Hello, hello. Michael David Wilson here.
My brand new dark comedy novel, Daddy’s Boy, is available to buy right now. You can buy it on Amazon US, Amazon UK, every other Amazon store, and of course, the This Is Horror website. It’s also available as an audiobook on various platforms (Audible coming soon), including my favourite here.
To celebrate the occasion, you can read Chapter One of Daddy’s Boy for free below.
And when you’re done, if you’re still on the edge, you can read Chapter Two of Daddy’s Boy over on Patreon, also for free.
I hope you love Daddy’s Boy and if you read it, please leave a review on Goodreads with your thoughts (love it, hate it, or fall somewhere in between—I’m appreciative of all your reviews).
Have a great, great day.
Now, on with the story.
MDW
Chapter 1
So, there I was, queueing up outside NatWest bank, in the red figuratively and now literally, thanks to the botched suicide attempt. The red rope burns around my neck concealed by a loose linen summer scarf. My cat kidnapped, my money non-existent, and my landlord so on my back I was practically a camel. To the left of me stood a Subway sandwich shop, outside two young lasses were physically fighting over a footlong meatball marinara. And to the right, in front of Pandora jewellery, a tracksuited twenty-something voiced aloud the pros and cons of robbing the place to his teenaged protégé.
Kidderminster is one hell of a drug.
It’s moments like these, you wonder if you’ve reached the bottom, but something always comes along to humble you. On this occasion, it was a one-legged pigeon. Now, why it hobbled towards me and not the girls spilling crumbs and marinara sauce all over the concrete, I couldn’t tell you, but so it goes. At first, I felt sorry for the little guy. One leg, all out of food, and living in Kiddy. We had a kind of pitiful kinship.
“How you doing, little fella?” I said.
The pigeon didn’t say anything to that, obviously, on account of it being a pigeon. But there was something in its big, dumb reddish eyes that said it understood. Then, as if in answer, it flew up into the air—which, by the way, I didn’t know one-legged pigeons could do with such ease—and flew off in the direction of the British Heart Foundation charity shop. Fair enough, perhaps it was looking for a ratty cardigan or a yellowed Enid Blyton book. Who was I to judge? One minute later, when it came limply flying back, I thought one of the Subway sandwich fighters had flicked mayonnaise at me, but nope—you guessed it—it was pigeon shit.
You see? You can always fall a little bit further.
Thanks, pigeon, you ugly little flying shithouse.
But sometimes you’re offered a lifeline. These gifts come in the strangest of forms. And on that day, about half an hour before lunch, it traipsed towards me in the shape of a man with grey shoulder length hair, wearing an ‘I was on Naked Attraction’ t-shirt, a denim jacket, blue-rinse jeans, a tattered rucksack, and scuffed Reeboks.
At first, he just stood at my side, less than a metre away. Snatching glances at me and trying his best not to make it obvious. Though, given his proximity and the exaggerated nature of his jumpy movements, how could it not be obvious? He scratched the back of his wrist vigorously, flaking skin to the floor. He mumbled something to himself, took a hipflask from his inner jacket pocket, and enjoyed a cheeky swig which apparently gave him some confidence because the next thing I knew he was patting me on the shoulder, smelling of hard liquor and old tobacco.
“What you in for then?” It sounded more like we were serving prison time than standing outside a bank, though in Kiddy the likening fit.
“A loan,” I told him.
“Loans are bollocks.” He was skittish, swaying back and forth, and playing with his hands. “What you want is honest money for an honest job.”
“I already have two jobs, but they aren’t enough to pay my lawyer or the rent.”
“Solicitors and landlords,” he said. “Thieving bastards, the lot of them.”
A woman with blue rinse hair and a patterned cardigan, further ahead in the queue, tutted, though whether it was because of the profanity or the man’s assessment of solicitors and landlords, I couldn’t tell.
“Word to the wise,” the man said. “Don’t bother with solicitors. Get a public defender instead. Much cheaper. That’s what I got. Didn’t end up doing any time either. Though if you’d seen the state of the other guy, I probably should have, know what I mean?”
I looked forward, careful not to give the man much eye contact.
“Public defenders,” he said again. “They’re well good. Little bit of legal aid. That’s what you need, boy.”
“Not for this,” I said. “A different type of business.”
