Bones in the Nest (3 page)

When the York Minster clock strikes the hour, the bell vibrates through the stone steps, up into the bones of Chloe’s chest. Compared to this huge building she is nothing, just a bundle of twigs that can be rattled apart by the sound. She hugs her arms around her knees even though it isn’t cold. The sun is overhead and she feels it pressing through her thin hair. She needs to move before her skin burns. She gets up and looks around. To one side she sees a road full of people and bicycles, but to her right there’s a sort of garden. If she stays close to the building there might be some shade.

She walks through a gate onto a lawn, slips her shoes off and enjoys the grass, cool and soft under her feet. There’s an ice cream van, but she can’t afford anything on their price list. She’s bought food, toiletries and her radio. She’s paid her hostel charge for the first week and now she’s down to her last few pounds. There are some children at the ice cream van, speaking another language, laughing, so she turns away
from them and heads for the shade of the building where the grass is longer, more protected. There is something there, where the wall meets the ground, and she thinks at first she’s looking at the broken pieces of a wafer or a cornet, but as her eyes adjust to the shadows, she sees they’re little bones, cradled in a dry brown nest. She kneels down to get a closer look. Two skulls, with perfect beaks, tiny ribs and fine white legs, tucked up where they lay, hungry perhaps, or their hearts stopping as the nest fell. She looks up and sees a line of guttering, and beyond it a glimpse of the square edge of the Minster tower. It seems to be falling towards her. Her stomach lurches and she drops down on all fours. She’s crouching, staring at the skeletons of the young birds in the nest, when she hears a voice.

‘Are you all right?’

A woman is watching her from the path with two children, a boy of about eight and a teenage girl. The woman hesitates, while the children look embarrassed, the boy tugging at his mother’s hand.

‘I’m fine,’ she says. ‘Just found something, a nest. The baby birds are dead.’

The girl pulls a face, but the boy lets go of his mother’s hand and darts forward.

‘Cool! Can I see?’

Chloe sits back on her heels and he comes close.

‘Amazing! They’re sparrows’ skeletons, I think. Can I pick the nest up?’

She nods.

‘How do you know they’re sparrows?’ she asks him.

‘From the beaks.’ He cradles the nest in his small hands
and peers into it. ‘It’s hard to be exactly sure; they could be coal tits. I’d need my book.’

‘Do you want it? The nest?’

‘Would you mind? Brilliant! Thanks.’ He looks back to check. ‘Mum, this lady says I can have it. Can I?’

The teenage girl rolls her eyes.

‘It’s not very clean,’ the mother says.

‘It’s fine, Mum. They’re just dry bones.’

‘Well, all right,’ she smiles at Chloe as if to say, this is what he’s like, this curious little boy. ‘Say thank you to the lady.’

‘Thanks.’

Chloe shrugs. She doesn’t have anything to say. It’s only when she watches them walk away down the path, the boy holding the nest up to eye level to scrutinise its contents, that she thinks how easy it was to give a gift of something that wasn’t hers to begin with. She shivers, her skin cooling in the shade. She lets her fingers play over the grass, thinking back to the first time she was allowed to work outside, in the prison grounds, and how strange the grass felt to her then. It was as if she had misremembered it. Each blade seemed stronger and thicker than she expected. Another chiming bell startles her and she checks her watch. Quarter to twelve. She stands up and decides to explore further round the building. She runs her fingers along the stone mass of wall until she reaches an iron fence and a gate. A cobbled street curves round to the right and she picks her way over the uncomfortable bumps until she feels smooth stone slabs under her feet again.

She half-laughs inside her mouth. Laughs at herself. They said at one of her parole hearings that she hadn’t grown up
yet and she’d have to grow up if she was ever going to settle back into society. They wouldn’t think talking to little boys about dead birds and walking barefoot was proper grownup behaviour, but who cares? They’re not watching her now. She takes a step, which is half a skip. For the first time in ages she thinks she might be happy. She skips again, two, three times, until her toe catches the edge of a paving slab and she swears. She looks around to check if anybody saw and puts her shoes back on.

They’re coming out of the door when she gets back to the entrance. Emma is rubbing one of her knees and moaning about how many steps there were.

