Brixton Rock (15 page)

“
W
anna make ten sheets tonight?” Floyd proposed to Brenton, gate-crashing his bedroom. “All we have to do is go to that building site down the road, where they’re building dem new yards, and clap out the plywood, chipboard and two by two. What are you saying, man?”

Brenton rolled over onto his back. “Who’s it for?”

“Spinner. He’s in my room. He said he’ll give me twenty notes when he picks up the goods.”

On hearing the name, Brenton stood up and his expression stirred suspiciously. “Spinner? That trickster! I’d rather trust Terry Flynn to give me a decent hair-trim than Spinner. Let me chat to him.”

Floyd was relieved to see that his spar was showing some interest in the job; palavering about in the dead of night nicking bits of wood wasn’t something he fancied doing on his own.

The immaculately dressed Spinner was parking on Floyd’s bed, rolling an impressive-looking spliff. An equally impressive black Stetson crowned his unusually large head. The square glasses he wore gave him a mature appearance, and the glint of gold tooth made his smile broader than a horny pimp’s.

Examining his joint to make sure it was pastried to his pleasure, rather like a jeweller poring over an uncut diamond. Spinner arsoned his spliff with a personal engraved lighter.

“Wha’appen, Brown?” he drawled. “Backside, you ah get big. I
can’t frig about with you now, can I?” He glanced at Floyd. “Check his arm section -solid.”

Brenton snarled, “You owe me two pound. I did lif’ box for your bruk-down sound last year. I want my two pound, man.”

Spinner took a deep inhale of the burning weed, then as a gesture of good faith, offered it to his ex-employee. “Here, man, just touch this and cool yourself.”

Floyd looked on suspiciously, wondering how Spinner and Brenton knew each other so well. Meanwhile, the herb-hungry Brenton was making a quick hoover of the spliff, the thought of passing it on to Floyd not occurring to him.

“Give us ten pounds now and ten pounds tomorrow,” Brenton demanded, “yeah, and we’ll get the goods tonight. But Spinner, you’re lazy, man. Why can’t you get the wood yourself?”

Spinner cackled, then delved into the pocket of his suede top, emerging with a neat, brown sheet.

Half past one in the morning -a sodden March night. Only a blue light from the Chinese guy’s yard – situated at the end of the road - illuminated the drab housing. The Chinaman had been unemployed for seven years, and recently decided to reinvent himself by performing yoga exercises through the night. Floyd often peered through his window on his way home from a rave, wondering if he would take up a mad hobby after seven years of
G-cheques
.

The humming of the sparse traffic mingled with the
pitter-patter
of rain as Floyd trudged down the street, feeling the chill despite his two pullovers and bobble hat. “I’m seriously cold, man,” he whined to Brenton. “Makes you wonder why our parents come to this damned land. We should’ve waited for a better night. It’s freezing! My bottom lip feels like someone put that hardening glue on it, ’cos it’s all stiff-like. My bone has shrunk underneath my seedbags, and my nose feels like it’s got a friggin tiny fridge in it, used by dem small insects that scientists can only see tru dem serious microscope … we might have to make two or three trips.”

“Well, if you step it up, we might get it done. So stop complaining and move your backside.”

Workmen had begun building a small housing estate at the end of the road where Floyd and Brenton lived, but as yet, they had only completed the excavations and foundations. On an idle afternoon, Floyd had noted a delivery of plywood and chipboard sheets - ideal materials for any serious sound bwai with ambition. Sensing an opportunity to supplement his Giro, he quickly got the word out to all prospective sound-system builders, and Spinner, being a man who would pay the retail price for clothes, but not for wood, expressed an interest.

The two brethren reached the site, where they were confronted by a wire-meshed fence of about seven-foot high. This presented no serious worries to the raiding pair as they used their agility to leap and somersault over it. Having experience of working on building sites, Brenton had wisely sheathed on his army-like boots. In contrast, Floyd was doing his best to dodge the numerous puddles and muddy areas in a pair of lightweight training shoes.

Floyd sighted a sheet of transparent plastic covering near a hut and slip-slided his way over to it. “Brenton. Yo, Brenton! See it der.”

The two plunderers didn’t waste any time. Within seconds, they carried two eight foot by four foot sheets of board to rest on the fence. Then they went back for more, piling the wood against the whimpering wire-mesh.

Brenton leaped over to the other side of the fence and as Floyd pushed the swagger up, Brenton guided it over onto his side.

Looking back at the huts, Floyd suggested, “Hey, shall we bust open one of them huts? You never know what’s inside. Might find some of dem power tools. Check it out, you could sell dem when you go to work to dem other builder man, innit. Or sell dem to Biscuit. You know so he buys anyt’ing. The udder day he bought a friggin tea-maker,” Floyd sniggered. “Who is gonna buy dat off him? Apart from his mudder.”

