Born Bad (30 page)

‘Good boy. So now I can go to work
without worrying, eh?’

Before he prepared to leave, Harry got another cuddle from Tom, and a swift crafty kick in the shins from Kathleen. ‘Thank you for telling him how it is,’ she declared sweetly, ‘that I’m a poor old thing who can’t go down the street without getting lost. Sure it’s a miracle to have a grand lad like Tom, to show me the way home.’

‘Bye, Daddy.’ Tom and Kathleen walked him
to the car, with Harry pretending to limp, until Kathleen gave him a sly shove and nearly sent him headfirst into the gutter. ‘Oh, dearie me!’ she told Tom. ‘Did you see yer poor old daddy? He lost his footing and nearly fell over, so he did. He must be getting old, don’t ye think?’

Tom gave a child-groan. ‘I can’t hold
his
hand as well,’ he complained, ‘’cause I need to hold yours, don’t I?’

‘You certainly do or I might get lost and we wouldn’t want that …’ she raised her voice to a suitable level, ‘WOULD WE HARRY?’

Harry gave a cheeky wink, ‘We might!’ he chuckled, ‘If you keep shouting at me like that.’

He climbed into the car and started the engine, ‘Bye, you two. See you later, eh?’

‘Now, come on you,’ she told Tom, as they waved goodbye to Harry. ‘Something wants washing, so
it does.’

‘What wants washing?’ Tom was curious.

‘Face, hands, neck and ears,’ Kathleen grinned, ‘and who d’ye think they belong to?’

‘TOM!’ He clapped his hands excitedly. ‘They belong to Tom!’

‘That’s absolutely right.’ She took a firm hold of him. ‘So let’s get on with it then. The sooner you’re all clean and shining, the sooner we’re off to the shops for them bright new Wellingtons.’ She
looked down as he skipped his way up the path. ‘So, is that all right with you then, Tom?’

‘It is!’ He ran on ahead. ‘SO IT IS!’ he called behind him, and when Kathleen took off after him, puffing and panting, and threatening to report him to the fairies for daring to mock the Irish, the joyous little fellow laughed until he ached.

For the next few minutes it was all screaming and yelling, until
a shiny face appeared from the depths of the towel. ‘Good grief!’ Kathleen declared in a shaky voice. ‘Who’s this little fella here? Sure I’ve never seen him before. Get out of my house at once … go on with ye! Sure, if ye don’t get out of me house, I’ll call on Tom. He’ll soon be rid of ye, so he will!’

Giggling, Tom protested. ‘It’s me!’ he cried out loud. ‘
It’s Tom!
’

‘Tom, y’say?’ Kathleen
took a step backwards. ‘That’s not my Tom, no, it’s not. Never in a million years.’ She peered at him, then she closed one eye to peer closer, then the other, until at last she cried with relief, ‘Bejaysus, so it is! Will ye look at that! Sure, I never would have known it was you.’

Tom couldn’t stop laughing, until she tickled him under the arms and he ran away with her giving chase.

When she
eventually caught him, she first gave him a stern talking to for running off, then she cuddled him good and proper.

On the way down to the sitting room, he held her hand. ‘Sure I’m not likely to get lost in me own house, am I?’ she declared.

‘So, don’t you want me to hold your hand?’ He felt disappointed, especially after promising his daddy.

‘Well, o’ course I do. It’s grand, so it is.’

So, with her smiling and him in charge, she allowed him to hold her hand all the way into the sitting room. ‘Are you all right now, Kathleen?’ he asked.

‘Right as rain, and thank you.’

‘Listen a minute, Kathleen.’

‘I’m listening, my love.’

‘W-well …’ he stuttered nervously, ‘I can’t hold your hand
all
the time. I’m too little.’

‘Ah sure, I understand so I do, and I have an idea.’

Tom’s eyes
grew like saucers. ‘Is it a secret?’

She took a deep breath. How to phrase her words so as not make him feel worthless, that was the problem. ‘Let me see … ah yes, that’s it. A special secret, just between the two of us.’

Lowering her head, Kathleen spoke softly, in a conspiratorial manner. ‘Look now, Tom, shall we make a deal between the two of us, right here and now?’

Taking on her secretive
manner, he leaned towards her, asking in a furtive whisper, ‘How can we do that?’

Kathleen peered from right to left and again over his head, before continuing in a whisper, ‘Well now, Tom. When we’re in the house or the garden, we won’t worry too much about holding hands.’ She paused momentarily, to have another furtive peek
about. ‘But when we’re out in the streets or crossing the road, we’d
best do as yer daddy says. So then, Tom, do you think that’s a good deal?’

