When they went back through to the shopfront, there was a young woman banging against the locked door. She had a VCR in her arms and a desperate look on her face. When she saw Jocky she bounced on her toes and looked like she might weep. Jocky sighed wearily. “If the skirts get any shorter, they’ll start doing without them all the gether.”
He drew a couple of pound coins from his trouser pocket and slipped them into Mungo’s hand. “Listen, ah like yer mammy, ah do. But she needs to cut back on the cheeky juice. Ah’ve got weans of ma ain to be worryin’ aboot. She cannae be sitting around aw day drinkin’。”
Mungo nodded as Jocky unlocked the door. He stepped out into the sunshine just as the silver dancers went twirling up the street.
* * *
The doocot door was open to the fair weather. James’s head was lowered in concentration. He was humming to himself as he mended the broken hinge on a cage. Patient and self-taught, James knew how to fix or build almost anything; the slates were already on the roof, he didn’t need anyone’s help.
As James worked, Mungo gazed upon him. He liked to watch him unawares. He didn’t know how much longer he would be allowed to do that, and he wanted to dub him on to the videotape in his brain while he still could.
The last time he had seen James, the hair at the nape of his neck had come to a ticklish point, like a little duck tail. Mungo had liked to touch the tip of his nose to it while James napped. Now his hairline was pink and precise where it had been edged by a straight razor. Mungo could picture Mr Jamieson holding his son’s head in his hands, asking him about Ashley, as he lathered his neck with the badger brush. Mungo swallowed the little ball of jealousy that rose up inside him. It slunk down his throat and bounced off his ribcage. He could feel it roll around inside him, like a marble dropped into a children’s toy.
James put down his pliers and drew a bird from the cage; it panicked as his hands encircled it, but he squeezed lightly and it stopped its nervous bobbing. Mungo watched the fingers cradle the pigeon, half-wild, half-stupid, and he was jealous of the bird, and its ignorant blinking. Mungo stepped into the doocot and kissed the secret pink skin behind James’s ear. He had tried, but he could not stay away a full week.
James flinched, his eyes darted beyond Mungo back into the daylight. “Don’t do that. Not here. Not now.”
The look in James’s eyes made it clear there would be no long fingers to hold him tight and make him feel calmer. He had a terrible urge to break something now, to tear the rickety shelves down and set all the birds free. Mungo stood with his arms by his side. He forced himself to remain very still.
“It’s almost over. Two more days and then he’s gone again. We are so close.” James was shaking his head. “He’s gonnae leave early to go see that wummin in Peterhead. Just two more days and we can be by ourselves.”
“Yeah, until next time.” He knew he was being callow.
“I cannae help that.” James kissed the pouter and put it back in its cage. He busied himself before he grew calm enough to ask, “What have you been up to anyhows?”
“Nothin’。” He didn’t want to talk now. He had no generosity in him to be good company. He found himself looking up at the small skylight, wondering if James could escape through there when Hamish came for him. “Absolutely fuckin’ nothin’。”
“You need a hobby.”
Here was yet another person telling him what he needed, how he should act, the person he should be. Another person who didn’t think he was enough just as he was.
James watched him turn to leave. He was talking to Mungo’s back as he dipped at the low doorway. “Ma da took us to Celtic Park. I haven’t been to the fitba since I was twelve. The whole match he stood there with his arm around me like he used to, proud, like. After the fitba, he treated Geraldine and me to a curry up in the West End. He took us to the pub and bought me ma first pint. He lied to the barman, telt him his son had just turned eighteen.”
“At this rate you’ll be sixty before I’m sixteen.”
“He’s had the best week he’s had since my mammy died. I didnae want to spoil it for him.” James was twisted-looking, embarrassed at his own happiness. “He hardly mentioned his fancy-wummin.”
Mungo tried to breathe through his hurt. All he wanted was the long fingers to wrap around his ribcage and hold him still, stop him floating away, let him know somebody cared. There was a long nail with a shackle padlock hanging from it, he ran his torn thumbnail along it and felt the metal scrape his wound open again.
“Another thing. He said he could get me a job on the rig.”
Mungo pushed his skin on to the nail. “Oh?”
“He said he didn’t see why not. They’re moving him to a new oilfield, on to a newer rig they’re building, called the Gannet or something. He said when I turn eighteen, he could get me in for caterin’ or janny work, maybe as a roustabout. Given time, I could work up to be a derrickman or driller. He said that’s where the money is.”
“That’s guid.”
“If I worked offshore with him, we could spend more time together.”
“Won’t Ashley mind?”
“Who gies a fuck about her?” James dipped his head to look Mungo in the eyes, peering under the curtain of his fringe. “I wouldn’t go, you know that. It’s just nice to be asked. Let me enjoy that, for Christ’s sake.”
“Do you like her?”
“Who?”
“Ashley.”
“Naw.” James seemed irritated. He busied himself by scooping bird pellets into a cup. “I sort of hate her. Every single thing she says is either stupit or about herself. She moans if I don’t give her attention every five minutes. Her hair always looks wet, but it’s dry and hard as a fuckin’ rock and when she touches me, you can tell she’s counting in her head, like she’s adding it to my bill. But …”
Something else had snagged on Mungo’s mind. “Have ye shagged her yet?”
“Naw.” James pushed the meat of his palms into his eye sockets. “But she keeps asking me to. Her maw and stepda are away in Majorca next week. Empty house.”
“But.” It was a small voice that came next. “We haven’t even done that yet.”
“I know.” James seemed tired now. He was just a wee boy, acting like a man, pretending to be a different type of man.
Mungo pulled his finger off the rusted nail. “I’m glad you are fixed, James. You’ve worked hard to get better. You deserve it.”
“I’m not fixed, Mungo. Ah’m just a liar.”
“Yeah, well.” Mungo tapped the shards of glass from the sole of his trainer. “I’m too many other bad things. I don’t want to be a liar as well.”
For a moment James looked like he was going to correct him – he was already a liar – but he bit his tongue. He crossed the rat glass towards him. In the half-light, he put his index finger on the nape of Mungo’s neck. It was the slightest of touches, a hand that could easily turn to a bully’s flick if someone came across the scabby grassland. In a downward motion he gently stroked the line of fine hair that grew there. Mungo tilted his head forward and closed his eyes. He wanted it to last.