‘Isaac.’
‘What’s wrong?’ Isaac nodded in the general direction of Leo’s left leg.
‘I got kicked.’
Leo climbed the stairs, guessing correctly that the boys would be in one or other of their rooms.
‘In Jack’s,’ Isaac said helpfully.
‘He got kicked,’ Isaac informed his brother as they entered the room.
‘Who by?’
‘Horse.’
Jack stood. ‘Why? You upset him again?’
They had given the nickname Horse to Leo’s mum’s current boyfriend after Leo had given them an explicit description of the size of the man’s dick – he’s hung like a fucking horse, he had said. From that day they had called him Horse.
‘Yeah, they wouldn’t sell me any cans at the shop, police crackdown or summat, so I had to go home without any. I walked in on him screwing Tina Jackson. He got mad.’
‘Let’s look,’ Jack said.
Leo unzipped his jeans, and lowered them to his knees. The bruise covered the whole of the top of his leg, and trainer soles were clearly imprinted.
‘Christ’s sake,’ Jack whispered. ‘And where was your mum? Obviously not there if he was screwing Tina.’
‘She was at bingo. I thought he’d broke it at first, my leg. Couldn’t stand, so he dragged me and threw me on the sofa. I kept rubbing it and it started to feel a bit better, but it hurts to walk.’ Slowly and carefully, Leo pulled up his jeans, as if trying to avoid touching the bruise.
‘Did you tell your mum?’
‘Nah. She’d only have a go at him, and then he’d batter her. I told her I’d hurt it playing football. S’pose I did really, I was the football. And I didn’t tell her about Tina ’cos I reckon if that carries on he’ll leave us anyway. I’d rather Mum caught him at it, than me tell her. I don’t want blaming for the fallout from this.’
‘You want a can of Coke?’ Jack asked, moving to the small fridge in the corner of his bedroom.
Leo nodded, and Jack handed him one.
‘Thanks. You got any painkillers?’
‘Yeah.’ Jack opened the drawer of his bedside cabinet and removed a small strip of tablets. ‘Keep ’em,’ he said and watched as Leo took two, thought about it for a second, and took a third.
‘I need to kill this pain,’ he explained, and tucked the remaining tablets into his jeans pocket.
‘Be better if you killed Horse,’ Isaac said.
‘Or fuckin’ Tina. She’s caused me some grief, that tart.’
The three boys stayed in Jack’s room until Leo said he felt a little better, and they moved outside onto the playing field.
They’d all called out to Kenny as they left, telling him they were going for a game of footy, and Kenny gave his usual warning of be good to them.
They reached the base of the tree, but in deference to the bruise, chose to sit around the base instead of climbing up into the branches.
Leo spoke quickly, as if he’d been holding words inside him; it was almost as if he didn’t really want to pass on the next piece of news. ‘I know who he’s screwing.’
‘Who?’
‘Graham Andrews. I told you word had it he was having an affair. I know who it is. My mum was talking to Horse last night and I heard them. It’s Tina Jackson. Horse didn’t say owt about him having her as well though.’
Jack and Isaac looked at each other, comprehension flashing across Jack’s face. ‘The same one Horse was having it off with. The barmaid in the Kestrel and Pigeon. Blonde hair, big tits.’
‘You would know that.’ Isaac laughed. ‘Can’t say I know her.’
‘Mum didn’t like her, that’s how I know Tina. Mum was going on about her one night, about a week before…’ Jack’s voice trailed away. Every so often it hit him that his mother wasn’t there anymore, and it took his speech, his thoughts every time.
‘She didn’t say why she didn’t like her?’ Leo asked, studiously avoiding looking at Jack brushing the tear from his cheek.
Isaac chewed on a blade of grass. ‘She said she was a tart. That probably means she’d found out Graham was seeing Tina. Surely to God you don’t think him screwing a barmaid is connected to Carla and Mum dying?’
‘The barmaid lives with Charlie Linwood,’ Leo said softly. ‘I really came to tell you that, it wasn’t to give you dopey Tina’s name. She must be proper loopy to be shacked up with Charlie.’
‘And if it’s right Graham’s screwing her, he must be proper loopy as well,’ Jack replied with a grin. ‘I wouldn’t want to cross swords or anything else with Charlie Linwood. But supposing Charlie’s found out…’
All three sat quiet for a minute, lost in thoughts that were scary to them.
‘We’ve got to tell somebody,’ Isaac said finally.
‘Your dad?’ Leo turned to his friend, a troubled expression on his face. ‘Not sure about that, you see. Your dad’s a bit of a jump-in-with-both-feet kind of bloke, might do something that could end up with you losing him too, either to prison or to Charlie. We’ve got to think about this.’
‘Should we have a word with Graham?’ Jack said, not convinced by the idea.
Again there was silence while they all digested the question.
Eventually Jack spoke. ‘I say we don’t. We shouldn’t be telling him we know anything. He’s going through enough shit. We should really tell the police, but I’m not convinced…’
‘So what do we do? Pretend we don’t know?’ Isaac directed his question to his brother.
‘We sort it,’ Jack said quietly.
Leo punched the air. ‘That’s my boy!’
‘What?’ Isaac stared open-mouthed at Leo. ‘You’re not telling me you agree with dickhead here? We can’t tackle anything. We’re sitting GCSEs from next week, in case anybody’s forgotten, and I’d prefer to write without broken arms, thank you very much.’
Leo flapped his hand. ‘Ah, forget them. We’ll ace them anyway.’
‘You done any revision then?’
‘Nope. Went in first time I was told anything, so don’t need to revise. Stop worrying. Who needs exams?’
‘Erm, we do,’ Jack volunteered. ‘And Isaac’s right, we’re sixteen, no authority, and you only look about twelve. What can we do? I know I said we’ll sort it, but I don’t know how.’
‘Anonymous phone call to the police?’ Isaac suggested.
‘Could do. But it’s only hearsay, you know.’ Jack hesitated. ‘Why would he go with Tina Jackson when he’d got Carla at home. Are we sure this is right? Carla worked most nights so how did he manage that? Kelly and Danny were too little to leave on their own.’
Again there was a prolonged silence while they mulled over all the for-and-against arguments. The sun was climbing ever higher in the sky, and the heat was building. Leo’s eyes closed, and Jack nudged Isaac and pointed to Leo.
‘The tablets are working. Let’s talk sensible while he’s nodding off. I think the only person we can pass this on to is Dad. It makes sense. The thing that puts me off telling him is his temper. He’s likely to fire up and go stomping round to Graham’s, convinced it’s all Graham’s fault that Mum’s dead. It’s not, Graham didn’t pull that trigger. Even if it was payback for him screwing this bird, he still didn’t shoot Mum and Carla. So how do we tell him without all hell breaking loose?’