‘Oh my God, Chloe, I wish I’d stayed out here. You go round and round this horrible little staircase and the top’s all fenced in, like a cage. I wanted to go back down, but they said I couldn’t.’

Emma scowls at Taheera and the young man. Chloe isn’t sure what the situation is, but she saw them hold each other’s hands as they went in and she thinks they might want to be alone for a bit. Her mum trained her from an early age to be discreet around all the boyfriends she brought home from the pub.

‘Come on, Emma, there’s some nice shops we went past before. Wouldn’t mind having a look in the windows.’

She links her arm in Emma’s and half expects her to pull away, but she doesn’t. She clamps Chloe closer to her and they start to walk back across the open square towards the narrow streets.

‘Wait a minute!’ Taheera calls after them. ‘I thought we might all go for a coffee.’

Emma hesitates.

‘OK, if you’re buying,’ she says.

Chloe thinks she’s shameless, after having moaned so much, but all the same she wouldn’t mind one herself. It’s only her second day on the out and she fancies sitting in a café, sipping a nice coffee. They end up in a little place, not much more than a shop front, with two soft untidy sofas in the window. Chloe would rather sit further back where it’s more private and there are proper chairs and tables, but Emma has steered her towards one of the sofas and sits down heavily.

‘I’m knackered!’ she says. ‘Do they do cake?’

Taheera ignores her and asks Chloe what she’d like first. Then she takes Emma’s order and tells the young guy, whose name turns out to be Mo, that he’ll have to get his own. The budget doesn’t stretch to him. She doesn’t sound mean when she says it, just playful and then Chloe gets it. This trip is meant to be about her. That’s why Taheera has got money to spend. That’s why she didn’t want her and Emma to go off together and why she clucked like a mother hen when Chloe said she wanted to stay outside the Minster. Chloe sits back on the sofa and decides she doesn’t mind being fussed over. She’s sure it won’t last.

Taheera goes up to the counter and Mo leans forward.

‘Do you want to see a magic trick?’ he says.

‘Do you make yourself disappear in a puff of smoke?’ Emma laughs, her scar tugging at her skin. ‘Only joking!’

But Mo looks annoyed. He turns to Chloe.

‘What about you?’

She shrugs.

‘You don’t say much, do you?’

No, she thinks. But that’s probably just as well because if she was a talker she’d be asking questions; what she really wants to know is why he’s on tag, what he’s done and where he’s been. She’s sure he’s been inside, and he must know she and Emma have too. What she really she wants to know is why Taheera has got a criminal for a boyfriend. It’s probably a sackable offence if you work in a bail hostel.

Emma goes off to find the ladies’ toilet as Taheera comes back to the table.

‘It’s a shame you didn’t have your camera up the tower, Mo.’

‘I left it at home. I didn’t think you’d want …’ he doesn’t finish.

Chloe sips the froth on her coffee and pretends he’s not looking at her. She sits back in the depths of the sofa and soon it’s as if they’ve forgotten she’s there.

‘Have you been doing much photography?’

‘Not much time,’ he says. ‘Been helping my cousin in the shop.’

‘How is she?’

‘Ghazala? She’s OK. Yeah, she’s good. She gave me the train fare to get up here. Her little brother Saleem’s being a pain in the arse, though.’

Taheera nods.

‘My brother was here last night,’ she says quietly.

Chloe tries to look interested in the tassels on one of the sofa cushions, spinning the purple and gold threads and watching them unravel. When you don’t say much, people tend to think you don’t hear much either.

‘Kamran?’ Mo says. ‘What was he doing in York?’

‘He’d been to York Races and he wanted to borrow some money to get into a club. He’d been drinking. My parents would go mad if they knew.’

So that was her brother. Chloe’s almost forgotten the scene she witnessed from her window last night, but now it comes back to her.

‘Had he come up here on his own?’ Mo says.

‘Someone was driving his car, a white guy. At least he wasn’t stupid enough to drive himself.’

Mo looks worried.

‘This guy, what did he look like?’

‘I didn’t really see, it was dark. Why? Does it matter?’

‘No, probably not.’

‘Mo?’

