Devil in the Details

It’s the not the kind of alley that’s seen much skipping. It’s the kind you pass through quickly - if you must at all - with eyes down. Willing yourself invisible, your peripherals on high alert. A street you don’t want to be alone in. Pungent smell of piss and smoke and stagnant, moldy water. Yet it’s skipping that Mack is most certainly doing. He can’t help himself. His feet carry him. He skips, glides, spins and jumps. At times he has to stop and theatrically yoink back up his oversized pants, as their frayed and greasy half-cuffs scrape the bitumen with an especially boisterous bounce. He’s meandering all over, yet he knows where he’s headed. Where else to go when one has Very Big News, but to the object of your heart’s desire. He rounds the corner. Her familiar, half-bored scowl elicits in him an involuntary grin somehow wider than his ears. She rolls her eyes as she sees him make his bee-line and makes to move to the far side of the stall. He has anticipated this move, and heads her off with a grin he didn’t think could get any wider.

“What’s up with you, grinning like an idiot?”

“No idea what you mean.” He says, grinning like an idiot.

“I got no time for games, buy a fucking coffee or bugger off.”

“Certainly I will have one of your fine beverages.”

“Yeah, and I’m the Queen of England.”

“I will. I’d like a large latte. Careful you don’t overheat the milk”.

“You have to pay for that, y’know”.

“Certainly. I have money”.

“As if you do”.

“Stacks of it. I come into some good fortune, you might say. Twenty thousand,” with eyebrows arched high, his chin in the air.

She eyes him suspiciously.

As she turns to the register he sees a notebook with a thick, well-thumbed black leather cover, sitting on the counter. His eyes widen, reverent. The Holder Of Her Secrets. His hand itches, pulled towards it, hesitant, yearning. He imagines discordantly delicate handwriting, hinting at hidden sorrows, and him comforting her. His hand almost touches the soft leather, the glinting gold on the cover. It jerks sharply back to his side as she passes him his change.

She opens her mouth to speak as a folded magazine whacks over her head, whacking the words right out of her mouth. Chased by a tumble of “fucks” and “work” by Big George with a scowl even mightier than hers.

And then Mack is walking again. He meant to say more. Tomorrow. He told her his secret, at least. That made her think, you could see it. He was sure she spoke to him longer. Lingered a little. A touch less sneer in her voice.

He skips on. Toothless Tony grins. Mack throws back:

“Better look at this pretty face while you still can!!”

Enjoying the man’s quizzical look, Mack laughs. And skips.

He passes the bright lights and agonizing, tantalizing smells of the patisserie on the corner. Almost passes on autopilot but then…maybe…. He turns, seeing the hand-glazed pastries and chocolates truly for the first time. He touches his hand to the folded package in his underpants. Pauses to consider. Then stops himself.

“Not yet. Not yet. We got plans for you. Big plans.”

Instead he pulls out an old half-sandwich from yesterday and finishes that. He skips on, almost colliding headlong into Braden’s thugs before realizing the danger he’s in. They smile, one especially bug-eyed and oversized youth catching hold of his collar with relish.

“Not today!!!” Mack shrieks, twisting, kicking out, and wrestles free of the teenage mountain’s grasp.

And he’s off. Leaving the lumbering brute staring dumbly at his own empty, fleshy fist.

Mack flies, emboldened and invincible. He hears fading laughter, carried away by feet already seeking the next trouble. A lone can lobs carelessly wide over Mack’s shoulder. Mack keeps running, but nearly trips on his own winged feet as he catches a glimpse of the retreating brute’s dirty back pocket…stuffed with a black leather notebook. Gold writing. The journal!? Confusion muddies his brain. Reluctant, torn, he lets the notebook walk off.

Later in his alleyway, he can’t sleep. The faces are familiar, but his hand keeps reaching to the package hidden in his underpants. It feels heavy somehow. The weight of promise. How can paper be so heavy? Then, an idea. It lights up his mind like morning. He grins in the dark, jiggling, emotions bubbling up his spine. Even further from sleep.

Yes!

Presumably sleep takes him, but takes him reluctantly. It’s her he’s thinking of. What he’s going to say. What those words might do.

…….

Morning. The world lights up to match his mind. He’s up and moving before his eyes have focused. He’s off. He’s got his Big Plan. His feet know the way. She’s in his mind. Just one stop first.

It takes some time to convince the jewelry shop-keeper to sell him anything. But the color of money is the same everywhere and with hesitation she relents. She takes his cash with a curled lip, leaning as far back as her willowy, scented arms will allow. No matter. He has his Big Plan. Bugger the stick insect.

And he’s off again, bright future split in two; the boulder weighing down his underpants and the felted box of promise in his back pocket. Bright and shiny future, cleaved in half. Yoinks his pants back up. Stepping into the tide of cars, taxis, buses, he plots an opening. Makes his dash. The ocean of grey suits peels away, all backs, noses turned away. Hands instinctively over wallets. He’s used to this.

Stepping onto the far curb, and another step closer to her. The sea of suits with eyes averted. All eyes but two. A suit, grey and bland like all the others. But the suit carries a head, and the head a pair of eyes. Not averted, staring, boring into him, unblinking. The suit carries two hands and in the hands are a thick, black notebook. Mack turns, lurches back into the throng towards the eyes with the head and the notebook.

“Hey! That’s not yours!!”

