Irony In The Soul

By Pete Adams

Recuperating from his past mission, disturbed but driven D.I. Jack Austin returns to work amid a personality clash with a retired colonel - who happens to be his new Chief Constable.

When the Constable is kidnapped - and returned in pieces - DI Austin's hapless hunt for the culprit begins. He investigates a string of cryptic murders including a beheaded minister, a drowned woman in a Hijab, and a band of terrorists with explosives.

Meanwhile, Austin battles a grievous inner conflict. Will he thwart the perpetrator, or become a conspirator himself? 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Next Chapter
• Release date: Feb 4, 2022
• ISBN: 4824109957

Book preview

PROLOGUE

On his death bed, Jack Austin received a text:

Get well soon Jane

Round 2

Angels and Virgins

Do you know thine enemy?

Mor.

He’s about to get another;

Nice to have you back Jane,

God has an angel beside him, and

A martyr is enjoying 72 virgins

Mor.

…and the Police will find an Imam crucified, and a Priest stoned to death.

POLICE HERO LEAVES HOSPITAL

Portsmouth Evening News

Bernie Thompson, crime reporter

59 year old Detective Chief Inspector Jack Austin, hero of last month’s dramatic rescue of 17 children held captive by a Paedophile ring on a Solent Fort, left QA hospital today.

---

Detective Superintendent Amanda Bruce said she and her colleagues were relieved DCI Austin was well enough to leave hospital, and looked forward to him returning to work after a short period of convalescence. He is an integral part of the team still following up the unusual sequence of events that led to the dramatic rescue, she said. The Superintendent would not comment further on the investigation as she left the hospital with the Inspector. It is known that the Inspector and the Superintendent are close.

ONE

‘The Kingdom of God is at hand,

God has a plan to rescue the earth from evil;

God is here with us, now,

The dwelling of God is within us,

Eden is here and now.’

---

And so the former rugby fly half, Joe Moss, proclaimed to his only aware audience, Jack Austin, lately a regular at this spot in the Southsea shopping presinker (precinct); Jack got words wrong; It is but a norm, open to change, he would say. Open to abuse Mandy would say, but many went along, even adopting the alternative vocabulary of Portsmouth’s, Mr Malacopperism.

Morning shoppers sneaked peeks at the bearded, down-at-heel preacher. Looks of disdain, or nonchalant avoidance. What happened to Care in the Community, the Big Society; who had volunteered for this one? Basking in the midday sunshine on this Saturday, late in June, bare legs outstretched, upon a most uncomfortable bench, Jack knew where the mental health programme had gone, could stand-up with his old rugby pal and spout equally uncomfortable truths, ‘Couldn’t care less in the feckin’ community’. Feckin’ was a favourite expression. Jack quoted many things from books, films, adverts, mostly wrong, but off the telly he loved Father Ted; got most of that wrong as well, but people thought him more endearing for all of that. Joe had stopped preaching, and Jack, squinting a look at people staring, ‘Did I just say that out loud, Joe?’

Joe shrugged, and recommenced his proclamations that would save us all. Ironic, they were outside a super-saver shop where Day-Glo posters, emblazoned upon the windows, offered convenience, readymade meals; ‘Better to save a few souls, the arteries have no chance?’

‘You alright, Jack, only you keep shouting.’

Jack pulled a fake grimace, ‘Been doing that lately, Joe.’

Joe returned to his pitch, energetically launching the radical word of the Lord. Not the word professed by Jack's friend and catholic priest, Father Mike, but more salvation, here and now, and not after you’d popped your clogs. Wish someone would pop Blogg’s clogs, Jack thought, a roundabout reference to the Deputy Prime Minister, who had conned a lot of people into voting for him on a social agenda, and then jumped in with the devil's spawn, Mackeroon; arch Tory Boy. Not quite the resolution (he meant revolution) Jack believed in.

Without thinking, he lifted his arm and a small child nestled. He did momentarily think, I hope this is Meesh, or he could be arrested, but it was, knew it was, he had peeked; Jack Austin was a famed cheat. In just a couple of months, Jack and Amanda had formed a close bond with this tiny girl. He knew about unconditional love with his own children, was beginning to feel it with Amanda, as he had felt it with his late wife, Kate. It was now three years since his wife had died, and it had been a long haul out of the depth of grief, unbearable pain, a pain he used to avoid the reality of existence. Amanda had rekindled within him a desire for life, and remarkably, a sex life he had formerly given up on, until a knob-head, kiddie fiddler, shot him. But life was returning; convalescence well spent, as Detective Superintendent Amanda Bruce, became his Mandy.