“Ah, Jesus, you’re not seeing a solicitor about a will, are you? Don’t bother with any of that. You can get a template off Google for that kind of shit.”
“That’s what you did? You made a will based on a template from Google?”
He scratched the back of his neck. “That’s what I would do.”
“And it’s legally binding?”
“It’s good enough. End of.”
“Well, thanks for the advice.” I moved forward in the queue, hoping my newly acquired human shadow wouldn’t follow, but of course he did.
“You can have that one for free,” the man said. “But anymore and I’ll start charging, know what I mean?”
He grinned.
I didn’t.
“Anyway, that’s not why I’m seeing a lawyer,” I said. “Nothing to do with wills.”
“Oh. Then what?”
“The lawyer—”
“Solicitor,” he corrected. “You ain’t a bloody yank by the sounds of you, so I don’t know why you’re acting like it. Watched too many reruns of Friends, have you? Bit of a Frasier-holic?”
The queue shuffled further forward. We were almost in the bank. So close I could hear generic music on tinny speakers.
“Well, whatever’s going on with you, I guess you need a lot of money, huh?” the man said.
I didn’t respond.
The man continued to keep pace with me, moving forward as I did.
“How much you hoping to borrow then?”
“Seeing as we’ve only just met, I’d rather not discuss that.”
“Only just met …” The man sniggered as if it were funny. “Nah, that’s fair enough, that is.” He nervously patted the cigarette packet in his trouser pocket. “Anyway, what if I said I could give you an easy job for a million pounds?”
I turned to look at him head-on for the first time. I know it’s not right to judge people by appearances but this bloke looked like he’d be hard pressed to offer me a job for five pounds let alone a million. It was my turn to snigger.
“Well, boy,” he pressed, “a job for a million pounds, what would you say?”
I swallowed, unsure why I was about to indulge him, but it wasn’t as if I had anything better to do. “If you were serious, I’d consider it.”
“Consider it? You’d more than consider it. You’d bite my hand off like a wild crocodile—snappity snap snap.” He mimicked the actions of a crocodile with his teeth. “Consider an honest job for a million pounds? Come off it!”
“Honest?”
The man checked over his shoulder, lowered his voice to an almost whisper. “Sure. Why not?”
“Wait. Is this actually real?” I said. “Is that what’s happening here? Are you offering me a job?”
“Yeah,” he said, but he didn’t sound so sure.
I scratched underneath my scarf. Pain burned from where the rope had pinched before breaking. I’d told Amanda it had been an autoerotic asphyxiation wank gone wrong, but the sadness in her eyes told me she hadn’t bought it. Christ, I needed to sort myself out.
“If only it were real,” I whispered, more to myself than the geezer.
He must have heard, cos the next thing I know he went, “Oh, but it is.”
It wasn’t. It couldn’t be. People like me didn’t win a tenner on The National Lottery, let alone get handed a fortune. But, on the other hand, what was there to lose, I hadn’t already lost?
“It really is,” the bloke said again.
“If you’re serious, then I guess I’m interested.”
“That’s the spirit! Well, heck, what are we still doing in line at this wreck of a bank? Come with me, boy.”
“I need to get this loan now. I can’t just follow you based on a hypothetical.”
“Haven’t you been paying attention? Nothing hypothetical about it. In three seconds, I’m leaving. You follow me and your life will change forever, or you stay here and ask yourself, what if?”
I appraised the guy. Everything about him and the situation screamed ‘bullshit’. But he was right about one thing, if I didn’t follow this probable waster, there would always be a part of me that asked what if? And if—no, when—it inevitably turned out to be bullshit, I could simply return to NatWest and apply for the loan or alternatively jump off the Galton Bridge depending on my mood.
The man headed away and up the high street. I took a deep breath, counted to five, then jogged after him.
He turned his head slightly, grinning cigarette-yellowed teeth at me. We passed the two Subway sandwich fighters, now sidled up closely next to each other on a graffiti-kissed bench, chatting as if nothing had happened, covered in the saucy aftermath of their battle.
“A million pounds,” I said. “How do I know you’re not full of shit?”
“For starters, I’ll give you a grand right now. There’s an ATM up ahead.”
“You could have just used the one outside NatWest.”
