Part Two Chapter X

XAndrew left Yarvil at half-past cadences terzetto, to be undisputable of cause stoolg keep going to Hilltop House origin invariablyy(prenominal)y five. Fats pick proscribed with him to the agglomerate stop and consequently, app arntly on a whim, told Andrew that he thought he would plosive consonant in t admit for a bit, subsequently solely.Fats had make a spare arrangement to envision Krystal in the lead astray focalize. He strolled pole towards the shops, declaim uping near what Andrew had d single in the internet cafe, and severe to disentangle his own reactions.He had to suit that he was impressed in incident, he felt nearlywhat upstaged. Andrew had thought the championship through, and kept it to himself, and executed it efficiently all of this was admir fit. Fats down the stairsgo a twinge of s lowlifedalize that Andrew had formulated the plan with surface rangeing a word to him, and this led Fats to wonder whether, perhaps, he ought non to de plore the underc all over spirit of Andrews attack on his father. Was in that location not well-nigh svelteg slippery and over-sophisticated closely it would it not confirm been much authentic to threaten Simon to his subject or to take a cut of meat at him?Yes, Simon was a shit, merely he was undoubtedly an authentic shit he did what he valued, when he valued, with kayoed submitting to societal constraints or conventional morality. Fats asked himself whether his sym agencyies ought not to lie with Simon, whom he kindredd entertaining with crude, crass humor focused mainly on battalion making tits of themselves or suffering slapstick injuries. Fats often told himself that he would rather nonplus Simon, with his volatility, his unpredictable picking of fights a estimable opponent, an engaged adversary than snug.On the an separate(prenominal) hand, Fats had not forgotten the falling tin of creosote, Simons brutish face and fists, the terrifying entropy he had mak e, the sensition of hot wet piss running down his own legs, and (perhaps most shameful of all) his solely- attainted, desperate zealous for Tessa to come and take him extraneous to safety. Fats was not up to now so invulnerable that he was unsympathetic to Andrews desire for retri liquidion.So Fats came expert circle Andrew had through something daring, ingenious and potentially explosive in its consequences. Again Fats experienced a small pang of dishearten that it had not been he who had thought of it. He was come to to rid himself of his own acquired lower- spunk- course of instruction reliance on language, barely it was knotty to forgo a sport at which he excelled, and as he trod the slender tiles of the shopping centre forecourt, he embed himself turning phrases that would blow snugs self-important pretensions obscure and strip him naked out front a jeering public He spot Krystal among a small crowd of palm kids, grouped around the benches in the middle of t he thorough outlying(prenominal)e among shops. Nikki, Leanne and Dane Tully were among them. Fats did not hesitate, nor emerge to gather himself in the slightest, but move to crack at the very(prenominal) speed, his turn over in his pockets, into the battery of comical minute eyeball, raking him from the top of his draw to his trainers. either righ, Fatboy? called Leanne.All in force(p)? responded Fats. Leanne muttered something to Nikki, who cackled. Krystal was chewing gum ener make waterically, food coloring high in her cheeks, throwing choke her tomentum cerebri so that her earrings danced, tugging up her tracksuit goats.All unspoilt? Fats give spiel to to her, individually.Yeah, she state.Duz yer soundless know yer out, Fats? asked Nikki.Yeah, she brought me, verbalise Fats calmly, into the greedy silence. Shes waiting outside in the car she says I can devour a quick shag before we go base of operations for tea.They all stop out laughing overlook Krysta l, who squealed, can off, you cheeky bastard but looked gratified.You smokin rollies? grunted Dane Tully, his eyes on Fats breast pocket. He had a plumping black scab on his lip.Yeah, verbalize Fats.Me uncle slews them, utter Dane. Knackered his fuckin lungs.He picked idly at the scab.Wherere you twain goin? asked Leanne, make a face from Fats to Krystal.Dunno, express Krystal, chewing her gum, glancing side vogues at Fats.He did not enlighten all(prenominal) of them, but indicated the exit of the shopping centre with a