Huts42

‘How’re you goin’ to get your stuff out? I asked Mary Russell, as we walked back to Morrison ward. There was no arm in arm this time. It was a military two-step, with arms swinging by her side. And it was me that was having trouble keeping up. Mary took time out from route marching to look up at me, her face crinkling into a smile, at me, or the world. I wasn’t really sure. But just as quickly any traces of it disappeared, like sunshine in Scotland on a winter or summer’s day and her furrowed brow cowed me, like a bare faced sergeant major.

‘Slow down,’ I said, ‘I’m knackered,’ wheezing the last bit out and trying to light a fag at the same time. Mary slowed, like a truck changing gears, and finally stopped her relentless advance.

‘How can you be so slow, with those big legs of yours?’ Mary asked, but her blue eyes flashed forgiveness. ‘Wait here,’ she said, ‘I won’t be long.’

‘Where are you going?’ I asked. But she was already away, eating up the ground.

‘To get my stuff,’ she shouted back at me.

I looked at my packet of fags and sat down on a grassy tussock. I’d only two left, which wasn’t near enough. Mary, like most women, would probably take longer than a full moon to sort through her stuff. And when she sorted through her clothes it’d probably be like that scene from Treasure of the Sierre Madre, with a set of mules tethered together, not carrying gold, but shoes, jackets and dresses, working there way up the hill towards me. I didn’t know how she was going to do it. But I just knew she would. I’d need to double back to Johnny Graeme’s shop to get more fags before she came back.

I was half way down the hill when I realized I’d no cash. And I couldn’t very well borrow off my mum on the same payday I was meant to be paying her back. That would be the equivalent of hanging a sign around my neck admitting I wasn’t worthy to be her only son. It would have been better if I’d been an orphan, or left at someone else’s door. I neatly body swerved our house, like Jimmy Johnstone, and chapped on Maureen Hargreave’s door up the street.

My hands shook when I reached in my pocket for a fag, but I couldn’t find them in any of my pockets. But it was kinda funny, because I didn’t expect Maureen to be in. So when I heard steps coming down the hall I suddenly felt like hiding. But Maureen flung open the front door, so I was caught and a bit startled. And it wasn't just because of the commotion, but because of the marks on her face and her black eye. Her wee brothers and sisters were hanging on to her and poking and pushing through the back of her, for attention, like daisies on a lawn, with life bursting out of them.

There was nothing to be said. There was no humour in the beating of a girl, only the certainty of teeth grinding and fingers shaping into fists. There was no need to ask which boyfriend did this thing, because she only ever had the one. The one that was not me.

The beating had stopped. But the reflection of it was inside her, lying posted in her eyes. She shied away from me, and the marks she could not hide, half turning towards the hallway, buckling back, as if she’d been pushed, into the safety of her brothers and sisters, speaking in strangely angled lips and clipped tones, as if someone had come in and stolen the idea of herself away from her and hidden its light.

‘What do you want?’ Maureen said.

‘Nothing,’ I softly said. I’d no answer to give to the ghost of this girl that I once knew.

Then Little Harry all blonde hair, snottery nose and a puddle for a nappy, suddenly made his big break for the wide open door and freedom. I scooped him up and he seemed quite content looking back curiously at all those he’d trumped, before wailing like a Fire engine, because it just wasn’t enough. Maureen took him and smoothed him down, like a bit of brown wrapping paper, and Harry once more looked contented enough, now that it was me that was the stranger.

That was enough. Maureen didn’t have the symmetry of beauty that Norean or even little Mary had, that you had to check and check again, but my eyes found a resting place. She smiled at me, finding ease in the antics of her little brother. And I smiled back at the girl I’d always know.

‘What’d you want?’ It was the same question, but it was a different person doing the asking.

‘I need to borrow some money,’ I said.

Her smile never wavered. She just pushed past her brothers and sister’s caterwauling and quietly closed the door behind her, leaving them behind, like a pack of caged animals.

‘I’ll need to get my purse,’ Maureen said, and her face went splotchy red, the way it usually did, and she shyly asked, ‘is ten bob enough?’ as if it was me that was doing her the favour.

‘Ten bob! Jesus. I only want a packet of fags,’ I said, ‘not a trip on the next Sputnik.’ But I could see she was pleased with that.

‘Right, I’ll just go and get the money,’ Maureen said nervously, as if being a businesswoman was just too much for her. I half expected her to stick her hand out to shake mine, to conclude the deal. But there was no mention of payment plans or default strategies. ‘Come in. Come in,’ she said pushing at the front door.

But I already had a fag in my mouth. ‘I think I’ll be safer out here,’ I mumbled.

‘Aye, you probably will,’ she laughed.

By the time I’d smoked the fag she was back down, leaving the front door half opened and half shut, as if that decision was still to be made. She surreptitiously slipped me the ten bob note, placing it square in my hand, but there was more eyes looking out the windows than a spider had, so it did not go unnoted.

Mary Russell was sitting, with her eyes shut sunning herself by the time I’d made my way back up the hill. She only had a black bag that wouldn’t even have been big enough to carry golf balls. On top of the bag she had placed a thick book, that probably weighed more than it. Mary stretched herself like a cat. And also as usual when her eyes opened her mouth opened with them.

‘We’ve got a bus to Glasgow to get,’ she said excitedly, pushing the bag towards me to lift like a servant. ‘Where have you been?’

‘We better hurry,’ I said, 'there's one leaves in 15 minutes.'