He must have signalled his warm feelings, because Meesh, short for Michelle and called Spesh by Jack, snuggled tighter. He liked it, missed it with his own kids, Alana, twenty five and living with Josh, despite Jack’s insistence she go into a Nunnery, and Michael, clearly not Jack’s son as he was so mature at eighteen, soon to go off to medical school with his girlfriend, Colleen. Jack could not stand the sight of blood, and fainted when approached by a needle; where did Michael get that tolerance? And maturity, Jack would say Tried that, not much fun, and much to Mandy’s frequently expressed exasperation, people accepted it.

‘Who’s Kate?’ Meesh asked.

Startled, he opened his eye and peered into devastatingly innocent, green eyes, of this delightful urchin. ‘Did I just speak my thoughts, Spesh?’ She giggled and cuddled closer, Jack’s shirt was already disporting a patch of sweat, and he knew Spesh and Amanda would laugh at him. He would complain, but it was another source of soulful comfort. Since being clinically dead, seeing the proverbial white light, just a splash of intense crimson from Mandy’s dress, moments like this had become precious, and he was eternally grateful.

‘Kate was my wife, Alana and Michael’s Mum.'

Meesh’s freckled, heart shaped, face, enquired, ‘Where is she?’ And a few months ago such a question would have Jack spiralling into a deep melancholia from which he would struggle to escape.

‘She died, Spesh. I like to think she’s with the Angels and your Mum.’ This satisfied Meesh, who had witnessed the murder of her Mum. Jack had rescued the child from a house of paedophiles, the beginning of May, which kicked off a particularly gruesome investigation, that Jack knew opened more lines of inquiry than it closed, knew also convalescence would be short, but for now, he stretched, absorbing the midday sun.

Meesh was fascinated by Joe Moss, strutting, his Bible extended in an outstretched hand; more likely preoccupied with Joe’s overcoat, Jack thought.

‘Why’s he wearing an overcoat?’

Jack felt obliged to open his eye fully to the mousey haired waif, ‘Spesh, darlin’, Joe is a truly good man. He has no malice, but because he wears an overcoat in summer and speaks out loud, people assume he’s mad, but he is just hurting so bad he can’t think to take his coat off,’ which was an Army Great coat.

‘What’s malice?’

Blimey, children and their questions, heaven forefend if he had sometimes shown exasperation with his own. ‘It means bad thoughts, but that man would not hurt a fly.’

‘But flies are not good. Gail killed one the other day, is she malice?’

Gawd, ‘No sweet’art, Gail is the most loving person around, and looks after you well, doesn’t she?’

‘Is she going to be my new Mum?’

‘We hope so, and that makes you a very lucky girl.’

Jack returned to his recumbent position, and Meesh resumed hers, observing, the Preacher, proclaiming God was here and now and not waiting for you in heaven. Radical stuff, better look busy, Jack thought, chuckling.

‘What you laughing at?’

‘Just thinking how lovely you are,’ and Meesh settled, content, but the child psychiatrist had said to expect a crisis, and it will come probably when least expected.

TWO

The child psychiatrist was, Jackie Philips, nicknamed Phil by Jack, but she had firmly suggested that outside work he call her by her name, understanding that in the workplace he had a reputation to maintain; plonker. Jackie was a tall and elegant black woman of mid-forties, and a firm friend of Detective Superintendent Amanda Bruce, and both strong women were observing Jack and Meesh from the cool entrance lobby of Knight and Lee, the Department Store.

‘Certifiable, Mands,’ Jackie quipped.

‘Who, Joe?’

‘You know who I mean, but now you mention it, why does Jack sit there listening to the word of God, thought he got that from Father Mike?’

Mandy snorted, ‘You know about the Father,’ and she went on, smiling benevolently, ‘Jack played rugby with Joe, got pissed together. Jack says you learn a lot about a bloke on a rugby piss-up.’

Jackie tugged Mandy’s sleeve to break her blissful review, ‘You do know that’s Jack psycho-babble?’

‘Oh yes, don’t you just love him, though.’

Jackie was not convinced, ‘I’ll be glad when you wake up and smell the coffee.’

