Windows 96

  Copyright © 2019 Cal Holmes

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

  Matador

  9 Priory Business Park,

  Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,

  Leicestershire. LE8 0RX

  Tel: 0116 279 2299

  Email: books@troubador.co.uk

  Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

  Twitter: @matadorbooks

  ISBN 978 1789012 620

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  Contents

  1.Chores

  2.The Garage

  3.Friday, First Day

  4.The Flour Mill

  5.Monday

  6.Baston headquarters

  7.Police

  8.James and Kevin

  9.Payday

  10.Out in town

  11.Hangover

  12.Terry

  13.Frank

  14.Brigitte

  15.Close

  16.Will’s party

  17.Rain

  18.Fight

  19.Saturday knocking

  20.Harold’s party

  21.Sunday

  22.Fox’s team

  23.Swimming pool

  24.The flat

  25.Pulling

  26.Bruce

  27.Stolen food

  28.Louise

  29.Tears

  30.Flat again

  31.Last attempt

  32.Date

  33.Training

  34.Over

  35.Confession

  36.Auntie Ruth’s party

  37.Jim

  38.Tidying up

  1

  Chores

  The line went dead. I absorbed the final insult with the phone still pressed against my ear, watching the faces on the TV erupt into muted laughter. I headed out to the garden, through the sunshine and into the cool darkness of the garage, sat on the old rug which used to belong in our dining room, and began to do sit-ups.

  My knees came up, threads of denim zooming into sharp focus, and out again on my in-breath. I tried to think of nothing except the silent counting and the controlled movement of my body, but the conversation barged its way into my routine.

  ‘We’ll hardly see each other when I start university,’ she’d said, emphasising university with an inflection at the end, the way they speak in Australia but without the accent. Lots of girls talked that way but I hadn’t noticed Anna do it before.

  ‘And there’s the distance, the travelling, the cost of the train fare.’ A thinly-disguised reminder of my broken car which I still had to replace.

  In the pauses, I made noises of agreement. She didn’t outright lose her temper, but her voice got tighter, rising in pitch as she told me how little time she’d have after all the studying.

  The even pace of my sit-ups increased, the waistband of my jeans digging into my lower back. I didn’t stop.

  She asked what Adam thought about me not going to university. My brother looked like the bare-chested men in the black and white posters girls seemed to go for. I told her I hadn’t spoken to him.

  ‘What did your parents say?’

  I told her they didn’t say anything, but it wasn’t strictly true. My mother cried and rang dad. He came over, perched on the edge of his old armchair, and told me to sit down. I leaned against the doorframe. He took off his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose, and said I was giving him a migraine. I offered to get him a tablet, then he lost it.

  ‘Alex, stop talking and listen, dammit.’

  I stopped talking and stopped listening; school taught me to go somewhere else in my head. At some point my mother stepped in to defend me while I slipped out, leaving them rowing over who was to blame for my ruined future.

  The heat radiated off my body, warming the air as I moved through it.

  ‘So, you’re just going to rely on summer jobs like last year?’

  She’d given up hiding the sarcasm. I’d meant to tell her I made more cash painting houses for my mother’s friends than Mark Lambert made working part-time at his dad’s garage. More than Mark Williams made peddling tenner deals and wraps of speed to the college first years. More than everyone we knew but instead, I told her I didn’t know.

  When everything else failed to get the reaction she was after, she’d said something I didn’t expect to hear, not from her.

  ‘To be honest Alex, I’m beginning to think you’re becoming a waste of space.’

  I flipped over into press-up position, thinking up things I could’ve said if she hadn’t hung up. They all sounded good, witty even. When I was done, I sank into the cracked leather sofa and rolled an almost perfect joint on the piece of broken glass.

  The rolling was sometimes relaxing enough. I didn’t always light it straight away and rested it behind my ear for later. This time, I didn’t wait. The glowing tip crackled and burned as I inhaled, thick, grey clouds, spiralling up to the rafters. After the next drag, I blew out perfect rings, swirling in mid-air until losing form and drifting away. The tangled mess of thoughts dispersed with the smoke and my body melted into a blissful calmness.

  Jimi Hendrix and Bob Marley watched with their smiling eyes from the duvet-clad walls. Next to them, sprawled against a backdrop of palm tree silhouettes, was the woman in the bikini, facing away, waiting.

  My daydream was as worn as the sofa. Blue sky with hot sun shining like diamonds off the water. She watched my perfect dive, cutting into the sea at just the right angle, powering through the clear water just below the surface. Her head tilted upwards, tanned body poised to jump in after me, but the admiring, seductive glance wouldn’t come. Her face morphed into Anna’s. She was frowning.

  There was no charging bull logo or cream leather dashboard in my getaway car. I was sitting in a Nova and my bikini-clad woman was gone.

  My car, the Nova, was at the back of Lambert’s dad’s garage, waiting for someone to come along and salvage the parts. I’d sold the stereo and base tube, the Momo steering wheel with the suede trim. The rest of my first car was a heap of scrap.

