CHAPTER 20
“I do know Hira, but how did you know it was, well, me?”

She suddenly looked embarrassed, and I understood.

“Let me guess: she mentioned my PCOS”

A nod.

“She didn’t mean to be rude or anything. We were having a chat about, well, you’ve got me doing that now, well, Mam had just had another ‘Why don’t you go back where you come from, towelhead?’ and she said it wasn’t just us who got the stupids”

“But your Mam is from bloody Cardiff!”

“Yup. Trouble is, to some people, that doesn’t count. Got brown skin, with or without a hijab, and you’re automatically excluded. Mam said she bit back on what she wanted to say, about Irish miners, then said how people make so many stupid decisions based on appearance, and you came up as an example. Couple of her patients have done the old ’they’re really nice, no complaints, but are they really a man?’ shit”

She paused, then shrugged.

“Sorry, but you asked, and I tend to gush when I feel awkward, and no, Lil, we are not laughing at that one, okay?”

I suddenly got the double meaning, so covered my amusement with a question.

“Irish miners?”

“Yes. Big coal strike back in the nineteenth century, the owners doing the usual shit things to their workers, and so said owners just shipped in loads of blacklegs. Lots of them were from Ireland. Thing is, they’ve been here less time than our family has”

She turned to Lil.

“Mind if I fill her in on my family, Lil?”

“Not for me to say, sweetheart”

“Right. Mam doesn’t cover her hair cause of religion, Jen, so much as habit. Our family’s always done that, well, till me, but I’m the bloody rainbow sheep, aye? Anyway, Dad, her, it was an arranged wedding. Another tradition. He comes over here after their wedding in Karachi, and everything’s fine. I’m born, and that’s acceptable. I get old enough to realise who I fancy, and he gets shitty. In the end, he divorces Mam, traditional style, but backs it up with a court trip, and by then Mam wants rid of him. So fifty-fifty split, Mam goes back to full-time, we struggle a bit for a couple of years. I found some part-time work to help keep us solvent”

“Where’s your Dad now?

“Joined some of his own family up in Brummagem, loik, and as if by magic, the cousin appears from Pakistan. Last I heard, I have three half-brothers. Not that I want anything to do with any of the miserable fuckers. How the hell did we get onto that subject, anyway?”

Lil said, “I think you were trying to justify your Mam being a bit open about Jen here, sweetheart”

I patted the girl’s arm myself.

“You don’t have to, woman. I got where she was coming from, and it did avoid another bloody True Confessions of a PCOS Woman session. More importantly, after what happened to your Mam… I only see her when it’s work, aye? How is she, in herself?”

“Oh, it is what it is, Jen. She says… I know she’s lonely. What she said is that the job gets her out, gives her a chance to meet people”

“That’s a bit like something I was thinking about, Amina. Your Mam’s patients, the ones Tom and me drive to hospital and back? Lots of them, it’s obvious we’re the only people they’ve seen for ages, and do they talk. I was, Tom and I were talking, and it’s that rare thing we have, a job where you get to make a difference for the better. Little things to us, but not so small for others”

Lil looked hard at me.

“You been okay, woman, since, you know?”

“Sort of yes and no, Lil. Part of why Tom and me got so pissed last night”

I turned to our new friend.

“Had to go to Coroner’s Court recently. Can’t talk about details, but it was a really nasty incident. They leave scars”

Lil murmured, “That multiple pile-up past Swansea, where the baby died”

Thanks, woman. I didn’t really need to hear that again. Amina almost whispered her reply.

“I read about it. Changing the subject. You spoken for, Jen?”

“No, not me. Fully single, as in single me, single bed, single room in the Nurse’s Hostel by St Dai’s hospital”

Lil chuckled.

“Not that she hasn’t got someone sniffing, eh?”

“You know she’s not my type!”

Amina perked up, asking if she knew the woman, and Lil answered with a shrug.

“Not sure if you will. Woman called Elf”

“Shit! Not the one from the Falkiri? Wildcat’s running mate?”