‘Coffee would be nice,’ and Jackie turned to look at the woman she fancied, who, unfortunately, was so in love with Mr. Ugly, and he in love with her; Jackie knew. Jack had once described Mandy to Jackie with his eye closed, face first, novel for a man, she had thought. Mandy was fifty-three, for a few more weeks, and not aware of her innate beauty; Jack’s words. She had lines like any woman of her age, but Jack saw these as an expression of her womanly allure. He loved her eyes, and described their hazel qualities, her thick arched eyebrows and long lashes, light olive complexion, her large roman nose; aquiline was the word Jack searched for, and never found, and had he not given the aqueduct nom to Cyrano of the drugs squad, who truly came from Nose City, Mandy would have had to bear that agony, having struggled with her nose all of her life, but, here she was with a man who loved her fireman’s hose, as he called it.

My Sophia Loren of Portsea Island, Jack would say, alluding to Capri; certifiable? Absolutely, and Jackie agreed, Mandy was a handsome woman. Saw also the Sophia Loren resemblance, in that she exuded an innate sensuality. She could see it, and surprisingly, Jack saw it as well. He loved her full body, rounded hips that swayed, another of his observations Jackie had noticed. A real woman, growing old in a beautiful way, not a stick, and any right thinking man would want a woman like this, he had said, and Jackie thought she would to.

‘I give up, Mands. I grant you he is a gentle man, except when he literally goes berserk, but he’s a towering, overweight, in all the wrong places, ugly, crisis-magnet.’

‘I know…’ a dopy loving look on her face, ‘but he’s my crisis-magnet, and I quite like his little belly,’ and flipping her loving gaze from the grossly underestimated little belly, she tutted, he was wearing his Morecombe and Wise, shorts, and sticking out from the ridiculously huge shorts, were two extra-long, skinny legs, embossed with a throng of varicose veins, and like Jack’s distended belly, she chose not see them, though given the chance she would dispose of the shorts.

Mandy thought he had the naughty, boyish, charm of Jack Nicholson. However, his most obvious feature was a disfigured and blind eye, which he steadfastly refused to cover. Wrinkled skin sank into the empty socket, a vertical white scar sketching a line from his forehead to the top of his cheek; a historic, horrific injury. Yes, he was ugly, a cross between Geoffrey Rush the actor and a slapped arse, she thought; not attractive, but then he was, and to a lot of women; she had noticed. Jack Austin required circumspect viewing.

‘Finished drooling?’ Jackie said.

‘Finished drooling over me?’ Mandy answered, enjoying the exchange.

Jackie touché smiled, having recently admitted she desired Mandy, and for a time, this had unbalanced the Detective Superintendent who considered herself a modern and open-minded woman; you had to be in the police service. For instance, she was okay with her computer team Frankie and Connie. It’s when it’s close to home, Mandy had confessed to Jackie. She talked about how she had not seen, but Jack had, that her twenty two year old daughter Liz, was not only from the Isle of Lesbos, as Jack so irritatingly said, but was in a committed relationship with another woman, Carly, a psychiatrist whom Jack called, ‘Curly the trick-cyclist’. And why did everyone think that was funny when it clearly was not? she would argue, this sense of frustration, exacerbated as her daughter’s partner liked to be called Curly, and frequently quoted Jack’s ludicrous expressions, which Liz, now, ironically, loved.

‘Finished analysing, Mandy?’ Jackie asked, a consummate professional woman who also, ironically, frequently used Jack’s expressions, ‘You want Jack to yourself, and it’s irritating, so many people love him, feel a part of him.’

‘How’d you know I was thinking that?’

Jackie flicked her own lustrous eyebrows, ‘I don’t just fancy you sweet’art. He’s a big man with eyes only for you. Well, eye, and I’ve not a cat-in-hells chance.’

‘Shut-up Jacks, let’s have coffee with Sleeping Bertie and his angel,’ and Mandy strode off, acknowledging Joe as she passed; Joe maintained his stride and so did she.

Jack was asleep. He could sleep anywhere, and frequently did. Notably he could be found asleep in his deckchair in the Community Policing office in Kingston Police station, from where, as a Detective Chief Inspector, he ran his seemingly benign squad of monkey coppers. Meesh was in fits of wriggling, giggling, as Mandy shushed her. Jack remained still, enjoying the sport as she leaned over and kissed him on his right eye socket, the dodgy one.