But the eyes are gone. The notebook is gone.

Shaking his head, he stands, dazed. A bus honks. He jumps. Shakes his head again, resets his purpose. He touches the package on one side and the promise on the other. He moves on. He’s excited, but also feels itchy inside. The package seems to bulge, and scratches against his skin. He tries to shake it off.

“Get a grip”, he barks under his breath. Breathes deeply. Rehearses his speech.

Next thing he’s at the coffee stall. He’s only got one shot. He’s rehearsed this in his mind, it takes two minutes fifteen seconds for Big George to make a latte. Mack orders, his time starts counting down. The most important two minutes fifteen of his life. The words are tumbling out. She’s half listening as he rambles.

“….come into some money…”

“…going to Queensland…”

“….buying the ticket today…”

“….find my mother…”

“…past is past…”

“….be real proud of me, now I’ve made something of myself…”

“…..big-shot now…”

She’s humoring him. Half-smiling. Picks at a fingernail. He shoves the box at her. One minute forty-six seconds. She opens it warily, like it’ll bite. The bracelet shines. He has her attention now. She narrows her eyes at him.

“You steal this?”

“No! Like I said, I come into some money.”

“What money?”

“A…a...a relative. In England. Got a letter from this fancy-pants lawyer in London telling me I had a rich great-aunt who carked it. She left it to me, twenty thousand dollars.”

“He sent you a letter, eh? How’d it find you, hotshot? You live on the streets.”

“Never mind that. Important thing is, I got this money. I got big plans. I’m going to Queensland to find my Mum, I know she’ll want me now. Now I’m worth something, y’know.”

“So this great-aunt, what’s her name?”

One minute four. He shifts to relieve the weight of the package.

“I…can’t recall her name, anyway. What’cha think of the bracelet? More where that came from. You should come with me!”

“To Queensland?”

“Yeah, to Queensland.”

“You don’t think people gonna ask where you got this money?”

“I told, you, from this….”

“Great-aunt. Yeah, yeah. So what bank’s your money in?”

“What? It’s…not in a bank.”

“They wouldn’t just post you no twenty thousand bucks from England.”

“What?! Anyway, you should come”….

Fifty-eight seconds. He’s shifting from foot to foot, aware his voice is louder than he meant it to be. Strangers shoot glances between he and the girl. He resents their looks. The bulge in his underpants feels heavy. Like a boulder. Why’s it so damned heavy??

He’s speaking but a bus thunders past, she doesn’t hear. Panic starts to build. A large poster emblazons the side of the bus: a vast black leather notebook. He’s sweating now.

“Did you see that book?” Forty-eight seconds.

“What book?”

“It was your notebook.”

“What notebook?”

“Black. Leather. Your notebook. Gold writing.”

“I don’t have no notebook.”

“It was here on the bench. Just yesterday. You were resting your hand on it.”

“You need to get off the drugs, boy. I don’t have no notebook.”

Thirty-five seconds. The sound of the frother pitches higher. Final creaming cycle.

“Notebook. Anyway, the Plan. Queensland…” He’s hot. Why’s it so hot? And this package, it’s grating against his skin. So heavy. Is paper heavy?

A man walks past. Meets his eyes. Holds them. Doesn’t even look where he’s going. Doesn’t blink. He’s holding a black leather notebook. What the..? The package itching in Mack’s pants. He’s sweating hard now. She’s shaking her head. He’s losing her. She’s glancing over her shoulder to check the progress of the latte. The man is thrusting the black leather notebook at him. Gold curlicue writing on it. Fancy-like. It’s Mack’s name. Mack knows what’s written inside. Without opening it he knows what it says. And the man is gone. Fifteen seconds. She’s holding her hand out with his change.

He stares at her. Through her.

“Your change”.

He doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. She shakes her head. Eight seconds.

He bolts. Runs as fast as his legs will take him. Across the four-lane road, between buses, cars and grey suits. She turns away. Takes another order.

He runs down the alleyway. Over the busted fence. Into the alley with the old factories, into Braden’s thugs. He pivots. Turns and runs but they give chase. They’re bigger, they’re gaining. They’re looking more serious this time. He spots a high window and leaps, pulls himself up, squeezes through the broken window, between the bars knowing they’re too big to follow. He falls onto a stack of old tables and broken chairs. An alarm sounds, but he doesn’t hear it. Doesn’t run. He slumps down against the wall. Looks down at the notebook in his hands, but there’s nothing there.

He keeps staring at his hands. Like they weren’t his hands. His hands. He’s disgusted with these hands. The package in his pocket. Why is it so damned heavy?? He pulls out the folded wad of notes in the wrinkled envelope. Eighteen hundred measly bucks. Throws it. Looks away in disgust. He hears sirens coming. The alarm sounds distant. He doesn’t move. Stares at these hands. Foreign. Old hands. No place for such old hands on such a young body.

He hears voices. Men talking. Approaching. Such old hands. They see the money.

“What do we have here, mate?”

Old hands.

“I said, what do we have here?”

They pick up the money.

“Where’d you get this money, kid?”

“…Queensland…”

“Sure you did. Up you get.”

“Hey Joe, there’s blood on this cash”.

“Think you might have been a bad boy. Think you’re a tough kid, eh?”

“Think you better come with us, mate. Cops might have some questions for you”.

Such old hands. Old.