Blood Relatives (27 page)

Time slipped a week or two before I headed over Shipley way. Cos I hadn’t been paying much attention when Mitch had driven me over there, I couldn’t remember rightly where it wor. I knew it wor a merchant’s yard, wi’ a line of offices on an upper storey wi’ cast-iron steps leading up to an outside walkway. I knew it wor t’ third door along.

I wor about to give it up as a bad job when I found it: a small industrial yard behind a row of shabby shops. There wor a couple of skips in t’ yard, an old Ford van and a pile of scaffolders’ poles and boards stacked along t’ base of one wall.

I knocked and heard a gruff ‘Yep,’ so I went in. It wor t’ same bloke all right, sat in t’ same fake leather swivel chair behind t’ same cluttered desk. An air-con fan rattled away in one corner, causing a pile of weighted-down papers to flap.

‘What can I do for you?’ he said in a bored drawl, leaning back so t’ chair rolled a little way from t’ desk. He had beads of sweat on his upper lip. His beer gut wor straining at his shirt buttons.

‘It’s about Mitchell Thorpe.’

He sat upright and frowned warily, as if trying to place me. ‘And you are?’

‘His son. Stepson. Or at least I wor.’

The bloke’s eyelids flickered. ‘Wor?’

‘He drowned. Last winter.’

The bloke’s eyes shifted from me to t’ door and back again.

‘So what do you want, a condolence letter?’

‘He fell through t’ ice trying to rescue his dog.’

The bloke picked up a stapler from t’ desk, turned it over in his hand. ‘And the dog? What happened to t’ dog?’

‘Dog wor fine.’

The bloke set the stapler back down, and seemed to deflate slightly. ‘I like dogs,’ he said.

‘There’s some stuff. I thought you might be interested.’

He cocked his arms half-wide, palms open, fingers spread. ‘So where is it?’

‘Back home. I need a van or someone to come and collect it.’

The bloke half-smiled, half-snorted. ‘I don’t do collect, sonny. You sort out a van and I’ll take a look at what you’ve got.’

Eric wor updating the round-book and chewing on t’ end of his biro.

‘How’s the nipper?’ I said, making idle talk.

‘Cries a lot. Karen’s mother helps out, and looks after him when Karen’s got hairdressing customers. That’s the only good bit about her folks living around t’ corner.’ He bit his bottom lip and stared into t’ middle distance. ‘She’s pregnant again.’

‘But that’s good, ain’t it?’

‘Dunno.’

‘You dunno?’

‘Dunno.’

‘You’ll need extra dosh then?’

Eric frowned. ‘I could always do wi’ a bit extra. Seems it’s never enough. Prices go up every month.’

I told him about all t’ knocked-off stuff that wor still in t’ garage. He said he’d come and give it the once-over. He said there wor someone at Corona who could probably get shot of it. ‘As long,’ he said, ‘as you put a bit my way.’

‘Of course. Tell me it’s not Craner?’

‘You think I’m that daft? No, it’s not bloody Craner.’

He closed the round-book and turned the ignition. ‘Come on. Tea-break time.’

Lourdes wor sitting astride the low yard wall outside her house, enjoying the late-August sunshine. She had a wide-brimmed straw hat pulled low over her large sunglasses, a canary-yellow top and tight denims down to her calves. When she clocked our van pulling up she stood up and went indoors. Eric and I exchanged a glance.

Eric said, ‘Take her a bottle of summat. She’ll be right wi’ you.’

She’d left the back door open, so I rapped on it and stepped directly into t’ hallway. ‘Lourdes! Corona!’ I swung the Coke bottle between my fingers. ‘Lourdes! Anyone?’

‘Leave it on duh table, mi got business,’ came a hoarse shout from t’ back kitchen. I walked into t’ kitchen. She wor leant wi’ her back to t’ sink, dragging on a ciggie.

‘You no hear me, bwoy?’

‘Don’t see no business.’

She pulled her hat tighter across her brow and pressed her forefinger against t’ bridge of her sunglasses. She wouldn’t look at me. The corner of her bottom lip wor swollen. I set the bottle of pop down on t’ small drop-leaf table near to me.

‘Ta,’ she said.

‘You’re welcome.’

She scratched the back of her calf wi’ t’ toe of t’other foot.

‘What I owes you for pop?’

‘You don’t.’

‘So what you’s waiting for? Mi ain’t doing business today, if that’s what you’s after.’

‘You know friggin’ well I’m not, Lourdes. Anyway, I thought you had business.’

‘Well, I ain’t. Ain’t making no tea neither. Dis place no caf.’ She pulled off the sunglasses. ‘Dis what you’s wanting to see?’

Her right eye wor puffed up and half-closed. Shades of dirty yellow and purple bruising bled into each other like a film of oil on a road puddle. Beneath her left eye wor a dark scored line.