‘That you Maisie?’ he reacted, and Meesh burst out laughing. Mandy feigned upset. ‘Finished talking about me, and Jackie…I saw you looking up the legs of me shorts; get an eyeful did yer?’

‘Hardly an eyeful,’ Jackie retorted, the two knew each other well, Jackie having been a colleague of Jack’s late wife, and they had a strong banter that usually left Jackie winning, only Jack couldn’t see it. Jack rarely conceded he was beaten. ‘631 to nil,' Jackie commented, using Jack’s nonsensical scoring system that he made up as he went along, so he could prove he had won. It was also amazing how many people got upset, they could not possibly be six hundred points behind, and Jack would wet his finger, and in the air sketch the addition of another point.

‘Shut-up Jacks, you’ve not added my seven thousand from last week, so that’s me winning, eh Spesh?’

Meesh leapt up, hugged Jackie’s leg and declared, ‘The winner.’

‘Turncoat,’ Jack muttered.

‘Is that Joe’s coat?’

Joe heard Meesh’s reply and cracked a heartfelt smile, a rare gesture from a man who had killed his family drunk driving.

Mandy broke the spell, ‘Costas, Jack?’

‘Coffee, Spesh?’ and Jack mimicked her screwed up face. ‘Okay, chocolate milk shake?’ Meesh was unmoved, her face familiarly questioning; a girl accustomed to mind games and never getting her way. Jack recalled a similar face when he agreed she could keep his dog, Martin; her comforter, no longer his. ‘Okeydokee, chocolate milk shake, espresso for me, and two sour puss juices for Jacks and Amanda, and afterwards, let’s take Martin to the countryside, eh, a pickernicker?’ A momentary excitement on Meesh’s face, then circumspect, but eventually she took Jack’s hand and lead the way to Costa Coffee, swerving to avoid some slouched hoodies. ‘It’s eight ‘undred degrees, ‘ow come you’re wearing fleeces and woolly ‘ats?’ Jack remarked, unable to resist a comment.

‘Fuck-off back to the monastery, Granddad,’ a spotty youth hurled back.

Mandy caught Jack’s arm, and with a disarming smile, disarmed him, steering him to Costas while addressing the yobs, ‘Swear in front of children again and you’ll have me to deal with, got that?’

‘Yes, Miss,’ a synchronised reply.

Jack looked back from ushering Meesh into one of the street-side seats; how come I can’t do that, he thought.

‘What’s a monastery Jack?’ Meesh enquired, as a fleece armed his way into the coffee shop; Jack had assumed a transitory daydream.

‘Jack.’

‘Luv?’

‘You go inside and order, then pay, Dinlo. Do that and I’ll explain to Meesh about your monk’s haircut,’ Mandy said.

Meesh laughed, not fully understanding, but since Mandy and Jackie were enjoying the joke, she joined in. Jack stood as the fleece ran out; a muffled shout from inside. Jack was a bit deaf and missed what was said, but stuck his leg out all the same; just for the hell of it. It was a natural reaction, a trick in the Nick was to make people jump, or to trip them up. One of the more mature activities Jack had instigated, and, in what Jack thought was a smooth and elegant movement, but was him falling over, he sat on the boy, sprawled on the floor.

He looked up to Mandy, ‘Not bad eh, darling?’ head tilted, to receive adulation.

Mandy explained, as if nothing else was happening, ‘Jack’s the Nick tripping champ.’

‘Got to be worth 652 points,’ a smug smile from the champ of chumps, looking to affirm the score.

‘In your dreams, dipstick,’ Jackie replied.

The lad, if he could have expanded his lungs, would have complained, but Jack was more concerned about the point’s allocation than the death of his temporary seat; this would mean a tie with Jackie if he was not mistaken. The Manager arrived to see Jack sitting on the miscreant and carrying on a near normal conversation with two women and a giggly girl.

‘Can you hold him until the police get here?’

‘Sure,’ Jack said, ‘can we have a chocolate milk shake, a double espresso, a glass of tap water with ice, and two Americanos, please?’

The Manager was distracted, ‘You order and pay inside…’ he carried on looking for the arrival of the police.

Jack spoke to the lad, who was starting to squeal; wimps, kids these days, it’s not like he was heavy or anything. Mandy and Jackie laughed, ‘Did I just say that out loud?’

