‘I gave the bathroom a good do,’ George said. ‘Got the nailbrush on the grouting. Looks a treat now.’
‘Stressed, by any chance?’ Aunty Sharon flung herself down onto the kitchen chair. It groaned beneath the weight of her heavy frame. Her taffeta skirt bunched up around her like an airbag triggered in a car crash. ‘Fucking thing is doing my head in.’ She stood again, unzipped the skirt and stepped out of the layers of electric blue fabric and netting. Flung it over the back of the adjacent chair. Sat back down, wearing only her generous knickers and a thick jumper. Dimpled thighs. Knees like dark chocolate blancmange. White ankle socks digging into her chubby legs. She rubbed her belly. Twanged the elastic in the waistband of her knickers. ‘That’s better. That new manager is some corny little rarseclart. He’s got me dressing up in 1950s shit and bobby socks, like I’ve escaped some pensioner’s mental home. I’m an experienced barmaid in a Soho titty bar. Not some kid serving chips in a themed bloody chicken shop. Cheeky bastard, he is. It’s -20 out there tonight. My toes are like frozen meatballs, man! If my fucking legs fall off with hypothermia, I’m going to sue his skinny white arse. At least Derek didn’t take the piss, trying to tell me what to wear. And he could have done! But even though he was my baby-father and long-time boss, he never pulled this kind of shit! Fucking novelty nights and all the girls in sodding bunny costumes like the twenty-first century ain’t even here!’ She sucked her teeth long and low. Paused for breath. Looked at her niece. ‘Well? What you been crying for, puffy eyes? Tell your Aunty Shaz.’ She reached out to her with a robust, welcoming arm.
George ignored the gesture. Stood steadfastly by the sink, wearing one of Patrice’s hoodies on top of her own. Arms folded tightly with sleeves down over her hands. Couldn’t get warm, even with the heating on 27 and the gas meter lifted onto a bucket so that the wheel had stopped turning. Fuse wire through the electricity meter too, so that they could put fan heaters throughout the house without worrying about bills. George had gored a hole through the casing with a hot bodkin herself. A trick Letitia had taught her as a child, passed on to a reluctant, law-abiding Aunty Sharon. Chalk and cheese, those two.
‘I haven’t been crying,’ George said.
‘Suit yourself.’ Aunty Sharon trotted over to the bread bin. Took out a fruit loaf. Cut herself an ample slice, slathered in butter. Made appreciative noises. ‘I make the best fruit loaf in the world,’ she said. ‘Derek used to love my fruit loaf.’ She started to cut herself a second piece and dropped the breadknife. Wracking sobs, suddenly.
‘Not you as well,’ George said, wrapping Sharon in a bear hug as she heaved with grief.
‘So, you w-was crying,’ Sharon stuttered.
‘No. Yes. Never mind me. You let it out, Aunty Shaz.’
Sorrow streamed forth from Sharon’s face; tears quickly dripping from her jowls. Speech coming in hiccoughs. ‘It’s still hard, love. Especially working at that place. Porn King and them girls what have been there a while are always banging on about Derek, like he was some fucking saint or something. Uncle Giuseppe, this. Uncle Giuseppe, that.’ She looked up at George with ghoulish mascara-besmirched eyes. ‘Derek de Falco managed a titty bar badly. Some claim to fame, right?! He fucked himself up. He fucked me and Tin’s life up too. Selfish dickhead.’
‘They’re all selfish dickheads,’ George said, wiping her aunt’s second-hand make-up off her jumper with a hot cloth. Knowing Aunty Sharon knew the score and wouldn’t take it personally.
‘Yeah. Stuff Derek, the stupid bastard!’ Sharon grabbed the kitchen roll off the worktop and blew her nose loudly into a clean sheet. Dabbed gingerly at her eyes. Tugged at her elaborate arrangement of platinum blonde extensions and brightly coloured headscarf until it all came away in one cumbersome piece. Short greying hair underneath. Receding hairline. A little too thin in parts from stress-alopecia, where cheap hair extensions over the years had taken their toll.
