Read The Absent One for Free Online Page A

Kimmie on legs as thin as a crane fly’s. ‘I’ve been looking for you, sweetie,’ she said, waving her freshly lit fag. ‘Did you know that people are asking about you down at the central station?’
    She seized Kimmie by the arm and escorted her to the benches across the street at Café Yrsa.
    ‘Where have you been? I’ve missed you so fucking much,’ Tine said, fishing a couple of beers from her plastic bag.
    As Tine opened the bottles, Kimmie glanced towards the Fisketorv Shopping Centre.
    ‘Who asked about me?’ she said, pushing the bottle back to Tine. Beer was the drink of the proletariat. She’d learned that growing up.
    ‘Oh, just some blokes.’ Tine set the extra bottle under the bench. She was happy sitting there, Kimmie knew, in that spot where she felt most at home; beer in one hand, money in her pocket and yellowed fingers pinching a fresh cigarette.
    ‘Tell me everything, Tine.’
    ‘Oh, Kimmie, I don’t remember so well, you know. It’s the junk, innit? Then it doesn’t work so good in here.’ She patted her head. ‘But I didn’t say anything. Just told ’em I didn’t know a fucking thing about who you were.’ She smiled, shaking her head. ‘They showed me a picture of you, Kimmie. My God, but you were fine in those days, Kimmie, love.’ She took a long drag on her fag. ‘I was nice-looking, too, once, I was. Someone told me that once. His name was …’ She stared into space. That was also gone.
    Kimmie nodded. ‘Was there more than one who asked for me?’
    Tine nodded and took another gulp. ‘There were two, but not at the same time. One of them came at night, just before the station closed. So maybe it was around four in the morning. Could that be right, Kimmie?’
    Kimmie shrugged. Now that she knew there were two, it didn’t really matter.
    ‘How much?’ The question came from a man standing right in front of Kimmie, but she didn’t react. This was Tine’s business.
    ‘How much for a blow job?’ he repeated.
    She felt Tine’s elbow in her side. ‘He’s asking you, Kimmie,’ she said, gone from the world. She’d already earned all she needed for the day.
    Kimmie raised her head and saw an ordinary-looking man with his hands in his coat pocket, wearing a pathetic expression on his face.
    ‘Sod off,’ she said, giving him a murderous glare. ‘Sod off before I smack you.’
    He stepped back and straightened up, then smiled crookedly, as if the threat alone were satisfaction enough.
    ‘Five hundred. Five hundred if you wash your mouth first. I won’t have any of your slime on my cock, you hear?’
    He pulled money from his pocket and flashed the bills, and the voices in Kimmie’s head grew louder.
Come on
, whispered one.
He’s asking for it
, sounded the rest. She grabbed the bottle under the bench and put it to her mouth as the man tried to stare her down.
    When she threw her head back and spat in his eyes, he lurched backwards, shock etched into his face. He glanced down at his coat, furious, and levelled his gaze at her again. She knew he was dangerous now. There was no shortage of assaults on Skelbækgade. The Tamil handing out free newspapers up at the next corner was unlikely to intervene.
    So she got to her feet and smashed the bottle down on the man’s skull. Shards of glass slid across the street to a buckled post box. A delta of blood spread from his ear
and dripped down the collar of his coat. As the man stared at the jagged bottle aimed at him, his mind was no doubt racing. How would he explain this to his wife, his children, his colleagues? He began running towards the central station, presumably aware that he’d need a doctor’s attention and a new coat in order to return to normal.
    ‘I’ve seen that cocksucker before,’ Tine snuffled at Kimmie’s side, as she stared at the beer stain spreading on the pavement. ‘Bloody hell, Kimmie. Now I need to go to Aldi for another one, don’t I? Poor fucking beer. Why did that idiot have to come