“Ha! After what we’d been talking about? I’m no idiot, boy. You want me to get jumped? All those fuckers know I’m loaded. I’m surprised no one pulled a gun on us.” He glanced around, checking the coast was clear. “Bloody parasites, they’ll do anything for a few extra quid in this town.”
“It’s mostly just OAPs and mothers.”
“Them’s the worst. They look innocent enough, which is how they get you.” He scraped his hair back, parted it in such a way to reveal a scar on the left side of his head. “You see that, boy? Tyre iron. And who’d you think was responsible? A pregnant cherry up at the Horse Fair.”
“Isn’t a cherry a virgin?”
“Well, this one obviously weren’t, given she was up the duff something proper. Come on, boy, use your smarts.” The man inserted his debit card into the ATM, got his pin wrong, then slammed his fist into the front of the thing. “Bollocks! You have to put your PIN in quickly, you know. They might have a camera, so you don’t want them to catch your deets.”
“Why not shield your pin with your other hand or wallet? That’s what I do.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Not a bad idea, but if you do it quickly, it’s just as good. They call me Ninja Fingers. And not just cos of this, if you know what I mean.” He winked. “Also cos—”
“Nah, think about it. If someone’s installed a camera, they could just slow the video down when they play it back, then they’ll catch everything. So you really should use your other hand as a shield.”
He shrugged. “Whatever. I have my method. You have yours. If one of us gets caught out, we’ll know who’s smarter, but until then …” He tapped his pin in with speed, as if touch typing. It was accepted. “You see? Ninja Fingers. Now, let’s get you your thousand quid, yeah?”
He went to withdraw a grand, but the machine soon informed him his daily limit was £300.
“Ah, crap,” he said. “Listen, I’m really sorry about this, boy, but I tell you what, I’ll give you three hundred from this card and another three hundred from the Nationwide account. How’s that sound?”
“It sounds as if I’ll be four hundred pounds poorer than I thought I was gonna be five seconds ago.”
He shook his head. “Bloody hell, you really are one of those glass half empty types, ain’t ya? Four hundred pounds poorer than five seconds ago? More like six hundred quid richer than two minutes ago.”
He shoved the first £300 into my hand, which I swiftly deposited into my own wallet, then he inserted the second debit card into the ATM.
“No need to mope, boy. By the end of the day, you’ll have a million pounds, so who cares if we run into a few obstacles along the way.”
“You’ll pay me that soon?”
He shrugged. “I mean, not literally. It’s just a phrase, innit?”
“I’m fairly sure it’s not just a phrase. If you say you’ll—”
He stamped a Reebok into the ground. “Give over, would you? You’re getting paid. You need to relax more and worry less. Here.” He handed me another wad of cash. “Now let’s get out of here and to the task at hand.”
The town was a gaping wound with the plaster half-off. We passed charity shops, bookies, and discount outlets with names like MegaValue.com. Soon, we were walking amongst the ghosts of yesteryear. A retail paradise in the nineties, buildings that had once housed shops such as Woolworths, Index, and Tandy were all boarded up and covered in ‘For Sale’ signs. But let’s face it, nobody was buying a place like that in a town like this. Broken Britain was fast becoming comatose Britain, do not resuscitate Britain, off to the morgue in five Britain.
“The high street of broken dreams,” the man said. “Not like me, boy. I’ve got dreams. Wild dreams. Dreams that stretch from here to … Well, a darn sight further than here. Somewhere a long way away … Like Bromsgrove.”
“Bromsgrove? It’s only twenty minutes away, tops.”
“Not if you walk it. Suddenly it’s a long way away. Another land …”
“It’s about nine miles, give or take. So you could do it in what? Three hours.”
“I don’t have three hours to walk to Bromsgrove!”
We headed up a set of concrete stairs to a more secluded area, out of the town. Brick walls were punctuated with graffiti declaring things like ‘Gazza woz ere’ and ‘Eddie got fingered’. The latter sounded like a rip-off of a Tom Green movie.
“What’s the job?” I said.
“I need you to drive me somewhere.”
My cheeks warmed—this was gonna be awkward. “So, the thing is … I don’t have my car here.”
“Hmm … But you can drive, right?”
“Had my license for over ten years.”
“Then there isn’t a problem.”