‘You did, Jumbo.’

Childish, he thought, and addressing his seat, ‘Listen, son, I’m a police officer, give us the money you took,’ and Jack eased his not insubstantial buttocks, whilst multitasking a fart; he knew he was accomplished. The boy coughed and spluttered but dug into his pocket and handed Jack the money. ‘You gonna to do this again?’ Jack asked, sitting back down for a bit of a rest.

‘No sir,’ the boy expelled; no staying power kids, today.

‘If you do, I’ll make it bad, understand?’ The lad managed a miasma blurred, Yes sir, and Jack got up, and the lad ran off.

‘What’re you doing?’ the Manager seethed.

‘I’m going inside to order my drinks,’ and Jack waved the money, ‘close your mouth we are not a codfish,’ and he walked into the shop.

‘Mary Poppins, hooray’ Meesh called out, looking for points.

Jack returned with a tray of drinks and gave the change to the manager as a uniformed officer approached, ‘Morning Ma’am, what’s occurring?’

‘No table service, Bobby,’ Mandy quipped.

The Manager decided to cut his losses, and rattling what was left of his money, excused himself.

‘Hi, Jack, how’re you doing; the lads’ll wanna know?’ Bobby asked.

‘He’s a very naughty boy,’ Mandy answered.

Meesh giggled with her fist in her mouth, squeezed beside the straw, her other hand clinging to the milk shake as if her life depended on it. Yep, her first milk shake, Jack thought.

THREE

Jack’s old Jaguar was a well-used, midnight blue, XJ8, that had taken more than its fair share of knocks around town, the most prominent being, someone had pinched half of the radiator grille, and Jack was completely disinterested in replacing it. Mandy suggested some psychological transference of his eye, He couldn’t see that, he'd answered, thinking it was funny, and if Mandy was honest, it was the first time. The interior ivory leather had become irretrievably grimy from the paws of Martin, formerly Jack’s, and now Meesh’s, scruffy, ginger, wire haired, Border terrier, who had never learned to wipe his feet; so like Jack.

Martin sat with Meesh, his nose out of the rear window, face animated and his wagging tail batting the little girl’s face, exciting great mirth. Michael sat in the passenger seat and Winders, Jack’s name for Michael’s girlfriend, Colleen, sat at the back with Meesh; Mandy was following in Jackie’s car. Jackie was concerned at the prospect of a country walk lead by Jack, they could be lost forever in the wilderness; he was not noted as a practical man. She visibly relaxed when Mandy reassured her Martin would be leading. People had a lot of respect for Martin, a sensible dog, and a devout catholic.

The glorious morning sunshine swelled for the afternoon and the temperature had soared by the time they reached the woodland car park. Following Martin, Meesh ran off on the well-trodden path that opened onto a clear sward of grassland that had been carved out of the dense woodland for several miles to create a vista to the Stately Stansted House. Try getting planning permission for that now, Jack would say, but he loved this walk and never tired of the vesta (he meant vista), even if it was created by arseycrats (he meant aristocrats). The long prairie grass encroached as the path narrowed and Martin was sucked in, bouncing into view, and then disappearing, Meesh correspondingly shouting and pointing with glee, diving into the tall grass herself, popping up, then down, giggling and calling out.

Michael and Winders paired, Jackie was dominating the conversation with Mandy, and Jack wandered, lonely as a cloud, Meesh and Martin’s rural vanishing and reappearing act a peripheral visual tableau. The warmth, the smell of the grass and the sense of being alive, nudged Jack into a hayseed daydream; one of his favourite pastimes, dreaming, he could take or leave the hayseeds, preferred the London Smog if he was honest with himself. In his reveries, he would shuffle haunting topics, currently, shall I go back to work? Am I scared? What would I do otherwise? What about Martin, can I go back to work without him?

Jack kept these thoughts to himself, fearing if he expressed these feelings, people would argue he should retire, and that was not what he needed to hear. He needed to resolve these issues in his mind, but did feel guilty not sharing them with Amanda; a Roman Catholic moment; Martin would approve. Jack was an inept man, his dilemma, and his fear. In his history he had been with MI5, a fact known only to a very few people, his children, Colleen, and now Amanda. When he was recruited to MI5, they quickly saw that in the field he was a liability, but he had risen up the ranks as a cerebral contributor, influencing major operations and decisions, eventually retiring, collecting his obligatory gong, a CBE, Commander of the British Empire. Using his not insubstantial contacts, he made the move into the Hampshire Constabulary, entering at Inspector level, posted in Portsmouth; he wanted to be by the sea, he said.

