told her that he loved sniffing the pages of a new book in the same way, and how he’d shoved his copy of Murder on the Orient Express under her nose to prove it. And he’d been right. The paper in books just smelled different from other paper. Enticing, somehow. As if the words themselves were reaching out to pull you in. God, she missed him. He should be here now, sharing this.
A loud whistle interrupted her thoughts. She looked up then and in doing so she realised where she was – just across the street from Mucky Melvin’s. She looked around her. The street was silent again, and there was no one about. It was dusk and the air carried a mild whiff of grease: people cooking chips, sitting down, eating tea. She carried on, careful not to look up towards the window across the road from her, shoving the record up under her jumper as she went. She was just crossing the road diagonally when she thought she heard something again, and as soon as she turned around, nearly shot a foot into the air – Mucky Melvin himself was stood there, right behind her.
She turned to run, instinctively, but even before her legs could begin moving, she felt a rough yank on her arm, and almost lost her balance. And in a matter of seconds, felt a stinking hand being clamped across her mouth, and the violence of being bodily hoicked back down the street, clamped by a strong unyielding arm across her chest.
Unable to make any sound other than a muffled grunt, and all too aware that the street was still empty, she squirmed and struggled like a wild animal against his terrifyingly strong grip. He’d pulled her only a matter of yards; not as far as his house – just into the alley that separated the row of houses and gave access to the backs, where a tall evergreen hedge scraped and shifted as they passed, emitting a pungent, piney scent.
‘You’ll only make it worse, Titch,’ Melvin whispered, almost conversationally, as he huffed his way along the alley between the neighbouring houses, his stinking hand under her nose making her retch. His grip was starting to crush her chest now, in his effort to keep her from escaping, and she was only now aware that the record must be gone. Please, please, please let someone be out in their yards, she prayed desperately, kicking her legs out to try and crack his shin or trip him up, and trying not to let her mind take her to the place where she knew Mucky Melvin’s was right now. She could tell by his breathing; the same raggedy rasp she remembered so well and that he was emitting from disgustingly close to her ear.
But there would be no one. It was cold, it was getting dark and it was tea-time. If she could only open her mouth wide enough to be able to try and bite him –
‘Shit!’ his voice took on a sudden explosive quality and in the same instant she was propelled from his grasp. She didn’t know how or why, only that she was aware of him falling – the force of his weight against her shunting her a good foot in front of him, before he crashed down onto the ground like a felled tree. She wasted no time in stopping to find out, either. He must have tripped in the gloom; stood on something, tripped on something. She didn’t know and didn’t care, just made her legs work like pistons, propelling her down and along and out of the end of the alley, her lungs almost bursting and her throat catching fire. She didn’t stop running till she fetched up at Carol’s house, where she began thumping furiously on the door.
‘Where’s the bleeding fire?’ Carol was already asking before Josie could even see her. Then, the door fully open and their eyes meeting, added, ‘Christ, Titch – you look like you’ve seen a ghost!’
Josie’s lungs seemed to still have a life of their own, rising and falling and stopping her getting her words out.
‘What?’ Carol said, pulling her inside and shutting the door with her foot. ‘What’s happened, Titch? What’s up? What’ve you done?’
Josie shook her head. ‘Not me,’ she managed to get out. ‘Wasn’t me. It was Melvin!’
‘Melvin?’ Carol said, herding her into the kitchen. ‘Mucky Melvin?’
Josie nodded. ‘He grabbed me –’
‘He grabbed you? What – where?’ she asked, pulling out one of the mismatched vinyl chairs and pushing Josie down on it. ‘You mean you went in his house again?’
‘No,’ Josie said. Her hands had begun to shake violently. She could still smell him. ‘No, no, never. He just grabbed me – right in the street!’
‘Bloody hell – in your street? In broad daylight?’ Carol glanced out of the kitchen window. ‘Well, broad-ish. The filthy bastard!’ She sat down too. ‘And then what happened?’
‘He just grabbed me and tried to pull me down the alley, and he had his hand over my mouth so I couldn’t even scream, and he was –’ She shuddered. ‘Oh, God, Caz, s’pose I hadn’t got away from him …’
‘The shitty fucking bastard,’ Caz said again. ‘So how did you get away from him?’
‘I don’t know. I think he tripped on something, or maybe slipped. No, probably tripped. One minute he was behind me – he was holding me against him, like, at the front –’ She drew her arms into a circle in front of her to demonstrate. ‘And the next he went down like a ton of bricks, and I just legged it. Christ, Caz, what am I going to do?’
Carol stood up again and put her hands on her hips. ‘You want some pop? The man’s been and I told him me mam wanted some leaving. She’ll go apeshit, like, but I’m not bothered. Dandelion and burdock. In the fridge. You want some?’
Josie nodded, biting her lip to stop herself from crying, and trying to still her trembling hands by smoothing Blue, who, perhaps having sensed that she needed her in some way had climbed out of her basket and trotted across to Josie, plopping her velvety head into her lap.
Carol got the pop bottle out of the fridge and carefully opened it to stop it spurting, then poured two glasses and placed them down on the little kitchen table.
Josie reached out for one, then thought better of it, and lifting the dog’s head from her lap, went over to the sink and washed her hands as thoroughly as she could first, using a squirt of washing up liquid.
‘I can’t tell my mam,’ she said, sitting down again and stroking Blue. ‘I just can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I just can’t, that’s all.’
‘I think you should – s’pose he tries it again and this time he doesn’t trip over?’
Josie sipped at the drink, the bubbles still dancing on the surface and tickling her top lip. ‘Because what if I do and then they go for him an’ it comes out that he – well, what he did to me before?’
Caz shook her head. ‘It won’t. He’s not going to admit that, is he? He’d have to be mad as well as mucky!’
‘But he might. S’pose he tells them I was asking for it or something?’
‘Asking for it? That’s just mad. Come on, Titch – you really think he’d ever do that?’
‘Yeah, but –’ Josie sighed. She wished she could believe he wouldn’t. But she never told before, and she was happy that she hadn’t. And she just knew telling now would make things bad for her. That somehow it would come out – she might blurt it out herself, even. That the not telling had made her seem bad, all by itself. Like she mustn’t have even cared much.
How badly she wished Vinnie was home – she was counting the weeks till his release date in September now. How badly she wanted the summer to be done with. How badly she wished he could just go round and punch Melvin’s lights out. She should have told Vin when it happened in the first place, she realised. He might not have been home but he’d have sorted it out for her. One way or another, he would’ve. He’d have sorted it so that bastard never thought, in a million billion years, that he’d got away with it. That he could try it on again with her now.
Her friend must have been reading her thoughts, she decided. ‘How about you tell Vin?’ Carol suggested. ‘You’ve got to