A pub.
Splott, Cardiff. Smoke. Men. Stonewash jeans. It’s 1997 and looks like it, smells like it. It’s an L-shaped room, the wooden alley the long stretch, a hatch at the back the balance. Drinks and change swapped through the shutter doors, the barmaid 21 but looking 42, a tight perm keeping each strand of bottle blonde under orders.
The kid rifles balls back down a gulley to the next man, more than a few missing chunks, the cider to blame. The thud of wood hitting wood punctuating the pop music.
The man’s curtains are gelled down, his Umbro touchline coat still on indoors. He takes a ball, works it in the palm of his hand, seeing what’s what. Whispers in its ear like a missus with a mood on. Takes three paces back and, with a flourish, launches it down the wood to the pins. It lumbers down. The men shout.
***
The kid walks down the street, a hint of a strut. Brown cords, three white stripes down dark blue arms. Past pebbledash houses. Satellite dishes. Peter’s, Gent’s Hairdressers. A group of kids hang around outside, all Kappa bottoms and Benson & Hedges.
The kid swallows.
Fuck’s sake.
He raises an eyebrow: a hello, a what’s happening, and tries to tiptoe through them.
His legs are swept.
Smack.
Mister Head meet Mister Pavement.
***
Gelled curtains knocks another pin down. The men shout.
The kid’s poised behind a gate, slammed shut to stop the pins flying in his face. His chin’s sat on top of it anyway, supreme confidence in his reading of the game. Nothing can hurt him here.
The next ball makes it halfway down the alley and slides off the side. The men sneer.
***
The kid’s dazed on the pavement. Chewing gum and white dog shit traced around his sore head. He pulls himself up. The other boys are cackling, hyenas on helium. A Boxer strains on the lead looking to make a scene.
He gets up while they’re cracking up, lost in spoils rather than beady eye on the butt of the joke. He’s on his toes, stretching out a head start, an elastic band sure to snap. Not this shit again written all over his face. Now they move. Sick notes in cross-country at first, all sorry sir, what’s the point. But they grow into it. Winner takes all. The Boxer’s loving it most, proper sherbet mouth and Hallowe’en fangs.
***
The smoke moves down the slim room by stealth, edging closer to the kid from the men 20 feet down the alley. His mam used to hate the smell of him when he came home.
You’re not getting in that clean bed reeking like that. The shower, now, and yes the immersion’s off and yes I don’t care.
***
There’s a corner shop ahead. Shah’s of Splott. The kid’s still running. They’re still chasing. He pushes through the door. A bell chimes. You can hear it over Candle in the Wind. The shopkeeper stands behind the counter. Brown face, big moustache, dad age. The kid runs past him. Makes eyes at him. The door slams open.
***
The ball smacks the front pin.
This fella’s a professional. An amateur, but a professional. Maths and physics in the real world, Pythagoras applied in the everyday, the ball hitting the pin just there, into the next pin just there, into the next pin just there, and –
***
They’re in. Three of them. And the Boxer. Eyes at the shopkeeper. He looks back. Gives nothing away. A proprietor of a convenience shop ready to serve his public.
The kid’s nowhere to be seen. They pace through the aisles, the one in the baseball cap knocking tins off the shelves. The others follow. The Boxer all gums, clocking the cans and thinking it’s treat time. The tins hit the floor. Bang. Bang. Bang.
***
The skittles don’t stand a chance now. It’s predetermined. The white curves fall against the alley, steelworkers in the divan after a double shift, glad of the rest. Eight. Nine. Strike. Shouts from the men over the music.
We’ve fucking won it.
***
The shopkeeper picks up a baseball bat from the little shelf he’d built special behind the counter. No need for a swing. They get it, a fuck off and out the door. The Boxer follows. One, two, three and the kid emerges from behind an aisle of Pedigree Chum.
***
The kid vaults the gate, a feline landing among the scattered skittles. He’s a contortionist, balletic. Fluid in form. Collecting, creating order. The black tape around the necks of the front three an arrow to the future.
***
I’m not saying I was born to do it. It don’t work like that. Nothing’s just yours all because you woke up one day. If you don’t like it, do something about it, and if you don’t do something about it, don’t say you don’t like it. I’m not sure it’s as tidy as that, but that's what she taught me and she’s dead now so best not to argue, really.
The doctor reckons it’s all about making things right, restoring equilibrium, gaining some semblance of control over the chaos. Her words, not mine. Alright mate. Whatever you say.
Because it’s not like that, right. No way, José. I’m just the sticker upper.
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