Decay Inevitable

Once out of the kitchenette and into the dim warmth of their living room, he began to shake, or at least notice he was shaking. Catriona’s copy of TV Quick lay open on the couch where she’d been sitting not ten minutes ago. They’d decided to watch a Daniel Craig film that evening; it would be starting soon.

He squinted into the street, astonished by the lack of warning. Was it always this way? Oughtn’t there be signs – contractions and the like? Those of his friends and family who had children had never described an incident resembling this. So did that mean something was wrong? Pincers tightened inside him. Mrs Garraway didn’t give the impression that anything was amiss but maybe she was hiding her concern so as not to panic him. He willed the sirens to sound and searched the sky for flashes of blue, trying to ignore the hollowing of his guts. Another scream drew blood from his tongue as he bit it; it should be him with her, not Mrs Garraway, yet he held back, afraid he wouldn’t hear the ambulance above his wife’s pain or the clamour of his heart should he return to the kitchen. As if suspecting his dilemma, Mrs Garraway called for him to stay put; she was in control, though her voice suggested otherwise.

He forced himself to resist anxiety and opened the door to the cool air. As much as he strained, he couldn’t hear a siren. Why tonight? he thought, cursing the thrum of traffic. Another cry pierced him. He must have been ready to faint for it appeared that great streamers of the night were sailing past him, destined for Catriona’s lungs as she sucked in the fuel for a scream that he was dreading. It wouldn’t sound of anything, that scream. The dying never scream. He heard Mrs Garraway moan, “Jesus Christ!” He fell against the door and a sheet of pain wrapped around his ribs; it cleared his head. Mrs Garraway’s face floated in front of his, twisted with grief and revulsion.

“Catriona,” he mumbled, searching to give muscle to his voice.

“She’s all right, Will. She’s okay.”

His relief was momentary. A skin of panic stuck his tongue to his palate. “The baby–” But his voice was a whisper. He looked past her to the kitchen door, which was barely open, offering a sliver of a view. The floor was awash with red. “The baby,” he wailed at last. Was that a towel there, that red heap? But it was moving, it was moving very slightly.

Mrs Garraway was shaking her head and crying. “The baby–”

“The baby what? The baby fucking what?” But he was pushing her aside. If it was moving, it must mean the child was alive. She said something else but he thought he must have heard wrong; she couldn’t have said that. At the kitchen door though, he saw she was right. Catriona was unconscious but breathing regularly, a peaceful look on her face. For him to scream now might wake her and he didn’t want to do that, not when it would mean she’d see that the baby had been born inside out.

KERWICK SAID, “I love this job.”

“What’s to love, for Christ’s sake?” Trantam leaned into the bend as he steered the Merc left. “And where, for the love of minge, are we?”

A voice from the back seat said: “Saddle up those sirens, children.” Out of the shadow, a head emerged, along with two huge, gloved hands that grasped the front seats. Black collars jutted into the grooves of a face so thin it seemed it must collapse in on itself.

“And can we have flashing lights too, Gleave?” sang Kerwick, clapping his hands. “Can we? Can we?”

“Nipple,” spat Trantam, but he was smiling. He turned to Gleave. “What’s happened?”

Traffic fell away from them as the Merc wailed and strobed through the north London streets. Gleave said, “We have to make a special pick-up. Same kind of shit we usually do, but we’re using a different hand to wipe the mess up with.” Gleave flexed his fingers; his directions were accompanied by the squeal of leather. “We’re on Pandora now. Hang a left into Narcissus. Top of the road, right into Mill Lane. West End Lane is straight ahead.”

Trantam braked hard outside Cumberland Mansions. The three men got out of the car. Gleave rang the bell. A few seconds later, a frantic voice yammered down at them about ambulances and police.

“That’s right, sir,” said Gleave firmly. “We’re from the hospital. Could you let us in, please?”

As the buzzer released the door, Gleave leaned against Trantam as Kerwick disappeared up the stairwell. “There are five flats in this block. Shoot anything that breathes. Shoot anything that doesn’t.”

WILL GOT SO far as to ask where the stretcher was before a great bright flare went off in his head. It took a while to blink it free and when he could see again, he was sitting in a puddle of his own piss on the floor, looking into the silenced muzzle of a gun.