  The small cash reserve in a tobacco tin at the back of my wardrobe was dwindling. The money left in my savings account could get me another banger, but there was still insurance and petrol, and I promised myself I wasn’t going to touch that. But there is nothing cool about living at home or borrowing my mother’s lilac Nissan Micra with a driver’s seat cover made from wooden beads. I knew I wasn’t a waste of space, but I suppose I could see her point.

  I emerged from the garage into the dazzling sunlight and wandered back to the house. Draining a can of cold Lilt, I saw the note on the fridge door, attached by a magnetic letter A. Blue A for me, red one for Adam. Completely unnecessary now he was gone, and it was only the two of us, but I suppose old habits can be hard to break. At least, since the row with dad, my mother said she would support me in whatever I did, as long as I did something.

  The list was in curly handwriting,
chores I was expected to do while she was at work and I wasn’t. With my studying excuse finished with, anything I missed went at the top of the following day’s list. Now Thursday, it was long and potentially liable to cause a breach in the relative peace if everything wasn’t ticked off before she got home.

  It wasn’t so tedious once I got started, pulling clothes off the line, unloading the dishwasher, gliding through in no order. Cut the grass, front and back, in capitals, had been at the top for a few days. I told my mother it kept raining, but she didn’t believe me.

  I took off my t-shirt and checked out my reflection in the hallway mirror. My body was still on the lean side but there was definition on my chest and upper arms, shadowy rows of muscle on my torso. The manual labour from the previous summer spurred me into wanting to bulk up, not like a bodybuilder or anything, but it made sense to keep it up.

  The sun warmed my back as I pushed the lawnmower up and down the garden, leaving even stripes in my wake. I finally stopped thinking about Anna, university and every other problem other people told me I had.

  By the time I got to the front, I was beginning to enjoy the process, that fresh cut grass smell, the steady ticking of the motor, then my concentration was broken. A burgundy Mondeo came speeding into our cul-de-sac, pulling up in front of the island of communal grass.

  A man with a shirt and tie got out. I wondered if I’d done anything recently that required some official type to come to the house. He waved as though he knew me. I waved back, remembering how I’d once done the same to the characters at the end of Sesame Street.

  He talked into his phone, loud enough to hear his squawk over the din of the mower, pacing in long strides beside his car. This show went on for a while, then he ended the call and headed to the house next door. I could’ve told him they were out. Nobody was in during the day on Mulberry Drive.

  Adam called our cul-de-sac on Woodland Estate, the bell end of Crosston. He hated the place, couldn’t wait to leave. I didn’t mind it until I got tired of playing football on the oddly shaped patches of grass and searched for better, only to find they didn’t exist outside of a long walk or a car journey away. Our piece of suburbia didn’t even have the luxury of a shop, or a pub.

  I carried on with the stripes, pretending not to notice him. He looked officious but walked with a swagger which didn’t quite match the clean-cut image. He slowed at the end of our drive and opened a folder.

  I hesitated then turned the motor off. My ears tingled with silence and vibration bounced through my hands. I looked at them, expecting to see trembling fingers.

  ‘Sorry to bother you, mate,’ he said, stopping at the edge of the grass. ‘Have you got a minute?’

  A random laugh almost escaped when I pictured emptying my pockets and saying, ‘no’.

  ‘You don’t know when next door’s likely to be in, do you?’

  ‘Around six, I expect.’

  ‘Perfect, I’ll come back later.’

  ‘No worries.’ I turned back to the mower.

  ‘While I’m here, can I ask, are you the homeowner?’

  It was a weekday. I was in, no car on the driveway, detached house, and I was eighteen. I thought it was clear to anyone that I wasn’t the owner of anything.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Well I’m pleased I caught you in, nice job with the lawn by the way.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘How do you get the stripes?’

  ‘It’s the roller on the back,’ I said, recalling my dad discuss it all once with a neighbour. ‘It flattens the grass.’

  ‘Well, you learn something new every day. I see you spend a lot of time keeping the place nice, and I notice you’ve had all your windows updated in UPVC,’ he said, gesturing to the house.

  I followed his gaze to our shiny, white-framed windows, and wondered where I was when this was done.

  ‘Your fascias and soffits are looking a bit weathered though.’ He looked up this time and so did I, but nothing sprang out to identify themselves as fascias and soffits.

  ‘Sorry, I haven’t even introduced myself,’ he said, thrusting out his hand. ‘Phillip Fox from Baston Window Company, you’ve probably heard of us.’

  He said his name in monotone, the Fs and Ls rolling off his tongue as though it were one word.

  ‘Alex Lawrence,’ I said.

  His grip was sharp and tight.

  ‘What I can do, Alex, is come over one evening, I’ve got a free slot on Monday if it suits you.’ He looked in his folder again. ‘Shall we say six-thirty? I can run through the procedure and cost. No obligation to buy of course, completely free of charge…’

  I looked up at the roof again, still none the wiser, and wondered if Mum would pay me to paint our house. Painting wasn’t a chore, it was actual work.

