They Did Bad Things Read online

  “Hang on. Checking in, aye? Drummond?”

  “Yes, sir. How’d you know?”

  “I’m a bloody psychic. No, I was being facetious,” he said into the phone. “Look, get your affairs in order and . . .” He rolled his eyes and pointed to the paper register. “Sign here. No, I don’t need your signature,” he said down the phone. “Are you a complete monkey’s ass?”

  Hollis scribbled his name in the book, but the young man swept it away before Hollis could read any of the other names. There were at least four others here, though, if none had been recorded on the previous page. Perhaps one of them belonged to the disabled SUV.

  Hollis pointed to a wooden nameplate on the desk. “Are you Mr. MacLeod? Back on the road there’s a—”

  “Do I look like a fucking Dugal MacLeod? Yeah, I am referring to you,” he said into the phone. “Your fans are asking after you, so you better get your ass up here by the last ferry or I’ll say more about you besides.” He chucked the phone onto the desk. “Let me find your key. It’s around here somewhere . . . fucking paperwork. There is a filing cabinet right bloody—” He swept some paper onto the floor.

  “Do you need to see some ID?”

  “You say you’re Hollis Drummond?”

  “I am.”

  “Good enough for me. Everyone else for this weekend is already here.”

  “Did one of them have car trouble? There’s a disabled vehicle—”

  “They’re all in the dining room if you want to ask, waiting on the dinner that I have to prepare like some fucking housewife because the fucking hired help—” He held up his hands, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, which only made him look more like a toddler having a tantrum. “Apologies. Sir. Bit of a staffing problem. Here’s your key. Room six, top floor.”

  “Room six.” A little chill ran through Hollis.

  The sound of glass breaking echoed from the dining room, and the indistinguishable voices rose.

  “I suppose I have to see to that now, too.” The young man hurried to the dining room, giving Hollis enough time to glimpse a blonde woman with her head in her hands before the door shut. He didn’t see her face, but something about her posture, the crystal-blue color of her blouse, triggered a memory. Sticky green carpet and the smell of fried chicken. He stared at the key in his hand, then at the door. But he was being paranoid. There were other guests here, clearly, but no one he would know. He started up the stairs.

  His back, stiff from the long drive, ached as he walked up to his third-floor room. Plush red carpet continued to line the hallway on his left, where dark maroon walls surrounded closed doors stained a deep brown. To the right, a sagging, frayed rope blocked off a darkened hall, the floor bare and lined with sheet-covered furniture. A misspelled handwritten sign pinned to the rope read: CLOSED FOR RENAVATION. Hollis followed the carpet.

  All that distinguished his door from the others was the brass 6 gleaming in the yellow light of the wall sconce. Before unlocking it, he imagined feeling a rush of cold air escaping from within, bringing with it black dust and a smell of must. But the door opened soundlessly to a clean scent Hollis traced to a Glade PlugIn by the bed.

  The interior matched what he’d seen in the website’s photos. The walls suffered the same maroon color as the hall and the paisley-patterned bedspread spoke of years of use. A desk, high-backed office chair, and bedside table completed the furniture but nothing matched, as if the pieces had been scavenged from throughout the house. Stepping between the bedroom and bath, however, was like traveling through time. The small bathroom had been renovated with a modern waterfall shower, white ceramic sink, and water-efficient toilet. Black tile lined the walls and gray slate the floor.

  Back in the bedroom, he wanted to text Linda and tell her he’d arrived safely, but his phone, which had died again, didn’t have enough power yet. He unplugged the air freshener, plugged in his phone, then searched through his bag for some paracetamol, finding the Dalmore first.

  “Don’t drink it all in one weekend, mind.” Linda had laughed as she handed him the bottle.

  With his pocketknife, Hollis sliced the gold ribbon from the neck of the bottle and flattened the gift tag out on his knee. Her cheery scrawl—Congrats, Dad!—smiled up at him. Linda was so proud of him it hurt, especially when he didn’t think he deserved such admiration.