‘Nothing. It’s nothing. Look!’ And he touches Taheera’s ear and pulls out a pound coin.

The low ceiling of the corridor outside the Divisional Inspector’s office had a fluorescent light which flickered as Sean waited, like a schoolboy outside the headteacher’s office. Maureen had ironed every inch of his uniform. She’d even offered him one of her sleeping pills to make sure he got some rest, but he said no. He needed a clear head. When he got in from his dad’s he went for a run to tire himself out and, by some miracle, fell asleep not long after midnight. He’d had five or six hours, but his right eye was twitching. Or was it the light? He couldn’t tell.

The door opened.

‘Come in PC Denton.’

He phoned Gav as soon as he came out.

‘Well?’

‘It was OK,’ Sean said, still not quite believing it himself. ‘What I said, how I described it, tallied with what you told them and as there were no independent witnesses. Basically, that was it.’

‘Good lad. Right, let’s celebrate!’

‘I’m not sure …’ He was thinking of his dad and the promise he’d made to help clean up the flat.

‘They’ve got a nice guest ale on at the Red Lion,’ Gav said.

‘Sorry, mate, I’ve got stuff on.’

Sean didn’t tell him the other part of what they’d said, Wendy Gore grinning at him through over-done lipstick that had smeared on the lip of her coffee mug, the bit about young eyes seeing things that others might overlook, that his previous work as a PCSO, especially in the investigation of a senior officer, hadn’t gone unnoticed. He had the feeling that they were asking him to spy for them. The only bit that made any sense was the warning to stay away from Saleem Asaf.

‘That shouldn’t be difficult,’ Sean said.

‘Except that he lives at an address on the edge of the Chasebridge estate, Denton, where I believe you have family.’

The Divisional Inspector couldn’t have made it sound worse if he’d actually come out and said ‘a drunk for a father,’ but Sean let it pass.

Sean sat on the side of his bed and unfolded the crumpled page with the estate agents’ logo and the colour photo of the ‘fabulous studio apartment’. He would be back on the night shift tomorrow and by the time he got round to viewing it, it was sure to have been let out. He screwed the details into a ball and threw it in a neat arc, straight into the wastepaper basket by the door.

‘Goal!’

He could hear the television. Maureen must be watching a comedy because the canned laughter came up through the
floor at regular intervals. When he went downstairs, one place was laid at the table and a cup of tea was waiting for him.

‘I was at my dad’s yesterday.’ He let it sound casual, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

‘Oh.’ She was at the cooker, stirring a pan of baked beans. She didn’t look at him.

‘He’s packed in drinking.’

‘Why would he bother doing that? It’s like air to him.’

‘Because he had to.’

Maureen tipped baked beans onto two waiting slices of toast and scraped angrily at the saucepan with a wooden spoon.

‘Bloody idiot. He’s ruined everyone else’s life and been killing himself for years, so why give up now?’

‘It’s serious. His liver’s packing up.’

She turned to him for a moment before flipping a piece of bacon out of the frying pan onto the mountain of beans and putting the plate on the table in front of him.

‘I really should eat a proper vegetable once in a while, shouldn’t I?’ Sean said, trying to change the subject.

‘You going to see him again?’ she said.

He didn’t reply.

‘Sean, love, it’s none of my business, and he is your father, but what good’s going to come of it?’

Sean shrugged and poked at the beans with his fork. Maureen went through to the front room and the sound of a game show filled the silence.

When he’d finished eating, Sean found a carrier bag under the sink and helped himself to a bottle of anti-bacterial
cleaner and a couple of cloths. This wasn’t going to cut very deep into the built-up grime of Jack Denton’s home, but it was a start. He put his head round the door of the living room to say goodbye to Maureen. She waved her cigarette but kept her eyes fixed on the screen. He could tell she was annoyed, but it wouldn’t last long.

Behind the house, he looked at his moped and thought better of it. He’d rather walk than leave it up at the flats. Along the road, a group of teenagers was hanging around the front gate of one of the gardens. Sean wasn’t a fighter, never had been. As a kid, he’d learnt to dodge rolled up newspapers, swinging belts, fists and feet, and he’d learnt to run. As a police officer, running away wasn’t an option any more, so he’d joined a gym to build muscles he hoped he wouldn’t have to use. Sean clenched his fists and felt his biceps harden but the teenagers didn’t even look round as he passed.