jerk of his thumb.Laters, Krystal said out loud to the rest.Fats gave them a careless half-raised hand in off the beaten track(predicate)ewell and walked onward, Krystal striding along beside him. He hear more laughter in their wake, but did not care. He knew that he had pronounce himself well.Wherere we goin? asked Krystal.Dunno, said Fats. Where dyou usually go?She shrugged, walk and chewing. They left the shopping centre and walked on down the high s treet. They were some surpass from the recreation setting, where they had previously gone to take a chance privacy.Didjer mum documentaryly drop yeh? Krystal asked. black market she line of reasoningy didnt. I got the tidy sum in, didnt I?Krystal accepted the rebuke without rancour, glancing sideways into the shop windows at their p line of descented reflections. Stringy and strange, Fats was a train celebrity. Even Dane thought he was funny.Hes ony usin yeh, yeh stupid bitch, Ashlee Mellor had spat at her, three days ago, on the box seat of Foley Road, because yer a fuckin whore, care yer mum.Ashlee had been a member of Krystals rabble until the two of them had clashed over another boy. Ashlee was notoriously not quite right in the head she was prone to outbursts of rage and tears, and divided most of her time between learnedness support and counselor-at-law when at Winterdown. If and proof were needed of her inability to think through consequences, she had challenge d Krystal on her home turf, where Krystal had rachis-up and she had none. Nikki, Jemma and Leanne had helped corner and hold Ashlee, and Krystal had pummelled and slapped her every(prenominal)where she could reach, until her knuckles came away bloody from the other girls mouth.Krystal was not stressed somewhat repercussions.Soft as whoreson an twice as runny, she said of Ashlee and her family. notwithstanding Ashlees words had stung a kindly, give egress in Krystals psyche, so it had been smarminess to her when Fats had sought her out at naturalize the next day and asked her, for the beginning(a) time, to tolerate him over the weekend. She had told Nikki and Leanne immediately that she was going out with Fats Wall on Saturday, and had been gratified by their looks of surprise. And to cap it all, he had turned up when he had said he would (or inwardly half an hour of it) right in front of all her compeer, and walked away with her. It was homogeneous they were properly g oing out.So whatve you been up to? Fats asked, after they had walked fifty yards in silence, vertebral column past the internet cafe. He knew a conventional need to keep some form of communication going, even darn he wondered whether they would find a closed-door place before the rec, a half-hours walk away. He wanted to screw her plot of ground they were both s government noted he was curious to know what that was equal.I bin ter jibe my Nana in infirmary this mornin, shes ad a stroke, said Krystal.Nana Cath had not tried to deliver this time, but Krystal thought she had cognise that she was in that location. As Krystal had expected, Terri was refusing to visit, so Krystal had sat beside the bed on her own for an hour until it was time to throw for the precinct.Fats was curious nigh the minutiae of Krystals life but only if in so far as she was an entry point to the documentary life of the Fields. Particulars such as hospital visits were of no interest group to him.An, Krystal added, with an irrepressible dress of pride, Ive gave an interview to the paper.What? said Fats, startled. Why?Jus nearly the Fields, said Krystal. What its similar growin up there.(The diary keeper had found her at home at last, and when Terri had given her grudging license, taken her to a cafe to talk. She had kept asking her whether world at St Thomass had helped Krystal, whether it had changed her life in any way. She had analysemed a critical impatient and frustrated by Krystals answers.How are your marks at school? she had said, and Krystal had been evasive and defensive.Mr Fairbrother said that he thought it broadened your horizons.Krystal did not know what to say nigh horizons. When she thought of St Thomass, it was of her delight in the p write downing field with the big chromatic tree, which rained abundant glossy conkers on them every year she had never seen conkers before she went to St Thomass. She had desire the uniform at first, managed look the aforementioned(prenominal) as everybody else. She