You Don't Know Me

We put a bin liner over his taped-up body so he didn’t stand out and looked back at him. I said a kind of prayer under my breath and tried to make it real but all I could see was rubbish lying there. I remember thinking then about that dust to dust thing and I knew that he was gone.

After we left him, we had to lose the wheels. We didn’t want to go too far though because we had Shilo and Binks to deal with still. So I drove a little bit until we saw another council estate and then parked up.

‘Here?’ says Curt.

‘Why not here?’ I say getting out.

‘This whip? Here? It’ll get jacked for sure,’ he says, heaving himself out from the seat.

‘Exactly,’ I say and head towards the main road, making sure I leave the doors unlocked and the key in the ignition.

We dash the gloves into a nearby bin and jump on the bus and back to the trap. We walk up slowly to the big front doors, looking at everything. Just in case. You never know what can come at you. But it all looked cool to us. Everything like it was. We bounced up the stairs and listened at the door for any sounds. Last thing we want is to be jumped by two very fucking vex boys, you get me. I have my ear pressed to the door but all I can hear is Curt’s breathing. I give him like a thumbs up and he puts in the key and turns it. As we open the door I half expect them to be gone. But Shilo and Binks are still there, fully awake now moaning and squirming in their taped suits. We ignore them and start cleaning the place up. We basically threw bottles and bottles of bleach around the place until the whole place smelled like a swimming pool. Nothing can survive bleach apparently. Kills ninety-nine per cent of all known shit, everyone knows that. It was only once we had washed the place down that Curt finally looked at me and then at the groaning men on the floor. He pulled me into the back room out of earshot.

‘What the fuck do we do with those two clowns?’

‘Cut ’em loose,’ I say. I just wanted the thing to be over right there and then. I wanted them out. I wanted Curt out. I wanted me out.

‘What if …?’

‘They don’t know fuck all. They was out cold,’ I say.

‘Well, eventually they will start to wonder where the fuck their bossman is at though.’

‘We tell ’em we delivered him up to Glockz. They might even drop the word to the Olders and start the war themselves.’

‘True say,’ he says and then walks back into the room and starts to pull the tape off their faces. They scream like girls. Then Curt leans his big face right into theirs and gives them this look.

‘Listen you motherfuckers, next time I see your ugly faces, they’ll be chewing steel you get me,’ he says and drags them to their feet. One under each hand.

‘Where’s JC?’ says Shilo rubbing his head.

‘He got some business with Glockz innit. They took him. Now if I was you, I would maybe want to get the fuck out of here before Glockz comes back for your arses.’

Binks is coming to life now and starts getting all jumpy again. Then he looks down at his leg and screams out. ‘You fucking shot me man,’ he goes to me, crying like a baby.

‘Yeah man,’ I goes, ‘I fucking shot you.’

They make as if to leave but Curt grabs each of them, by the collar.

‘Wait the fuck up boys. Curt got some questions for you. And you better think before you give me any bullshit or you gonna follow JC up North.’

Even I am afraid when I hear Curt talking about himself as if he’s some next man. I look at him and he nods like he’s saying, ‘Yeah I know.’

Break: 11:00

22

11:15

So the rest is just details really. We were pretty surprised that Jamil pulled that shit in the first place you get me. It weren’t even one of them things. It was like, yeah we expected him to think about trying it on but we thought even he wasn’t stupid enough to cut off a supply chain at less than half the price of what he was paying the Olders. It was like he hadn’t even thought this shit through.

The thing that amazed us most of all though was that the bag he brought with him had actual money in it. Not the full sixty grand but half of it. It was like he weren’t even that bothered about losing the cash. Why risk taking all that cash if all you was planning on doing was taxing the drugs in the first place? It didn’t make sense to us at first. It couldn’t have been as a just-in-case kind of thing, because there was only half the cash there.