2007 - A tale etched in blood and hard black pencel (13 page)

Martin now sends a glance Colin’s way, a very serious and concerned look on his face, like he’s seen Paul fall over and hurt himself rather than just tell them something really daft. That’s Martin, though: he’s never a bastard, which is probably why Paul has sought him out for this. Colin’s heard similar, knows the deal. They all have. It’s like a game, usually, except you’re pretending it’s not a game, and you never acknowledge that. Jamesy once said he had the power to turn invisible but could use it only when his life was in danger. Colin himself remembers, a little uncomfortably, telling people he had a pilot’s licence and could fly a plane if the owners would let him. But this was Primary Three stuff. Okay, maybe Primary Four at the latest, but definitely a pure slagging now, in the wrong hands. Colin and Martin both know this. Colin understands why Paul’s chosen them to tell, but still can’t believe he’s saying it. Besides, they’re not playing together: they’re in the middle of a game of football.

Paul was off school for a couple of weeks recently. Colin overheard his mum say quietly to his dad that the McKees were getting something called a ‘D-Force’, which he thought might be a new car until his dad replied that it was ‘a shame for the weans’.

“We’ve all got superpowers back on our home planet, but we cannae use them here in case folk find oot and the baddies come and catch us. The planet’s called Star X Z Five. It’s dead far away. Further than Spain.”

Colin looks forward again to check the proximity of Robbie, but his attention is caught more pressingly by the sight of Richie Ryan hoofing the ball from the edge of the opposing 18-yard box. Richie’s got a hard kick on him, and he’s caught it a cracker, on the half-volley, causing it to soar high and far towards Colin’s penalty area. It lands midway into their half, well ahead of the pursuing stampede, carrying plenty of momentum after the bounce. Robbie runs out to meet it. He makes an arse of trying to kill it with his foot after the second bounce and it ricochets away to the left, just inside the area. Robbie is still nearest as it slows almost to a stop, though Martin has gone out wide to close him down. Behind them, the rest of the mob are charging up the pitch like Viking invaders, leaving only goalie Mick Garvie and Robbie’s mooching counterpart Gary Hawkins in the other half of the field. They’re still too far back to intervene, though, despite the front-runners shouting on Robbie to ‘play it back for the shot, first-time, Robbie, first-time, come on’. Colin would welcome this, because an effort from that range would be just perfect for diving at, but he knows there’s no chance. Also shouting, and a far nearer option, is Paul, who would be clear through on Colin if Robbie played, as he is desperately appealing, a ‘square baw, Robbie, square baw’. Colin knows there is no chance of this, either. Instead, Robbie goes for glory himself, stepping around the ball so it’s on his right foot and giving it a big dirty toe. By this time, however, Martin’s right on him and the ball deflects harmlessly off his knee before bouncing out for a shy.

“Ah, ya wee ball-greedy bastard,” Paul moans, the sentiment quickly echoed by several of the new arrivals preparing to set up camp in Colin’s penalty area.

“Fuck off,” Robbie replies, eyeing Paul rather than any of the other complainants; inevitably given that Paul is the smallest of them. More surprising was Paul’s own outburst, his anger getting the better of his caution. It’s going back a bit now, but Colin has not forgotten how coldly brutal Robbie was in responding to his own moment of challenge.

Colin understands Paul’s frustration, however. Paul isn’t one of the good players but tries really hard and absolutely loves it when he converts a rare opportunity to score. Okay, strictly speaking, Paul had been mooching when that chance came, but he still put himself in the right spot and Robbie should have played the pass.

Big Richie takes the shy. He’s nothing like the first one there or particularly noted for his throwing ability, but his teammates defer to him on the dual grounds that it was his terrific kick that started the move and that he can batter just about anybody else on the pitch. He holds off for a wee minute as he has spotted Matt Cannon returning from the dinner hall and it’s wise to wait until their star player has made his way across the pitch. The delay also allows just about everybody else to take position around the touchline and the right-hand side of the penalty area. Only Paul and Dominic distinguish themselves: Paul by moving back to the edge of the ‘D’ to anticipate a clearance; Dominic a straight marking job on Paul, with the added incentive of a possible head start for a breakaway attack if the ball gets cleared.

