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in.”
    â€œI’m reading.”
    â€œRead to me, Billy.”
    â€œYou wouldn’t understand it.”
    She runs to the table and cuddles close to me.
    â€œGo on, Billy, read me a story.”
    Mam comes into the room to get her cigarettes.
    â€œGo on, Billy, read to your sister.”
    I push Linda away.
    â€œGo on, get out of it,” I tell her. Then to Mam: “Dad can read to her when he comes up.”
    â€œYour father’ll be too tired. He has a long day.”
    Yes, a long day, I think. Half past six in the morning when he opens the shop till nine o’clock at night. Then away to the pub. He doesn’t even come up for his dinner any more.
    â€œIs Dad coming up today, Ma?” Linda says. “Is he coming up?”
    â€œHe’s a very busy man, your father,” she says as she goes back into the kitchen.
    I recognise the tone of voice and I recognise her expression. She’s going to defend him, to tell us how hard he works, that if it wasn’t for Dad we’d be across the road in the Buildings with the rest of them, that he only thinks of us, that she, Mam, has a lot to be thankful for, but although she says the words in the right tone of voice the final effect is different, as though she has been referring to herself, not Dad, and by referring to herself she’s having a go at Dad, by letting us know that she’s only defending him for our sakes, because that’s her duty, as Mum, even though she has a lot to put up with, she puts us first, even though he won’t. And yet she’s said none of this, but it’s all there.
    Of course, the final underlining will be the mentioning of the drink. I wonder how she’ll work it in today? Yesterday it was easy for her. Dad had asked for some to be brought so she’d asked me to go, given me the jug, trying to hide her distaste but not trying hard enough, so that I’d see in her face what she wanted me to see, how noble she was trying to be secret, how noble in comparison to the man downstairs behind the counter, rocking quietly on his feet staring back in time to the years of his childhood in the heather, becoming more silent as each drink burns down into his stomach.
    I wait, staring at the page, while Linda slides her hot arms round my shoulders, pressing close to me and gently rocking, as if she is trying to sway me off my seat without my realising.
    â€œBilly,” she says, “read to me from the book; tell me the story.”
    In the kitchen the kettle boils and hot water gurgles into the tea pot. A pause for brewing then two cups are filled and the tea is stirred and Mam says: “Billy, will you take this down to your Dad? He’ll be ready for a cup by now.”
    So that’s what it is today. An unwanted cup of tea, to demonstrate to me again what is happening downstairs behind the counter.
    I loosen Linda’s arm and cross the room and take the cup from Mum and open the door to the stairs and edge my way down past the cardboard boxes and the Vimto crates and the Craven “A” cartons and at the bottom I open the door that leads into the shop.
    Dad is standing in the dusty sunlight, his head bowed, his arms rigid, his knuckles quietly grinding into the counter top. The shop is as hushed as a church.
    I walk over to the counter.
    â€œDad,” I say. “Mam’s sent your tea.”
    Only the head moves, slightly, in my direction.
    I put the cup and saucer down on the counter. I look into Dad’s face. His eyes are on the tea and his head begins to shake slowly from side to side.
    I walk back to the stair’s door and close it behind me and as I go back up the stairs I hear the sound of the cup and saucer as they are swept from the counter down on to the floor.
    In prison, you never get tired. You can always sleep; but that’s because you use sleep as an ally, to shorten consciousness, to defer thought. Lots of cons make a career of sleeping.