Daddy Dearest by Paul Southern

Author:Paul Southern [Southern, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Published: 2016-05-31T23:00:00+00:00

20

The fat Greek next door seemed like an amiable guy to me. Sure, he had funny manners and his hygiene was certainly Mediterranean, but there didn’t seem anything unduly creepy or criminal about him. There are people I’ve met who might as well have those words tattooed on their forehead. I am talking about scallies and smackheads and drunks and people who look like paedophiles. Yeah, I know you’re going to say, well, you can’t tell about people, but most of the time you can. It’s why I cross the road to avoid them. Am I the only one who does that?

Occasionally, I heard him play his music and, more occasionally, heard him and his friends watch the football, and pump their arms on my wall whenever Greece or whoever scored. Though I am not given to that kind of passion, I can understand it. I have seen it in my daughter. I suppose it’s about being or feeling young. I might have been that way once, though my mother always told me I was a serious child. She made me that way, I’m pretty sure. She didn’t mean to; it was because of my dad. She was good enough to keep the problems to herself, and never got the children involved - it’s what people of that generation did - but it affected her. I realise that makes me sound old. Just to know people like that makes you sound old.

When I got to back to the flat, there were some officers in the lobby. I’d got used to that kind of activity and didn’t really think about it, but when I saw the fat Greek being escorted by two of them, I stopped. He shot me a look and it was not of anger, nor of guilt - how could it be? - but of imploration. I’m innocent. It wasn’t me. Sherlock was there and held my arm back. Was he expecting me to take a run at him? Was I the kind of man who looked like I would take an eye for an eye?

I watched as he was bundled into an unmarked car. He went without a struggle. I don’t think I would have been as composed. I would have screamed.

‘What’s happened?’

‘Just routine.’

‘Does he know something?’

‘It’s just routine.’

‘Does he know where she is?’

‘We don’t know.’

‘What am I meant to do now?’

‘Just sit tight. We’ll be in touch.’

I didn’t want to overstay my welcome, nor overdo my concern. Everything in moderation. He looked at me like he knew what I was thinking, which was worrying. But I suppose, if he really had done, he’d have arrested me, and not the fat Greek.

When I got to the seventh floor, I went straight to Rashelle’s. I made sure no one was about, then gave the coded knock. After the last visit, we decided it was better to have one. We’d already agreed not to use our phones, not that we ever did much; it wasn’t that kind of relationship. With what they can do nowadays, it would have been too dangerous.

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