Richie throws the ball to Matt, who shimmies, twists and sometimes just shoulders his way past several challenges as he progresses into the box. Colin doesn’t like how this is shaping up, as Matt looks like soon being in his preferred striking position for his preferred striking method: less then four yards out for a full-blooded, point-blank blooter which Colin would prefer to go past him rather than off him. Matt skips past another obstacle and draws back his foot, at which point the only dive Colin is considering is out of the way. Instead, however, Martin suddenly lunges between them and gets a boot in the way before the ball has travelled two feet, deflecting it at high speed towards the edge of the area, left of the penalty spot, where Paul and Dominic are hovering. They both react, but Dominic is quicker and gets to the ball first. He misjudges, though, the spin and it comes away from his foot, allowing Paul to nip it off his toes with one touch and go past him. It looks brilliant, like Paul has turned him and left him for dead. Paul glances up, sees he is on his own and gives it an almighty arse-winder from almost the full eighteen yards. He meets it sweetly, hard and true.

Colin can tell from the moment it leaves your foot whether it’s a toe, a sclaff, a daisy-cutter, a dipper or whatever, and he knows this is something rarer. Paul has met it perfectly, at pace, right off the laces, and it’s flying fast at an unwavering eighteen inches off the deck, straight across him and into his bottom-right corner. However, eighteen inches is the perfect height for diving at, and the ball still has plenty of distance to cover, which is why Colin is already airborne. There’s no way he’s getting his body behind it—it’s too fast and always moving away from him—but with his arms outstretched he is able to get his fingers to it, just as his (thankfully jacket-clad and thus well-padded) shoulder hits the turf. There’s too much power behind it, however, and though Colin’s hand deflects it up, its momentum is still taking it forwards. He looks up from the deck to see it loop over him and bounce once behind his head before spinning on with more than enough pace to take it over the line.

About an inch before it does so, Robbie steps past Colin and toe-ends it as hard as he can through the goals, then goes running off with his arms in the air making crowd noises, regarded as the just reward of all goalscorers. Colin can’t believe it. Even as the ball dropped close to Paul and Dominic, he had heard Martin receive unaccustomed praise for a ‘brilliant tackle, well in wee man’ upon the normally unstoppable Matt Cannon. Then Paul had pulled off a nice piece of skill and balance to set himself up for a shot from a distance only Matt or Stephen would normally attempt, and justified his audacity by unleashing a peach of an effort. This in turn had brought out a dive of unprecedented scope and bravery on the part of Colin, one they would all no doubt remark upon despite it proving insufficient to prevent Paul’s once-in-a-lifetime thunderbolt from finding its well-earned and rightful place in the back of the imaginary net.

And then that wee shite had just nicked in and ruined everything by thieving all the glory.

Robbie, however, is not the only one who’s running. Paul is now haring after him with an urgent sense of purpose that Colin suspects has little to do with wishing to congratulate him on a clinical piece of close-range finishing.

“That was ma goal ya fuckin prick,” Paul shouts at him, causing Robbie to stop and turn round.

“Naw it wasnae. Colin saved it.”

“It was still goin in.”

“Was it fuck,” Robbie insists, albeit half-heartedly. He turns as though to walk away rather than face down Paul’s argument, and he looks far from defiant.

“Aye. It. Fuckin. Was.”

Each of these last short bursts of speech is accompanied by Paul booting Robbie up the arse, the fourth kick seeming to lift Robbie clear off the ground, though this is as much a result of his attempted leap out of the way.

“It was Paul’s goal,” rules Matt Cannon, putting a hand on Paul’s shoulder, which seems to assure him of his status and restrain him from sending Robbie on another short-range flight. “Good goal, wee man,” he adds. “Cracker ay a shot.”

Paul smiles a wee bit but Colin can tell he’s still raging. Though he’s been awarded the goal, the moment is over. He can’t go doing the hands-up run now, and that’s the best part. However, Colin believes Paul, in his state of anger, is missing the bigger picture. In the last couple of minutes, something has happened that will have a far greater impact on his standing than merely scoring a stoater of a goal, and this is soon borne out as more and more boys rejoin the game from the dinner hall.

“What’s the score?” Colin hears Paddy Beattie ask Anthony Hughes, one of the Primary Sixes.

“I hink it’s nineteen-fifteen.”

