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  Of course, he’d never been one to save money. He’d lived for the moment, just like Dino.

  The doctors told him to stop drinking, eventually. Said, if he didn’t, he’d lose a leg to gangrene. Or maybe both. He didn’t care. He kept on boozing. And when the time came, he let them do it without protest. Let them lob his pins off. He wasn’t going anywhere, was he?

  Sometimes he blamed the act for his heavy drinking but he knew he was always a piss head at heart. Just like his dad. It was genetic. People didn’t change, anyway.

  The Social Services used to send a nurse once a week. Meals on wheels, too. But that stopped. This was the Big Society they said. His friends and family would help him. No wonder they called it BS, he’d said.

  Tommy and Harjit were in London now, working with Jonathon Ross on his television show. It was ironic humour, apparently. The pay was serious enough, though. He could have been there, too. If he could have walked.

  He guzzled the last of the whisky from the bottle.

  Mrs. Griffiths from the corner shop would be at the cottage in a while with the new supply. She was a bit on the big side but she was alright. She laughed when he sang “That’s Amore” but not so much when his false teeth fell out. And then she’d crawl into bed with him.

  He got and gave the love where he could these days.

  And like Dino said: everybody loves somebody, sometime.

  The end

  Things to Do in Deptford When You're Dead

  The trouble with me is that I never realise how deep in the shit I am until I'm choking on the stuff. Take last summer, for example. It started, as usual, in a pub and ended up, as always, in a graveyard. But that wasn’t the problem.

  You see, I’m a professional killer. A hit man. Twenty years in the business, man and boy. Booze and bullets and bodies are all par for the course in my game. But it was a bird that landed me in it. And not just any bird, mind you. It was the boss’ bird.

  Yes, I know what you’re thinking; never shit on your own doorstep. And, I’d normally agree. Shagging a married woman is a no-no, for survival reasons, if nothing else.

  And if that married woman happens to be hitched to an aging psychopath who had aptly earned the nickname Carl Carnage before his balls had dropped, well, you’d be forgiven for thinking that I had some sort of a death wish.

  But then you’ve never met Velvet.

  * * *

  The Blue Anchor on a Tuesday afternoon is usually about as lively as a Coldplay song. I was zoning out from the barflies' heated conversation – the smoking ban, for the thousandth time – when my phone rang. It was a number that I didn’t recognise which always set my spider sense tingling.

  I answered.

  “Aye,” I said, wringing out the sleeve of my knock - off Armani jacket, which I’d just plonked in a pool of spilt Stella.

  There was a rasping sound, like a heavy breather was bashing the bishop and the other end.

  “Cormac?” said a voice.

  “Who wants to know?” I said.

  Instinctively, I fiddled for my packet of Benson & Hedges. I had a vision of Christopher Walken as The Man with the Plan in that film with Andy Garcia and the old bloke from Back to the Future. It wasn’t filling me with a sense of well-being, I can tell you.

  “The Shadow Knows!” said the voice before bursting into a fit of laughter.

  “Keith, you tosser,” I said.

  Keith just kept on giggling, starting to sound a bit like Woody Woodpecker. He was clearly on the Jolly Dandruff already.

  I gestured to Nick the barman and pointed to the bottle of Mortlach behind the bar, thinking that if you can’t beat them then at least attempt to join em.

  “What’s the craic, Keith?” I said once the giggling had slowed down.

  “Business. Work,” gurgled Keith. “Graft.”

  “Where? When? How much? And ... who for?” I said. I very choosy about who I work for, professional pride and all that.

  “Last one first,” said Keith.

  “Well,” I said. “Don’t keep me in suspenders.”

  “Carl,” said Keith. “Carl Carnage. And he’s paying top bleedin’ dollar, I can tell you.”

  Nick changed channels on the goggle box. Noel Edmonds sat cross legged on the floor while the genius contestant got the old brain cells working trying to make a life altering decision. I didn’t take so long.

