Chapter 3
712 Words
3
The rain has stopped, but a strong wind blows across the half empty car park. Few people have a car here. Most are beat-up rust buckets a couple of decades old.
That’s why I drive the Peugeot. It’s fast, with a turbo engine. But it’s not fancy enough to get nicked.
I walk across the car park to the flats, pink balloon tugging in the wind. It's one of those fancy ones. A big number nineteen, tied with sparkly ribbon instead of string.
Don't wanna leave it in the car in case someone steals it.
The block of flats looms high over me. Looks more like an open prison than a residential area.
I notice a black Mercedes saloon parked up near the main entrance to my block. Not a raindrop on it. Means the owner keeps it undercover, lives local and only just arrived.
I look around me. I don’t see any trouble, so I head into the open communal area at the bottom of the block.
The lifts are playing up again. There’s a scruffy note, written in biro and taped to the breeze block wall. Someone kicked the s**t out of a lift door and now both are knackered.
So I take the stairs. Seven floors up. Concrete steps and naked walls scrawled in graffiti and stained with old piss.
No, make that fresh piss.
Disgusting.
I feel the climb in my legs. I’m not quite as young and fit as I used to be. For a second, it occurs to me that I might be getting too old for this business.
Then I think, nah. Gotta get back in the gym, that's all. Lay off the cake and biscuits.
I’m five floors up when I hear another pair of feet a couple of flights below. Heavy scuffs in shoes. The formal kind.
Must be someone dressed up for court, I think.
But as I round the railing onto the next flight, I see a burly guy coming up below me. A walking wardrobe in a dark-blue overcoat. Shaved ginger hair receding on top.
I keep climbing. Up to the seventh. The guy picks up the pace behind me. Breathing heavy. I hit the covered walkway that leads to my flat. It looks out over the industrial wastelands. High-rises, terrace houses, boarded-up shops and rundown factories. Merging into converted mills and swanky glass apartments as they get closer to the city.
Along the walkway to the left, sits a long line of pale blue doors. Mine is number 707. There’s a guy standing facing me at the end of the walkway. Jet-black hair and rugged features. A young version of me, before the battle scars and grey sprinkles.
I move towards my door, heavy raindrops dripping slow off the roof edge. I stop and tie the balloon off on the walkway railing. Slow. Careful. Both eyes on the guy in front.
I reach inside the left pocket of my faded black jeans. Pull out my door keys. My younger lookalike starts towards me. I unzip my jacket as I walk.
I turn at the sound of those fancy shoes. The ginger guy from the stairwell has caught up. Red in the face. Blowing out clouds of cold air.
The net closes in. A guy on either side. Me in the middle. I pass door four, five, six . . . I get to seven and stop. I reach slow inside my jacket. I grab at fresh nothing.
Bollocks. I left my gun in the glove box of the car.
I leave my hand there anyway. Maybe it’ll fool 'em.
No, they close the gap.
As they reach inside their coats, I fly through the options in my head.
Option one: I plant a left on the chin of the guy in front, spin and throw a backhanded right at the one behind.
Option two: I move fast as the guy in front reaches for his weapon. I grab it and direct the shot at Ginger Nuts behind. Then I wrestle the shooter over the steel railing.
Option three: I bust through my own front door before they can get a clean shot. I run through the hall, into the kitchen and grab my sawn-off from under the sink. As they run in behind me, I come out blasting.
Yeah, the third one sounds best. Okay, three, two, one . . .
- Writer
