for him, let alone a half-decent house, so it gave him a feeling of satisfaction and immense pride to be able to provide what he’d never had for Johnny.
Most people he knew with sons had already kicked them out or they’d left home on their own accord by the time they reached the age of twenty-five. But with the sixty-inch inbuilt flat screen TV, the custom-built Goldmund chrome music system, the games consoles and the tabletop football with the tasteful drinks bar underneath, he knew there was no reason for his son ever to move out. And Frankie Taylor liked it that way.
It made him feel safe knowing his family were under his roof and as long as he felt safe, Frankie was happy. Family was everything to him. He hadn’t known his father and he had a sneaking suspicion his mother hadn’t either. He didn’t hold that against her. What he did hold against her was her pitiful existence, her acceptance of her surroundings, her inability to provide for her family, and her refusal of ever attempting to raise a smile, even on Christmas Day. These were the things which fuelled Frankie’s bitter resentment of his childhood. He could recall her words as if he was hearing them now. ‘What’s there to bleeding smile about, Frankie? The only time I’ll be smiling is when I’m dead and gone from this miserable earth.’
Even though his mother had been the most miserable bleeder he’d ever known and he’d resented his upbringing, it hadn’t stopped him loving her. He’d loved her like no one else.
As a child he’d always worried about her, running home from school instead of playing with his friends to make sure she was alright. When his mother had gone on a night out, he hadn’t been able to settle until she’d come home. Always staying up waiting for her, making sure she’d got in from wherever it was she’d been. If she hadn’t arrived home by eleven, Frankie had gone looking for her. Usually finding her skewed up to the eyeballs on penny lagers, with her knickers round her ankles from one nameless encounter or another.
He was only twelve when the butcher at the end of their street had found his mother keeled over at the bus stop after her heart had had enough of beating. What initially struck Frankie wasn’t sorrow but shame at the fact she’d been clutching onto a bag of scrap end meat. They’d needed to break her fingers to remove it from her grip.
When he’d seen her lying on the mortuary slab the first thing he’d looked for was a smile, but all he’d seen was the same tight, pursed expression she’d had when she’d been living and breathing.
He and his eight siblings had been carted off to the local kids’ home in Stepney in the East End of London where one by one, they’d been separated. Picked off like cherries from a tree as do-gooders came along looking for a child to complete their own family, not realising or caring they were breaking up one already there.
Fifteen years ago he’d tracked all his siblings down, but besides from his sister, Lorna – who called him every Wednesday evening to moan about everything from her burning haemorrhoids to the miserable skinny fucker she was living with in Belgium – he’d lost touch with all the others again.
The pretence of family unity had been too much for them to keep up. The ties had been severed and damaged a long time ago, and eventually they’d all stopped calling each other, slowly backing away; slinking off to their separate lives. All relieved that they could stop pretending they cared.
As sad as it was and at times painful for Frankie to think about what could’ve been, he had his own family right here in front of him. He had his own wife, his own son and there was no way history was going to repeat itself. He wasn’t losing contact with anyone, because no one was going anywhere, not if he had anything to do with it.
Looking down at his son with a naked Saucers lying next to him, Frankie smiled. Johnny was certainly a chip off the old block. He was proud of him. He couldn’t have asked for a better son. Johnny certainly knew how to have fun, but there was a time for fucking about and a time for work.
If they weren’t careful they’d be late opening the clubs and as business had been down lately, he didn’t want to give any of his regular punters an excuse to go somewhere else. Besides which he didn’t want a nag-full from his wife, Gypsy, if she came home and saw him running late.
He smiled again when he thought about his wife. He’d been married to her for thirty-two years, the ceremony being held on the day she’d turned sixteen. And after all this time, she still did it for him. Still gave him a boner when he thought about her – and Frankie knew very few people could say the same about their own missus.
Not that he didn’t bang the goods at his clubs on a regular basis. No one in their right mind could expect him to love, care and be faithful to his wife. By anyone’s standards that would be taking the piss. If he had to do that he may as well cut his balls off now and feed them to the fish in Hyde Park.
He looked at his white platinum Rolex watch; a present from Gypsy for his fiftieth birthday to go with the white gold diamond knuckledusters she’d got him the year before. He really needed to be at the first club by four at the latest, but thinking about his wife had left him feeling horny. Perhaps once he got to his club he’d search out the little blonde with the big tits who’d started work last week. Get her to give him a blow job. Part of the perks of running girls – but for now he and Johnny had things to do.
‘Come on son, get up. I’ll meet you in the car in ten minutes. We don’t want to be here if your mother comes home. You know what she’s like.’
Frankie roared with laughter, then roared even harder as he saw Johnny grimace, putting a pillow firmly over his face. He smacked the pert naked bottom of Saucers who groaned as well. Walking out of the room he whistled, feeling very pleased with himself. Though in particular he felt pleased with himself because the night before he’d managed to rub Max Donaldson up the wrong way. Anything to do with annoying Max always left Frankie feeling good.
The ride in the back of the black Mercedes to Holloway Road should’ve been a comfortable one, but Tommy Donaldson was finding it quite the opposite. Not simply from the broken air conditioning but from having to sit and listen to his father firing off a ranting tirade of abuse, directed at him.
Tommy noticed whenever his father was angry there was a change in his Irish accent. Over the years it’d become watered down from the years he’d lived in Soho. The anger, however, turned it back into a thick guttural growl, making all his words sound more violent and attacking than usual.
Catching his father’s eye in the driver’s mirror, Tommy continued to listen to the barrage of abuse, hoping desperately to get to their destination as quickly as possible.
‘Is it only me who’s able to tell the bleeding difference between four and half past four? When did you start to think it’s alright to be late? I didn’t bring up me kids to make a mug of me. Virgin Mary help me, because I’ll beat the shit so hard out of you son, you’ll be needing a colostomy bag. Between you and Frankie Taylor you’ll have me digging me own grave. What is it with people that think they can get away with disrespect? Well tell me lad, do I have cunt branded into me arse?’
Tommy glanced out of the window, biting his lip; he didn’t know if the question was supposed to be rhetorical or not. If he didn’t answer when he should’ve done, he knew when the car stopped he’d get a hard slap. If he answered when he shouldn’t; the same rules applied.
Before Tommy had decided what to do, Max swerved the car with blackout windows into the carwash off the traffic-filled Camden