At Eagle Mount One Jack opened his front door cautiously.

‘Who’s that?’

‘Me. I thought I’d have a go at a bit of cleaning,’ Sean held up the carrier bag.

‘Come on in.’

Sean looked round the kitchen. He wished he’d bought some rubber gloves. Yesterday’s mugs and soup bowl had been added to a sink that was full of thick grey water, where the edges of crockery stuck up like the tips of icebergs. He held his breath and plunged his hand into the chilly slime to find the plug. A memory of his mother came to him. He must have been very little, standing on tiptoes to get his hands over the edge of the sink. She was wearing pink Marigolds.
Her fingers looked long and elegant, as if they were dressed up for a party. She let him put the gloves on and he danced round the room. It made her laugh.

He ran the tap and waited for some hot water, but none came. He filled the kettle and put it on to boil. Jack was lingering in the doorway watching him.

‘How are you feeling today?’ Sean said.

‘Like shit.’

‘Sorry to hear it.’

Jack sighed. ‘I’ve been a bugger. I know it.’

‘Leave it, Dad.’

‘I should have been there for you, after your mam died.’

Sean rubbed at the murky window with his thumb. The view from this side of the block was away from town. Cars streamed by on the ring road, and beyond was the dark outline of the woods. He could see himself, a boy of ten or eleven, sitting against a tree, head back, mesmerised by the leaves of the upper branches waving against a blue sky, the rush of the wind drowning out the sounds of the road and the estate beyond it. He sometimes fell asleep and woke up shivering, dry-mouthed, with the light beginning to fade. He always went home in the end, not because he was afraid of the woods, but because he feared what his father would do if he stayed out any later.

‘I should have taken you to football and that,’ Jack said.

‘I don’t think so.’

There’d been occasions when Jack was in a good mood, the right side of drunk for a joke and a laugh, but Sean never really understood what the jokes were about and just laughed along to keep things sweet. Then there were the times he’d
had to help his father home, paralytic and covered in vomit.

‘We should do something together, father and son, while …’

The cough caught his words and Sean was left to finish the sentence in his own head. He didn’t want to turn round and be reminded that Jack was only a man, not a monster. The kettle rattled to the boil and he poured a splash of boiling water onto a cloth and scrubbed away at the sink.

‘You said you might come to the meeting, what’s-their-name? They’ve got this thing, this group,’ Jack said.

Sean put the plates and cups back into the sink, squeezed in the washing up liquid and poured the rest of the kettle water on top.

‘Clean Up Chasebridge?’

‘Aye, that’s what they call it. They’ve got a bit of fire in their bellies, these lads. Haven’t seen much of that since Arthur Scargill.’

Sean rubbed away at a stubborn deposit of greenish-white mould at the bottom of a mug.

‘CUC. Clean Up Chasebridge. Good name, in’t it?’ Jack said. ‘Brings all the issues together.’

‘Right.’ The bottom of the mug was gradually turning white again and Jack was staring into space.

‘Aye.’ It was like a motor starting up. Jack nodded, blinked and licked a bit of spittle from the corner of his mouth. ‘Good lads, getting this place in order. Chasing out the undesirables. Chasing them out of Chasebridge! D’you get it? I should write the bloody slogans, me!’

He laughed and coughed his way into the next room where he collapsed back on the settee and lit up a cigarette,
hands trembling. Sean stood in the doorway of the living room and watched him struggling to catch his breath. When Sean turned back to the kitchen, he half expected to see it how it was before, when his mum was alive, and the floor tiles were still bright green. Through the window he watched a blue light flashing down the dual carriageway. It looked like an ambulance. If it was an RTA, who’d be attending? Maybe it was an attack. Every case started somewhere. Suddenly, a wave of relief flooded over him. The Saleem Asaf business was over, as quickly as that, and tomorrow night he’d back in uniform with Gavin telling his rubbish jokes in the battered squad car. Fuck it, he thought, it wouldn’t hurt to spend one evening with Jack.

‘When’s the meeting, Dad?’