Christmas at the hostel and the tree in the
lounge is lopsided but bright. Christopher is sitting on a sofa, holding a
bloody wad of tissues to his mouth, which he takes away only to smoke, and to
tell something else about the assault. The thrill of it has galvanised the
place. Various characters appear and disappear, scuttling back to the squat
round the corner where the whole thing blew up, either to report on who’s there
now, or to carry out the vengeance they’ve sworn on Christopher’s behalf, or
just hurrying to and fro in a pin-eyed, point-less kind of excitement.
Christopher is an impressive figure. I’ve
seen him around, his shaven head nicked and scarred from other fights, his tall
frame intensified by his years on the street. He carries himself with economy, a
Kwai Chang Caine of Skag, loping from place to place, with his bag of cans and wraps.
‘He hit me with a block of wood. Shoom! And
there must’ ve been a nail in it or summit ‘cos it ripped my face, man. Look at
me! I can poke my tongue through. D’you think I need stitches? It’ll never heal,
will it?’
Christopher’s friend Dave stands just
behind his right shoulder. He’s the complete opposite to him – short, hunched, a
sagged and pitted face. He fits his words into the spaces that Christopher
leaves, skipping in and out like a Court Jester around a King.
‘You should definitely get him for this,’
he says. ‘I tell you what. You get him, I’ll finish him off.’
Christopher takes the wad from his face and
looks at Dave.
‘Seriously, mate. Don’t. Look at me! He
could’ve blinded me with that nail. I’m not like him. I’m not stooping to his
level. I want the police here so I can point him out, then you can take me down
the hospital and get me stitched up.’
‘Yeah, mate. That’s the best thing to do,’
says Dave. ‘Then we’ll do him when he comes out.’
* *
*
We wait in the triage zone to handover.
Christopher holds some fresh gauze to his face, and leans forward in the
wheelchair. We’ve heard the whole fight scenario a few times now – how the
squat had been building up to this, that nasty geezer from Tottenham who’d taken
over; how there’d been trouble brewing with dogs there, a bite or two, a police
raid; how it’s a shame that particular party had changed the mood of the place;
how he’d tooled himself up for a confrontation with Christopher, who’d only
wanted to talk to him about stuff.
‘I don’t know,’ he says, shaking his head,
then displaying the gaping hole in his upper lip again. ‘If I hadn’t turned my
head when he did, he’d have taken my eye out.’
Dave moves forward and clears his throat.
‘Did I tell you about Father Christmas this
year?’ he says.
He has our attention.
‘It’s like – I told him in July all I wanted
for Christmas was my two front teeth. Yeah? He’s had six months to get them
made in his poxy little workshop in the North Pole. So what do I find in
my stocking? Two cans of Stella and a tangerine.’
He pauses, staring down at the floor as if
in his head he’s overwhelmed by a great volume of laughter. Then he snaps a
look up again and carries on.
‘And what about those elves, hey? Santa’s
Little Helpers? I hear they’re really into genetic engineering this year. Yeah.
They’ve crossed a mouse and a donkey, so now you can tie up your own shoelaces,
wear a moustache and still get home at night.’
Pause.
‘I’ve got a million of ‘em. Welcome to the Rainbow
World of Dave,’ he says. ‘So now you know what I think.’
He steps back again, bashfully toes the
floor, shakes his head, blushes with pleasure.
Christopher glances at him coolly, then lifts
off the gauze to show us his wound again.
‘Will it scar, d’you
think?’ he says.