Amazingly, only Amanda had been curious how he got there. She now knew about his past, the real story about his eye, and how he got the Queens Gallantry Medal. She was with him when he earned the recommendation for the George Medal. Of course, you never leave the Intelligence Agencies, he'd said, and Jack did not want to. The network of contacts helped him in creative problem solving, namely assisting when his eccentricities got him into hot water, the most prominent being his inherent nature as a berserker. The police psychiatrist had said that in Viking times, Berserkers were used to go in at the front of a battle, and the terror of a demonic man, blind to anything that might cause himself harm, dressed only in a bearskin, would break the resolve of opposing forces. In those days, Berserkers were revered, not for their dress sense, of course, but today, as Jack could testify, berserking is generally frowned upon. So, despite the appearance of his extravert and extravagant nature, Jack was a private man, but it was true that if he was not berserking, he was driving someone else berserk; not Jack’s thoughts, but Mandy’s, and shared by the Chief Constable.

Jack’s psychiatrist had recommended Martin; The calming influence of a hound, and Martin had become more than just man’s best friend, until Meesh popped onto the scene. Up until then, Jack and Martin were inseparable, work, home, and church, not that Jack was religious, but he had to think of Martin’s spiritual well-being.

It was Martin and Meesh who claimed his current daydream. Meesh had undergone the most horrific experience, serially abused by a paedophile ring, and witness to the murder of her mother; Martin had fallen in love with her, and vice-versa. Martin had gone from Jack’s comforter, to Meesh’s lifeline, and Jack’s feelings were confused; could he go back to work without Martin? What would that be like? Meesh was adjusting well into her foster family, Gail and Mickey Splif, a large, stable, and loving, Pompey family. Jackie maintained that an emotional crisis was imminent, but in the meantime the steady support was Martin. Jack could see that a child and a dog was a mutual thing, whereas with Jack and Martin, if he was honest, it was mainly Martin to Jack; so why get upset? Was it not good to see his dog happy? Meesh happy?

When Jack daydreamed, he was often unaware of what was going on around him; another concern of the psychiatrist. He hadn’t noticed Meesh come back, pass him, and grab Mandy by the hand, ‘Jack’s crying,’ she whispered.

Yes, to top it off, as if an eccentric, fat and ugly, half blind, berserking, spook copper, was not enough, Jack Austin was also an emotional man, and cried at the drop of a hat, especially if he dropped his hat. He should just go away and crawl under a cheese; the self-esteem lessons about on a par with his anger management.

‘Jack, you okay?’ Mandy asked, looking into his watery eye.

Jack didn’t want to think of himself as needy, he had specific views on this, but right now, he needed Amanda, just him and her, to feel her arms around him. This thought made him cry more, the selfishness, and anguish at what explanations would be needed, especially as he expected Jackie, the resident bleedin’ trick cyclist, to insist he declare his innermost thoughts so she could analyse them in front of everybody, and announce a cure, but she didn’t.

‘Jack, we’ve been expecting this. Go home; you need Mandy now and nobody else.’

Martin seemed to be agreeing, nudging Jack’s varicose veins in the way he does; ‘Go home numpty,’ he woofed. Nice dog, but a bit short on the sensitive genes. Jack knew Martin wanted to get on with his walk and didn’t need to be dragging a grizzling, pansy-arsed berserker around with him, who was likely to get lost anyway.

Distracted by Jack, nobody noticed Meesh clinging to his leg, dry sobbing, her petite frail body convulsing with short panicky breaths. Jack dropped to the ground with Mandy following and together they encircled the mousey haired girl, deep green eyes in a heart shaped face, emerald eyes beginning to brim, a previously skeletal frame filling, thanks to Gail’s nurturing. It was okay to cry, Jack had shown her, and they cried together, Meesh’s tears licked by Martin, walk forgotten; Martin was nurturing.

