Highbridge by Phil Redmond Read Free Book Online Page A

he?’ asked Carol.
    ‘What’s wrong with him giving me things?’
    ‘It’s what he thinks he’s paying for.’
    ‘I don’t know why you two are so down on him.’
    Tanya started slicing the first pizza. ‘I told you. He’s creepy.’
    ‘Why, why do you say that?’
    ‘It’s the way he looks at you.’
    ‘You mean, never stops looking at you,’ added Carol.
    Becky turned to Tanya. ‘Like you never get that everywhere you go?’
    ‘He’s different, Becks. The others try sly looks, but he’s, he’s …’
    ‘Blatant?’ offered Carol.
    ‘Even more than that. Like, you know, he’s just constantly sizing us up.’
    ‘What? Don’t treat me like a sex object!’ Becky shot back defiantly.
    ‘I can’t quite explain it, but he’s like the dog when we’re eating.’
    ‘Yeah,’ Carol agreed. ‘And that’s what makes him creepy.’
    ‘How, how can you say that? You’ve never spoken to him.’
    ‘We don’t need to. We don’t like him, OK?’ Carol shot back at Becky, patience finally strained.
    Becky turned and headed out of the kitchen, slamming the door behind her. Carol turned to Tanya, anxious, but Tanya carried on switching pizzas in the microwave. ‘She’s left her fake Chloé.’
    Carol looked across to where Becky had indeed dumped her bag, and relaxed.
    ‘Don’t kill yourself, Cags,’ Tanya said, as she dug out the pizza cutter and designated Carol as slicer. ‘She needs to hear it.’
    ‘I know, but I think we made the same mistake my dad always does.’
    ‘Unsuitable boyfriend syndrome?’
    ‘Yes, Mum. Any ketchup?’
    ‘Yes, darling. In the fridge. Get it yourself.’
    As Carol opened the fridge, Tanya opened Becky’s bag and removed the Samsung. She killed it and frisbeed it into the mound of old blankets that covered the dog’s bed. With a bit of luck he’d eat it.
    *
    ‘You may be right,’ Matt conceded.
    ‘I am.’ Luke was his usual dogmatic self. ‘No matter which way you go at it, it always comes back to the one answer. Unemployment. They never really focus on that in films. Do you remember
Rambo
?’
    ‘Brilliant film. In my top ten. The first one.’
    ‘Yeah, but if they’d only given John Rambo a decent job when he came home …’
    ‘They wouldn’t have had a movie?’ Matt interjected.
    ‘There is that. But it’s like the 2011 smash and grab riots. Whenever you see something on the telly about the bad guys terrorising people on council estates …’
    ‘Projects, they called them in things like
The Wire
.’
    ‘Thanks. But are you still trying to defuse any potential build-up of psychotic stress-related blame tendencies?
    ‘Is it working?’
    ‘No,’ Luke replied. ‘I’m not blaming anyone. Except those clowns on TV who are quick to blame the cops. And the politicians. They haven’t got a clue. Never have had, especially as most of them didn’t come from the estates.’
    Matt just nodded. He knew where Luke would go next. He’d heard it all before. There was no point debating, because he agreed with it. It was the reason he was lying on a freezing hill beside his mate. A reason the politicos would never understand. Because they were definitely a world apart.
    They blamed their predecessors and drugs and failing education and, well, almost anything and everything they could crap on about, except the one thing they could do nothing about. Jobs. What happens to 30,000 people when their main source of income, their employment, just ups sticks and walks away?
    Luke was definitely on a similar track, as he panned the Barrett to look down over what was laughingly called Meadow View. It used to be called Butler Fields after some long-forgotten councillor but became known locally as Butcher’s Field when things started to fall apart in the 1980s. Luke adjusted the focus on the scope to take in the empty concrete slabs where the industrial park used to be.
    ‘What’ve you seen?’ Matt asked, suddenly alert.
    ‘Nothing. Just history.’ Luke panned