Thicker Than Water

We sat with our backs against the stone, facing towards the cemetery gates because Richie still wasn’t sure that some unspecified enemy wasn’t going to try to sneak up on him while we talked. Consequently his gaze wasn’t on mine and I could watch him while he talked; look for any chink in that heavy armour of certainty.

‘She was living in Derby when he found her,’ he said, his beautiful voice elegaically lowered. From his tone, you knew that as far as he was concerned, that was where Anita’s death had begun.

‘He paid some private-detective bloke to chase her down, with some bullshit cover story about how they were separated but he wanted to give it another chance, and then he turned up on her do«ed okeorstep one morning.’

He stared into the past, saw nothing there to give him any comfort. ‘She was in a bad way,’ he said, flatly. ‘She had a bit of a habit. Heroin, I mean. And sometimes . . . You know how it is. Some times are worse than other times. When Kenny showed up, she’d just been thrown out of a job and she didn’t have any money coming in.

He practically said he’d keep her fucking supplied. Anything to get her to go back and live with him.

‘I told her. I frigging told her. You know yourself what he’s like. You know he can’t control himself. Even as a kid he was fucking dangerous, so what do you expect him to be like as a man? People like Kenny Seddon don’t change. He’ll hurt you, Nita. He’ll hurt you worse than . . . worse than you’ve ever been hurt in your life.

’

It was as though he were having the argument with her now. As though she was standing there on the grass in front of us, visible only to him, talking only to him. The cigarette between his fingers burned down unnoticed, growing a longer and longer beard of ash.

‘She didn’t care,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘She knew I was right, but it didn’t make any difference. “I don’t deserve any better,” she said. “Look at me, Richie. Look at how I’m living. He’ll put a roof over our heads.

He’ll be a father to Mark. Fuck knows, somebody’s got to be. I can’t go on like this.” And all the rest of it. Like it was a rational decision. Like what she was doing made sense. But it didn’t, Castor. And I’ll tell you why.

‘She knew. She went back knowing what he was going to do to her. In fact, that was why she went back. Because Kenny could be relied on to treat her the way she thought she deserved.’"

"The cigarette burned his fingers.