Ziggy
Ziggy
Ziggy had spent the past ten days on high alert. It was Kylie’s very first Christmas, and his mum had tried so hard to make it memorable and special, working double shifts so they could buy Kylie a small mountain of presents. Even Jenna had made a flying visit to see her daughter. She’d bought her a T-shirt bearing the slogan MY MUMMY IS THE BEST . Given that Jenna was horribly hungover from a Christmas Eve party, had nearly knocked Kylie out with stale vodka fumes and hadn’t bothered to wrap the present, which was already too small for Kylie, Ziggy highly doubted that this was the case.
Even on Christmas Day, Ziggy couldn’t relax. He kept expecting the doorbell to ring at any moment as the police, or Social Services, or both, turned up to remove Kylie from his completely inadequate care. Or to find one of Floyd’s men on his doorstep, thrusting another toxic package and address at him.
Over and over again, he ran through that scene at Mandel Community Center. How many seconds—or minutes, even—had Kylie sat there covered in class A drugs, looking like a miniature Pablo Escobar? Was it possible that nobody other than Alicia and Daphne had noticed? Was there a chance that Alicia had decided not to tell anyone else?
Even if he had, by some miracle, got away with it this time, he really couldn’t risk being in the same situation again. But how could he avoid it? Since his school and the community center were both closed for the holidays, he’d been able to steer clear of Floyd and the gang by staying holed up in his flat. But he couldn’t keep doing that forever. Besides, both he and Kylie were going stir-crazy. There were only so many times you could build a tower of bricks then knock it over with a plastic truck, and his threshold was considerably lower than Kylie’s. How many years did he have to wait before he could teach her to play Grand Theft Auto ?
Ziggy wrapped Kylie up against the cold, strapped her into the buggy, grabbed the shopping list his mum had left on the kitchen table, and headed toward the supermarket.
“We’re going on a mission, Kylie! Engage weapons and activate force field!” he said, hoping that his comically gung ho and upbeat tone might infect his actual mood, and wishing that the weapons and force field were real.
He couldn’t see Floyd as he approached the exit, but he spotted a lookout, younger than him, sitting on the wall. The boy put two fingers into his mouth and whistled. Just a couple of minutes later, he saw Floyd sauntering toward them with his trademark swagger. He’d probably come out of the womb walking like that.
“Hey, bro,” he said. “I’ve been looking out for you. Here. Merry Christmas.” He offered Ziggy a handful of folded notes. Five well-used twenty-pound notes.
“What’s that for?” Ziggy said, his hands gripping the buggy handlebars tightly, so he wouldn’t be tempted to reach out and grab it, trying not to think what that cash would mean for him, and for Kylie.
“Those errands you done for me. You’ve earned it,” said Floyd, waving the money at him. “I always look after my people, don’t I?”
“Thanks, but I don’t want it,” lied Ziggy. Then he took a deep breath and grabbed at the opportunity being offered. “Actually, I can’t do any more of those errands. It’s not safe for Kylie. You get it, right?”
The ensuing pause lurked like a physical entity between them, as Ziggy held Floyd’s unblinking, reptilian gaze and tried not to flinch.
Still not looking away, Floyd put the notes he was holding back into his jeans pocket.
“OK,” he said, finally. “You do one more run for me, then we’ll call it quits. Deal?”
“Deal,” said Ziggy, letting out a long exhalation.
Floyd nodded to the guy standing a few steps behind him, who handed him a package, much larger than the previous ones, and a slip of paper with an address.
Could this all really be nearly over? Why hadn’t he plucked up the courage to do this before? He hadn’t expected it to be so easy. Had he been putting himself and Kylie through all this stress for nothing?
Ziggy almost skipped to the address he’d been given, about fifteen minutes’ walk away, the beam of light at the end of the tunnel he’d been crawling through for weeks. He could see his bright future shimmering in front of him like a mirage in the desert. All he had to do was this one job, then he’d be able to reach out and touch it.
It was obvious from a distance which door he was headed for. It was the one with the peeling paint, covered in graffiti tags. Junk mail and bills spewed from the letterbox. He slowed as he approached, trying to appear casual, while surreptitiously checking for any sign of police or—even worse—Floyd’s rivals. Once he was as certain as he could be that he wasn’t being watched, he knocked on the door. As always, it was quickly answered, the package snatched from his hand and replaced by another one, which Ziggy shoved into his backpack. The less time he spent with his fingers actually touching it, the better.
“Mission accomplished, Kylie,” he said. “Let’s take this back to Floyd, then we can get to the shops. We could buy a Colin the Caterpillar cake to celebrate! What do you say?” Kylie grinned at him, his mood infectious.
Ziggy turned the buggy into a narrow side street which the sun was unable to penetrate. It smelled of rotting food and piss, so Ziggy picked up the pace, trying to get back onto a main road as quickly as possible.
The moped came from behind. He could hear the engine getting louder as it approached, the roar reverberating off the sides of the alleyway, and tucked the buggy as close to the wall as he could to give it space to get by.
Ziggy never knew what hit his head. A baseball bat, perhaps. All he saw, as he lay in the gutter, his cheek pressed against the grill of a drain and a high-pitched ringing in his ears, was a man in black leathers and helmet gunning the moped’s engine, with Ziggy’s backpack flung over his shoulder. The backpack containing Floyd’s package. The final package. His escape route.
“It’s OK, Kylie,” he said to the crying baby in the pushchair next to him, as he pulled himself to his knees and tried to make his eyes focus. The freezing water from the gutter seeped into his jeans. He reached round to the back of his head, which was sticky to the touch. “It’s all going to be OK,” he repeated, his voice thick and slurry, before vomiting into the drain.
But it wasn’t going to be OK, was it? It was very, very far from OK. How was he going to tell Floyd that his package had been stolen? Even if Floyd believed it wasn’t his fault, he’d make Ziggy pay. Someone always had to pay. The bash on the head he’d just received would be nothing compared to the beating he was likely to get from Floyd and his lackeys when he returned empty handed.
The light at the end of the tunnel flickered, dimmed, then went out.