“Look, man, I don’t wanna spend more time here than I need to, right? So just dally.”

The damp weather forced the marauders to work quickly. They soon had the first two sheets of wood stacked in the hostel’s back yard, and from then on, only a couple of troublesome motorists impeded their progress, causing them to place the wood flat on the pavement and hide behind parked cars. As for the limb-stretching Oriental, whose silhouette animated grotesquely behind a curtain, they simply ignored him.

They made three trips in all, and by 2:45 am were back in the warmth and safety of their rooms, rewarding themselves for a job well done by hoovering a generous spliff each. Spinner would call in next morning at seven o’clock to pick up the goods and sign the invoices.

Although very tired, Brenton could not sleep, nor even wanted to - Juliet gate-crashed his mind. Looking forward to next Friday evening, when they had arranged to meet, he had exciting visions of embracing her and scissoring her hair … His eyes closed as he tried to recapture the moment when he had kissed Juliet for the first time. He felt a strange loneliness in his bed as he bade laters to Mr Dean and drifted off to sleep, hoping for a sweet dream.

A
s Brenton lay curled up in bed, fast asleep and dreaming of all things pleasant, Juliet writhed sleepily in her own bed, under attack from morality questions that trampled her conscience. She hated herself for longing to be at Brenton’s side.

Her mind was like a battleground, with one side fighting for rampant desire, and the other for what was right. Passion easily won the day.

Seven o’clock in the morning.

Ms Massey had made a pot of tea. Wrapped in her dressing gown, she slowly climbed the stairs to wake her daughter, tapping on the door twice before entering. Before she could say, “Rise and shine, it’s seven o’clock‚” she saw that Juliet was already sitting in front of the mirror on the dressing table, tending to her hair. “Seh how long since you get up?” Cynthia asked, surprised.

“Oh, about half an hour. Couldn’t sleep last night.”

Cynthia studied her daughter in the way mothers do. “You must be worrying about somet’ing,” she remarked sagely. “Anyway, on your way from work, I want you to buy a few t’ings in Brixton Market. You know, yams an’ green banana an’ breadfruit.”

Juliet decorated her face with make-up. “Yes, Mum.”

“You sure everyt’ing is all right, mi love?”

“Yes, Mum, I’m just a bit tired.”

On the Tube train travelling to work, Juliet aimlessly stared out
the window as the crisis about her brother resurfaced from her mind. “There are more questions than answers,” her mother used to sing while cooking the Sunday dinner. If she only knew the truth, Juliet would never hear her cheerful voice again, she thought with a shudder.

Once she arrived at work, she was able to concentrate on her duties, leaving her no time to ponder on her personal problems. She talked on the phone to clients, filled in many forms, made phone calls to find out if potential clients were credit-worthy, and she danced her fingers on a typewriter and video data unit. Beside from her chores she fended off the amorous looks and chat-up lines from a few males who worked in the establishment.

Most of the guys she worked with were harmless, she thought, but one or two made her feel very uncomfortable by undressing her with their eyes. What’s wrong with married men? Ain’t they ever satisfied? she asked herself.

The women at work always seemed to be gossiping about who was allegedly screwing who within the company, and Juliet found that boring, but she got on well with a white girl who lived in the Elephant and Castle. Her name was Tessa, and Juliet found her working class wit very amusing. An attractive brunette with a man-look-over-his-shoulder figure, Tessa could stop the work on many building sites if she sauntered by - especially as she loved to dress in short tight skirts.

This Monday morning, the two colleagues went to a nearby McDonald’s for lunch. Tessa got ready to murder a Big Mac. “Steve’s a perve, I’m telling you,” she said earnestly. “Every time I talk to the bloke, he gawps at my breasts. Anyone would think he’d never seen a pair of boobs before. I mean, what did he suck on when he was a nipper? He can’t keep his bloody eyes off ’em. He gives me the bleedin’ creeps. I’ve got a good mind to tell Baldie my boss. Only thing is, I caught
him
staring at me an’ all! Christ, they’re all bloody perves at that place. They should be castrated.”

Juliet sniggered, although her friend was trying to be serious,
and she nearly choked on her fries when Tessa added, “How old is Baldie, anyway? Only twenty-eight, ain’t he? And he ain’t got no bloody hair. I’ve been here for nearly three years and Baldie’s never had any hair. He looks like one of them far-off planets, the poor bastard. We should call him Pluto.”

Still laughing, Juliet tried to defend Baldie. “He’s all right, though. He treats me OK, and he is fair and can take a joke. He puts up with a lot, with everybody taking the piss out of his head.”