‘Jeez. Who did that?’

A brief, hollow laugh escaped her. ‘Why, bwoy, what ya going to do about it?’

‘I … I …’

‘You’s want some advice, bwoy? Stay out of what don’t concern ya. You’s remember that. Don’t go telling people ya business, bwoy, and don’t trust no one.’

She wor right. Punter, pimp, domestic. None of my concern. Mitch would have said the same.

‘I have to go.’

Lourdes nodded. ‘You go. Lourdes don’t want you round here no more. I’s giving up dis game. Maybe start a new life in a new town. You go, and leave Lourdes alone.’

On t’ back of t’ van someone had traced in t’ grime: ‘I wish my bird was as filthy as this’. Eric wor in t’ cab, his gob full of sausage roll.

‘Well?’

‘Tea’s gone cold.’

He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. ‘So we’ll find another pit stop.’

‘She says she’s giving up t’ game.’

Eric laughed sourly. ‘They don’t give up. None of them do. It gives them up when they lose their looks cos of all t’ drink or t’ drugs they’re downing or injecting. Or they just plain get too old and get pushed out by t’ young’uns. If they live that long.’

The ‘someone’ at Corona wor four-fingered Kev. He turned up wi’ Eric in an old estate car. Mother came waltzing out of t’ house to say hello, so I had to introduce her to them both, and then she blathered on for a friggin’ age wi’ Eric cos she’d heard all about him from me and it wor ‘good to put a face to a name’ and all that baloney, while Kev hung back wi’ his hands in his pockets like he wor wanting to hide in t’ nearest shrubbery. I told Mother that they wor helping me clear out the garage by flogging some stuff and taking the rest to t’ tip. Mother nodded briefly, like she knew what wor going on really, but didn’t want to know. She said she wor heading into town to do some shopping. That gave us a good two hour.

We loaded up the boot as fast as we could. The rear tyres wor half-flat by t’ time the car wor fully loaded. It looked like it wor leaning back on its haunches. I told Kev that if he got pulled over wi’ it I’d deny all knowledge. He gave me thirty quid, which wor way under t’ value. Then I had to give a tenner of that to Eric. But at least I wor shot of it.

Late in t’ evening the phone rang. I wor standing right by it, but as no one ever phoned me, I worn’t going to answer it. Mother glared at me and snatched it up. She wor expecting it to be Mand. She’d gone to a Bauhaus gig at Leeds Uni wi’ all her goth mates. Mother had been fretting about how she wor going to get home afterward, which had led to another barney. She didn’t want sis even walking the short stretch from t’ bus stop at the end of our road. This had riled sis, which meant another slanging match about keeping safe and avoiding HIM, and sis doing her usual shouting and door-banging stuff. I said that if HE came upon Mand in t’ dark in all her goth clobber he’d probably turn tail in fright and run a friggin’ mile. Mother told me to shut it. In t’ end it wor agreed that Mand would stay wi’ Marcus, and that she’d ring to say she wor safe. Sis wor happy about this, cos it meant she could spend the whole night wi’ her boyfriend. Probably hanging upside down from a beam.

Only it worn’t Mand on t’ phone. It wor t’ nursing home to say that Gran wor very frail and might not have much longer on this earth. Mother wor told that they’d ‘keep her posted’, and she thanked them. She sat on t’ padded seat end of t’ telephone table, cradling the receiver in her lap. She didn’t notice that the caller had rung off and the phone wor buzzing ’til I said so. Then she set it gently back in its cradle.

Mid-autumn dusk wor a blueish tinge by t’ time I reached the small prefab estate where Gordon lived. There wor three kids, nine- or ten-year-olds, sitting atop a flat shed roof, firing off small stones at the gnomes in t’ neighbours’ garden. One of them tossed one my direction.

‘Hey, mister!’

‘Ain’t it past your bedtimes?’ I kept walking.

‘Fuck off! You don’t belong round here. Hey mister! Mister! Are you going to visit the old bloke?’

One of them stood up and chucked a stone wi’ more gusto. It whizzed past my ear and pinged up off t’ pathway that led to Gordon’s prefab. If I’d been wearing my blue nylon Corona coat and portering a few bottles of cherryade or dandelion & burdock, that would have been a legit intrusion. Cos I’d have summat they wanted. They watched me ’til I turned the corner and wor out of their sight, behind t’ hedge. The Humber wor parked in front of t’ lean-to garage overhang. I tapped my house keys on t’ doorway glass.

The door opened a bit, and through t’ crack I could see a slice of Gordon’s face. On seeing me, his face lit up, but then promptly dropped, cos it worn’t usual for me to just pitch up unannounced. He unhooked the door-chain.

‘This is a mighty surprise,’ he said in a voice that wor pleased and cautious at the same time. ‘Not in trouble, I hope?’

