He opened the carton and offered it to Sharon. She took a cigarette and allowed Milton to light it for her. He lit his and watched as she took a deep lungful of smoke, letting it escape from between her lips in a long sigh.

“You’ve been so good to me,” she began after a quiet moment. “I don’t know why.”

Milton inhaled himself, the tobacco crackling as the flame burned higher. “You’ve had some bad luck,” he said. “Things aren’t always fair. You work hard with Elijah, you deserve some help. I’m just glad I can do that.”

“But why me?”

“Why not you?” he retorted. He let the peacefulness fall between them again, his thoughts gently turning on her question. Why her? Had it just been a case of his being there at just the right time, or was there something else, something about Sharon that drew him toward her? Her vulnerability? Her helplessness? Or had he recognised in her some way to make amends for the things that he had done?

The sons that he had orphaned.

The wives that he had widowed.

He didn’t know the answer to that, and he didn’t think it wouldn’t serve to dwell upon it.

He drew down on the cigarette again.

“Can I get you a drink? Don’t have any vodka but I think I have some gin, and some tonic, maybe.”

“I don’t drink any more,” he said. “A glass of water is fine.”

She went through into the kitchen. Milton stood alone in the sitting room and examined it more carefully than he had before. He noticed the small details that Sharon had included in an attempt to make the blandly square box more homely: the embroidered cushions on the sofa; the box of second-hand children’s toys pushed against the wall; the Ikea curtains that hid the bars on the windows outside. He went over to the sideboard. Sharon had arranged a collection of framed pictures of her children, the two boys at various stages of their lives. He picked one up and studied it; it was a professional shot, the sort that could be bought cheaply in malls, with Sharon pictured on a chair with the children arranged around her. Milton guessed it was taken four or five years ago. Sharon’s hair was cut in a different shape and her face was absent the perpetual frown of worry that must have sunk across it in the interim. Elijah was a sweet-looking ten year old, chubby, beaming a happy smile and without the wariness in his eyes. His older brother, Jules, looked very much like him. He had an open, honest face. He must have been the same age as Elijah was now. There was nothing to suggest a predisposition towards self-destruction but Milton guessed that he must already have started along the path that would eventually lead him to ruin.

Sharon emerged from the kitchen with two glasses in her hands. “My boys,” she said simply. “I failed with Jules. I’m not going to let the same thing happen to Elijah.”

“You won’t.”

She smiled sadly, resting both glasses on the table. Milton watched as a single tear rolled slowly down her cheek and he went to her, drawing her into his body and holding her there, his right hand reaching around to stroke her hair.

She gently pulled back and looked up into his face. Her eyes were wet and bright. Milton pushed her against the wall and kissed her, hard, on the mouth. She pulled away and Milton took a step back to give her room. “I’m sorry,” he said, but her hands came up, the fingers circling his wrists, and she drew him back towards her until their bodies touched. She moved his hands downwards until they were around her slender waist and angled her head to kiss him, her mouth open hungrily. Milton embraced her passionately, his tongue forcing her teeth apart, her own tongue working shyly at first and then more passionately. Milton pulled her even more tightly into his body, crushing her breasts against his chest. She gasped, disengaging her mouth and pressing her cheek against his, her mouth nuzzling his neck. They stayed like that for a moment, breathing hard, Milton feeling her hard breasts against his sternum, his hands sliding down into the small of her back.

She leant back a little so that she could look up into his face. She gently brushed aside the lock of black hair that had fallen across his damp forehead. Her hand slid into his, the fingers interlacing, and then she pulled him after her, leading the way across the sitting room to the door that led to her bedroom.

32

Elijah awoke at eight, just as usual, and got straight out of bed. His body felt sore from exercise but it was a good pain, a steady ache that told him he had worked hard. He thought of his muscles, the little tears and rips that would regenerate and thicken, making him stronger. He thought of Pinky, and the session in the ring. He had dreamt about that in the night, replaying the two rounds over and over again. It was one of those good dreams where it made him feel happy at the end, not the nightmares that he usually had. He thought of the boys who had been watching. “He banged Pinky out,” one of them called, and there had been something different in the way that he looked at him, the way that they all looked at him. He felt a warmth in his chest as he thought about it again.

He took off his shirt, opened his cupboard door and looked at his torso in the full-length mirror. He was lean and strong, the muscles in his stomach starting to develop, his arms thickening, his shoulders growing heavier. His puppy fat was disappearing. He knew from the few pictures he had found in his mother’s room that his father had been a big man, powerfully built, and he had always hoped that he might inherit that from him. He wanted to be like Rutherford. A man that size, who was going to mess around with him?

He found a clean t-shirt and pulled on his jeans. He threw his duvet back across his bed, straightened it out and went into the sitting room. It was empty. That was strange; his mother was normally up well before him, preparing his breakfast before she went off to work.

“Mums,” he called.

There was no reply.

He went into the kitchen and poured himself an orange juice. He went and stood before the door to her bedroom. It was closed.

“Mums,” he said again, “I can’t find my iPod. You awake?”

He heard the sound of hasty movement from inside and, without thinking, reached for the door handle and opened it. His mother was half out of bed, fastening the belt of her dressing gown around her waist. She was not alone. Milton was sitting in her bed, the covers pulled down to reveal his hard, muscular chest.

Elijah felt his stomach drop away. He felt sick.

“Oh no,” he said.

“Elijah,” his mother said helplessly.

“What? What’s going on?”

“Elijah.”

He backed out of the room.

His mother followed him, stammering something about him needing to be calm, about how he shouldn’t lose his temper, how he should listen, but he hardly heard her. She came into the sitting room as he scrabbled on the floor for the trainers he had left there after he came in last night. Milton came out of the bedroom, his trousers halfway undone and hastily doing up the buttons of his shirt.

“Come on, Elijah,” he said. “Let me talk to you.”

“You said you weren’t like the others.”

“I’m not.”

“I thought you wanted to help me?”

“I do.”

“No you don’t. You just want her to think you do so you can get with her. What’s wrong with me? You must think I’m an idiot. I can’t believe I fell for it.”

“You’re not an idiot, and that’s not how it is. I do want to help you. It’s very important to me. What happens between me and your mum doesn’t make any difference to that.”

“You can fool her if you want, but you ain’t fooling me, not any more.”

He stamped his feet into his trainers and laced them hurriedly.

“Elijah…” Sharon said.

“I’ll see you later, mum.”

She called after him as he slammed the door behind him. He stood on the balcony in the fresh morning air. The kids at the end of the balcony sniggered and, as he turned back, he saw why: someone had sprayed graffiti across the front door and the paint, still wet, said SLUT.