Before answering, Tom also had a peek about; he adored Kathleen and he loved their secret. ‘Yes!’ he whispered. ‘It’s good, yes.’

Groaning, Kathleen stood up to straighten her old bones. ‘You’re a wise old man in the making, Tom Blake. But we’ve made a wonderful deal so we have, and I’m very pleased.’

‘Yeah!’ Tom felt
very proud of himself, and especially proud of Kathleen, who knew how to fix everything.

Kathleen ruffled his hair. ‘That’s you done with,’ she declared, ‘so now I’ll be away and make the beds while you play with your Dinky cars, Okay?’

Tom was so happy, he could not help jumping on the spot.

‘Okay, Kathleen!’ and off he went to find his box of cars, leaving Kathleen to watch the happy little
soul skipping away, and her old heart bursting with love for that brave little fella who had found a forever place in her affections.

‘Ah, sure ye’re a lovely little fella, so ye are,’ she whispered. ‘Never you fear, me darlin’, ye’re daddy and me will always take care of you.’

Feeling content with her lot, she went away to make the beds.

Not a million miles away in Jackson Street, Judy
was busy clearing away the breakfast things. While Kathleen’s home was cosy and inviting, however, the house where Judy and Phil lived was jaded and worn. Most of the furniture was second-hand, on account of Phil claiming that he did not have money to waste on new stuff.

In the beginning, Judy had stood her ground and managed to secure a new dressing-table and bed, and a smart sideboard for the
sitting room. The sofa though was already past its best when they bought it; the brown cloth covering was rubbed bald and in the corner where Phil normally slouched to nap, there was a distinct hole which seemed to grow larger and deeper by the day.

That’s where she found him now, stretched out on the sofa snoring like a pig. ‘Phil.’ She gave him a gentle prod with the end of the hoover. ‘Wake
up.’

Arms flailing, he sat bolt upright. ‘Stupid bitch!’ Rubbing his eyes, he demanded, ‘What the hell’s wrong with you?’

Instinctively taking a step back, Judy explained, ‘I need to hoover underneath the sofa, and I have to tip it backwards. I’ve done all the other jobs and left this till last because I knew you were tired. Only I’d like to finish off now.’

‘Oh, would you now?’ Swinging himself
up to a sitting position, he stroked her leg, pushing with the palm of his hand all the way up to her thigh. ‘So, what’s the big hurry?’

As always when he touched her, she began to tremble inside. ‘No reason, only I had a mind to go into town and see how much their sofas were.’ She gestured towards the kitchen. ‘I was just looking at the local paper and Jacobs have a sale on. They’re getting
rid of old stock. Some of the stuff is going for less than half. I thought if I got down there early, I might be able to get a cheap sofa.’ And if there was half a chance, she might see Harry. That would be so wonderful.

‘What!’ Clambering to his feet he laughed spitefully in her face. ‘Why would we need a new sofa?’ He began bouncing up and down. ‘There’s still a few good years left in this
one.’

Hoping he was not about to be difficult, Judy pointed to the sagging area where he had lain. ‘Well, for one thing that hole is getting bigger, and the pattern has rubbed off the cloth everywhere else. It’s a mess, and I’m ashamed of it. Please, Phil … can’t I just get a new one?’

‘Oh, I see. Just like that – we go out and spend a chunk of
my
hard-earned money, to pay for something we don’t
need and don’t want. Have you lost your mind or what?’ As it happened, Phil had a nice little stash put away from his thefts at work. He and the big Scot, McArthy, had covered their tracks well.

Judy knew the signs. When he was in one of his argumentative moods, there was no reasoning with him. ‘I know how hard you have to work for your money,’ she admitted, ‘but if you could agree this once,
it would be money well spent. Take a good look at the sofa, Phil, and you’ll see it’s way past its prime. Your mate gave it to us after he bought his wife a new one, and that was years ago. I’ll admit it’s served us well, but we need to be rid of it now, before it falls apart.’

‘It won’t fall apart. It’s made of wood, and likely to survive longer than the two of us put together.’

Detesting the
nearness of him and realising that she had lost the argument, Judy turned away. ‘All right, Phil, it doesn’t matter.’

‘Hey! Not so quick.’ Gripping her by the shoulders, he spun her round to face him, his face wreathed in a smile, the kind of smile
that spelled trouble. ‘That’s not very nice, is it … turning your back on me like that? Especially when you woke me out of a deep sleep.’

‘Sorry.’

His face crumpled in disgust. ‘Why must you always be sorry?’

