Ziggy
Ziggy
“Ziggy! Get out of bed! You should have left ages ago!” shouted Ziggy’s mum.
“I’m coming!” lied Ziggy, pulling the duvet over his head and wishing that one day he could just wake up and find himself somewhere else. Anywhere else.
“Look, I’ll take Kylie into the nursery on my way to work—that way you might just get to school on time,” she said. “But you owe me one, because it’ll make me late for work. Again.”
“Thanks,” said Ziggy, who hadn’t actually been to school once since the new term had started, nearly two weeks ago. It had taken a week for the worst of his bruises to fade, and for him to be able to walk without wincing, and by then he hadn’t been able to see the point of returning. It would only remind him of everything he’d lost. And just the thought of bumping into Alicia made him dizzy with anxiety.
Ziggy had managed to stagger back to the estate, following his mugging in the alleyway, only to find himself being beaten up by Floyd, as punishment for not bringing back the package that had been stolen from him. It had, it transpired, contained a huge amount of cash. Ziggy had curled himself into a ball while Floyd kicked him over and over with steel-capped boots, hoping that Kylie’s pushchair was angled away from the sight of her father being pulverized. Or, at least, that she was too young to understand or to remember what she was witnessing.
In between the kicks, Floyd had explained that Ziggy now owed him ￡10,000, which he would have to pay off by being at Floyd’s beck and call for the foreseeable future.
“You’re lucky I choose to believe you,” he’d said, with a sharp kick to Ziggy’s ribs. “I don’t think you’re stupid enough to steal from me. But your life is mine now, you hear? Until every penny you owe me is paid back.” Deft kick to the abdomen. “Get it?” And one in the back of the head, still raw from the mugging. “Raise your arm if you get it!”
Ziggy had managed to lift his trembling arm a few inches and the kicking, mercifully, had stopped. One of Floyd’s lackeys had deposited him and Kylie on his doorstep, and he’d had to explain to his horrified mother that he’d been the victim of a random robbery. He’d refused to let her call the police, or take him to hospital, so she’d patched him up with antiseptic and plasters as best she could, reassuring him that it was all over now.
But the nightmare was just beginning.
There was no point in going to school, and taking his mocks, or submitting his UCAS form for universities that he’d never be able to attend. Because if he disappeared without paying back his debt, it just passed over to his mother. And Ziggy couldn’t let that happen.
So, he was fucked. Right, royally fucked.
Ziggy went back to sleep. But even that wasn’t an escape, as his dreams just taunted him with replays of the past few days until he was woken by a flurry of notifications on his phone.
Floyd needed him to do a delivery.
···
By the time Ziggy had completed that delivery for Floyd, followed by another two, it was early afternoon. He still had three hours before he was due to collect Kylie, so he put the twenty-pound note and the shopping list his mum had left on the kitchen table in his pocket, and headed for the supermarket. But then he walked past a pub and saw the promise of temporary escape. The only way to forget, just for a while, the car crash of his life.
Ziggy found some mates at the bar. Well, not mates so much as boys he had once known vaguely, who had dropped out of school after spectacularly bombing their GCSEs. But when you’re seeking oblivion, anyone else doing the same is automatically your best friend. Especially ones who’ll lend you cash to buy more vodka shots. And then offer you a line or two of coke, just to straighten you out a little.
“Your phone’s ringing, man,” said one of Ziggy’s new best friends. “Who uses actual voice calls? Must be a scammer.”
Ziggy squinted at his phone. The letters on the display danced in front of his eyes. He put a hand over one side of his face, flinching at the smell of wee and weed on his fingers. The name on the screen came temporarily into focus: JANINE .
Fuck.
Ziggy looked at his watch. He was already fifteen minutes late to collect Kylie.
“Hi, Janine. I’m on my way. So sorry,” he said, amazing himself at how incredibly sober he’d managed to sound.
“Ziggy. You’re paralytic. You can’t turn up here in that condition. Where are you?” said Janine.
“The Nag’s Head,” slurred Ziggy. Too drunk to lie.
“I’ll call your mum,” said Janine.
Even in his current state, Ziggy knew this was not a good idea. If his mum found him like this, it would lead to a whole string of questions. Like why he hadn’t been at school, taking his mock A-level exams. Like why he was throwing his entire future away. Like whether he was fit to be responsible for her grandchild.
“No, don’t do that. Call Daphne,” he said. A decision he would come to regret.
“OK,” she replied, and hung up.
···
“WHERE IS ZIGGY?” came a shout from the doorway, just a few minutes or so later. Or maybe longer. Ziggy’s perception of time was doing very strange things.
“Oooh, who’s in trouble?” said one of Ziggy’s new friends.
“Your mum ain’t aging well, Ziggy,” said another.
Ziggy stood up. Then fell over.
Daphne walked up to the barman. “Right, you!” she said, leaning across the bar and prodding him in the chest with her metal-tipped walking stick. “The one who lets teenaged boys get legless on a school day in the afternoon.” He looked terrified, as well he might. He wasn’t the only one. “Look after this baby while I deal with her father. Try not to get her drunk.”
Daphne walked over and grabbed Ziggy by the scruff of his neck. Ziggy’s new friends just stared, mouths open, like a row of targets in a fairground game, waiting for someone to throw a ping-pong ball at them.
“Fuck, you’re strong,” he said, the words garbled by the force of her grip.
“I do weights. Helps prevent osteoporosis,” said Daphne, through gritted teeth. “This way.”
She steered him toward the toilets. The ladies’ toilets. Then she propped him against a sink while she filled it with cold water. She took a handful of his hair and plunged his face into the basin.
He gasped and spluttered as she pulled his head out. Then she did it again.
He should have called his mum.
“How DARE you?” she said, pulling his head up and shoving his face toward the mirror, so he could see what a mess he looked. “You have been given the gift of youth, of health, of a beautiful CHILD and you are pissing it all away.” Head back in the sink. “One day you will get to my age, if you don’t get murdered before then, and you’ll realize what an honor and a privilege you had, and how spectacularly you wasted it all.”
Ziggy took a deep breath and wiped the water from his face with his sleeve, thinking his punishment was over. Wrong.
“You STUPID”—sharp slap to the right cheek—“STUPID”—and one to the left—“FUCKER!”—back in the sink.
“Right,” she said, toweling off her hands, reverting to a normal, relaxed tone, as if they’d just been discussing the weather over tea and cake. “Let’s rescue Kylie from the negligent barman, go back to your place, have a strong cup of coffee, and work out what we’re going to do to fix the mess you’re obviously in. OK?”
“OK,” said Ziggy, weakly.
“Hey,” said the barman as he handed over Kylie. “I knew I’d seen you somewhere before. You’re on TikTok.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Daphne.
“You definitely are,” said the man, thrusting his phone toward them. “You’re a meme.”