  ***

  Carl was out where the buses don’t run in both meanings of the phrase. He lived in a swanky mock Tudor detached house in the depths of Deptford – far away from where public transport ceased. And he was also mental. Barking. And I don't mean the town in Essex.

  Of course, Carl had always been a little, er, off the wall, but over the years the Old Timers disease had spread like a plague and his behaviour was becoming more and more erratic.

  I’d worked for Carl a few times over the years and he’d always paid well. The job usually involved a bit of travel, too. I once took out a matador in a bullring in Seville in 42 degree heat; a Helsinki politician ended up in an underground car park. Well underground.

  The last couple of times I’d seen him, however, Carl was just gazing out of the window with a Teddy Bear in his arms. Velvet had done all the talking. And I’d done all the looking.

  * * *

  Velvet answered the door in a red leather dress, that was made with just about enough material to make a wallet, and looking like a long limbed drink of water calling out to a thirsty man.

  “Hello stranger,” said Velvet, leaning forward and giving me a chaste kiss.

  I followed her into the main room and thought about my brief fling with Velvet back in the days when she was just an up and coming glamour model. Emphasis on the coming.

  I walked into the main room. Carl and Velvet’s interior design taste was clearly similar to that of Jimmy Saville and Lily Savage and I considered putting my sunglasses back on.

  And then I saw Carl.

  Carl sat drooling in a leather armchair, the Teddy Bear ripped to shreds in his arms. He looked old. He was old, true, but he looked a lot older.

  We followed the usual routine.

  Velvet poured me a drink, I kept my eyes away from her Grand Canyon of a cleavage, and Carl handed me a large brown envelope.

  I looked inside. There was a wad of cash, sure but the prerequisite picture of the target was missing.

  “Carl,” I said “There’s no ...”

  “I know, Cormac” said Carl, sounding weak “I know.”

  Velvet sat on the arm chair and put an arm round him.

  “The piece of business,” said Carl. “The hit...” he coughed “... is me...”

  * * *

  So, the upshot was that Carl’s Alzheimer’s was getting worse and he was losing the plot. Shitting himself. Having violent tantrums. Bouts of depression. He wanted taken care of before it he became a complete drooling wreck.

  And so, I did the job. I took him out when he was on holiday in Dublin. Velvet claimed on the insurance - which was a bonus - and everything went tickety boo.

  And me and Velvet?

  Yep, we got back together. Hitched a few months back. Just before little Stardust was born.

  And here I am, all domesticated. Washing up, gardening and learning how to change shitty nappies. Oh yes, I’m up to my neck in it now, I really am.

  The end.

  The Gift That Keeps On Giving

  ONE

  Living well is the best revenge, or so they say, apparently. And , for most of my life, I had lived very well - once I’d broken free of Seatown’s umbilical cord, which was strangling me like a noose.

  Fame.Money. Drugs. Travel. Fast cars. Faster women. All of the above.

  And it felt good. Bloody good.

  Or, at least, it used to.

  TWO

  The taxi crept along the coast road, past the worn-out Bed & Breakfasts, half-empty amusement arcades and deserted kebab shops. A shabby looking Santa Clause pissed against the side
of a mangy looking Christmas Tree that was stood shaking in the wind outside the public toilets.

  “Do you get home much, these days, Mr Stroud?” said the crumpled tissue of a taxi driver with the big, bushy eyebrows.

  “Not so much, these days,” I said, half yawning. The radio was playing a medley of Christmas carols at a volume so low it was sending me to sleep.

  “Bet it’s a fair bit different to life down the smoke, eh?” said the taxi driver. “Bright lights, big city and that.”

  He slowed down as a raggle-taggle group of rat boys staggered across the road.

  “Vive la différence,” I said.

  The taxi pulled up at a red light. It was early evening and allegedly rush hour but there weren’t too many cars on the road. The granite sky was filling with black storm clouds.

  I gazed out of the window at Booze n News, Seatown’s popular chain of newsagents and off-licences. Booze n News had been the brainchild of Frank Griffin, a local Conservative councillor and father of Nigel, my childhood tormentor and font of all of my bile.