They stayed like this for some time, people and other dog walkers passed by, curious, not stopping; a middle class walking area and Mackeroon’s Big Society did not extend to empathy, to embracing someone else’s hurt, sharing pain; it’s about money, getting something for nothing and wielding power over victims of the recession. They heard Jack speak his usual generalised thoughts and said nothing. Meesh managed a halting tut, tut and Jack tightened his hug; the milky smell of Meesh, suffused with the scent of grass, and the woman he loved. It was at times like this Jack endured the immensity of the world, simultaneously appreciating the micro-sensations that were in it.

After a while they trudged back to the cars. Jack carried Meesh; she had assumed the life-saving grip she previously had when he took her from the house that had been her prison, her torture chamber; leaving behind a dead police officer, and a dead woman; her mother. On that fateful day, Jack had embraced the girl as if his own life had depended upon it, hers did, and an unbreakable bond was forged.

FOUR

Gail prised Meesh from Jack. Jackie stayed, and Michael drove Jack and Mandy to Mandy’s flat. Jackie had confided that after a trauma it was sometimes difficult to step back into the swing of normal life; she was confident Jack would be okay, would heal, but how fast? No one could tell. The first thing Mandy did was run a bath; she said nothing. In the bedroom she undressed him, then herself. Into the bathroom, no argument over who would have the taps; they were in the centre anyway. ‘In you get, Jack,’ she was kissing him, smoothing her hands reassuringly across his fuzzy back and spotty bum as he stepped in.

‘Feck,’ he shot upwards, braced his arms on the bath rim, lifted his feet and folded his knees to his chest. Propped and swinging, he hovered, worried for is dangly bits, precariously close to the scalding water, ‘Feckety feck woman.’

Mandy burst into an uncontrollable fit of giggling, and Jack, swinging naked, allowed his face to transform from trauma, to joy; just like that. Laughter, fitful at first, tearful, finally uncontrollable; thoughts of floating to the ceiling like Mary Poppins; I like to laugh ha-ha-ha-ha, anything to get away from the broiling water. The dam had burst and he stepped into her arms, sharing her hysterics, immediately aroused. Laughter morphed to kissing, hard, repeated, passionate kissing, a frenzied, stumbling, journey to the bedroom, and a release of restrained ecstasy, promises and exchanges of love.

After their lovemaking, they slept, and it was early evening when they roused themselves. Mandy in a silk nightdress made some dinner, while Jack, in his boxer shorts and an open shirt, messed up the telly controls and hid the conch; the TV Controller, named from Lord of the Files, he said; He who has the conch has control and he went to the kitchen and cuddled Mandy from behind, ‘Telly’s fucked, darlin’.’

She nodded, accepting the inevitable with her man and technology. ‘Can you fuck anything else tonight, because if you can, I’m not interested in what’s on the telly?’

He turned her around, they kissed, and he leaned in, went to lift her onto the counter but messed it up, thought he may have put his back out. Mandy popped herself up for him. ‘I could have done that you know.’

‘Listen Brains, I’m not interested in Mr Muscle,’ but Jack’s Mister Brain had become misty as he slid her nightdress up and his boxer shorts down. She leaned over, switched off the hob and patted out the flame on the flappy cuff of his shirt.

Sunday morning, Mandy graciously decided to answer the phone. ‘I don’t believe it, Mike, I thought Sunday was a busy day for you?’ She listened some more, ‘Okay, but this had better be good,’ she hung up.

‘Father Mike?’ Jack was out of bed and on his way to the bathroom.

She stopped him, held the tops of his arms and fixed his eye, ‘In one, and he’s on his way, done mass already.’ She looked at him intensely, seriously, he resisted any jokes but managed a face, and she managed a giggle. ‘You know why he’s coming ‘round,’ she stopped his smart arse answer with her eyes. ‘If you don’t want to go back to work ever again, that’s okay with me? If you’re not ready to go back, also okay. If you’re scared…’

‘Scared?’

She looked like she wanted to say Der, but settled for the more informative explanation. ‘Jack, men go around ninety percent of the time with their minds vacant, women do not, cannot; I know you. Is this what you have been thinking about?’

‘Amanda,’ she knew he was going to be serious, he used her full name. ‘Yes.’

She kissed him, ‘Thank you.’

He turned to go to the bathroom, and she grabbed him again, ‘No you don’t, let me go in first and when you go in, leave the fan on supersonic.’ Tipping her toes, she kissed him again; she felt strangely excited, work had been dull. She knew Jack would go back, she just hoped he was ready.

FIVE

‘If it’s the Holy Ghost then we already have one,’ Mandy giggled