Tessa scoffed her burger, looking towards the counter, where customers were lining up to buy their lunch. “That guy behind the counter, he’s a bit of all right, ain’t he? Wouldn’t mind his eyeing me up. Trouble is, the men you don’t want to ogle you, do, and the guys you want to notice you, don’t. I mean, why do I attract all the poxy low-lifes? It’s not bloody fair.”

Juliet could do nothing but giggle. “What happened to that guy, Whatsisname? You introduced him to me after work a few weeks ago. He was all right – not bad-looking for a white guy.”

“Bloody cheek! Malcolm is much better looking than the bloke you was hanging about with before Christmas. What’s his name? Oh yeah. Garnet – Mr Male Model who wears crocodile shoes and a Lee bleedin’ Van Cleef hat. He looks like a cross between John Wayne and Shaft. He was so vain, weren’t he, with that silly John Travolta walk and imitation silk shirts. I’m surprised he didn’t have a vanity case in his pocket. He’s another one I caught staring at my breasts. He was the one who had speaker boxes the size of my nan’s four-poster bed, wasn’t he?”

Juliet found it difficult to locate her mouth as her friend was making her laugh too much.

“Yeah, Malcolm was OK,” Tessa said reminiscently, “but he was an idiot as well though, a bloody moron. I’ll tell you something about Malcolm, shall I? He would rather get up on a cold Sunday morning, leave my bed and pay one pound to play football in some stupid park. And what’s more, he expected
me
to watch! The guy’s sex-drive is all in his feet. I mean, what’s wrong with me? I used to
think I frightened him off because I can be demanding, if you know what I mean. But football, effing football.”

Tessa was good therapy for Juliet. She could always be relied upon to bring a smile to her face. Even so, the lunch-break was only light relief, for Brenton was ever present at the back of her thoughts.

The two work mates high-heeled reluctantly back to the bank, knowing the sexist comments would be a little easier to cope with if they stayed in each other’s company.

It was 3:30 in the afternoon and across London on a building site, saucy remarks were shouted at passing women. Hammers tapped away like lead-filled drops of water falling into a sink. Bricklayers chipped their bricks with the same sound effects as popular late-night Kung Fu movies. Foremen and charge-hands were trying unsuccessfully to make themselves heard over the hum of a busy crane. Now and again, a couple of men dressed in shirt and tie and crowned by yellow safety helmets, went by clutching rolls of sketches and drawings, which seemed too large to analyse.

A young man walked gingerly away from the building site, holding his back with his right hand and stooping slightly. A black woollen hat covered his head, specked with cement mix. The size of his crusty frame was enhanced by the black, padded donkey jacket he was wearing, and along the pavement in his wake, he left a trail of gooey cement, dribbling off his army-type boots.

Cursing his luck, Brenton asked himself how he could take his sister out now that he’d hurt his back. He struggled his way to the bus stop, grim faced. A few aches passed before a number 36 heading for Camberwell pulled up. He took a seat on the lower deck, something he did very rarely.

After he disembarked near his home, he Long-John-Silvered to a chemist’s shop to buy a relief spray for aches and pains in the muscles. Reaching the hostel, he climbed the stairs to his room, where he delicately took off his donkey jacket and thick woollen pullover. He applied the spray to the damaged area, wondering
when he would derive relief‚ but only sensed a numbing coldness. Carefully, he laid on his bed, hoping for the pain to fuck off and leave him alone. Glancing at Mr Dean, he thought to himself that he might as well be in discomfort somewhere he would be looked after - his mother’s home.

He faltered down the stairs, hoping that Mr Lewis would be in, but a couple of unanswered slaps on the man’s office door prompted the thought that Lewis was probably attending a social-wanker meeting. Time for plan B - struggle down the road to the phone box, and pray that it hadn’t been vandalised.

Following a change of clothes, Brenton hobbled carefully to the red phone box. To his surprise, it was in working order, although there were hammer marks on the metal box where the coins dropped.

Brenton dialled 100 for the operator, explaining to her very politely that had pushed his coin in the slot, but lost the call due to a faulty mechanism. The operator asked him for the number he wanted to dial, and he gave her his mother’s. The operator then connected him through. Although he was now earning a wage, the crafty habits he had caught off Floyd were hard to cure.

Fortunately Ms Massey was at home having a day off; she was delighted to hear that her son was going to pay her a visit. Concerned about his bad back, she advised him to call a cab to travel to her home - Brenton had been hoping his mother would make this offer.

Sitting in her kitchen, opposite Cynthia, sipping a hot mug of tea, Brenton appeared thoughtful.

“How did Lewis find you?” he asked her suddenly.