  Outside the shop was a familiar looking woman being hassled by a whining toddler as she struggled to put a buggy into the back of a Renault Espace. Karen Griffin, Nigel’s wife.

  Once she’d been the glam of glams and now she was looking more than a little shop soiled. I smiled to myself with satisfaction. This is what I really came “home” for. Bathing in the misery of the people that had caused me so much unhappiness during my youth. Taking pleasure in seeing any spark of life that they’d had dampened by the drab hand of domesticity.

  Karen locked eyes with me and smiled but I just turned away and looked at the torn billboard outside the shop.

  In red marker pen it proclaimed:

  “Best selling thriller author Julian Stroud to host Rotary Club Christmas Charity Lunch”.

  “Bet it’s gone downhill since you came here last time, eh, Mr Stroud?” said the taxi driver.

  “Plus ca change,” I said, as I slowly let out a silent fart.

  “Aye,” said the taxi driver, winding down the window.

  THREE

  I used to lay awake at night thinking of my childhood humiliations. How much I was ridiculed. Laughed at. And over the years I let my hatred marinade. And congeale.

  And then the doctor told me about my body’s uninvited guest. The plague that crawled through my veins. And then I had an idea.

  FOUR

  “So, you never heard about Fast Eddy then?” said Karen Griffin. She downed her fifth Baileys with a gulp. Her face flushed red and her eyes sparkled.

  “No, I hadn’t,” I said. I looked out of the Carvery window. Out at sea, a fishing trawler adorned with Christmas lights bobbed up and down on the waves.

  “They say he met a lass on the Internet. Was getting on really well, too, until he sent her his picture, that is, and then she blocked him,” said Karen.

  I remembered Fast Eddy and could understand the girl’s consternation. He was once described as being like a fatter version of Bernard Manning. Without the charm.

  “And what happened?” I said, almost interested.

  Karen was looking good, I had to admit. She’d dolled herself up pretty well. Her idiot husband had apparently been in a drunken sleep on the sofa and hadn’t even noticed her sneak out.

  The fatigue was behind her eyes though and I almost felt sorry for her. I was starting to wonder if I could go through with this nasty little plan that I’d hatched.

  “Well, he had an idea of where she lived. Some village in Scotland. And so he started to spend every weekend going up there on the train and walking around the place looking for her. Until he got picked up by the police for being drunk and disorderly. Thing is, though, he’d got the wrong village, anyway!”

  And then she laughed.

  Karen Griffin’s cruel cackle hauled me back to my teenage years and the agony of just living. And made up my mind for me.

  FIVE

  The motel room was dimly lit. Outside, I could hear the heavy bass of an old Public Image song.

  I finished my brandy, popped a Viagra and crawled into the bed.

  “Speak French to me Julian, you know it really turns me on,” said Karen, as she pulled me towards her.

  I took out a condom that I’d earlier pricked with a pin and put it on.

  “Le Petit Mort,” I said, with a smirk.

  Well, Christmas is a time for sharing, after all.

  The end.

  White Ink

  “Words are our tools, Craig. Even our weapons, sometimes” said Katy sipping her long glass of gin and leaning back against the switched-off cigarette machine.

  “They have no meaning within themselves but we give them meaning depending on our own experiences and prejudices. For example, if I describe a man as single it’s one thing –maybe he’s a bit of jack the lad, a lady-killer, like you…”

  Craig smirked, his chubby lips looking even more rubbery.

  “But if I say that someone’s a bachelor then what do you think of?”

  Craig peeled the label from his bottle of Efes.

  “A bachelor gay? Lives with his mother? Kiddy fiddler, maybe?” he said.

  “Aha. And what do you think of when you hear the word spinster?”

  “Oh, frigid, I suppose. Lesbian. A bit desperate. Gagging for it!” He laughed and snorted beer through his nose.

  “You see, that’s why I don’t tell people that I’m a librarian. Because of the connotations.”

  “Yeah? I see what you mean,” said Craig, who very clearly didn’t have a clue what Katy was talking about.

