Mungo knew what demons looked like. As the bus trundled north, he sat quietly and thought about his own.
“Ah wish this driver would hurry the fuck up,” the tattooed man said. He reached into the bag between his legs, the canvas strap was studded with brightly coloured lures. Rummaging amongst the spools of fishing gut he produced a pouch of tobacco. He rolled a fat cigarette, his tongue darting along the paper. The man took a deep drag and blew the smoke into his empty lager can. He cupped his hand over the mouth like he had caught a spider, but the stench of tobacco was already wafting around the bus. Several of the passengers turned and glared towards the back seats. Mungo leaned over him with a meek smile and unclipped the hasp on the thin window.
“Do you smoke?” the man asked between greedy puffs. His eyes were a rich green, glinting here and there with flecks of gold.
“No.”
“Guid.” He took another lungful. “It’s bad for ye.”
St Christopher reached out a trembling hand and the tattooed man reluctantly let go of the cigarette. St Christopher inhaled and filled himself up to the very brim. His dry lips were sticky on the damp paper. The tattooed man rammed his shoulder into Mungo’s. “Ma pals call us Gallowgate on account of where I’m frae.” He adjusted his sovvie rings and nodded towards the oblivious bus driver. “You’re a nervous wee fella, int ye? Don’t worry. If he gies us any lip, ah’ll fuckin’ stab him.”
St Christopher sucked on the dout until it burned his fingers. “Do ye like tae fish?”
“I don’t know.” Mungo was glad to see the cigarette die. “I’ve never done it before.”
“Where we’re gaun ye should catch pike, eels, speckled trout,” Gallowgate said. “You can fish the whole weekend and naebody will come by and ask for a permit. Ye’ll be twenty, forty miles from the nearest soul.”
St Christopher nodded in agreement. “Aye. It is as near tae heaven as ye can get on three buses.”
“Four,” corrected Gallowgate, “four buses.”
The remoteness of it filled Mungo with a sinking feeling. “Do you eat the fish?”
“Depends on the size,” said Gallowgate. “In breeding season you can catch that many that you’d need a deep freezer to keep them all. Does your mammy have a big freezer?”
Mungo shook his head. He thought of Mo-Maw’s tiny box freezer, how it was thick with ice. He wondered if she would be happy with a fat speckled trout, but he doubted it. Nothing he did seemed to make her happy. He had been worrying her heart lately, which he knew because she had told him so. He had tried not to laugh when she had said it, but all he could picture was her heart walking around the living room in her chest and folding a white hanky in agitation. At the time Jodie had rolled her eyes and said, “Listen to yourself, Maureen. Do you even have a heart?”
Mungo picked his cheekbone as the bus passed Dumbarton and the ochre banks of Loch Lomond came into view. He remembered the heavy things Mo-Maw had said. He knew why he was here; it was his own fault.
“How auld are you anyhows?” asked Gallowgate.
“Fifteen.” Mungo tried to draw himself up to his full height, but his ribs still hurt and the old bus had terrible suspension. He was average height for his age, one of the last in his class to take a growth spurt. His older brother Hamish liked to grip his chin and tilt his face to the light. He would inspect the fine line of dander growing on Mungo’s top lip in the same way a gardener checks on a spindly seedling. He would blow on it just to irritate Mungo. Although Mungo wasn’t especially tall, he was still taller than Hamish. Hamish hated that.
St Christopher reached out and circled the boy’s wrist with his long fingers. “Ye’re only a wee thing aren’t ye? Ah would have put ye at twelve, thirteen, tops.”
“Ach he’s nearly a man.” Gallowgate slung an inked arm over the boy’s shoulders. He exchanged a sly look with his friend. “Have yer balls dropped yet, Mungo?”
Mungo didn’t answer. They just sort of hung there all wrinkly and pointless. If they dropped, where would they drop to?
“Ye know, yer nut sack?” Gallowgate punched the boy lightly in the groin.
“I don’t know.” Mungo doubled over for protection.
The men were chuckling to themselves and Mungo tried to join in, but it was a self-conscious laugh, a half-beat too late. St Christopher broke into a hacking cough and Gallowgate turned back to the window in disdain. He said, “We’ll look after ye, Mungo. Nae worries. We’ll have some laughs, and you can bring yer mammy some fresh fish.”
Mungo massaged his sore balls. He thought again about Mo-Maw’s worried heart.
“Aye. Yer mammy is a good wummin. One of the few left.” Gallowgate started biting the dry skin from around his index finger and spitting it on the floor. Suddenly he stopped what he was doing. “Can I see?” Before Mungo could protest, he hooked his hand at the bottom of Mungo’s cagoule. He started to lift it and began undressing the boy. “Gie us a wee look then.”
Mungo raised his arms and let the man draw his top up until the nylon cagoule covered his face and bathed everything in a calm blue light. Mungo couldn’t see, but he could hear the men and the ragged patterns of their breathing. There was a sad intake of air, a pause, then a sigh. Gallowgate’s fingertip was slimy where he had been chewing it. He pressed it against the blackening bruise on Mungo’s chest, and Mungo felt it travel from his sternum, around the curve of his bottom rib, as though the man was tracing a map. Gallowgate prodded his ribs and then, as if testing their tenderness, he dug his finger into the bruise. Mungo winced and squirmed to get away. He pulled his clothes back down, certain his face was scalding. Gallowgate shook his head. “Terrible business that. Yer mammy telt us all about that mess ye got yourself into with those dirty Fenian bastards. Catholics, man. Butter widnae melt.”
Mungo had been trying not to think about it.
“Dinnae worry,” grinned Gallowgate. “We’ll get you away frae that scheme. We’ll have a proper boy’s weekend. Make a man out of you yet, eh?”
* * *
They changed bus, and then they changed bus again, and then they waited nearly three hours for the next one. They were far beyond Loch Lomond now and Mungo began to think the men had no real idea where they were. It all looked the same to him.
The two soaks lay in the gorse behind the metal bus shelter and finished the last of the Tennent’s cans. Every now and then Gallowgate would throw an empty over the hedge on to the country road and ask the boy if a bus was coming. Mungo tidied up the rubbish and said no, “No bus.”
Mungo shivered in the sunlight and let his face tic freely, free from the open-mouthed stares of strangers. When he was alone, he tried to tire out the urge like this, but it never worked.
It was colder out here in the countryside. The slow northern sun seemed stuck in the sky, but the heat it gave was stolen by the long wind that hurried through the glens. His nose began to drip. He might also be sunburnt in the morning.
He sank on to his haunches. There was a scab on his right kneecap, the skin was puckering and itchy. Mungo checked no one was watching. Then he put his lips to it, ran his tongue over it to soften it, and sucked it till his mouth filled with a metallic taste. Mungo knew he couldn’t be trusted not to lick his scab again so he covered his bare legs with his anorak and, pulling his knees to his chest, he hid them from the warmth-less sun. It had been such a rare sort of heat on the scheme that he hadn’t thought to bring more than his thin football shorts. Mo-Maw had given him no time to get his bag ready, and she hadn’t stopped him as he sloped, poorly dressed, out the door.