Dark Waters(3)

‘I’m going to run you a bath, Col. And as for you …’ She glared at her elder son. ‘I’ll have more to say to you later.’

Col limped up the stairs behind his mother. The fight, the night, had taken more out of him than he’d thought.

‘Col,’ Mungo called up to him as he was halfway up the stairs. ‘I’ll make this up to you, bruv. I’ll get you a really special present.’

Col looked down at his brother. Mungo was still muddy and bleeding but even now there was a cockiness about him that scared people, but attracted them too. Mungo was everything Col ever wanted to be. Feared and admired and despised. He was the best big brother anyone could ever have.

He’d never do anything to hurt him.

He’d die before he’d ever turn against him.





Chapter Two


‘That’s some keeker you’ve got, McCann.’

Thelma Blaikie shouted to him across the playground. Her spiky hair was as black as his eye had become over the weekend. She sauntered over to him, chewing her gum, trying to look cool.

She fancied herself as his girlfriend. She wished. Thelma Blaikie was as hard as nails, always in trouble at school – when she was there. She seemed to think that mapped her out as a suitable bird for a McCann. No way. Though, even Col could see she had the potential to be a stunner … in spite of the Gothic white face and the black eyes. But as soon as Blaikie opened her mouth she spoiled everything. Blaikie’s voice could grate cheese. She was too loud, too brash, always it seemed to Col trying to impress him.

Like now. She stopped in front of him and blew a bubble right in his face. He was tempted to flatten it all over her ghost-white cheeks.

It burst with a bang and she sucked it back into her mouth. She laughed. ‘Big fight at the weekend? Heard there was trouble up your way.’

Col shrugged. ‘Nothing to do with us. Me and Mungo were in all night. This …’ he pointed to his eye, ‘was an accident.’

‘Some accident. Want me to kiss it better?’

Col curled his lip in disgust. ‘I’d rather be eaten by tarantulas.’ He walked away from her while she stood watching him, still trying to look cool.

His mate, Denny, ran up behind him. ‘You’re well in there, Col.’ As Col turned to face him, Denny’s eyes lit up. ‘Wow! What bus hit you?’

He told Denny the same story he told Blaikie. Mates they might have been. Bosom buddies they were not. The lie would be all he would ever tell anyone. The truth would be between him and his brother.

Every teacher that morning asked him the same question, and was given the same answer.

Except for Mrs Holden, the Maths teacher. She and Col had long ago decided they didn’t like each other. She had also taught Mungo, remembered him from his time at the school. Remembered the trouble he had caused her, and every other teacher. She’d expected the same trouble from the younger McCann, and Col hadn’t disappointed her. When he paid no attention in class, he made sure no one else did either.

She didn’t ask what had happened to him. Not out loud. But her eyebrow lifted, ever so slightly, when he strolled in late to her class.

‘It’s OK, Mrs Holden,’ Col explained. ‘I was having an intellectual discussion about algebra, and the other guy lost his temper. See, these mathematicians … they cannae take a joke.’

Denny laughed. Most of the class did, too. Only Mrs Holden’s face remained stony.

‘It would be nice to know you could be passionate about something, Col,’ was all she said.

If only she knew the truth, Col thought, as he slid down in his seat. Would she ever have done what he did for his brother? Somehow, he didn’t think so. Part of him wanted to tell her, to shout it to the world. But no, it had to be a secret, a McCann secret, and that’s how it would stay.


The cold wet weather turned to ice and the hilly town became treacherous. The cold seemed to seep into the bones and the school’s central heating hardly took the chill off the air. One afternoon just a few days later, Col decided not to go back after lunch at the chippie. He wanted to breathe in the ice-cold air, and if he was going to be cold, he’d rather be cold outside than in. If anything, his face looked worse, the bruise turning blue then green, and the endless questions about it were beginning to annoy him. He wandered aimlessly up through the town, over the hills, past the local prison and the hospital. Someone waved from a prison window and Col waved back. He wondered what it would be like to be locked up, to have that door slam shut, and locked behind you – to know you weren’t free to leave whenever you wanted. He’d hate it. Mungo had been locked up. More than once, on remand. And he had hated it. He prided himself on the fact they had never been able to make any charge stick.