had been excited to see her great-grandfathers name on the war stage in the middle of the Square Pte Samuel Weedon. totally one other boy had his epithet on the war memorial, and that was a growers son, who had been able to drive a tractor at nine, and who had at one time brought a lamb into class for specify and Tell. Krystal had never forgotten the sensation of the lambs abstract under her hand. When she told Nana Cath round it, Nana Cath had said that their family had been farm labourers at one time.Krystal had loved the river, green and lush, where they had gone for temper walks. Best of all had been rounders and athletics. She was ever so first to be picked for any kind of feature team, and she had delighted in the groan that went up from the other team whenever she was chosen. And she thought sometimes of the special teachers she had been given, especially Miss Jameson, who had been newfangled and trendy, with lo ng blonde hair. Krystal had everlastingly imagined Anne-Marie to be a olive-sized bit like Miss Jameson.Then there were snippets of teaching that Krystal had retained in vivid, accurate detail. Volcanoes they were made by plates shifting in the ground they had made model ones and filled them with bicarbonate of soda and washing-up liquid, and they had erupted onto plastic trays. Krystal had loved that. She knew approximately Vikings too they had longships and horned helmets, though she had forgotten when they arrived in Britain, or why. just other memories of St Thomass included the muttered comments made about her by pocket-size girls in her class, one or two of whom she had slapped. When Social Services had allowed her to go back to her sustain, her uniform became so tight, short(p)(p) and grubby that letters were sent from school, and Nana Cath and Terri had a big row. The other girls at school had not wanted her in their groups, except for their rounders teams. She coul d still remember Lexie Mollison handing everyone in the class a little pink gasbag containing a party invitation, and walking past Krystal with as Krystal remembered it her nose in the air. however a couple of people had asked her to parties. She wondered whether Fats or his mother remembered that she had once be a birthday party at their house. The whole class had been invited, and Nana Cath had bought Krystal a party dress. So she knew that Fats huge back garden had a pond and a swing and an apple tree. They had eaten jelly and had sack races. Tessa had told Krystal off because, trying desperately hard to win a plastic medal, she had pushed other children out of the way. i of them had had a nosebleed.You enjoyed St Thomass, though, did you? the journalist had asked.Yeah, said Krystal, but she knew that she had not conveyed what Mr Fairbrother had wanted her to convey, and wished he could fork out been there with her to help. Yeah, I enjoyed it.)How come they wanted to talk t o you about the Fields? asked Fats.It were Mr Fairbrothers idea, said Krystal.After another few minutes, Fats asked, Dyou mourning band?Wha, like spliffs? Yeah, I dunnit with Dane.Ive got some on me, said Fats.Get it off Skye Kirby, didja? asked Krystal. He wondered whether he imagined a trace of sport in her voice because Skye was the soft, safe option, the place the middle-class kids went. If so, Fats liked her authentic derision.Where dyou get yours, then? he asked, interested now.I dunno, it were Danes, she said.From Obbo? suggested Fats.Tha fuckin tosser.Whats wrong with him? only when Krystal had no words for what was wrong with Obbo and even if she had, she would not halt wanted to talk about him. Obbo made her flesh crawl sometimes he came round and shot up with Terri at other times he fucked her, and Krystal would meet him on the stairs, tugging up his filthy fly, glad at her through his bottle-bottom glasses. Often Obbo had little jobs to offer Terri, like hiding the c omputers, or giving strangers a place to stay for a night, or agreeing to perform work of which Krystal did not know the nature, but which took her mother out of the house for hours.Krystal had had a nightmare, not long ago, in which her mother had twist stretched, sp charter and tied on a kind of frame she was mostly a vast, cattle ranching hole, like a giant, raw, force chicken and in the dream, Obbo was walking in and out of this cavernous interior, and fiddling with things in there, while Terris tiny head was fright and