“Eighteen-fifteen,” insist a few voices.

“But never mind that,” Anthony says. “Paul McKee battered Robbie.”

“Paul battered Robbie?” Paddy asks. Pleasure and disbelief are equally measured in his voice, but his volume is not. Robbie is not nearby, but close enough, it would appear, to have heard.

“Aye. Robbie mooched his goal and Paul took a pure eppy and battered him.”

“Naw he never,” Robbie insists, walking closer to state his case.

“What you talkin aboot?” Anthony laughs. “He booted your arse umpteen times and then Matt jumped in and saved you.”

“Saved Paul, mair like. He hardly touched us. I was ignorin him.”

“Ignorin him? Is that a new word for shitin yoursel?” Paddy asks.

“Fuck up,” Robbie says, the delivery notably lacking his usual viciousness.

“If he never battered you, why don’t you claim him, then?” Anthony enquires.

This makes Colin uncomfortable. He doesn’t like it when folk try to instigate fights between people, and he fears for Paul if this gets pushed through to a conclusion.

“Nae point,” replies Robbie. “He’ll shite it. He knows I’ll batter him, so he’ll no turn up.”

“Sounds like you’re the wan shitin it,” says Paddy.

“Fuck up,” says Robbie again, and walks away.

Colin fears for a moment that he is going to head straight for Paul to claim him after school or to settle the matter more immediately, but instead he just wanders away to stand on his own in his favoured mooching zone around the penalty spot. And that’s when Colin understands why Robbie won’t be claiming Paul now or later, and why he didn’t fight back when Paul booted him. He was scared. He was scared then and he’s scared now, despite what having been officially battered by Paul will do to their respective reputations.

Robbie stands for a moment, his eyes drawn more to Colin and Martin than to where play is under way, and frequently beyond them to the steady stream of boys making their way to the pitch and playground from the dinner hall. Then he screws up his face in that pinched way of his and begins trotting across the pitch towards the new arrivals. Colin guesses he’s intending to start spreading his own version of events before they hear it from anyone else, but he can’t see the point. It will only make it worse when they hear the truth.

“T
here’s somebody would like a word, Mr Jackson,” says the polisman who is waiting in the corridor outside the interview room.

“Who would that be?”

“The Detective Super in charge of the investigation. Just follow me.” He leads Martin along the hall towards the security barrier and the reception lobby. “Just there,” he indicates, gesturing towards a tall woman in a dark suit, standing with her back to him as she chats to the desk sergeant. She clocks the other polisman’s approach and spins around on one sturdy heel.

It takes Martin a long second to realise that Noodsy mis-remembered nothing. “Detective Superintendent Gillespie,” he says, standing as straight and tall as he can. She still seems to tower over him. She’s probably got only two or three inches on him, but they made their mark indelibly when these things really mattered.

“Mr Martin Jackson. What a pleasure to see you again, and in such a beautiful suit. Must have cost more than my last car. Of course, they do say there are few more impressive sights than a Scotsman on the make, and you certainly look the part.”

“I always liked you in uniform. Shame you’re in plain clothes.”

“Step into my office, please. And don’t push your luck.”

She ushers him into a stuffy fire hazard of a room, strewn with folders, loose paper and polystyrene cups. He thinks of his own dual-aspect corner suite in Holborn and wonders why he’s the one feeling juvenile and a little intimidated. Karen pulls out a swivel chair for him then takes her own seat on the other side of a desk so marked with coffee rings it could have been the sketch pad of the guy who designed the Audi and Olympic logos.

“So, Detective Super,” he says. “I didn’t even know you were in the polis, let alone…Guess you must be the one with all the gen on what happened to everybody. Or the bampots, at least.”

“Not so much. I’ve not long transferred to this division. Haven’t been to Braeside before now. I’m catching up fast, though. Of course, if I wanted to know what happened to you, I’d just need to pick up a copy of
Heat magazine
.”

Martin sighs. He feels a blush coming on, which pisses him off, because he does
not
want to look remotely bashful about this. “One photograph, once,” he says. “One fucking photograph. And they didn’t even get my name right. I was
Matthew
Jackson, if I recall correctly. But
everybody
bloody saw it.”

“‘Showbiz lawyer Matthew Jackson’ was, I believe, the caption. And are you still seeing…?”