  He tossed the bottle back and forth in his hands and considered pouring a drink, but stopped himself. If he started drinking now, he might not stop. He would try it later, when he had a full stomach and a clearer head. He’d send Linda a picture of himself with a glass of it. Maybe use one of those silly filters she’d installed on his phone. He tucked her note into the breast pocket of his shirt.

  The wind battered the building as Hollis made his way down the cold hall, which held a damp whiff of wet dog. He straightened his shirt cuffs, eager for the warm fire downstairs, when a thump sounded from behind him. Nothing but closed doors, and the weight of a presence.

  “Oi!” he shouted, hoping to startle anyone who might be there. Nothing save the wind responded.

  He waited a few seconds more, then shook off his paranoia. Maybe he should’ve had that drink first, he thought.

  Reception was empty, so he warmed his hands by the fire and breathed in the smell of burning peat, enjoying the quiet he never got to have in Manchester.

  Until the heated voices from earlier erupted into a full-fledged argument. Hollis dropped his hands. Just what he needed. Some domestic spat where he’d have to play peacemaker. He slipped into his policeman’s persona as he paused at the door.

  “Trouble follows me, Linda,” he once told her.

  “Dad, you only say that because you’re a copper. What you think is trouble is normal to everyone else.”

  But when he opened the dining room door, he knew they’d both been wrong. This wasn’t normal. And it was worse than mere trouble.

  The shouting ceased once he stepped inside, the four other guests looking far less surprised than he. He logged each of their faces, their names popping into his head as if he’d last spoken to them yesterday, not twenty years gone.

  Maeve Okafor, wet frizzy hair enveloping her head like a bird’s nest, jeans a size too small and a jumper two sizes too big, her ballet flats caked in mud.

  Eleanor Hunt, body thin and sharp as a knife, her long blonde hair chopped off to a line so straight it could cut.

  Oliver Holcombe, his black leather jacket with sweatshirt hood meant for a man a decade or two his junior, a beer gut and an almost—but not yet—comb-over.

  Lorna Torrington, sensible skirt and a turtleneck that concealed her large chest, the same black bob framing her face.

  Lorna flipped her fringe out of her eyes, and suddenly he was back—back in that room in that house with these people and the black niggle in his stomach that told him to run.

  Run now, as fast and as far as he could.

  Pp. 6–15

  to tell you something. It’s from memory, this story. Mine and theirs. So I may not have everything right. It’s possible I may have got some things confused. But I’ve done my best. I swear.

  This story begins with a house. Or rather a roundabout. One particular roundabout on one particular day in early September 1994.

  Read carefully.

  Five ordinary streets protruded from the concrete central island of this roundabout, known as Manor Circle, a roundabout which loitered on that side of the Thames only ever discovered by accident. None of these streets contained anything resembling a manor. Chiltern Drive led to a chip shop and off-license, open when they weren’t needed and closed when they were. Sandal Road curved toward the train station, where tourists disembarked to visit the failing high street and purchase overpriced goods at half-stocked housewares shops. The Byeways contained a pub which on Saturdays doubled as a nightclub and closed monthly when the police had to investigate the latest stabbing. Berry Avenue wound around to Cahill University’s back entrance, which students never knew
existed and so never used.

  Caldwell Street led nowhere.

  On either side of its buckling tarmac squatted semi-detached, three-story family homes purchased decades ago by young pregnant couples hoping to get in on the up-and-coming regeneration area of Moxley Gardens. The children had since been born and grown and were now sitting university exams while their aging parents continued waiting for Moxley Gardens to up, come, or regenerate. However, most of the Caldwell Street houses remained acceptable enough for a crowd with a certain ironic sensibility.

  This was not the case with house number 215. The façade of number 215 sagged more than its neighbors. Damp warped the window frames. The fence leaned as far as a fence could without falling over. In fact, all that made number 215 special was that the weed-infested front garden had yet to be paved over for off-the-street parking. However, what made number 215 Caldwell Street a poor excuse for a family home made it a fantastic student house. (Until a fire of unknown origin would destroy it some years later, but we’re not there yet. Don’t jump ahead.)

