on to one knee, so that he was looking up at Shuggie. His lips were moving silently, almost like he didn’t know quite where to start. “Don’t make the same mistake as me. She’s never going to get better. When the time is right you have to leave. The only thing you can save is yourself. ”

Whatever weak power Leek had held over the house faded away as he left with the last of his black bin bags. The lowest of the demons came out of the off-licences and bookies, and they filled her with the drink. They drank and they smoked together, and then they fell asleep, sat upright in her armchairs, only to wake and start drinking again. Shuggie tried to keep them away; he tried to hold on to a little money and get himself to school. He only wanted to do his best for Leek, to prove that she could get better, and maybe that would bring him home again. But it was hard.

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