Candy by Kevin Brooks Read Free Book Online

porter was his job, but being a DJ was what he did. Dad, of course, couldn’t understand it. He couldn’t understand how anyone could just have a job instead of a career, how anyone could just want to do something because they really liked doing it.
    It was beyond him.
    Anyway, about six months ago Mike packed in the porter’s job and opened up his own little business in Romford, selling and hiring out DJ equipment—desks, mixers, sound systems, that kind of thing. At first he kept on DJing as well, but after a while he began to realize that he liked the business side almost as much as the DJing itself—and it was less tiring, too. And more lucrative. So now he’s pretty much retired as a DJ and he’s doing really well with the business—making a name for himself and piles of money—but it doesn’t make any difference to Dad. He still can’t stand him. Which, to put it mildly, makes things a little bit awkward now and then.
    So when I went down to the kitchen that night, and Gina told me that Mike had asked her to marry him, I didn’t know what to say. I was pleased for them, of course, and it was really nice to see the excitement in their faces, but I couldn’t help wondering what Dad was going to say.
    “Have you told him yet?” I asked Gina.
    She shook her head. “Mike only asked me tonight—look…” She waggled her finger at me, showing off a small silver ring.
    “Very nice,” I said, looking at Mike. “Did you get it in a cereal packet?”
    “I’ll have you know that’s a top-quality platinum ring,” Mike said.
    “Who told you that?”
    “The guy who was selling them in the pub—top-quality, he said, forty-eight-carat platinum, very high-class.”
    “High-class goods for a high-class guy.”
    “That’s right.”
    He grinned across the table at Gina, making her smile like an idiot, and I found myself looking at him, wondering why I wasn’t scared of him in the same way I’d been scared of Iggy. It was an uncomfortable comparison to make, and it made me feel really stupid, because I knew I was only making the comparison because they were both big and black, and that didn’t make any sense at all. I wasn’t scared of Iggy because he was big and black; I was scared of Iggy because he was scary. Because he was Iggy. Black had nothing to do with it.
    “What’s up?” Mike asked me.
    “Uh?”
    “You’re looking at me like I’ve got two heads or something.”
    “Sorry,” I said. “I was miles away.”
    “Thinking about Candy?” asked Gina.
    “No—”
    “Who’s this Candy?” asked Mike, leaning his arms on the table, looking interested.
    “No one—” I started to say.
    “Come on, Joe,” Gina interrupted. “We made a deal. I told you our secret, now it’s your turn.”
    “Yeah,” echoed Mike, “come on, Joe—give it up, dish the dirt, spill the beans, ‘fess up—”
    “I thought you were going home?” I said to him.
    “There’s no rush.” He smiled.
    I didn’t want to tell them about Candy. I was afraid of making a fool of myself. But I didn’t want to keep it inside me, either. I wanted to let it out, to give it some air, to see how it sounded outside my head…at least some of it, anyway.
    And I had made a deal, after all.
    So I drank some tea, settled back in the chair, and told them what had happened. I didn’t tell them everything, of course. I didn’t tell them about the touch of her fingertips or the intoxicating scent of her skin, and I certainly didn’t tell them about the light in the darkness or the crying voice or the stuff I could feel deep down inside me…whatever it was.
    Even if I’d wanted to, I couldn’t have told them about that.
    But I told them everything else.
    When I’d finished, no one said anything for a while. Gina just sat there, looking at me with a slightly dazed expression on her face, while Mike kept his head down and stared thoughtfully at the table. I drained the cold tea from my cup and glanced around the kitchen. White