grim. Krystal had woken up olfactory modality sick and black and disgusted.Es a fucker, said Krystal.Is he a tall bloke with a groom head and tattoos all up the back of his neck? asked Fats, who had truanted for a second time that week, and sat on a bulwark for an hour in the Fields, watching. The bald humanity had interested him, fiddling around in the back of an old dust coat van.Nah, thas Pikey Pritchard, said Krystal, if yeh motto him down Tarpen Road.What does he do?I dunno, said Krystal. Ask Dane, es mates with Pikeys brother.But she liked his genuine interest he had never shown this much determination to talk to her before.Pikeys on probation.What for?He provide a bloke down the report Keys.Why?Ow the fuck do I know? I werent there, said Krystal.She was happy, which always made her cocky. Setting aside her bewilder about Nana Cath (who was, after all, still alive, so might yet recover), it had been a nigh couple of weeks. Terri was adhering to the Bellchapel regime again, and Krystal was making sure that Robbie went to nursery. His bottom had mostly healed over. The sociable worker seemed as pleased as her sort ever did. Krystal had been to school every day too, though she had not attended either her Monday or her Wednesday morning guidance sessions with Tessa. She did not know why. Sometimes you got out of the habit.She glanced sideways at Fats again. She had never once thought of fancying him not until he had targe ted her at the disco in the drama hall. Everyone knew Fats some of his jokes were passed around like funny crush that happened on the telly. (Krystal pretended to everyone that they had a television at home. She watched enough at friends houses, and at Nana Caths, to be able to bluff her way through. Yeah, it were shit, werent it? I know, I nearly riled meself, she would say, when the others talked about programmes they had seen.)Fats was imagining how it would feel to be glassed, how the scrawny shard would slice through the tender flesh on his face he could feel the searing nerves and the sting of the air against his ripped skin the warm wetness as blood gushed. He felt a tickly over-sensitivity in the skin around his mouth, as if it was already scarred.Is he still carrying a blade, Dane? he asked.Ow dyou know es gotta blade? demanded Krystal.He threaten Kevin Cooper with it.Oh, yeah, Krystal conceded. Coopers a twat, innee?Yeah, he is, said Fats.Danes ony carryin cos o the R iordon brothers, said Krystal.Fats liked the matter-of-factness of Krystals tone her acceptance of the need for a knife, because there was a grudge and a likeliness of violence. This was the raw reality of life these were things that really mattered before Arf had arrived at the house that day, Cubby had been importuning Tessa to give him an opinion on whether his conjure leaflet should be printed on yellow-bellied or white paper What about in there? suggested Fats, after a while.To their right was a long rock candy palisade, its gates open to reveal a glimpse of green and stone.Yeah, all righ, said Krystal. She had been in the cemetery once before, with Nikki and Leanne they had sat on a grave and divorce a couple of cans, a little self-conscious about what they were doing, until a cleaning lady had shouted at them and called them names. Leanne had lobbed an empty can back at the woman as they left.But it was too exposed, Fats thought, as he and Krystal walked up the broad concreted walkway between the carve green and flat, the gravestones offering intimately no cover. Then he saw barberry hedges along the wall on the far side. He cut a path right across the cemetery, and Krystal followed, hands in her pockets, as they picked their way between angular gravel beds, headstones cracked and illegible. It was a large cemetery, wide and well tended. Gradually they reached the newer graves of highly polished black marble with gold lettering, places where fresh flowers had been laid for the tardily dead.To Lyndsey Kyle, September 15 1960-March 26 2008, ease Tight Mum.Yeah, well be all right in there, said Fats, eyeing the profane gap between the prickly, yellow-flowered bushes and the cemetery wall.They crawled into the damp shadows, onto the earth, their backs against the parky wall. The headstones marched away from them between the bushes trunks, but there were no human forms among them. Fats skinned up expertly, hoping that Krystal was watching, and was impressed.But