Ian smiled. ‘ Haven’t you noticed the sun is up?’
‘ Alright, but it’s still early’.
‘ I’ve got to get home, get changed, pick a couple of the lads up and bring them down to the site’.
‘ You’ll be knackered today’.
‘ Sure will be after last night’ said Ian. He tweaked the end of Mark’s nose between his fingers. ‘ Tiger’.
‘ Do you want to come over tonight? I’ll make us dinner’.
‘ All this and he cooks too’.
‘ That’s about it, yea’.
Ian sat down on the edge of the bed and leaned forward. Mark was a wonderful guy and Ian was
scared stiff of his feelings for him.
‘ Life for me is on my own, Mark’.
‘ What the hell is that supposed to mean?’
‘ Mark, what you see isn’t all of what you get with me. I’m complicated’.
‘ So are you trying to tell me you’ve got a wife and kids?’
‘ What? Oh, Christ, no’.
‘ So what are you saying?’
‘ Mark, I can’t take a chance on something like this’.
‘ Trust me to pick on another emotional retard’ said Mark, tersely.
‘ That isn’t fair’
‘ Well excuse me for being a bit put out. I thought we’d had a great night’.
‘ We did, we did, it’s just … ‘
‘ …Ian, it’s as hard or as easy as you want to make it’.
‘ For you maybe but not for me’
‘ Christ, Ian, you make it sound as if getting involved with me would be the worst thing that ever happened to you!’
‘ No it wouldn’t be’ said Ian. ‘ It would be the best thing that happened to me in years. But it could be the worst thing that ever happened to you’.
‘ Shouldn’t I be the judge of that?’
‘ You don’t understand. I’ve lived this way for twenty years and I can’t go back now’.
‘ Can’t or won’t?’
‘ Mark, I’ll call you’ said Ian. He stood up and went to the door.
‘ Ian, I’m worth more than to hang around on standby whilst you work out whatever your complications are. Either you want me or you don’t’.
CHAPTER FOUR
Derek Campbell put his pint down on the small circular table. He looked around the small bar of the William of Orange pub just off the
Shankhill with its peeling paint and walls stained with yellow because of all the cigarette smoke they’d been subjected to. He could hold onto his past in a place like this and he’d been doing a lot of that lately.
‘ This wasn’t how it was supposed to be, Freddie’ he said, his voice heavy. He hadn’t counted on a parade or anything when he came out of the Maze but he hadn’t counted on getting little more than a cold shoulder from folk. The other punters in the pub acknowledged him with a smile, a nod, a wink. One or two even shook his hand but then they were gone, seemingly unwilling to exchange any further. It made him angry. They were a bunch of ungrateful bastards. He’d spent twenty years inside for them.
‘ It’s certainly not how it was, so it isn’t’ said Freddie as he rubbed his chin before beginning to roll himself another cigarette. Freddie had gone down with Derek but on the lesser charge of extortion and had served ten years before being released. Since then he’d been working in one of the big DIY superstores on the outskirts of Belfast. He and Derek had known each other all their lives, they’d grown up on the same street and gone to the same school. Freddie had joined Derek’s gang when he was starting out. He was Derek’s number two. He’d been the only one there when Derek came out of the Maze. Derek’s son Shaun hadn’t bothered to turn up and his wife Gillian was too busy drinking herself into an early grave to worry about her husband coming out of gaol after twenty years.
‘ This lot don’t know what fighting is all about, Freddie’ said Derek. ‘ Even our Shaun left Jamie Robertson to us, said he didn’t want to get involved’. He shook his head with a mounting sense of gloom. ‘ Robertson had informed on us to that DI Armstrong character and he, my own son, said he was leaving it to us to sort out. My own bloody son too wrapped up in his drugs trade and his bunch of bloody working girls to work with his old man’.
‘ Shaun’ll come round, Derek’ said Freddie, although he doubted that. ‘ It’s the Judas we need to concentrate our energies on, Derek’.
Derek took the pack of photographs out of his jacket pocket and laid them out on the table. The very sight of the man in the pictures, older face, different name, but same look of Judas in his eyes, made Derek’s skin crawl.
‘ You’re right there, Freddie, so you are’ said Derek, clenching his fist. ‘ I could ring his fucking neck with one hand so I could’.
‘ We need to watch it there, Derek’ said Freddie ‘ If we’re right about what happened to him then he won’t exactly be left uncovered. They’ll want to protect him’.
‘ There’s always a gap’ said Derek. ‘ I just hope our man is up to it, that’s all. I have my doubts about him, Freddie’.
‘ We have to work with him, Derek’.
‘ Well we haven’t much choice, Freddie’ said Derek. He looked round the bar again. This was where he used to be able to command the attention of thirty or forty willing volunteers for his campaign against republicanism. This was where he’d planned the killing, the murders, the battles to stick it into the Fenian trash. Since he’d been released he’d noticed there weren’t many of this kind of pub left. Now it was all theme bars to do with Australians or some other shite and the lads and lasses were all lapping it up. Had they forgotten what sacrifice meant? He wished to God he could reach out and grab back those old times. He’d been a somebody back then. He didn’t know what he was anymore.
‘ He’ll do it, Derek, I’ll make sure of that. He has his instructions and he hasn’t let us down so far’.
‘ When does Peter Irvine want to see us?’
‘ Sunday morning’ said Freddie ‘ Straight after morning service’.
‘ Do we know what it’s about?’
‘ No. All his people said was that we had to keep it buttoned. Tight’.
