The Walk Home Part 10

"See? It's a different number on the delivery note. That's not what Tomas wrote."

Marek even cleared the return with the driver, and then reported back to Jozef.

"They'll bring the right ones over tomorrow."

"On a Sat.u.r.day?"

"They made the mistake," Marek shrugged. "So I made out it was urgent. He said they'd send a van sometime middle of the morning."

Jozef eyed his nephew, thinking how much easier life would be if he was always this useful. And how Ewa might be happy too, if he kept Marek on beyond this job. He was due to rip out the ground-floor carpets after breakfast, so Jozef told him: "We have three more deliveries on the way. You'll be down here anyway, so you can check them all in."

"With Stevie too?"

Jozef paused, knowing Ewa wouldn't like that, but it would help the day run smoothly. He gave Marek the rest of the paperwork.

"Just make sure they've charged us the list price, yes?"

Marek did the calculations on his mobile over breakfast. They'd put the big table in one of the first-floor rooms, and the others joined them as they arrived, bringing rolls and coffee. Stevie was late down, coming in as Jozef dealt out the morning's jobs; he came in the door all thin T-shirt and narrow shoulders, with a deep sleep-crease across his cheek. Tomas gave him a nod: "Good morning."

And then: "Looks like our boy-thief has been out half the night again."

He said it in Polish, but it raised enough knowing smiles to have Stevie shifting, casting a nervy glance around the a.s.sembled workers. Jozef motioned to Marek to give him his orders, and then kept on handing out tasks, moving things along, aware any move he made in Stevie's favour might be reported back to Ewa.

He waited until all the men were standing before he pushed his way through to the boys.

"Use the back room, but stack everything neatly, yes?"

One of the trucks would bring all the copper pipes and fittings for the new central heating.

"We'll need them for every room, so keep them to hand."

Stevie nodded, short, aware he'd been the b.u.t.t of a joke, and then Marek kicked at Tomas's boot as he was pa.s.sing, holding out his mobile so he could see what the heating order came to.

"Look how much you spent."

Marek tapped the screen in emphasis, but he only got a shrug from Tomas: "Now you know what things cost here. See why I get at you for cutting pipes too short? Measure twice, cut once: no waste."

"Right, right."

Marek turned away, but Jozef frowned at him to listen; high time he knew how these things worked. He told him: "We'll sell on what we don't use. Claw some money back."

"From the supplier?"

"Wherever we get the best price. Maybe I'll get you to find out."

He wanted Marek kept on his toes now.

Jozef sent the boys down to work, thinking he'd most likely just pa.s.s on any leftover pipes to Romek. Fit them in his van, along with his boxes, drive them down to London en route to Ewa and Gda"sk.

He only went downstairs just before lunch, to check the goods were all in, and stored properly.

He heard the boys from out in the ground-floor hallway: still in the back room and sorting, but Marek's mind already on the weekend.

"I'm out tonight. With Tomas, maybe a couple of the others."

He wanted Stevie along, but the boy didn't sound too keen on the company. Even when Marek told him: "Tomas is all right."

"Naw, the guy's out tae drive a wedge. Cannae be daen wae that s.h.i.te."

Wise before his time, Jozef thought, coming to a stop by the door; the boy still sounded tired too, not in the best mood. There was the clank of pipes, so Jozef knew they'd arrived, and then Marek asked: "Who's best to sell to up here, then?"

But Stevie just shrugged the question off.

"What you askin me for, pal? Ask around the pubs when you go. I havnae lived here for ages, not since I was a boy."

Jozef thought he was still a boy now. A strange young-old child who'd seen too much of life. Bare floorboards, bad conscience, too many wedges driven through his family: who knew what kept him from sleeping?

He and Marek were in need of another task in any case. He saw they'd left a bundle of pipes in the hallway, it was just at Jozef's feet, so he picked it up, stepping into the room: "You forgot these."

Both boys turned to face him, swift, as though he'd caught them slacking, but the back room was full and well-enough organised. Marek started searching out the paperwork, so Jozef took a quick look around the rest of the ground floor while he was waiting, to check they'd torn up all the carpets. The living room was clear, but they'd put another two bundles of pipes in there, over by the window.

"Have you done that in every room?" Jozef called, and Marek came to find him, with Stevie holding back, just behind.

"It's just the lengths that are needed." Marek handed over the delivery notes and explained. "I measured up, and put enough pipe in every room for the heating."

His nephew blinked at him, ready to hear he'd done wrong. It was rare to see Marek hesitant, so Jozef had to smile then. He patted him on the shoulder: he'd shown initiative, and humility too, all in the one day, and Jozef thought he'd have to tell Ewa, if she called again. He told the boys: "They'll get in the way, those pipes. But you can just leave them for now. Come upstairs. I've got more work for both of you before lunch."

Friday pa.s.sed quickly, all the working days did now; still the whole ground floor to finish, and it would be July next week.

After the others had gone, Jozef went through his job lists, laptop on his lap, perched beside his boxes, on the corner of his bed. Trying to work it out. If they could get this done by the first July weekend; how soon he could get to Ewa.