  ‘Summer’s the best time of year to get it done. It won’t take long. We can run through payment options and anything else you need to know. Sorry, what time did I say?’

  ‘Six-thirty, I think.’

  ‘Great, I’ll get one of the girls in the office to give you a quick call to confirm it. If I can just take your number?’

  I reeled it off, tongue sticky with renewed thirst, blinding sun in my face. He was a shadow against a glaring white screen. His outline etched onto my eyeballs when I blinked, following wherever I looked. A cufflink flashed a streak of light into my vision.

  ‘What was that?’ I said, moving so I could see him better.

  ‘You did say six-thirty, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but I think…’

  ‘I thought I was right.’ He went back to writing.

  ‘Wait,’ I said, not sure what was supposed to be happening, but certain I didn’t want to be part of it. ‘I don’t think it’s me you need to be speaking to, it’s my mother. She’s at work.’

  He stopped.

  ‘Your mother?’

  ‘Yeah, she’s not here.’

  ‘I thought you said you were the homeowner.’

  ‘I am, I mean I live here, but technically…’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  The silence stretched out, sweat trickled down my bare back.

  ‘She’s definitely at work,’ I said.

  ‘I’ve written it all down now,’ he said. ‘I asked you if you were the homeowner, you said you were. We’ve made an appointment for Monday.’

  He stared, thumb clicking the end of his pen. I wished I’d left the mower running or better still, left the lawn for tomorrow’s list.

  ‘Can’t you cross it out?’

  ‘Cross it out? Yeah, I could do that, Alex, but I’ve taken up all the space in that time slot for your appointment. There’s no room left to replace it.’

  His voice had changed into a dull dead tone. I shoved a clammy hand into my pocket and took a step back.

  ‘Is this some kind of joke?’ he said. ‘You make an appointment, I go through the whole rigmarole of filling it all in, then you change your mind, just like that.’

  He snapped his fingers in the space between us.

  ‘I don’t know…’

  ‘Did you wait? Did you actually wait, until I was finished? This guy looks like he’s got nothing better to do, I’ll just wind him up for a while.’

  ‘No, I didn’t realise…’ He threw his folder, it landed open on the grass. ‘Yes please,’ he said. ‘I’ll have an appointment. Day, time, number, oh no wait, I’ve changed my mind.’

  This wasn’t how my father got angry, shouting, and going red. The guy was bigger than me, too, if he wanted to pummel my head in on the front lawn there was nobody around to hear.

  ‘I think we might have some Tippex,’ I said, holding my hands up. ‘We can cover up the writing, no harm done.’

  He bent over, not to pick up the folder, but to hold his stomach. There was a groan, his body jerked up, an
d he broke off into a showy, open-mouthed laugh. I released the breath I didn’t know I was holding.

  ‘Tippex,’ he said. ‘I was only messing about, mate, no offense intended.’ He picked up his folder and snapped it shut, the whole business of whatever he was selling apparently over with. ‘Alex, you’ve made my afternoon, do you know that? You should have seen the look on your face, it was classic. Actually, you know what, are you looking for a job? It’s just that it’s past lunch time and you’re obviously not at work. No offence or anything.’

  ‘I’m good, thanks.’

  ‘No problem, just thought I’d ask. What is it you do then?’

  I wanted to say, none of your business, dickhead. ‘I’ve finished my A Levels. I’m going travelling.’

  ‘Nice,’ he said. ‘Where you off to?’

  ‘I haven’t decided yet. Europe, Australia, maybe Asia.’

  ‘It’s all right for some. Doesn’t sound cheap.’

  I shook my head.

  ‘When do you go?’

  ‘After Christmas.’

  I walked back to the lawn mower, pretending he wasn’t there.

  ‘It’s only a few months away, it’ll fly by, I’m telling you,’ he said. ‘Well, I’ll leave you to it, but if you change your mind and need a job in the meantime, top up the funds, give me a call.’

  He handed me a card, his name printed across the middle, below it, sales executive. He checked his watch and started to walk away.

  ‘Doing what exactly?’ I said.

  His smile revealed straight white teeth.

  ‘This,’ he said, spreading his arm out to the empty estate. ‘Making appointments. A hundred and twenty quid a week basic, twenty-five for each one that sells.’

  I wasn’t naïve enough to think it was decent money, but it was a hundred and twenty more than I was currently making, and if I didn’t like it I could leave. Unlike my stint at manual labour, where walking away from a half-painted fence wasn’t an option, especially when it was around the corner at your mum’s friend’s house.

  ‘Look, I’ll tell you what I’ll do,’ he said. ‘Come out on the job with me tomorrow. I’ll personally give you twenty quid at the end of the day. If it’s not for you, what have you lost? Nothing. It’s a win-win situation. I, on the other hand, might be down twenty notes without so much as a lead to show for it, but I’m willing to take that chance on you.’