“The very one. She runs a door security firm, and pub fights are part of Jen’s business, though I do have to remind her not to join in”

She waved at the last lingering trace of my shiner, the cow, so I then had to explain.

“Lil, What is it you two know, and I don’t? All these warnings about her club?”

“Ah, Jen, dominant local biker gang round here for women. They run parallel with the top dogs for men, though their patch, the men’s, is actually a boar. Marlene calls them ‘the Satanic kitten eaters’. Leave them alone, you won’t even know they exist. Piss them off, and it’s nightmares in technicolour. Elf is what they call their Sergeant at Arms. At least, she has a sense of humour”

I finally managed to shift the conversation away from my connections to scary women and took a fresh pint and a couple of bags of crisps to a corner table, leaving the lovebirds to their sweet nothings, and settled down with a hillwalking magazine that had caught my eye. In essence, living the solo life left me with little to do when not at work, so I was reading voraciously, and if I went out for a meal on my own, I was the sad cow with the book open next to her lamb jalfrezi or kung-po chicken. I’d just set the mag down, sated for the moment, when the tall woman who normally sat reading a paper (snap) approached me.

“Could I have a look at that mag? Cover picture looks like somewhere I know rather well”

“Feel free! My eyes are a bit worn out tonight”

“Thanks. I’m Debbie, by the way”

“Jen”

“Pleased to meet you, Jen. Yeah, here it is: Y Garn. Right… Sorry, just this magazine has a habit of posting great photos, but giving absolutely shit directions. They’ve swapped the names for two lakes. How do you know my sister?”

Where the hell did that come from?

“Who?”

“I heard Lil mention her name. Wildcat”

“Ah! I don’t know her, I know someone called Elf”

“How?”

“I’m a paramedic, and…”

Her face transformed with that last word, and she grinned happily.

“You’ll be the one she’s got the lusts for! Sorry, Jen; I’m just a bit protective of my family. I heard the name, and thought I’d best check it out. No offence, I hope”

“Um, none taken, I suppose”

“You got the black eye, am I right?”

“Is there anyone in the city that doesn’t know about that?”

“It’s that sort of city, woman”

“But you’re a Gog, I am guessing”

“Aye. Flintshire, me, but been away years. Used to be… We used to be travellers, my parents and me. Anyway, I gather Elf isn’t your type”

She laughed at my expression.

“Girly-girls for you, like Lil over there, I believe. Anyway, I actually wanted to pass on some thanks. You did a pick-up a little while ago, behind the Greyfriars car park”

“How did you know?”

“Ah, family thing the Yanks call paying forward. I had a really shit early life, I got recued, that’s all you need to know. I can’t pay back, so I try it that other way. I’ve got a Transit; rigged a boiler in there, and when it’s shitty out, I park up where the rough sleepers are, give them a hot drink, sometimes soup if I can manage it. One of my regulars had noticed the body; he was the one who let me know, and I sort of slipped the plod the word indirectly. I don’t like coppers”

“I think I’ve heard about you. One of the other drivers called you ‘Our Lady Of The Mugs’, said he’d picked up a gangrene case who thought you were some sort of angel”

“Angel? Me? Most definitely not. Anyway, none of your lot ever park up nearby. To the people I mean, that is. I could tell you where the rough sleepers gather, but nobody ever comes to Splott”

“Why Splott?”

“Working girls, Jen. Red light district. Parking there would put off men looking for trade, but if you were around the corner for a while, some of the girls could do with a little bit of treatment. Just having a sharps box available would be a good start”

I looked at her in silence for a few moments, then smiled.

“You are utterly realistic about addicts, aren’t you?”

“Yes. I can give them something hot, ask people like you to offer the simple things, but I can’t get them off the smack, or the game, so I stick to what I can do. Not asking for a needle exchange, or anything like that, just anything you can do to make some lives a bit less shitty. Little things make a big difference; I’ve been there. I know”

She took a sip of her drink, a pint of ale, and then returned my smile.

“Better subjects, and I’ll just say that I’m straight, then. What sort of music are you into?”