What You Pay For by Claire Askew

Author:Claire Askew
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781473673076
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Published: 2019-08-21T16:00:00+00:00

I’ll never forget the sound Jimmy made as Fenton pulled the trigger on that gun. I still hear it sometimes, when I have nightmares. Sometimes he’s there, my da, and it’s him making it; other times I open my mouth in the dream, and I make that noise myself. It was the sound of pure, distilled terror – a sort of howl, the last of Jimmy’s rotten soul giving out. I let go of his arm and he hit the ground like a sack of wet soil.

Fenton stood over him, laughing. He levelled the gun above Jimmy’s head and pulled the trigger again, then again. Each time, the same loud, hollow click. On the sticky tarmac, I watched my da gibber and cry, spit-bubbles blistering on his lips.

‘Are ye frightened, Jimmy?’ Fenton said.

My da couldn’t speak, but he pressed his palms together as though in frantic prayer. He nodded.

‘Good,’ Fenton said. ‘While ye’re down there, I want ye thinking back. I ken ye’re addled wi’ the drink these days, and it’s a while back. But when this kid’s sister was a wee lassie’ – Fenton nodded towards me – ‘his mammie got pregnant again. Wanted a new wean to add to the family. Didn’t she, Jimmy?’

My da’s eyes were pink as a rabbit’s. I could see the blood vessels in them, broken by fear and booze. He smelled pretty rank.

‘Didn’t she?’ Fenton yelled.

I jumped, and my da squirmed and wailed. ‘It wisnae,’ he said. ‘I didnae . . .’

Fenton drew his foot back then, and drove it into my da’s side, sending all the air out of him. This was it. Time for me to step up. Mimicking Fenton’s movement, I did the same, planting my foot slightly higher in the side of Jimmy’s body. I heard the wet snap as his ribs caved. He howled again, higher pitched this time.

‘What ye did, Jimmy’ – Fenton was still shouting, and I was kicking and kicking methodically now, punctuating his rant – ‘was beat that baby oot. Was kill this laddie’s brother or sister. And ye ken that fine well.’

I looked down at my da, spasming on the ground in fear, in pain, in the dirt. I realised he was nodding. He admitted it.

‘But . . . the drink,’ he coughed. ‘It wis . . . the drink.’

I booted him again, in the same spot as I had at first. No snap this time, just a dreadful, sloshing sort of thud. Jimmy folded in half, his face a mask of pain. Fenton circled him, lining himself up to cave in the other side.

‘Okay,’ I said.

Fenton glanced up at me.

‘Okay,’ I said again. ‘That’ll do. That’s enough.’

I saw Fenton frown. I got the feeling he thought we were just getting started. But for a second, I held his gaze, and saw him get it. This was my da. I’d got what I wanted.

In truth, I felt sick. The old man made me feel sick – making excuses, even now, as he snivelled down there among the trodden fag butts and stale piss.

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