‘I need to talk to you.’

I followed him into t’ lounge. Music wor playing. The gramophone lid wor raised, and a rotating shellac disc gleamed in a narrow shaft of sunlight and dust motes. Gordon lifted the needle arm and the music cut mid-note.

‘A foxtrot,’ he said apologetically. ‘I used to dance the foxtrot rather well.’

He indicated that I should sit. I remained standing.

‘I’ve been thinking, Gordon.’

‘Have you now? Do you want some …’

‘No ta, not just now.’

Gordon lifted the record off t’ gramophone, holding it by t’ edges wi’ his palms, then slid it carefully into its brown-paper sleeve.

‘So what’s all this about?’

‘That time in that posh caf in Harrogate, you remember you said that after Brendan there wor another man in your life, a man who died.’

‘Ah. Perhaps you should wait here.’

He went into t’ bedroom and I heard a drawer opening. He reappeared holding a photograph.

‘It was bound to come out someday.’

I took the photo from him. In washed-out colour wor two men standing on a hillock wi’ their arms slung around each other, squinting at the camera. The one on t’ left wor most certainly Gordon – a more sprightly Gordon, a lot thinner, wi’ a side wave of dark hair and the inevitable ciggie between his fingers, while t’other – I tilted the photo toward t’ lamplight – wor my granddad.

Gordon dragged deeply on his ciggie. ‘You must appreciate that this whole business has been very difficult for me.’ He exhaled mightily.

‘So I’m right. About t’other man. The one after Brendan.’

‘You know, my boy, when you walked into that Gay Lib meeting for the first time all those years ago it was a tremendous jolt, I can tell you.’

I looked up from boring my eyeballs into t’ photo. ‘You recognised me?’

‘Not at once. I hadn’t seen you since you were a toddler, apart from briefly glimpsing you from afar at Frank’s funeral, of course. Then at the Gay Lib meeting I kept looking at you, thinking that you were familiar, but I couldn’t think why for the life of me, so I asked someone your name, and then the penny dropped.’

‘You wor at the funeral?’

He said he’d eavesdropped on t’ service from t’ church foyer, watched the burial from a distance, watched us all – Gran, Mitch, Mavis and Don, the smattering of friends – saw him lowered into t’ ground and earth sprinkled on him, and then, when we’d all gone, he’d stood by t’ side of t’ grave for a long time and said his own prayer.

‘I was with Frank when he became unwell. It was here, in this house. He started having chest pains, and his speech was slurring. I thought it would be quicker to drive him down to Leeds General Infirmary A & E than to wait for an ambulance.’

He paused, lit a fresh ciggie wi’ wobbling fingers.

‘He had a major heart attack right there in the hospital foyer. The hospital staff took over, and whisked him away. I knew I couldn’t wait. I left details with the front desk on who to call. I didn’t want to be there when you all showed up, but I couldn’t desert Frank either. As far as the hospital was concerned, I wasn’t a blood relative. I wasn’t next of kin. So I sat in the car and waited. I prayed. I’m not a religious man, but I prayed all the same that he would pull through. Then I saw you all arrive in that old van your father drove. Some time later I saw you all leaving. I knew at once that Frank was gone.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

‘What was I supposed to say? “Hello, I’m your late granddad’s lover”? I didn’t know what was for the best. So I decided – wanted – to befriend you. I have to say that I expected you to tell me to get lost. But you didn’t. Why was that, Rick?’

‘Dunno. I admit I wor wary at first. To be honest, I think it wor Fazel who decided it for me. Just summat he said.’

‘Ah yes. Fazel.’

I looked about as if t’ ghostly traces of my granddad might be present in t’ corners.

‘Was my granddad often here?’

‘Oh, he didn’t mind the old prefab, if that’s what you mean. Prefab house, prefab life. Of course, staying overnight was quite another matter. That’s the trouble when you have a wife who never goes anywhere. Never went away for a weekend on her own, or to see anyone, or anything like that. She had no relatives to speak of, apart from a half-sister in Hull, and they didn’t get along. So she never went out unless Frank took her. Wedded to her house, she was. And she expected him home every night. Married duty.’

‘So how did you first meet? Where?’

‘Late fifties, and it was a public toilet. Where else could you meet anyone in those days? I couldn’t bring him back here while my mother was alive, of course, so before she passed on it was all secret meetings in the back of the car, in woods, sometimes at friends’ houses. I was terrified that we’d get caught. Before ’67 it was illegal, for one thing, and if you were caught you risked imprisonment, ridicule, your name in the papers. I knew of men who’d killed themselves out of shame, others who’d had their marriages wrecked. But Frank was devil-may-care, and that terrified me sometimes. I’d lost Brendan; I didn’t want to lose Frank too. People thought we were horseracing chums. Before I met Frank I’d only been to about one race meet in my life.’