Hater 1: Hater (6 page)

    Chris Spencer had been laying the drive in Beechwood Avenue for almost a day and a half and the job was not far off finished. It was a cash-in-hand job on the side for Jackie, a friend of a friend of his girlfriend. He'd started digging out and laying the foundations first thing yesterday morning and now, Saturday lunchtime, he was two-thirds of the way through putting down the block paving. It was hard, physical work and he was on his own today after being let down by his brother who, for a few quid, usually helped him out with jobs like this. It was a cold day but at least it was dry now. It had been raining earlier and he'd started to wonder whether all the effort and the loss of his usual Saturday morning lie-in would be worth the wad of cash he was hoping to shove in his back pocket.

    The wheelbarrow was empty again. Tired and hungry he stood up and brushed the sand off his knees, ready to fetch another load of paving bricks. A couple more hours hard graft, he thought, and that would be everything but the edging stones done. He pushed the barrow over towards the half-empty pallet on the grass verge at the side of the road. His calculations had been just about spot-on, he smiled to himself. He'd quoted Jackie for two and a half pallets of bricks but it looked like the job was only going to need two. He'd shove the rest of the bricks in the back of the van and use them on the next job. It wasn't much of a saving but it all helped. It was all profit.

    He was half-way through filling the barrow when the motorbike pulled up beside him. It was a huge, powerful thing with a wide exhaust and an impossibly loud engine. He'd heard it approaching from the bottom of the hill. Must be Jackie's son, he thought. She'd said something about him coming over to see her this afternoon. He glanced up and nodded an acknowledgement to the rider as he parked his machine and rested it on the kickstand. The leather-clad figure flicked back his visor and took off his helmet.

    'All right, mate, how you getting on?' he asked. 'Mum said it was looking good.'

    'Almost done now,' Spencer replied, loading the last few bricks into the barrow and standing up straight. He stretched his back and looked across at the other man. 'Couple of hours and I should be finished. Just got to get the rest of these bricks down and finish off the edges. I think it's…'

    He stopped speaking and stared into Jackie's son's face.

    'What's the matter?'

    Spencer couldn't answer. He couldn't speak. He was filled with a sudden, indescribable sense of panic and fear. His heart thumping in his chest, he took a couple of nervous backwards steps towards the house and tripped up the lip of the bricks he'd already laid, landing on his backside. The other man walked towards him and held out his hand to help him up.

    'You feeling okay, mate? Want me to get you a drink of water or something?'

    Spencer recoiled. He scrambled back to his feet, grabbing a heavy lump hammer as he got up. He launched himself at Jackie's son and wrapped his left hand round his throat. Knocked off-balance the two men fell awkwardly to the ground, Jackie's son on his back with Spencer on top, pinning him down.

    Spencer lifted the lump hammer and brought over a kilogram of metal smashing down into the middle of the other man's face, caving in his forehead and the bridge of his nose and killing him almost instantly. He lifted the gore-covered hammer and bludgeoned what was left of his face another five times, leaving his head virtually concave, hollowed out like a deflated football.

    Spencer got up and stood breathless over the corpse before being thrown off balance again. Jackie, wailing like a banshee, ran from the front of the house and shoved him away from the body of her son. She screamed and dropped to the ground when she saw the hole in his head and the mass of splintered bone and pulped flesh where his face used to be. She looked up at Spencer but all she saw was the bloodied edge of the lump hammer as he swung it towards her.

    'We're going to be late,' Lizzie grumbles. I know we are, but there's not a lot I can do about it. If she'd given me more notice that we were supposed to be taking Edward to a friend's birthday party then we would have been fine. Half an hour to get the kids ready and out isn't enough. Part of me wishes she'd forgotten about it for another hour. I want Ed to have a good time and enjoy himself of course I do, but I'm not looking forward to spending the next couple of hours sitting in a kid-friendly and adult-unfriendly 'fun-barn' attached to the side of a pub. It's not how I'd planned to spend my Saturday afternoon.

    'We'll get there when we get there,' I tell her. 'Getting wound up about it isn't going to help.'

    'I'm not wound up,' she snaps, proving that she is. 'I just don't like being late, that's all.'

    'We won't be late. We've got a few minutes yet. The pub's only round the corner.'

    'I know but look at the traffic.'

    'There's probably been an accident or something,' I tell her, sitting up in my seat and craning my neck to try and see further down the road. 'I think there's something going on at the top of the hill. Once we get past that the traffic will clear.'

    I hear a muffled thump and a yelp from behind me. I glance over my shoulder and glare at the kids who are crammed shoulder to shoulder on the back seat. They hate being in the car nearly as much as I do. It's too small for us all to fit in but what can I do? I can't afford to change it so they'll just have to put up with it for now. We all will. Lizzie looks at them and then leans closer to me.

    'We're going to have to feed them,' she whispers, keeping her voice low so they don't hear.

    'Ed will eat at the party, won't he?'

    'Yes, but…'

    'We'll get the other two a packet of crisps or something,' I say quickly before she gets any ideas. I think I know where this is heading.

    'They'll need more than that,' she says. 'We're going to be out for a couple of hours. Why don't we just make it easy for ourselves and have a meal.'

    'Because we can't afford it.'

    'Come on, Danny, we might as well. We're going to be sat in the pub anyway.'