The evening quiet had fallen over the house, the leafy street outside, and Jozef was left there, missing her. Mulling over the slow slide of his marriage. It would be a year soon since she left, and it was still hard for him to grasp. How that rift had opened up between them: how had they let it happen?

He was going to Gda"sk, but he still wasn't certain if he could ask her to come back here. Or what he would do if she said no. What would he say if she asked him to stay at home?

16.

They never used to shout, Stevie's Mum and Dad, not when he was wee. Now he was eight, and they did it behind closed doors, sending him out if he came in the room, but Stevie still heard them through the walls. They shouted about the flat. Or if Stevie's Dad went out they shouted about that: where he'd been and who with. Mostly it was his Mum's voice Stevie heard.

He was glad of the times she was happy, and Stevie knew his Dad was too because he did things to keep her that way, like watching the football at Uncle Brian's house. Or not watching the football at all.

He drove them off the scheme one Sat.u.r.day morning: the three of them, all together, out to the hills, and Stevie's Mum laughed when he parked them up by a sheep-scattered field.

"What we doing here, then?"

Stevie's Dad shrugged at that, like he wasn't too certain himself.

But he used to come and camp here sometimes, with Uncle Craig and Malky Jnr., back in their army days, when they came home on leave. He said they'd shown him the best way to the woods, and how to keep a fire lit, and then he built them one just by a stream, so Stevie could stand on the bank and throw stones in.

Stevie's Mum crouched next to him at first, harder to win over, arms tight about her knees. But then she rolled up her jeans, and slid down to the water to put her toes in. She ended up wading right across barefoot; hands up for balance and fingers spread wide, and then she turned and stood grinning over at them from the far side.

"I'm needing that fire now!"

When the next weekend came, she asked to go back again.

"Has Malky Jnr. still got his tent?"

They didn't go every Sat.u.r.day, but most. Driving off early in the van, windows still misted from the cold, borrowed camping mats and sleeping bags in the back, between the red plastic tray shelves that held Stevie's Dad's tools.

The drive was just long enough for Stevie to get drowsy, strapped into the front between his parents, and he'd nod off sometimes after they'd stopped, with the warm sunlight on him through the windscreen, and the wind buffeting the sides of the van. His Mum and Dad would be outside when he woke up. Leaning over the gate and talking, sharing a smoke, their heads level and close; his Mum's feet up on the metal rungs, and his Dad's in work boots, planted in the wide tractor ruts.

If they stayed away overnight, then Stevie slept lying across the seats, in a sleeping bag under the windscreen. He'd be up with the sun, earlier than his Dad and Mum: they'd still be sleeping in the back, in the narrow s.p.a.ce down the middle of the van, just wide enough for the camping mats. Stevie would climb over to find them, half-dressed but warm, lying under old blankets and clean dust sheets, and he'd nudge each of them over so he could slot himself between them.

The wheels got stuck one Sunday morning, in the soft verge, and dug themselves in deeper when Stevie's Dad tried to drive them home. The engine roared, the back of the van sagged and his Dad cursed. Then he set off down the road, on foot, his solid back receding, Rangers shirt flapping: royal blue, picked out by the sun, standing out against the surrounding green and grey and brown. There was a farm a mile or so on, and while his father was gone, Stevie pressed all the b.u.t.tons he could reach on the dash, and his Mum unclipped her seatbelt, climbing out to stand by the van.

The wind caught her hair, a few loose strands, two thin red flags flying, and so Stevie tried the window-winder, shoving and bashing it round in its stiff circle until the window opened enough to put a hand out to them. But he couldn't reach, and his Mum had her face turned to the sunshine anyhow, breathing in the wind.

Stevie's Dad came back with help: sacks to put under the wheels and an old guy in overalls who put his shoulder up to the back of the van with him. Stevie's Mum had to work the pedals, sitting well forward, her b.u.m on the edge of the driver's seat and the steering wheel huge in her hands. She cheered, loud and happy, as the van lurched under her, and she steered it onto the road, laughing at the sight of Stevie's Dad in the long wing-mirror, his mud-spattered shirt. Only then she clapped a guilty hand over her mouth, seeing his face all dark with blood, the effort of getting them back onto solid ground.

"Aye, well. You can laugh. I was gonnae wear that tae the club thenight."

Stevie heard them shouting again that evening, from behind the closed door of his bedroom.

Pride of b.l.o.o.d.y Drumchapel.

His Dad had been in it before Stevie was born, and now his Mum yelled about him going to practice again.

You never said.

Shouldnae have tae ask.

He started going on Sunday nights, and then there were no more camping trips.

Some days the yelling started at lunch. If Stevie's Mum got angry enough, she'd slam the doors, run down the close and off down the road, and Stevie watched her go then, from the window in his bedroom, her red head bright against the tenements. He thought if she turned, she'd see him up there; his hair was the same as hers. Stevie watched her all the way down the hill, until she made the corner. She never looked back, but he knew where she was headed.

He went through the rooms then, looking for his Dad. One time Stevie found him on the sofa, white-faced and quiet. His Dad asked: "She gone tae your Gran's, aye?"

And Stevie nodded. His Gran said her door was always open. Stevie's Dad told him: "I know whose side she's on, but."