She took a moment, before replying in a small voice, ‘I don’t know, really. I suppose I’m always sorry, because …’ She wanted to say she was sorry because she hated herself for kowtowing to him; and that she hated him for making her afraid; and because he had made her little more than a prisoner, keeping her to himself, and now she
had no friends and no one else to turn to. She wanted to tell him how desperately unhappy she was, and that if she had anywhere else to go, she would leave him here and now.

More than anything else, she longed to tell him that every minute of every day she ached with regret, for being so naïve and trusting in saying yes, when he asked her to marry him.

She was desperately sorry, because he had
turned out to be a bully and a brute. She was sorry that every time he took her to himself, it was with a degree of sadistic savagery that only made her loathing of him all the greater.

All of that and more, she wanted to shout from the rootftops, but she did not have the courage to face the pain and punishment that would surely follow
.

Slowly but surely, Phil Saunders had turned her into a
recluse, a frightened, cowardly creature who continued to put up with him and his domineering ways, because over the years he had systematically taken all the fight out of her.

That was the sad list of reasons why she was ‘sorry’ – but she would never dare say it out loud. Not if she wanted to go on living.

Checking her need to yell at him, she gave him a quiet, studied answer. ‘I’m sorry because
you won’t let me go out to work, so I can help bring in some money, to get more of the things we need.’

As soon as she said it, she knew she had made a mistake; her comments were like a red rag to a bull. ‘Phil, I only meant—’

‘I know what you meant!’ He pushed his face close to hers, the spittle flying out of his mouth as he raised his voice. ‘
Liar!
What you really meant was, you don’t think
I bring home enough money. You resent me going for a pint on a Friday night, don’t you? Admit it! I’m right, aren’t I?’ Taking hold of her, he shook her hard. ‘ADMIT IT!’

‘No, Phil. I didn’t mean that at all.’

There was no let-up. ‘You’re a barefaced liar! You sulk when I
have a pint or a bet on the horses, and you hate me talking to other women. You whine all the time about how we never go
anywhere, that you never have enough money for this or that, and now you’re nagging to go out to work, so’s you can eye up other men and get them into your knickers. That’s it, isn’t it? I SAID, ISN’T IT?’

‘No, I would never do that … you know I would never do that.’

‘LYING COW! I know what you’re up to. Don’t think I haven’t seen you looking at other men when you’ve been out with me. Time and
again, I’ve had to forcefully claim what’s rightfully mine, because you would rather give it to some other man. And look at you now, eh? Not satisfied with what I provide, you’re after spending my hard-earned money on a sofa, when we already have a perfectly good one right here. What do you take me for, eh? WHAT THE DEVIL ARE YOU TRYING TO DO TO ME?’

Dreading what was bound to follow, Judy began
trembling. ‘I’m sorry, Phil.’

‘Oh, there you go again, with the “Sorry, Phil”,’ he mimicked. ‘Well, I’m sorry too. Sorry that you can’t live peaceably with me, and sorry that you feel I’m not looking after you as a man should.’

He threw her aside. ‘You make me sick!’

As she went to claw her way up from the floor, he pushed her down with the knuckle-end of his fist. ‘If you think I will ever
let you go out to work, you’d better think again. Your place is here in this house, keeping it clean, having my meal ready when I come home from work, and giving me comfort whenever I need it. You’re my wife! It’s my right. You’re supposed to understand that, for pity’s sake.’

Hunched on the floor, she merely nodded at his every word. Right now, there was nothing left to say, nothing in her heart
to give him.

‘Oh, so now it’s the silent treatment, is it?’ Stooping, he stared her in the face. ‘What’s your little game, eh? What are you up to?’

‘I’m not up to anything!’ Angry and frustrated, and regardless of what the punishment might be, she found herself yelling back. ‘I’ve told you before, I’m not a liar and I don’t make eyes at other men. All I want is to work and earn money so we can
have a new sofa, and curtains. Maybe we could even afford to go on a holiday, or just spend one day at the beach. Or just for once when I see something I like – a pair of shoes or a dress – how lovely it would be to go in and buy it, instead of grovelling to you for money and then waiting until you’re good and ready to give it. Don’t you see?
I could take that burden from your shoulders, if I
went out to work.’

Mentally and emotionally drained, she finished lamely, ‘Besides, I get so lonely staying in this place. There’s no one to talk to. The thing is, Phil, I need to be with other people. I find myself doing little things twice over, like wiping down the table, hoovering, or going round the furniture with the polish, and sometimes when I’m really lonely, I might walk down to see
Pauline.’