Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 825 by Angharad

I took Simon a cuppa, he’d somehow managed to screw two pieces of wood together on either side of the broken pane. “Just stay close, but say nothing unless I ask you to.”

“Yes, boss,” he said and I poked my tongue out at him.

“Would you like a cuppa?” I asked the young coloured youth. He shook his head, there were still tear marks down his face.

I sat in front of him and drank mine. I was wearing my nightdress and dressing gown, along with my slippers. My hair was tousled and probably messy, and I had no makeup on. In fact, I probably looked like a mobile disaster area–oh, I forgot, the nightdress wasn’t silks or satins, it was a cotton one with a picture of a kitten in a hammock on the front, which came to mid-thigh, and the dressing gown was a woollen one with a tie belt.

“You were telling me about your mother, would you like to call her to come and get you?” Simon was sitting behind the youth and he snorted his tea at this question. The boy shook his head.

“Would you like me to call the police?” I asked and the boy shrugged–whilst behind him, Simon was nodding enthusiastically–like one of those dog things they used to put on the back window of cars. “Well would you?”

“Ya gonna do it anyway, why ask me?” said the boy.

“I might, especially if you keep up this surliness.”

“’Ow am I supposed to be, I’m tied up and for all I know you gonna kill me.”

“I’ll let you into a secret, I have killed, several times. It wasn’t nice and I have no desire to do so again. However, I think I ought to warn you–so don’t push your luck, sunshine.”

“Ya bluffin’, you ain’t killed no one.”

“I think the count is up around nine or ten. All of them Russians. One I hit over the head, another I shot with a bow and several arrows, another I burned and several I shot with an AK47.”

His eyes registered shock but his mouth kept up its disbelief, “You never killed no one.”

“I’m afraid she did or should I say, has.” Simon spoke from behind the boy which made him jump, he’d forgotten he was there.

“Was you in the army?”

“No, working with the security services.”

“What, you’re a spy?”

“No–I’m a teacher. Now before I make the list a confirmed ten, I think you’d better start spilling the beans, laddie or prepare to spend a very long time pushing up daisies under our muck heap.”

“You’d kill me?”

“No, I wouldn’t–the muck heap would. We’d just bury you under it and all the bugs and worms and fungi would eat you away to nothing.”

“But I’d be dead–so it wouldn’t hurt.”

“Not for several days and I can assure you it would be very unpleasant as the worms burrowed up your nose or through your ears or possibly even your eyes–assuming the ants didn’t get them first.”

“You can’t do dat.” He looked very worried now.

“Why? Nobody is going to miss a nobody like you, are they?”

“Yeah, I told me mate I was comin’ ‘ere.”

“You’re lying.”

“No I ain’t.”

“Yes you are sunshine. Simon, when you’ve finished your tea can you dig a hole under the muck heap.”

“How deep?” he asked.

“Enough for this–(I pointed to the boy)–to be well hidden by shit.”

“You can’t do dat?” he looked very frightened.

“Are you going to stop me?” I asked and he struggled so much he fell off the chair winding himself in the process. “You could you know?”

“’Ow?” he looked fearfully at me.

“Tell me who you are and where you live?”

“No.”

“Okay Simon, couple of feet deep, I’ll strip him off ready–you’re soon going to have the fun of worms wriggling up your bum.” I smirked at him.

“No–no, I’ll tell you.”

“Carry on Simon, in case he’s lying–if he is, I’ll sling him out there anyway.”

“Okay, it’s off to work I go,” he chuckled and the boy wet himself.

“Wonderful–you can clean that up before we kill you.”

“All right, my name is Leon, alright?”

“Leon–why should I believe you?”

“ ‘Cos it’s da trooff.”

“Where do you live?” He muttered an address which wasn’t too far from where I’d had a room at the university–in what seemed like years and years ago.”

“Are you on the phone?” The tears rolled down his face. “My ma has a mobile, we don’t have no landline no more.”

I demanded the number, which he reluctantly gave me. “Now tell me what the problem with your mother is?”

“She ain’t well.”

“What’s the matter with her?”

“She’s got MS.”

“As in multiple sclerosis?”

“Yes.” He looked defeated.

“So why do you go out thieving?”

“It’s a buzz innit? Da money is useful too, we don’t ‘ave much.”

“How did you come out here?”

“ I walked, innit?”

“Okay, we’re going to take you home to her. Simon, watch him, I’m going to change.”

“Okay.” He sat opposite the boy and drummed his fingers.

I was ten minutes at most, dressed in jeans, trainers and a fleece top. Simon went and dressed and he was soon down. We dumped Leon in the back of the car and drove towards Portsmouth.

“You’re not going to try and um-help his mother are you?”

“Yeah, I’m taking her son back home to her instead of handing him over to the police.”

“Well that’s hardly going to stop him becoming the next Al Capone, is it, especially if mummy is ill?”

“Simon, just be quiet and drive.”

We pulled up outside a small terraced house which had seen better days. There was a light shining inside. I asked if Leon had a key, he said the door was always open.

“What is your mother’s name?” I asked him.

“Theresa.”

I knocked on the door and turned the handle, the door opened. “Hello, Theresa?” A voice answered from inside and I knocked and entered. “Are you, Theresa, Leon’s mother?”

She was reclining in an ancient armchair, “What has happened to my son?”

I looked at her, she was rather overweight and dressed very badly in a house which was both scruffy and in need of a good clean. She smelled so I didn’t get too close. “He broke into my house earlier and we have him in the back of the car.”

“I’ll kill dat boy, he brings shame on my head.”

“He came very close to breathing his last tonight.”

“Is he hurt?”

“He has a black eye.”

She laughed, “Well dat’ll go wid de rest of his face.”

“Indeed.”

“Why did you bring him home to his ma, not call de police?”

“I have children of my own. I frightened him by spinning him a yarn of burying him under my compost heap–alive, he didn’t go much on the idea of worms wriggling up his bum.”

“I ain’t surprised,” she showed me a wide eyed expression then roared with laughter. “Maybe I should try dat ‘ere?”

“I’ll loan you the shovel.” She laughed at my response.

“I don’t know what to do wid him, he’s gettin’ uncontrollable.”

“I want him to come to my house every weekend, I shall find him jobs to do, gardening, painting and so on and I’ll pay him fifty pounds for the weekend.”

“What if he say, no?”

“He’ll miss out on fifty quid.” I called Simon to bring him in. He dumped him unceremoniously on the carpet in front of his mother. “We had to restrain him to stop him getting hurt.”

I put the offer to him and he shook his head, “Dey’s boff mad, Ma. Dey was gonna kill me.”

“You shut up, you stupid boy. You gonna take da job, an’ maybe you behave youself better.”

“No I ain’t, dey was gonna bury me under da shit heap.”

“If you don’t behave youself, maybe dey still can?”

“No, Ma, dem’s crazy.”

“Good, you gonna do what I say not what you want.” She laid into him for several minutes. We shook hands and she gave me a very old fashioned look. “’Ow long you ‘ad de powah?”

“Me?” I winked.

“No wondah, I’s been feelin’ strongah. Bless you, lady.”

“Leon, I shall expect you at nine on Saturday, don’t be late or I’ll fine you.”

“How is I s’posed to get der?”

“You got there tonight. Goodnight Theresa.”

“Goodnight, Lady.”

“He won’t turn up,” Simon opined as we drove home.

“A fiver says he will.”

“You’re on.” He smiled, so did I, he was a lousy gambler.