Not his.

He sat with his fists on his knees. Then he put his big hands up to hide his face, and Stevie didn't know what to do then.

He wished his Mum had taken him with her. He didn't know why she'd left him with his Dad. His Dad told him: "She reckons I'll have tae stay home now."

Sometimes he did. He ran Stevie his bath and put him to bed.

"Warm enough, pal? Aye. Get tae sleep then."

But sometimes he made their tea early and then they'd head off across the scheme, the opposite way to his Mum. Stevie knew they were headed to practice, and that she'd shout when she found out. She shouted about Shug especially.

He was the bandmaster, and he'd be round the back of the snooker club when they got there: tall, with his long arms folded, standing in the doorway like he'd been waiting hours. He had pale eyes and raw-boned fingers, and he shook hands with Stevie's Dad first, before he looked at Stevie: "You with us this week, aye? You can make yoursel useful."

Shug laughed when he said it, but it didn't sound like he was joking, so Stevie did as he was told and put the chairs out. A half-circle for the flutes in the middle of the function room, so they had somewhere to sit in the breaks, and one to hold the ba.s.s drum too, in front of the stage. Stevie learned to do it fast, and right first time, leaving enough s.p.a.ce for the snares to stand either side.

The drums were kept in lockers at the far end of the room, and if Stevie was quick about finishing the chairs, his Dad gave him the key, and let him carry his drum to the stage.

"Mind an be careful."

It was an Andante, top notch, and it had sat locked up for years, but it cost four hundred new, near enough. Stevie knew that had come out of his Dad's pocket; and his drumsticks too, that were hickory wood Dutharts. His Dad stood by the lockers, sorting out the best pair, resting them in his palms, testing them for weight. He said they had to balance, and he turned Stevie's hands face up, laying one in each, so he could feel it.

"Naw, naw, son. Keep your wrists easy."

But they were over a tenner a pop, so Stevie kept his thumbs gripped tight about them.

The function room had a bar at one end, and a stage, and the rest was just wide, white walls, with benches down the sides. It was a great, cold hangar of a place, but Shug said it suited him: big enough to make a good noise in. Once the drums were out, he went down the line of them on the stage, checking the skins, bending forwards and tapping with his fingertips. Stevie watched the way he put his ear up close, twisting the screws, tight, but not too tight: Shug said he wanted noise, but it had to be the right one. His hair was sandy, receding, and he kept it clipped, and Stevie could see his scalp creasing beneath the soft fuzz while Shug worked; all the fine blue veins between skull and skin, if he was close enough. Stevie mostly kept his distance, but he stood next to Shug when he tuned the drums up, so he could see the reddish sheen on his eyelids, when he got the tone right and he closed them; the soft line of his thick white lashes.

"It's the music, aye?"

Shug wanted the whole band to love it like he did. And put in the hours to make it worth it, so no one was late if they could help it. He kept a fine box: an ice-cream carton with a slit cut in the lid, and come more than ten minutes after the door shut, you'd risk a ban.

"You cannae keep time, I've nae use for you. f.u.c.k off hame."

"Ach away and w.a.n.k, Shug."

Not all the bandsmen would have it, especially the older ones with families and jobs, reasons to be late sometimes. But some had been in other flute bands before, where the instruments were all third-hand and there'd been no uniform as such, so they were quick to put down any moaners.

Pride of Drumchapel marched in royal blue livery, made by Victor Stewart of Lurgan; Shug reckoned the best regalia came from Ulster. He chose gold braid and epaulettes and high caps too, with short black peaks that pointed straight down your nose. They made you walk with your chin up and your back straight so as to see the way ahead. Military bearing. Shug said the lodges the Pride played for got quality: sharp turnout and tunes, and no booze until the parade was done with. And he made sure the lodges came up with proper money for it. Discipline paid: for uniforms and banners, and trips to Belfast.

Stevie got to like it there, in among the men. Even if it made his Mum shout. Even if they could be merciless some nights, taking the p.i.s.s; out of Stevie's tiny bones, and how his Dad was big and thick. Everyone knew everyone, the long and the short of it, and they made jokes that Stevie didn't get, but he knew his Dad should. About how Stevie looked like his Mum, a dead spit, and there was none of his Dad in him. They reached up and rapped at the side of his Dad's head, if he was slow to laugh: "Emdy there?"

"Naw. Lights is on, but."

They patted his cheeks, that had gone all flushed.

It made Stevie want to ram his head into his Dad's soft belly; the way he had no come-back, just an aye right, shrugging them off, like he wasn't that bothered.

His Dad wasn't quick with words, but Stevie knew he was good on the drum, better than anyone on the scheme, so he was always glad when Shug got his Dad to kick the practice off. With part of a drum salute, maybe, to get them all going, his right stick knocking, while the roll was kept up with his left.

He'd never done a full salute for the band yet. That took near-on five minutes, and he told Stevie he had to get it perfect first. It was the parts where he had to pick up a different beat that were the hardest, and on Sundays when they didn't go to practice, Stevie listened to his Dad working on them at home in the evenings. While Stevie's Mum wasn't there to hear it.