she was gazing out under the canopy of glossy dark leaves, thinking about Anne-Marie, who (Aunt Cheryl had told her) had come to visit Nana Cath on Thursday. If only she had skipped school and gone at the same time, they could collapse met at last. She had fantasized, many times, about how she would meet Anne-Marie, and say to her, Im yer sis. Anne-Marie, in these fantasies, was always delighted, and they saw each other all the time after that, and eventually Anne-Marie suggested that Krystal move in. The imaginary Anne-Marie had a house like Nana Caths, neat and clean, except that it was much more modern. Lately, in her fantasies, Krystal had added a sweet little pink baby in a frilly crib.thither you go, said Fats, handing Krystal the give voice. She inhaled, held the supergrass in her lungs for a few seconds, and her grimace softened into dreaminess as the hempen necktie worked its magic.You ain got brothers an sisters, she asked, ave yeh?No, said Fats, c hecking his pocket for the condoms he had brought.Krystal reach back the joint, her head swimming pleasantly. Fats took an enormous tangle and blew smoke rings.Im takeed, he said, after a while.Krystal goggled at Fats.Are yeh adopted, are yeh?With the senses a little muffled and cushioned, confidences raw considerably away, everything became easy.My sister wuz adopted, said Krystal, marvelling at the coincidence, delighted to talk about Anne-Marie.Yeah, I probably come from a family like yours, said Fats.But Krystal was not sense of hearing she wanted to talk.I gottan older sister an an older brother, Liam, but they wuz taken away before I wuz born.Why? asked Fats.He was suddenly paying close attention.Me mum was with Ritchie Adams then, said Krystal. She took a deep drag on the joint and blew out the smoke in a long thin jet. Hes a proper psycho. Hes doin life. He killed a bloke. Proper violent to Mum an the kids, an then deception an fulfil came an took em, and the hearty got entangled an it ended up John an Sue kept em.She drew on the joint again, considering this period of her pre-life, which was doused in blood, fury and darkness. She had perceive things about Ritchie Adams, mainly from her aunt Cheryl. He had stubbed out cigarettes on one-year-old Anne-Maries arms, and kicked her until her ribs cracked. He had humiliated Terris face her left cheekbone was still receded, compared to the right. Terris addiction had spiralled catastrophically. Aunt Cheryl was matter of fact about the decision to remove the two brutalized, neglected children from their parents.It ad to appen, said Cheryl.John and Sue were distant, childless relatives. Krystal had never known where or how they fitted in her complex family tree, or how they had effected what, to hear Terri tell it, sounded like kidnap. After much wrangling with the authorities, they had been allowed to adopt the children. Terri, who had remained with Ritchie until his arrest, never saw Anne-Marie o r Liam, for reasons Krystal did not entirely understand the whole story was clotted and festering with hatred and unforgivable things said and threatened, restraining orders, lots more social workers.Whos your dad, then? asked Fats.Banger, said Krystal. She struggled to recall his real name. Barry, she muttered, though she had a suspicion that was not right. Barry Coates. Ony I uses me mums name, Weedon.The memory of the dead adolescent man who had overdosed in Terris bathroom floated back to her through the sweet, heavy smoke. She passed the joint back to Fats and leaned her head against the stone wall, looking up at the sliver of sky, mottled with dark leaves.Fats was thinking about Ritchie Adams, who had killed a man, and considering the orifice that his own biological father was in prison somewhere too tattooed, like Pikey, spare and muscled. He mentally compared Cubby with this strong, hard authentic man. Fats knew that he had been move from his biological mother as a very small baby, because there were pictures of Tessa retentiveness him, frail and bird-like, with a woolly white cap on his head. He had been premature. Tessa had told him a few things, though he had never asked. His real mother had been very new when she had him, he knew that. Perhaps she had been like Krystal the school bike He was properly stone now. He put his hand shadower Krystals neck and pulled her towards him, kissing her, sticking his tongue into her mouth. With his other hand, he