    'We can't afford it,' I say again. How much clearer do I need to make it? 'Look, we'll drop Ed off then go back home and have some dinner. I'll come back and pick him up again after the party.'

    'Is it worth all the hassle and the extra petrol? Let's just stop and have a meal and we can…'

    'We can't afford it,' I snap for the third time as we reach the top of the hill and pass whatever it is that's been slowing down the traffic. I look into the rear view mirror and see that the kids are pressing their faces against the glass, trying to see what's going on. 'Don't stare,' I shout at them. I can't help but look myself. Looks like the police have sealed off the entrance to one of the roads which leads off Maple Street.

    'Twenty quid,' Lizzie continues. Bloody hell, she's not going to give up. 'Are you telling me you can't find twenty quid to feed your family?'

    'Yes,' I answer, trying hard not to get annoyed, 'that's exactly what I'm telling you.' I'm determined she's not going to get the better of me today, no matter how hard she tries. 'I haven't got twenty quid and even if I had, why should I spend it on a meal when we've got a freezer full of food at home? At home we can eat twice as much for half the cost.'

    'When was the last time we ate out?'

    'When was the last time I had enough money to take us out?'

    'Come on, Danny…'

    I'm not even going to answer. I'll keep my mouth shut and concentrate on driving. She does this to me too often. She's like a dog with a bone. She won't let go. She just keeps nagging and piling on the pressure until I relent just to shut her up.

    Not today.

    I caved in. I'm disappointed with myself but it was inevitable. She just wouldn't stop. She kept on and on at me all the way here. I figured I could either relent and take the hit to my wallet or I could stand my ground and risk a whole weekend of grief and her not talking to me. When I walked into the pub and smelled the food and looked at the menu my resistance crumbled. Pathetic really.

    We've been waiting for our dinner for almost half an hour now and I'm starting to think they might have forgotten our order. We're tucked out of the way in a corner of the main dining area and the place is heaving. It's Saturday lunchtime so I expected it to be busy but not like this. The long, horseshoe-shaped bar is surrounded by a crowd of bodies several drinkers deep. I should have seen it coming really. There's a football match on this afternoon. It's a local derby between two teams at the bottom of the table and there's a lot at stake for both sides. The ground the match is being played at is only fifteen minutes walk from here. Most of the people crammed in here seem to be supporters enjoying their traditional pre-match drinking session. I bet the place will empty after kick-off but we'll be long gone by then. The supporters from both sides seem to be tolerating each other but the noise in here is deafening and I feel uneasy. Maybe I'm just on edge after what happened at the concert last night. I'm worried that there's going to be trouble. Lizzie's thinking the same thing, I can see it in her face. She keeps looking around the crowd and frowning. She's noticed that I'm looking at her now and her expression has suddenly changed.

    'Okay?' she asks, trying to sound relaxed and happy but failing to convince me.

    'Great,' I grunt. 'No food yet and I can't hear myself think.'

    Ellis reaches across the table and tugs at my sleeve.

    'Don't do that,' I snap.

    'When's dinner coming?'

    'When it's ready.'

    'When will that be?'

    'I don't know.'

    'Just be patient,' Liz tells her. 'As soon as they've cooked it someone will bring it over to us.'

    'I want it now,' she states, not interested in any excuses or explanations. 'I'm hungry.'

    'We're all hungry, love. As soon as it's ready they'll bring it over to us and…'

    'Want it now,' she says again.

    'Did you hear what Mum just said?' I hiss at her, my patience rapidly wearing thin. 'Just shut up and wait. Your dinner will be here when…'

    I stop talking. Smashing glass. There's a sudden roar of noise from deep within the crowd around the bar. I stare into the mass of faded denim and football shirts looking for trouble. I can't see anything. I'm relieved when I can hear laughs and jeers amongst the noise.

    'What's up?' Lizzie asks me.

    'Nothing,' I answer. 'Can't see anything…'

    A very drunk, beer-soaked football fan staggers past our table on the way to the toilet. A member of the bar staff carrying a dustpan and brush passes them going the other way. Looks like it was a spilled drink, nothing more serious.

    Our food finally arrives. My mouth starts watering and my stomach is growling but I can't eat yet. Another one of the joys of parenthood. Josh is sitting next to me and I now have to go through the well-rehearsed routine of cutting up his dinner and smothering it in tomato sauce before I can start mine. Both Liz and Ellis are well into their meals by the time I finally manage to pick up my knife and fork.

    'Is it all right?' she asks me before I've finished my first mouthful. Christ, give me a second to taste it first.

    'Fine,' I answer. 'Yours?'

    She nods and chews.

    For a blissful minute or two the table is quiet. The rest of the pub is still filled with noise but with everyone temporarily distracted by their food there's a welcome pause in our conversation. It doesn't last long.

    'I want to go and see Dad tomorrow,' Lizzie says. 'That all right with you?' I nod my head as I eat. I'm not surprised. We seem to end up over at Harry's house most Sunday afternoons. We see him virtually every day now since he agreed to look after Josh so that Liz can go to work. She's a classroom assistant at the school Ed and Ellis go to. Harry's not happy about it but he does it because he knows how much we need the money.

    'Okay,' I answer, finally swallowing my food, 'we'll go over in the afternoon.'

    'He's been really good to us recently,' she continues. 'I don't want him to think that we're just going to keep taking.'

    'Like your sister does?'

    'Leave Dawn alone. She's been struggling since Mark left.'