  Because of its proximity to the university and its excellent transport links to London (which were excellent so long as the weather was neither snowy, rainy, windy, nor sunny), number 215 held great appeal for students. Over three narrow floors it contained six bedrooms, one full bathroom, a downstairs toilet that sometimes worked, a spare room, a kitchen, and a communal front room. There was also a private back garden, lovely for barbecues except during the spring and summer when it was prone to flooding with sewage. The landlord had not set foot on the property since his wife left him and the mortgage fifteen years ago. He allowed it to be let and managed by Jameston Estate Agents, where it became the charge of a man called Yanni who no one was certain even worked there anymore. As the landlord chose not to remove any of the shit furniture his ex-wife had bought from her alcoholic brother, the house also came fully furnished. Over time, it filled with the various abandoned items of previous tenants, including but not limited to coffee pots, teakettles, three microwaves (one of which worked), a Learn Spanish Now! VHS tape, and a vinyl recording of the Grease soundtrack. No student was entirely sure what belonged in 215 Caldwell Street and what they would be required to bring, as Yanni was the only person with the move-in and move-out checklist and his coworkers were beginning to think immigration had returned him to Ukraine.

  And yet every autumn, number 215 was fully let because the university kept attracting students and students needed a place to live. House shares were the ideal alternative for those who preferred private accommodation with no privacy and the constant odor of a pot-smoking wet dog. In return, letting agents loved students because students never complained when their door wouldn’t lock or the smoke detector didn’t work or there was something suspiciously close to a bloodstain smeared on the wall of bedroom 2. As long as they had running water and a working microwave, they would chalk anything else up to life experience before returning to the ever-providing arms of the family unit following May exams. The cycle would continue and by September, six new young adults would claim 215 Caldwell Street as their own, pretending its faults were charms as they suffered within its walls.

  The beginning of the end of communal living at house number 215 began in the afternoon of that one particular September day when a Ford Escort bumped against the curb and rattled to a stop. The engine wheezed and a clicking under the bonnet continued as the car wound down.

  “This it then? Hollis. Hollis!”

  His mum elbowed him in the side. Hollis jerked awake, grabbing his knapsack before it slipped to the gum-encrusted floor. He glanced out of the window, confused as to why trees were no longer passing in a blur.

  “This it?” he asked, sitting up.

  “What I asked you, innit?” She lit a cigarette, and Hollis held out his hand. “Where are yours?”

  Smashed in the back pocket of my jeans, he thought, and flung open the car door. His mum popped the boot, and he gave it the extra thump it needed to open. He withdrew his canvas duffel and the cheap pink polyethylene zip bags Gran had given him, which he would torch as soon as possible.

  “Hurry it up, love.” The cigarette dangled from her lips as she grabbed a plastic Tesco bag from behind her seat. Caldwell Street, number 215, his home for the next nine months, looked as dumpy as the letting agency had warned. A good lick of paint could’ve at least brightened it a bit, but whether or not the house wanted to be brightened was another matter.

  Hollis unlocked the chipped green front door as his mother lagged behind.

  “Don’t understand why you couldn’t have gone to the polytechnic like your brother. Good enough for him, and your father.” She wheezed, out of breath from the short walk.

  “Dunno.” Hollis stepped into the darkened hall. “Hello?” No one answered.

  “This is nice,” she said as she waddled ahead of him. “Look at this front room. Bigger than Gran’s. Where’s the kitchen? Never mind. I see it.” She continued down the narrow hallway. “And there’s a garden! Didn’t tell us ’bout the garden, did you, Hollis? Could do with a bit of work. Wonder if they’d let you do some DIY in exchange for rent?”

  Hollis went upstairs. A musty smell emanated from the carpeted staircase, and a layer of sticky black dust clung to the banister. He couldn’t blame the letting agency, though. They hadn’t actually promised it would be professionally cleaned, only hinted that it might be.

