Read Online Eightball Boogie by Declan Burke - Free Book Online Page B

beer kegs spotted me, rapped on the pub door while Dutchie was still clearing up. They carried me inside and Dutchie propped me up in one of the cubicles. Once we figured out nothing was actually broken, he went for tissues, hot water and Dettol.
    “ Fail the breathalyser?” he asked.
    I groaned. I was wedged in an oil drum that some maniac was attacking with a Kango hammer. Except it wasn’t noise that brutalised every synapse, it was pain. Searing here, vicious there, throbbing everywhere. Funny was the last thing I needed. What I needed was a syringe full of the purest smack to wrap me in a cotton-wool cocoon.
    Dutchie dabbed at the open cuts and grazes with the Dettol-soaked tissues. Compared to what the rest of my body was feeling, the stings were fluttering kisses. When he was finished he collected the tissues, dumped them in the bin. He came back with a bottle of brandy, poured a couple of large ones.
    “ Get that into you. Any time you’ve brandy inside you, things could be a lot worse.”
    I hate brandy but the double went down the hatch like it was suicidal. Dutchie poured another, kept pouring, and after I’d lost count of exactly how many brandies I hated, the pain started to subside. Dutchie watched me drink, sipping his own. Eventually he said, in a neutral tone: “You were lucky, Harry.”
    “ I’d come out of a barrel of tits sucking my thumb. Luck had nothing to do with it. They knew exactly what they were doing.” I grimaced, shook my head, which only caused me to grimace some more. “Bastards,” I whispered. “Fucking bastards.”
    “ Without doubt. Any fatherless fuckers in particular?”
    I shook my head again, gently this time.
    “ One of them sounded northern.”
    “ Those fuckers never need an excuse.”
    “ They had one.”
    “ You got verbal with northern cunts?” He pursed his lips. “Not like you, Harry.”
    “ I never said a fucking word. They jumped me from behind. Never even seen them coming.”
    “ So why?”
    I drank the rest of the brandy, pushed the glass forward for a refill.
    “ He told me to stay away from her.”
    “ Her? Who her?”
    “ He didn’t say. All he said was, stay away from her. Otherwise it’ll be Ben next time.”
    “ Scumbag.” He drained the dregs of the bottle into his own glass and said: “Katie?”
    “ I doubt it. She used to be engaged, some bloke who did a runner. He’s hardly following her around, knocking lumps out of every bloke she meets in a pub.”
    “ So – who her?”
    “ Who else? Helen fucking Conway.”
    “ You were seen? Today?”
    “ Maybe I’m not as smart as I think I am.”
    “ No one’s that smart, Harry. Think it was the bloke or her that sent the lads?”
    “ Does it matter?”
    “ Depends on whether you’re taking it any further.”
    “ With the Dibble?”
    “ It’s what any law-abiding citizen would do.”
    “ That’d be right, give the boys on the nightshift a laugh.”
    “ Give them something to do, at any rate.”
    I shook my head, the brandy kicking in nicely. I was tired, sick and sore. Tired, mostly. No, sore mostly, and tired. And sick. I thought of the backroom in the office, dark, cold and empty. It made me want to puke.
    “ Drive me out home, Dutch. I’ll sort you with a cab when we get there.”
    “ You’re going to Dee’s?”
    “ I’m paying for the place, Dutch. Since when is it Dee’s?”
    “ Since she keeps chucking you out if it.”
    I shrugged. It was too late to get into it about Gonzo. He said: “If you want to stay here, Michelle won’t mind. The bed’s made up in the spare room. Don’t worry about the kids, a bomb wouldn’t wake them.”
    “ Cheers, Dutch, but no. I want to die in my own bed, boots off.”
    I was lying, naturally. I didn’t want to die in my own bed, boots on or off, or in any other bed for that matter. I didn’t want to die, period, but even then I didn’t know then how fragile life can be, and how permanent death is. How squalid and black and