‘You! Plans! Don’t make me laugh. You never go out, only to the shops or mine.’
‘I’m visiting my aunt. She hasn’t been too well.’
‘Be a devil and let’s have some fun. Tommy has been a naughty boy, roaming the streets with that Darling lad again. Bad boys deserve to be punished,’ Ian chuckled.
‘No can do. Sorry, Ian.’
‘But you said you liked the lad.’
‘Yeah, I do. But I really need to see my aunt. She sounds as though she’s on her last legs.’
‘Oh well, your loss is my gain,’ Ian smirked.
‘Certainly is. Enjoy,’ Norman shut his front door, ran to the bathroom and doused his sweaty face in cold water. If Tommy squealed to those Darlings, Ian was a dead man walking. Literally.
‘You’re late,’ Ian snapped when Tommy walked through the front door.
Tommy glanced at his watch. He hadn’t wanted to come home tonight, but knew he had little choice. His only consolation was that Auntie Sandra would be here, as he’d asked her yesterday if she would be visiting her sister this weekend and she’d said no.
‘It’s ten past nine. You are taking liberties lately, Tommy. Massive liberties. I thought I told you to stay away from those Darlings. They’re no good, do you hear me? No bloody good at all.’
‘But I like Danny and he’s the only real mate I’ve met round ’ere. If I stop knocking about with him, then I got no one and I’ll be lonely.’
Ian smiled. ‘You’ve got me, but you don’t seem to want to spend any time in my company these days. I’ll do you a deal. You be nicer to me, and I’ll allow you to be friends with Danny. How does that sound?’
Suddenly aware the perve had been drinking, Tommy froze. ‘Where’s Auntie Sandra?’
‘Answer my question first, then I’ll answer yours.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Oh, I think you do, Tommy.’
Tommy’s eyes burned with fire. ‘You come anywhere near me again, and I swear I will tell Ronnie Darling. I mean it. I will, and he will do you over.’
When Tommy ran up to his room, Ian paced up and down the lounge. Ronnie Darling would most certainly do him over, as his nephew had so politely put it, but Ian doubted the lad would ever have the balls to tell Ronnie anything. Bar his sister, he had never told anyone what had happened between himself and Uncle Ted. Especially once he’d got used to all the wonderful gifts Uncle Ted bought him and the great days out they had together. Surely, given time, once the initial shock had worn off, Tommy would feel the same way about him?
Brain fuddled by the amount of alcohol he’d supped, Ian paced up and down the threadbare filthy carpet. He had to think very carefully about his next move. Very carefully indeed.
*
Tommy lay on his bed thinking about his mum, sister and Rex. He never thought about Alexander or that old witch Nanny Noreen. They had put him in this situation so, to him, they were both dead.
Feeling nauseous, Tommy put his hand under the right-hand side of the pillow to check the handle of the dagger was in the right spot, if push came to shove. No way would he tell Ronnie or Danny if his uncle were to violate him again. He never wanted anybody to know. It would make him feel abnormal. He was a Millwall fan now and wanted to be a boxer when he grew up. He refused to be known as some poor molested orphan. He’d die of shame.
Deciding to turn his music off so he could hear Ian approaching, Tommy picked up his Shoot magazine. He couldn’t concentrate on reading it though. He had no idea where that fat cow he was forced to call Auntie Sandra was, but he prayed she would come home soon.
It was past midnight when Ian made his way up the stairs. He had decided at one point not to touch the boy again, but then he’d had a few more drinks and his mind had drifted back to the past …
Valerie had always been the popular one. Like him, she had no idea who her father was, but it was obviously a different man to the one who’d fathered him. Valerie was pretty, vibrant and confident, whereas he had always been the total opposite. He’d been a chubby boy with few friends and no one to confide in. It had taken him weeks to pluck up the courage to tell his sister what Uncle Ted had been doing to him, but she’d been going out with pals that day and was too busy tarting herself up to even listen.
And now her precious son was going to be well and truly initiated into the world Uncle Ted had introduced him to all those years ago.
Unable to sleep, Tommy could feel his heart beating at an incredibly rapid pace. He hadn’t got undressed, was too scared to in case he needed to run out of the house. He’d even debated whether to sleep down by the canal, but that was no long-term solution. Danny was right. Killing the perve was the only way out and he didn’t even care if he was sent to a bad boy’s home. Hazel might not have been happy in the home she’d been sent to, but at least she was safe from perverts like Uncle Ian. Anything had to be better than living like this.
‘Tommy, you awake?’
Having switched his lamp off, Tommy did not reply. He could smell the stench of alcohol mixed with cigarettes. He could also hear the perve’s laboured breathing.
‘Tommy, Tommy, wake up. Look, I am sorry if I shouted at you when you came home. But I miss what we had. I want us to be close again,’ Ian slurred.
When the perve began to stroke his face, Tommy wasn’t taking any chances. He pulled the dagger from under his pillow and plunged it straight in the left-hand side of Ian’s neck.
Stunned, Ian fell backwards on the bed.
‘You dirty bastard,’ Tommy bellowed.
Having guessed it would come to this, Tommy had already packed the treasured photos of his mum, Hazel, Linda and Rex in his duffel bag, along with PC Kendall’s phone number, his Millwall programmes and records.
‘Tommy, help me. Call an ambulance,’ Ian rasped, holding the neck wound.
Tommy took one last look at the fat bastard. ‘I hate you, ya nonce. I hope you die.’
‘Please. Please help me.’
Aware that his once grey-looking sheets were rapidly turning to claret, Tommy grabbed his belongings, ran down the stairs and legged it along the street as fast as his little legs would take him.
The nearest phone box was only a couple of minutes away, but it was out of service, so Tommy ran towards the Old Kent Road.
It was gone midnight and there were drunks staggering about the streets, but Tommy wasn’t scared. After living with that perve, nothing and nobody would ever scare him again.
There was a lad already in the phone box and Tommy silently willed him to hurry up. PC Kendall was the only person he could think of turning to for help in this particular situation. He was too young to run away and was bound to meet other perverts like Ian if he was forced to live on the streets.
When the phone box became free, Tommy darted inside and with trembling hands dialled the number. ‘Can I speak to PC Kendall, please?’
‘PC Kendall isn’t on duty at the moment. Is there anything I can help you with?’ came the reply.
‘No. I only want to speak to PC Kendall. He’s my friend. It’s important. I think I might have killed someone.’
The officer on night duty could tell Tommy was a kid. Instinct told him this was no crank call though. ‘What is the number you’re calling