snow angels: the Fab Four stretching out their capes and toppling over into the whiteness. . no, not just any-body . . To Claude, she’s drunkenly earnest: You couldn’t ’elp it, you wasn’t to know — you said that man, Parkinson —. Parsons, he corrects her. Yeah, him, Parsons — you said Parsons only told you what bomb it was that night — you didn’t know what it was gonna do, how it was gonna kill all those Japs. We knew, he says leadenly. It was in the comics ferchrissakes — the movies too. Everyone knew what kryptonite did. . But it weren’t you, she insists, you didn’t drop it — you were in the spotter plane, you said that! He shakes his head vigorously and spikes of his Brylcreemed hair stand up. . Statue of Liberty. He says: When we weren’t takin’ a dump on Hiroshima, it was other cities — we were all that bastard LeMay’s faithful worker bees, packin’ bombs into our bellies, then shitting down fire on the Japs. They pinned a medal on us, Jeanie, when we were through making skin angels — but there wasn’t any bravery in what we done, bravery’s takin’ on a fuckin’ Marine when he’s gonna stick his Ka-Bar in you! Awww! Claude suddenly sings, I wanna go down to Tom Anderson’s ca-fé, I wanna hear that Creole jazz band play! The Cadillac, the Red Onion too, the Boogie-Woogie an’ the Parc Sans Sou’, You can enjoy your-seelf down on Rampart Streeeet! He goes on like this for a while, strumming his banjo belly, his cold sore growing bigger and hotter and angrier in the smelly Zephyr — and Jeanie doesn’t know what she should feel. — Later still, Claude’s fallen asleep, his head stuck down between the seat and the misted window, his legs spread. His socks have clocks, and there’s no hair on his ankles. She leaves the car door ajar, taking care not to wake Claude, because she both fears and pities him. Jeanie’s legs run away with her down the steep hill to Aldbury: a few staggery steps. . a hiccupping halt, a few staggery steps. . a hiccupping halt. She’s proud of herself. . I ain’t puked. A crow spies on her as she limps out on to the lane that runs away from her to jump over the railway line to the canal. As she stumps along the overgrown tow path, one of his crazy songs rises up Jeanie’s throat — this she does spew: Oi, blackies, ’ave you seen your master, wiv a moustache on ’is lip! Oi, blackies, frow ’im inna coal ’ole, wiv de moustache on ’is face. . When she reaches the cottage Mumsie’s sitting in the armchair — Jeanie sees her hangover, a fireball round her head, tongues flaming out from it to lick Jeanie’s own burning brow. Faithful Hughie is lying at Mumsie’s feet, watching the telly smoulder in the Inglenook fireplace, slowly roasting Fanny and Johnnie. Mumsie doesn’t ask where Jeanie’s been — so Jeanie doesn’t tell her about the whoring — she should tell ’em about the whoring ’cause thass what’s done it: one of the babies is a whoring baby, and thass why it’s eaten the other one right up! In the darkness there’s a lit-up lime-green stick man who’s escaping . . and Genie feels the gentle burring of. . sick breff on her face and her arms, which lie on top of the tight covers. If she wasn’t paralysed she’d reach for the buzzer and p’raps one of the nurses would come, her torch beam poking into the weedy crack the shark baby. . chewed froo me. But Genie’s tied down by tubes and crucified by the spike they’ve hammered through the back of her hand. . always take a claw one if you’re gonna open a squat . . Cutty’s not coming. . no one’s coming, except for Genie’s own cold white conscience, which has already arrived — and at first circles her, keeping its distance, held in check by curiosity and fear, before moving in closer. . and closer, until its slickly rough skin rasps her face, and its cherrywhisky breath fills her nostrils. . It veers away and swims out through the fifth-floor windows. — As Genie floats in the cold remote middle of the Paddington night, a doctor comes to plummily abuse her: Dipper-dipper-dation, your op-er-ation, how many junkies at Padding-ton Sta-tion . . His eyes are clock-radio digits, he whispers: It’s a nice irony, young lady, that you’re a heroin addict — since this hospital is the very place where diamorphine was first synthesised. What goes around. . he sniggers. . comes around. — They do come around, the punters: the blunt snouts of their Vauxhall Cavaliers and Ford Sierras push into the mouth of Queen’s Drive, and their headlights cut holes in the drizzly netting draped over the slick rooftops. Down the punters come, licking spittle on to their flaking lips, their fingers fidgeting with the flip-tops of their fag packets, their feet faffing with brake and accelerator so they keep the slow speed they need to scan the meat rack: kebabbed womanflesh rotating in the streetlamps’ sodium light and the washed-out neon signs for the COUNTY HOTEL and the BELLAVISTA GUESTHOUSE. Genie’s never been inside these particular. . knocking shops, but she remembers what they’re like from more affluent times: full-flounced and thickly carpeted interiors, the small rooms bursting with H&C, TV and other stuffed mod cons these sad mingers . . in their torn fishnets and red plastic miniskirts. . can only fucking dream of. — The punters go round annaround . . but that’s shopping for you: from Queen’s Drive they turn right into Somerfield Road, and from Somerfield Road they take another right into Wilberforce, a tomcat’s yowl. . screwin’ froo their engines’ receding drone. At the junction with the Seven Sisters they wait, sweaty, suckered to their steering wheels, before leaping into the traffic stream and for a few seconds going with the flow of lorries heading for Green Lanes and. . all points north. Then they take the first right back into Queen’s Drive. . and down they come again. Sometimes, angered by their protracted browsing, one of the girls advances out between the parked cars into the road and, lifting up her skirt, bumps and grinds in the punters’ headlights: You wannit? she’ll screech above the long, drawn-out moan of the city. Then fer fuck’s sake pull over and geddit! — The punters the girls all long for are the frummers from Stokie and Clapton — always driving Volvos, always polite. The Yids don’t go round. . annaround. Whatever people say, they. . ain’t nosing for a discount or extras such as up-the-gary wiv no rubber. They come straight down the Drive and stop at the first brass to tickle their fancy — usually the plumpest, mumsiest-looking one, so if you want to catch yourself a frummer, it’s best not to bother with heels, a push-up or. . any of that malarkey. So they’re a little fishy-smelling, what of it? Spunk’s fishy-smelling anyway. . so it’s only double-fish. The important thing is: all they want is a little TLC . . to have their beards stroked, bury their heads in a pair of titties, and be told they’re Mumsie’s dearest, sweetest, cleverest, icklest boy. . after that it’s a couple of pulls on their plonkers. . anna happy ending inna Andrex. But if they do want sucking, there’s plenty of room in the front of a Volvo — no need for the back. . which is where the trouble usually starts. They call you Miss. . wouldya b’lieve it! Miss, would you mind? Miss, if it isn’t too much bother? Cough up on the nail an’ ask after your health. . way their Mumsies taught ’em to. — Business, Genie says, sticking a hip out and staggering on her broken heel. From inside a Merc’ a Yank ’s voice says, Sure, hop in. But as soon as Genie does she knows she’s made. .