“Apparently, it was quite easy for him. The social services ’ad files on you when you were very young. Before you was born, I ’ad to fill in ah whole ’eap of forms, y’know. Dem ask questions like, who is your doctor? Your address, next of kin. Dat kind of t’ing.”

Although he was listening, Brenton looked blank, trying to give the impression that his mother’s explanation wasn’t important.

“In fact, even though I did move around ah liccle in the early days, I always ’ad the same doctor since I was pregnant wid you, y’understand? So anyway, a while ago I had a call from my doctor an’ him tell me that a man from social services of Lambet’ wanted to talk to me urgently. I knew it was about you, so at first I tried to ignore it, ’cos I felt too much shame. But after t’inking about it for a week, I called my doctor an’ tell him that I would like to make my address available for Mr Lewis of the social services. I could have called Mr Lewis directly, but I didn’t want to. I don’t like social workers.”

Brenton stared out of the window, watching an impatient motorist reverse into a space, which seemed too small. He rubbed his temple as Cynthia continued, “It don’t sound good, do it? You mus’ be ashamed of me.”

Brenton switched his gaze to his mother’s regretful-looking countenance. Then he slowly nodded. For the first time since he’d met the woman, he pitied her. But he didn’t show any signs of sympathy. Instead he sipped his tea again, wondering when the offer of food would come.

“Wid dat sick back, you better go in the front room and lie ’pon the couch an’ res’ up. In a short while I will bring you somet’ing to eat.”

So Brenton painfully hauled himself from his chair and dragged his throbbing back to the front-room sofa.

Twenty minutes later, Ms Massey entered the room carrying a fried-egg sandwich on a plate. She noticed Brenton had taken off his pullover, exposing his T-shirt, and had made himself comfortable, lying down with eyes slightly ajar on the sofa. But what truly drew her eye was the ugly scar upon her son’s neck. “I will cook dinner later,” she told him, “but ’ave dis snack for the time being.”

Brenton sat up painfully and received the offering as Cynthia felt compelled to comment about the wound. “Brenton, do you mind if I ask you how you got that scar ’pon your neck?”

Brenton alligatored the sandwich before answering. “Some bad man did stab me. I don’t want to go into it, but these things happen when you’re on your own. I was lucky to live, so the doctor told me. But I survived and I’m here. If there’s one thing I am good at, it’s surviving.” The image of the loathsome Terry Flynn hurtled into his mind. You will pay for this, he promised inwardly.

Ms Massey settled into the armchair opposite her son and gave him a lingering‚ caring look. Brenton glanced at his mother and finished his sandwich.

“You know, your fader got into fights because he went out wid me,” Cynthia confided. “I remember one of his best friends got drunk-up one night, an’ started calling him a nigger lover. Gary ’ad a very bad temper, an’ I screamed when the two of dem clashed.”

His interest caught, Brenton listened avidly.

“We ’ad to be very careful where we did go if we wanted to go out somewhere nice,” Cynthia went on. “Sometimes we would jus’ walk an’ talk inna park, y’know. Gary used to like nature an’ was always talking about driving to the country for the weekend. One of me best memories was your fader taking me to Kew Gardens. It was such a beautiful day - all the plants, flowers and t’ing look so nice. Your fader did want to take me to the bes’ clubs, but it was too dangerous. Even if we went to a black person party or
drink-up
, people would pass dem comments.”

Brenton thought of his adopted bench in Brockwell Park.

“When I look back,” Ms Massey said thoughtfully, “I ’ave to say your fader was a very brave man.”

“He wasn’t brave enough to look after me though, was he?”

Cynthia watched her son try and get himself comfortable on the sofa once more. A few Gary reminiscences later, she departed.

Time passed and Brenton fell into a heavy slumber. At a quarter to seven in the evening, the front door closing awoke him and in walked Juliet, both hands clutching bags full of shopping. She was surprised to see her brother there, snug on the settee.

“Make yourself at home, won’t you?” she joked.

Brenton was really pleased to see her but, as so often of late, his mind suddenly decided to rewind to an incident from the past.

Sitting on his metal-framed bed, the seven-year-old Brenton was confronted by The Belt. In her loud shrieking voice, she laid down the law to the child entrusted to her care.

“You, my boy, are going to school. I don’t want to hear any more lies about hurting your back while getting in the coal last night. No excuses, you’re going with the others. Or else I’ll give you what for.”

The speed at which Brenton’s mind recalled an event from his childhood was the same that flashed him back to the present. He focused his eyes on his sister, thinking about that day of forbidden passion.

“I was mixing cement and I felt this wicked pain in my back,” he explained, “so I’m here, getting some tender loving care. Know what I mean?”