Grimms 74

Jaz hears the loud screeching and the rising harangue which follows. It woke him up. It wakes the whole tenement block. The smell of cigarette smoke, a reddish dot and Karen rising like a Sphinx beside him with bedclothes around her shoulders, he waits for the climax, recognising his mum’s voice.

‘Whit time’s it?’ he asks, still half-bevvied.

‘She’s gettin’ worse,’ Karen mutters, a disembodied voice.

 His hand floats in the air and she passes the cigarette she is smoking. Head on the pillow, he takes a few draws and feels her leaning over to retrieve it.

He meets Rab outside Maggie Scott’s just before opening time. He recognises his old mate’s nervous cough before he sees him. Despite the heat the round neck of a fawn wool jumper peeks out of a denim jacket buttoned to the neck. He’s shivering, shifting from foot to foot, scratches the back of his neck, fingers pull and scrape against the outline of his long jaw and fuzzy beard.

‘Yeh got a fag?’ A ham actor trying to force a smile.

‘You’re back on that stuff,’ Jaz says in a gruff voice, narrowing his eyes, but stands beside him, pulls out a twenty packet gives him one and lights one himself.

The door of the pub opens. ‘Beautiful day,’ Drew favours his better leg, smiling out at them.

They follow him inside, blinking away the sunshine, dust motes and dullness combine with the sour smell of yesterday’s booze and years of fag smoke, a patina clinging to the walls and lodging in their throats.

‘Two pints.’ Jaz holds his fingers up, in a V-sign. ‘And two doubles.’ Drew had already started pouring the pints before he spoke. He leaves a pound note on the counter and peels away to take a seat in the corner with Rab scuffing his feet behind him, right hand cupped over his mouth.

An old guy, a regular, with a Daily Record under his arm comes in. He nods at Jaz before going to the bar and waits while Drew fiddles about with the radio, scrolling through the stations before getting to Radio 1 and the upbeat voice of Tony Blackburn doesn’t brighten anyone’s day and adds babble to the sense of gloom.

‘That’s terrible whit happened to yer brother,’ Rab necks some of his pint and sniffs.

‘Whit?’ Jaz leans forward, an expression on his face which has Rab measuring the distance to the door.  

‘You no’ hear?’ Rab starts coughing, takes a mouthful of whisky and gargles with it before swallowing. Words come out in whisky breath. ‘Lifted.’

Jaz puts his glass down beside the ashtray, staring ahead of him. Then in a hoarse voice, ‘Who?’

‘The Tash.’

Rab didn’t expect Jaz to smile into the sloshing pint he lifts in salute. Rab relaxes, took another nip and becomes talkative. ‘He was unlucky caught with hash and heroin. With his record he’ll no’ get bail. He’ll be in the Bar-L.’ Lifts a fag from the ashtray and sucks on it. ‘Do not pass go,’ he says in a monotone voice. ‘Lucky if he gets out in a few years.’

‘Where’d he get the stuff?’

‘I’ve already told you. The Dunnes.’ He takes another drink, whisky, followed by lager chaser, trying to hold himself together, to stop from shivering and the dry boak. Get enough courage to ask for a few quid, enough to half a tenner bag.

‘Don’t get cheeky.’

Rab nods in agreement, although he’s not sure what Jaz is talking about. His eyes water and he can no longer concentrate. He tries to speak, feels his stomach lifting, salty water rising into his mouth. He runs to the toilets, almost tripping over a stool, the sound of a cistern gurgling in front of him and behind him, laughter.

When he returns Jaz has gotten another round in. He sprawls back against the chair, legs akimbo and peers up at him through fag smoke and pats at his hair. A few older men and a younger woman, with an eggshell-blue pullover over the top of her shoulders, drift in, but keep to their own company.  

‘Sit doon,’ Jaz says.

‘The thing is Ja—’ Rab starts to say.

‘—Fuckin’ shut it.’ Jaz digs out a roll of notes from the side pocket of his denims and sticks them on the table. Customers glance over but just as quickly look over their heads at light from the window above them. ‘How do I get to the Dunnes?’

Rab slides into the seat facing Jaz and picks up a whisky and downs it in a oner. Out of the side of his eyes he’s counting how much and gets to a few hundred and gives up and bangs his glass down. ‘You don’t,’ he says. ‘They’re up the tap of the hill. Holy City. One way in and one way out. They’re the top close, back of Clydebank High School, up from the hall, and they’ve got somebody watching in every one of the closes round about them. They’re team handed. Even the police can’t get in without getting grief.’

Jaz reaches into his left hand pocket and pulls out the pearl handle of the razor and puts it on the table beside the money. He flings back a whisky and bangs the glass on the table, mimicking him. ‘If the mountain won’t come to Mohammed…how do you get your stuff?’

Rab’s hand shakes as he reaches for the packet of Silk Cut beside Jaz. A packet of Swann Vestas is flicked across the table in his direction. He lights up, takes a deep drag. ‘I’ve got contacts.’ He sniffs, a mouthful of lager clears his throat.

‘Nah,nah, nah,’ Jaz hold up a finger. ‘We’ve got contacts.’ Leans across the table. ‘Who ur they and where will they be, round about noo?’

‘Eh,’ Rab takes a drink of lager to buy time to think.

‘Don’t fuck me about,’ Jaz growls ‘Where would you go noo, if you wanted something?’

Rab knows he’s been caught, in the same way that the Tash has been caught, but figures at least there is a kind of safety in a different kind of solitary. ‘I’d go down to The Bisley bar. There’s two guys in there I kinda know. Usually got something.  But your best bet is The Cledden’s. That’s home territory. Always somebody hanging about there. Dealing.’ 

The money wad is swept off the table and back into Jaz’s right-hand pocket. The razor tucks into his left. He finishes his lager. ‘Leave that pishwater,’ he tells Rab. ‘We’ll get a pint in The Bisley then The Cleddan’s.’

Rab’s mouth falls open. ‘Fuck sake Jaz,’ he says. ‘Are you mad?’ One glance at his face and he know the answer. The pupils in his eyes are black holes.

Jaz grins down at him. ‘Hurry up, yah, stupid cunt.’