  Each bedroom came with its own lock, but the agent hadn’t known which key went to what door and had handed Hollis one at random from a Quaker Oats box. Hollis’s key opened bedroom 6 on the third floor—a square white box with yellow patches on the ceiling and hardened Blu Tack marring the walls. On one side, a wardrobe took up half a wall and half the floor space. On the other, a thin pillow and even thinner duvet were spread across a simple box spring bed. Hollis dropped his knapsack and looked out onto the overgrown garden, where he saw his mum repositioning the mismatched furniture to mimic the arrangement they had at Gran’s. He tapped on the glass. She didn’t hear him.

  After carrying up the pink bags, he wandered into the narrow kitchen as she came in from the garden.

  “Nice place this,” she said. “Could be real nice. When are the others coming?”

  “Dunno. Today or tomorrow. Freshers’ Week starts Monday.”

  “You ain’t no Fresher, are you?” She winked.

  “Technically, suppose I am.” A red splotch stained a square of brown floor tile. Dried bolognese, he hoped.

  “None of that now. Chin up.” She straightened his shoulders and lifted his head. “That other place weren’t good enough for you. Didn’t respect you, did they? You’ll be good here. Better.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Let me see a smile. There’s a good lad. Wait here a mo.” She left Hollis in the kitchen. The yellowed fridge clicked on, vibrating the Ziggy Stardust magnet that held up a pizza takeaway menu with coupons three years out of date.

  “Here we are.” She handed over the plastic bag.

  “What’s this?”

  “Open it and see.”

  Hollis set the bag on the laminate countertop, wincing as its contents clanked, and pulled out a brand-new frying pan and electric kettle.

  “Couldn’t have you going without your morning fry-ups, could I? Best thing for a hangover, ain’t it?”

  “Mam, you didn’t . . . there’s a kettle here.” He pointed to the plastic one on the counter, lime scale visible through the blue measuring window.

  “You deserve your own. Now, keep ’em clean. I don’t want to see mold growing over the sides. And after you wash ’em, they go right back in your room. They’re not for anyone else, all right? They’re yours.” She hugged him, her head barely reaching his chest as he wrapped his arms around her wide shoulders.

  “There.” She pulled away. “Enough of that now. Best be off. Dad needs the car for bingo. Saw a chippy down the road, off that round-about. Get yourself a good meal tonight.”

  “Yes, Mam.” He
walked her to the door.

  “Oh, and here.” She pressed her cigarette pack into his hand. “Don’t spend it all in one place.” She winked again, then waddled to the Escort, breathless by the time she reached it. “Call us tomorrow!” she shouted, voice hoarse. “Let us know how you’re getting on.”

  “Aye!” He waved her off, watching her lopsided three-point turn and listening to the engine’s rattle as it sputtered into the distance. The street fell into a silence made worse when he closed the front door, the house filling with the type of quiet unfamiliar to a teenager with three brothers, a mam, a dad, and a gran squeezed into a two-story, one-bath maisonette.

  He brought up the new kettle and pan, tucking them on top of the wardrobe. From the outside pocket of his knapsack, he pulled out the wrinkled Freshers’ Week pamphlet and plopped onto the bed, resting his head against the wall. There were plenty of things to keep him busy—parties, pub crawls, picnics. Enough so he wouldn’t get bored. So it wouldn’t be so quiet. Hollis took out his lighter and opened the half-empty cigarette pack Mam handed him. Only then did he notice the £20 note stuffed inside.

  It was later in the day, but not long after Hollis slipped the note into his wallet, that Lorna Torrington paused before house number 215. Sweat rolled down her back, plastering her fringe to her forehead and producing a faint odor from her armpits. Though exhausted after walking from the train station, her arms and back sagging from the weight of her luggage, it was the sight of the building itself that made her drop her things.

  “Shit.”

  The pictures from the estate agent hadn’t depicted the water-stained roof, cracked front steps, or clogged gutters. She leaned against a pillar box and considered returning to the agency and demanding to be let out of her lease, but as the feeling returned to her shoulders and arms, she decided it was better to be stuck in this near-condemned pit than homeless for the night or taking the convoluted train route back to her parents’.