Chapter 12

He struggled to fuck Lizzie that night – and hated himself a bit when he managed to spurt his load only when he thought about his hand on Rosie's arse in the kitchen the night before and the way she'd wriggled back against it, as if it was entirely natural that his hand belonged there. Because he was quite sure his hand did belong there. But that didn't change the fact she was fifteen. And they were not living gypsy. And, even if they were, he'd asked her to come so he could take care of her – not so he could claim her.

Despite the difficulty in his own release, Lizzie made it worth his while making the trip over to her – she was servicing a few communists and she knew who most of them were from hanging about outside their meeting places and rallies to pick up business. She wasn't servicing Freddie Thorne, but she was fairly sure there were no commies directly on Watery Lane. The vicinity – sure. But he'd known that anyway. They had rat holes all across the city. He would just make sure to put down some poison if any nests popped up too near him. It left the question of just what Freddie had been doing on Watery Lane – he didn't even fancy it if his street was the quickest path between some of their locations, he didn't want them anywhere near his family. But his initial worry subsided, at least a little. As much as any of his worries ever subsided anyway.

The house was in darkness when he got back. He wondered what had been said, because Polly had locked the door. She never usually bothered when she was leaving. But the front was locked and so was the back he found, after he trekked away down the row of houses and climbed over a back wall to get into the lane. He thought about breaking in – and then he thought about the baby and the redhead lying up the stairs who would probably be terrified if they heard that going on. Or, he corrected himself, the baby would be terrified. The redhead would probably be down and wielding a kitchen knife, waiting for the moment the intruder got through. And he was sure he'd deserve it.

He glanced up at the darkened window of the room they slept in. If he threw some stones or something up there, he'd wake her up and she could come down let him in. He'd done that sometimes when it was John's room. But he wasn't ready to face her yet. He didn't know when he would be – or what he would say or do. Or if he said or did anything would it just make it worse? Maybe he should just act like he hadn't stormed out because his brother had accused him of looking at her arse?

Anger flashed through him. He'd left with no keys. In the space of a week he'd spent enough nights at home – or, more specifically, he'd been home early in the night – that he'd forgotten himself. He'd become a man who got home when the household was still active, before doors were locked. He didn't know that man. He wasn't that man. What the fuck did he think he was playing at? He'd gone running into this, knowing fine well that she was the only person he couldn't figure out. He'd practised that conversation in his head so many times, because he couldn't imagine her responses. She was the only person who surprised him. And now he was locked out and annoyed because he'd found himself in a situation he couldn't control – and he'd engineered the bloody situation himself.

He sank down, his back against the locked door. He wondered vaguely if Finn came out during the night these days if he needed a piss, or if he was still too scared to make the journey to the outhouse in the dark. He needed to talk to Finn, properly – he added that to his list. He should have waited the other day, after Arthur had taken Finn out. It was easier with girls in a way – he knew Ada needed the words, same as Rosie probably needed words, same as Lily needed words – all those reassurances that girls needed. All the softness and the gentleness. He knew he probably didn't remember enough that they were needed, but at least with girls it was expected, natural, to treat them softly. Finn was… He was at that age where the crying had to start stopping. He was at that age that was just the beginning of that period of not being a kid completely anymore – not able to take care of himself like a man yet but starting the period of time where that all needed to adjust. He had to start taking steps to becoming a man.

And it was ironic that Tommy was supposed to be the one who would help him to do it – when he was stuck outside feeling like a fucking kid. His mother used to lock the doors on them if they weren't back in on time. He'd honestly believed at the time that she'd gone to bed, but he knew now she would have been sitting up, wide awake, listening for them to come home and thump on the door and then she'd make her decision, once she knew they were safely round the back – or as safely round the back as any back in Small Heath was – whether she was going to let them in and skelp them the whole way from the door up to their beds or whether she was just going to let them stay outside all night for their trouble and see if she still felt like skelping them in the morning.

The first time he'd got John's attention with stones at his window, his brother hadn't had the sense to try and come down quietly to let him on. He'd been still half asleep and he'd made a racket, their mother had heard him on the stairs of the shop, had come running down her own stairs and met him in the kitchen, boxed his ears and sent him back up to bed. Tommy had been standing outside unaware and had turned around saying, "About fucking time," when the back door had opened – only to be faced with his mother instead of his brother. She'd put him over her knee in the kitchen for being late and sent him up to bed with the taste of soap in his mouth for his swearing. There were other times, when he'd slept out altogether and not come hammering at the door at all when he'd got it worse.

But there was a safety in it.

He rubbed his nose with his hand in annoyance. He was a man in his twenties and here he was, standing in the back, locked out, missing his fucking mother. But there was a safety back then – in knowing that someone else was in control, in knowing what he was supposed to do or not do, in that all being clear and easy. But he was fine for so long, he had been fine for so long, in taking that control for himself. And now he was losing it – but he wasn't handing it back to someone who would look after him, it was just going. And it scared him. He didn't know how to deal with that.

There was a feeling of content and security in being a child. And he hadn't realised he had been missing it. And then he had felt – not quite it again, but something like it, something akin to it.

He felt it when he had snatched the tongs off of her when she had been making bacon last week, laughing at her as he held them over his head out of her reach. He had felt it when he had held her on Saturday night. He had felt it on Sunday when they went to church – her hair had been fluffy after she had had her own bath on Saturday night (with all the doors and curtains shut and them all confined to the front room) and had just gotten fluffier with every brush stroke; so she had been sat next to him with a strange red halo in mass, her eyes murderous every time he laughed at her – looking for all the world like an angel of hell. He had felt it last night, helping Lily help her in the kitchen, sitting with them on the couch after dinner.

It was all mix up. He felt terrified that he couldn't control her, couldn't control what his life was around her. And at the same time, he felt content with her, safe and secure, almost like the way he had felt as a child but different too. Like he had a sudden understanding of his place in this whole fucked up world – it wasn't a child's place, but it was a certain, defined space that he was supposed to occupy.

But it wasn't just about him or her. It was about the whole family. He had to maintain control, he had to keep this family running because god only knew Arthur wasn't going to be able to.

But he wanted her. Oh god, he wanted her. He wanted her more than he'd ever wanted anything. But he wanted to give her everything too, he wanted to expand the business and give her a good life, like she deserved. And he needed to be in control to be able to do that. He wanted that little girl never to want for anything. And upon thinking that, he felt sick because by that little girl, he meant Lily. But he could have meant her – she was fifteen. And it didn't matter that she had the mentality of someone double that age, it was what it was. And regardless of what Ada or Polly said, they weren't living fucking gypsy and the owner of the next mouth that came out of was going to fucking catch it.

He stood up and looked up at the window again. The people in the room behind that window were a decision he was both entirely sure about making and entirely terrified about now having made it. His hands instinctively went to his pockets.

He needed to clear his head. To figure things out. He needed to remind himself who he was – a man who took keys for a fucking start. Of all the doors in this city to be ones that were closed to him that he didn't have it in him to break down – it had to be the ones to his own house. In more ways than fucking one.

He turned and strode away from the house. Let it see if he cared if it didn't want to let him in.

Let it see that he cared enough not to break it, that he didn't want to disturb its occupants. That he wanted its doors to open to him again, full and intact, so he could come in and shut them behind him rather than leaving them hanging off the hinges because he had forced himself through them.

But he had disturbed the occupants, because even as he fell asleep in the stables in Charlie's yard, the shovels had left the house and followed him there, banging all around him.