It was Saturday night and Ian had arranged to meet Mark downtown.
‘ I was surprised to get your call’ said Mark after they’d hooked up outside the old Midland Hotel.
‘ I was surprised I made it’ said Ian.
‘ So why did you?’
‘ Because I can’t get you out of my head’.
They made their way down to Canal Street and it was packed. The early evening sunshine had brought everybody out and there was a real party atmosphere. They got a couple of pints from VIA and were lucky enough to find a table on the cobbled pavement next to the canal itself.
‘ You haven’t been down here before, have you?’ Mark asked. He could see that Ian wasn’t quite at ease with his surroundings.
‘ No. Do you come down here a lot?’
‘ A couple of times a month’ said Mark. ‘ Depends what me and my mates fancy doing. Whether we want to go out for a few drinks or whether it’s just laughs and talk over a meal we’re more in the mood for’.
‘ Can I ask if you always come down here on the pull?’
Mark laughed. ‘ Are you trying to find out how much I play the field?’
‘ I suppose it’s something like that, yea’.
‘ Or if I’m the sort who’ll dump you once I know I’ve got into your heart just because I’m young and therefore I can?’
‘ Somebody as good-looking as you has every right to make the most of his chances’.
‘ Well you’ve no need to worry on either score’ said Mark ‘ But I’m flattered that you take such care’.
‘ I take care over everything’ said Ian ‘ It’s in the nature of what I do’.
‘ There you go again’.
‘ What?’
‘ Talking as if you live half your life in some kind of parallel universe’.
‘ Chances are more easily afforded when you’re as young as you’.
‘ So you’ve got a thing about the age difference between us?’
‘ I’m thirty-eight, you’re twenty-three. I’m bound to be a bit doubtful about it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it does my ego the world of good to know that you want me but I don’t understand what it is you see in me’.
‘ And it makes you feel better to believe that I’m just playing with you?’
‘ Better?’
‘ Makes it easier not to give in to your feelings’ said Mark.
‘ What are you doing to me? Whenever I think of you I feel like I’m unravelling’.
‘ And that’s a bad thing?’
‘ I didn’t realise how easy it would be for the right guy to do’.
‘ So I’m the right guy then?’
‘ You certainly don’t miss a trick’ said Ian.
Mark thought Ian looked the business in his blue jeans, white linen shirt, black leather single-breasted jacket, big chunky silver watch on his hairy wrist. He didn’t know if he preferred him all washed and scrubbed up like this or all dirty at the end of the working day when his signature smell was strongest. He was definitely a meat and potatoes man as opposed to a quiche and salad one, a pint of bitter, not a vodka and
slimline.
‘ So when you said that life for you was alone’ said Mark ‘ Can you tell me what that was all about?’
Ian looked down at his beer. ‘ It was about a long time ago back in Ireland’.
‘ Was it something to do with the troubles?’
‘ Yeah, it was to do with the troubles’ said Ian.
‘ You’re a deep on alright, Taylor’.
‘ Am I?’
‘ It’s part of your charm’.
‘ Do you fall in love easily?’
‘ You ask me a lot but you don’t give much away about yourself’.
‘ Sorry’.
‘ It’s okay. I’m just letting you know and the answer is no, I don’t fall in love easily. Do you?’
‘ No. It’s only happened once before’.
Mark smiled at the implication of what Ian had let slip and then smiled even more when he saw Ian blushing.
‘ Do you realise what you just said to me?’ said Mark.
‘ Yes, and I’m going to get another round in before I say anything else I shouldn’t’.
Ian went to the bar and brought them a couple more pints out. If somebody had told him a few weeks ago that he’d be sitting here with Mark he’d have told them they were on drugs. If he’d known this was going to happen when he’d gone into Conor Naughton’s flat and blown his brains out he’d have considered it some kind of sick joke. That was the trouble. The other side of his life wasn’t exactly compatible with falling in love.
‘ Do you have any family over here, Ian?’ Mark asked when Ian returned with their drinks.
Ian shook his head. ‘ No. Look, do you want to go and get something to eat?’
‘ Yeah, I’m famished’ said Mark who noted the quick change of subject.
‘ Where do you fancy going?’
‘ This is Manchester. We can get whatever we want’.
‘ Yes, but it’s Saturday night and we haven’t booked anything’.
‘ So?’
‘ So why don’t we head back to my place and we can order some takeaway? I’ve got loads of wine and beer at home. We could send out for pizza, Chinese, Indian …’ he was caught by the filthy, wild look in Mark’s eyes that so turned him on. ‘ … what are you thinking?’
Mark grinned all over his face. ‘ I’m thinking that I could eat chips out of your boxer shorts whilst you were still wearing them’.
CHAPTER FIVE
The next morning Mark and Ian were sitting up in Ian’s bed eating toast and drinking tea.
‘ At least we’re using plates this time’ said Ian.
‘ Yes, that was a very amusing little game we played last night’.
‘ We should be locked up for what we did’.
‘ Go on then’ said Mark ‘ Bring out the handcuffs’.
They laughed and Mark stroked the side of Ian’s face. It was clear that this big Irishman carried a lot of demons around but he’d wait until he was ready to bring them out and when he did, Mark would clear up whatever mess they left. He had no idea what they could be but he reassured himself with the thought that he’d be worried if a man of thirty-eight years old didn’t have baggage or demons of some kind or another.
‘ The only time I eat breakfast at home is on the weekend’ said Ian