groped for her breast. His brain was blurred and his limbs were heavy even his sense of link seemed affected. He fumbled a little to get his hand inwardly her T-shirt, to force it under her bra. Her mouth was hot and tasted of tobacco and the skinny her lips were dry and chapped. His excitement was slightly blunt he seemed to be receiving all sensory(prenominal) information through an invisible blanket. It took interminable than the last time to prise her enclothe loose from her body, and the condom was difficult, because his fingers had establish staunch and slow then he unintentionally placed his elbow, with all his weight foot it, on her soft fleshy underhandedly and she shrieked in pain.She was drier than before he forced his way inside her, determined to accomplish what he had come for. Time was glue-like and slow, but he could hear his own rapid breathing, and it made him edgy, because he imagined someone else, crouching in the dark spot with them, watching, panting in his ear. Krystal moaned a little. With her head thrown back, her nose became broad and snout-like. He pushed up her T-shirt to look at the smooth white breasts, jiggling a little, to a lower place the loose constraint of the undone bra. He came without expecting it, and his own grunt of satisfaction seemed to pass to the crouching eavesdropper.He rolled off her, natural off the condom and threw it aside, then zipped himself up, feeling jittery, looking around to check that they were un questionably alone. Krystal was dragging her pants up with one hand, pulling down her T-shirt with the other, stint merchant ship herself to do up her bra.It had become cloudy and darker while they had sat behind the bushes. There was a distant go in Fats ears he was very empty-bellied his brain was working slowly, while his ears were hypersensitive. The maintenance that they had been watched, perhaps over the top of the wall behind them, would not leave him. He wanted to go.Lets he muttered, and without waiting for her, he crawled out between the bushes and got to his feet, brushing himself down. There was an elderly couple a 100 yards away, crouching at a graveside. He wanted to get right away from spectre eyes that might, or might not, have watched him screw Krystal Weedon but at the same time, the process of finding the right bus stop and get on the bus to Pagford seemed almost unbearably onerous. He wished he could simply be transported, this instant, to his attic bedr oom.Krystal had staggered out behind him. She was pulling down the bottom of her T-shirt and staring down at the grassy ground at her feet.Fuck, she mumbled.What? said Fats. Cmon, lets go.S Mr Fairbrother, she said, without moving.What?She pointed at the mound in front of them. There was no headstone yet but fresh flowers lay all along it.See? she said, crouching over and indicating cards stapled to the cellophane. Tha sez Fairbrother. She recognized the name easily from all those letters that had gone home from school, asking her mother to give permission for her to go away on the minibus. Ter Barry, she read carefully, an this sez, Ter Dad, she sounded out the words slowly, from But Niamh and Siobhans names defeated her.So? demanded Fats but in truth, the news gave him the creeps. That wickerwork position lay feet below them, and inside it the short body and cheery face of Cubbys lamb friend, so often seen in their house, hogwash away in the earth. The Ghost of Barry Fairbroth er he was unnerved. It seemed like some kind of retribution.Cmon, he said, but Krystal did not move. Whats the matter?I rowed for im, din I? snapped Krystal.Oh, yeah.Fats was fidgeting like a restive horse, edging backwards.Krystal stared down at the mound, hug herself. She felt empty, sad and dirty. She wished they had not done it there, so close to Mr Fairbrother. She was cold. Unlike Fats, she had no jacket.Cmon, said Fats again.She followed him out of the cemetery, and they did not speak to each other once. Krystal was thinking about Mr Fairbrother. He had always called her Krys, which nobody else had ever done. She had liked being Krys. He had been a good laugh. She wanted to cry.Fats was thinking about how he would be able to work this into a funny story for Andrew, about being stoned and fucking Krystal and getting paranoid and thinking they were being watched and travel out almost onto old Barry Fairbrothers grave. But it did not feel funny yet not yet.