  And she was loving it. Loving watching him squirm as he tried to concentrate on what she was saying and tear his gaze away from her cleavage. Especially when she accidently-on-purpose dropped the ice cube between her breasts.

  “But you don’t look anything like my idea of a librarian,” he said. He almost licked his lips off his face.

  “Well there you are. It’s a matter of perspective. For example two people could describe the same person in a different way, depending on their political bent. One man will say that someone’s a freedom fighter and another will call him a terrorist.”

  “One man’s fish is another one’s poison?” said Craig, crunching a mint between his shiny, white, teeth.

  “Exactly. One man could say, for example, that you’re well-built and others would say you’re fat.” She winked.

  Craig flushed and Katy patted his wrist.

  “But I don’t need to explain that to you, do I?” She beamed at him. “You’re a successful estate agent. You put a spin on words all the time, eh? Make gold from lead. Turn shit to shinola?”

  Craig laughed, seeing this as way out of the conversation and an inroad into talking about himself.

  “Well, the place I saw last week could only be described in one way- a goldmine! Bought it for a song, too. The daft old bird didn’t have a clue what she was signing over.”

  “You’re, wicked,” said Katy, with a wink. She looked at her watch. “I’d better be going.”

  “Your chariot awaits!” said Craig, holding his briefcase in front of his hard-on as he stood.

  ***

  The night was inky black as Craig parked the car outside his Chelsea flat, eager to get Katy through the oak door.

  “And then there’s my hobby. It’s such a cliché for a librarian, such a stereotype,” said Katy.

  “What’s that, then?” Craig unfastened his seat belt and twisted round toward her.

  “Knitting!” she said “Imagine! A librarian who likes knitting? Just think of those connotations. That’s why we have to be careful what we put in these online dating profiles, eh? Why I had to say I was a lawyer.” She put her black handbag onto her knee and pulled out a ball of wool, knitting needles skewering through it.

  Craig grinned and leaned toward Katy.

  “Well, I prefer what I see in the flesh.”

  Katy smiled as she took a black object from her bag and slam
med it between Craig’s legs. It buzzed and he screamed.

  The scream melded with the whine of the Taser as it started to charge up again. He sobbed as the sound grew louder and Katy jammed it up against the side of his neck.

  “And, of course, one man’s serial killer is another woman’s vigilante, eh?” she said, slamming a knitting needle into Craig’s ear.

  The end

  A Can Short of a Six Pack

  Keith Cokehead was off on one, again, and he was doing my friggin’ napper in no end, I can tell you.

  “You know what sorta day it was, eh, Browny ? I’ll tell you what sort of day it was,” he slurred, a strand of drool stretching from his mouth to his bottle of blue WKD.

  “The sorta day it was … sunglasses, boxers. No t-shirt, flip-flops. That’s the sorta day it was. That’s the sorta day ...”

  All the time he was regaling me of the joys of his recent booze-cruise weekend in Krakow, Keith was fiddling with the clusters of multi-coloured acupuncture needles that pierced his ears. He had so many now that he was starting to look like the bloke from Hellraiser films.

  For the last few weeks, as part of his ASBO, Keith had been having to attend regular “addiction awareness sessions” at the Albion Road Substance Abuse Centre, in order to help him “deal with his self – medication issues”. The effectiveness of these sessions could be judged by the ant hill of happy talc he’d just vacuumed up his nostrils in two seconds flat.

  “It was fucking hot, man. Scaldin’. Scorchio!” he shouted, and swigged his bottle of WKD. “You know, you think of Po-land, Sausage –Roll Land, you think … snow. Loadsa snow, eh?”

  He wiped his nose and started giggling.

  “And I like me snow, like…” He winked. “but there, right. There … I’ll tell you… I’ll tell you what sort of day it was ...”

  Keith had called me down to Astro’sBar to discuss the details of a job that Stan Bogajski wanted us to do over the August Bank Holiday weekend, but there was clearly less chance of that happening than there was of Cliff Richard getting a lass up the duff.