George touched her own head of thick dark curls reflexively. Curls which Van den Bergen liked to grip when he kissed her passionately.
‘Anyway. Uncle Giuseppe’s old news. Tell your Aunty Sharon what’s eating you,’ Sharon said, pulling her sizeable bra from beneath her jumper and hanging it over the taffeta skirt. ‘It is laughing gas, in there?’ She gestured towards the living room.
George shook her head. ‘No. She’s the least of it. I keep getting texts from Van den Bergen. We’re on. We’re off. He loves me. He never says it, the arsehole. Up one minute. Down the next.’
‘Thought he was always like that, anyway. Didn’t you say he was depressed?’
George nodded. ‘He’s not been the same since the Butcher. Physically, he’s healed. But mentally … They’ve had him chasing missing persons for two years. Sat on his arse in the office, checking online reports or sat drinking coffee in people’s houses while he does interviews. Insisting he’s not well enough to face active service. But they’ve got him working a new murder, Marie’s telling me. I haven’t spoken to the tosser for weeks because of what happened. Now he wants me over there under the pretence of it being in a professional capacity, I’ll bet. Wants me to hold his hand, more like. He’s full of shit.’
The beginnings of a smile played on Sharon’s chapped lips. ‘Your fellers always end up in bits, thanks to you, don’t they? You’re more high maintenance than that mother of yours.’
A heavy sigh. ‘Actually, I’d be lying if I said she wasn’t doing my head in, too,’ George said, breathing out heavily. Glaring at the door to the living room, behind which her mother slept. ‘She was such a pain in the arse while you were at work. I’m trying to write my research up, and she’s chatting in my ear, giving it, I’m dying. I’ve got pulmonary hypertension – she can barely bloody pronounce it. I’ve got sickle cell anaemia – she doesn’t even know what the fuck that is. You don’t give a monkey’s about me. I can’t deal with it.’
‘Take no notice of that attention-seeking bitch, love,’ Sharon said, frowning and shaking her head. ‘My sister will play every last dirty card in her hand to get what she wants. I’ll believe that “I’m dying shit” when I see it. She’s got some brass neck, threatening to die when she’s strong as a horse.’
‘She’s got some brass neck, kipping on your sofa!’
Sharon was unexpectedly silent. Tremors, rippling across her chin and cheeks, gave the impression that she was about to be sick. Her face crumpled rapidly, the silence giving way to wailing loud enough to wake her sister and her sleeping son. Fleshy hands balled into tight fists.
George was taken aback. Barely knew how to react to this secondary outburst. ‘Try to remember Derek the way he was,’ she said, turning to tend to the tea. Stirring the cup too briskly. Nice and strong. Three sugars and a healthy wallop of rum. That’s how Aunty Shaz liked it after work on a cold night. Set the cup down on a coaster with handle perfectly perpendicular to the edges.
With electric blue nail extensions to match her abandoned dress, Sharon wrapped her hands around the mug, spitting and sputtering her words one by one. ‘It ain’t Derek,’ Sharon said. ‘Not really. I’m crying cos of …’ She flapped her hand in front of her fact, as though she was wafting away unwanted emotion. ‘It’s just … it’s little Dwayne.’ She stared off into the middle distance.
‘It’s not today, is it?’ George asked, glancing at the calendar.
Sharon nodded. Looked suddenly feeble and frail, clutching at the silver locket around her neck. Dimpled chin and downturned mouth. Streams of glistening, sorrowful tears and snot, lit up by the kitchen lightbulb, looked like strange tinsel, two months too late for Christmas.
‘Shit. I’m so sorry,’ George said, sitting by her side and hooking her arm around her aunt’s shoulders. Suddenly her own problems seemed paltry in comparison. Guilt jabbed at the soft spots that were already raw.
‘I told you, didn’t I?’