The man scanned the vicinity. The backstreets were secluded. Filled with soiled carrier bags, empty crisp packets, and crumpled beer cans. Cars that had seen better days were parked along the kerb. He approached a half-rusted orange shit-heap of a car, fresh out of the eighties, then looked around before smashing the driver’s side window with his elbow.
“What the fuck are you—”
“Shh, boy. Shh. I’m solving a problem.” He reached his hand through the broken glass, unlocked, then opened the door. “Give me a moment and we’ll have her up and running in a jiffy.” He brushed glass fragments from the front seat onto the pavement, shards sticking to and sparkling on his skin, then took a screwdriver from his rucksack and started unscrewing the steering column. His hand began to bleed, but he continued, unperturbed. He looked up. “Don’t just gawk at me, boy. Keep a lookout. If you see anyone angry-looking coming towards the car, I might have to use my judo.”
I gazed up and down the street. It was empty. As grey and lifeless as the town itself. My heart thumped in my chest.
What the hell was I now part of? Could I leg it before I became an accessory to a crime or was I already in too deep? Knowing my luck, he’d use his judo on me if I backed out. Assuming he even knew judo. Plus, I’d have to give him the six hundred quid back and wouldn’t see a penny more.
The radio began to play, interrupting my internal panic—some pop tune as old as the car itself.
The man got out of the car and beamed at me proudly. “All right, get in the driver’s seat.”
He hastily made his way to the passenger side. I was still stood there contemplating my options by the time he got in the car, which apparently wasn’t a good look because the man soon screamed, “Come on, come on. We haven’t got all day, boy. Get your arse in the bloody car already.”
I felt and heard the crunch of old glass underneath my rear as I plonked myself down in the driver’s seat. The man switched the radio off and sparked the starter wire against the battery wire and the car started.
“Go on, boy. Rev the engine something proper.”
I did as instructed and the old shit-heap roared to life.
“You sure we should be doing this?”
“Doing this?” he said. “We’ve bloody done it, boy. We’re off to the races. Or at least we will be, once you put your foot down.”
“I mean, if it isn’t too late, perhaps we could just get a taxi and—”
“This is time sensitive. ‘Isn’t too late’.” He scoffed. “We’ve done the window in for god’s sake. And look at your arse! Covered in more glass than the Crystal Palace. If the glass was a prostitute and you bailed after that much contact, you’d still have to pay a pretty penny.”
A scream echoed from behind us.
I looked in the rear-view and saw a couple of men in Wolverhampton Wanderers football shirts dashing towards us.
And from the looks on their out-of-breath, raging-red, too many Carlings before eleven a.m. puffy faces, the lads weren’t happy.
“Oi, wanker!” one of them yelled.
That settled things. No time to worry about the repercussions of stealing a car—we were well and truly in it.
I stepped on the accelerator and got us the hell out of there. One of the football lads picked up a rock, which he threw towards the car. It conked the bumper and rolled away. Dribbles of sweat trickled down my forehead.
“We showed them. Bunch of pussies!” the man said.
“It’s no laughing matter. What if they call the police?”
“I’d imagine they will, given we nabbed their motor. So no pissing around. Treat the accelerator like a StairMaster and step on it.”
“Oh god! Oh god!” I was close to hyperventilating.
I’d done some questionable things before but not like this and not so spontaneously. Then again, after so many dalliances with death and suicidal ideation playing more frequently than ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham in December, the rules had changed.
I should have texted Amanda. Let her know what was going on, just in case. But my phone was wedged deep in my pocket, and I didn’t want to lose control of the vehicle and add further charges to my future rap sheet.
The man scratched his blackhead dotted nose. “Ah relax,” he said, picking up on my panic. “They might not even call the pigs. Round here, a couple of cunts like that could be just as likely to take things into their own hands. Especially if they’ve had a few tinnies. Police don’t exactly do much in these parts and it’s more fun to give someone a good kicking, know what I mean?”
I knew precisely what he meant, and it didn’t make me feel easier about anything I’d done since meeting this oddball. My life consisted of drawing as little attention to myself as possible post-breakup with Amy. What most certainly was not part of the plan was starting beef with any of the local football hooligans.
We neared the ring road up by the train station. The Wolves lads long out of sight. My heart rate slowly returning to normal.
“So, where exactly do you want me to drive us?” I asked.
“New Wood Lane, Blakedown.”
“That’s the posh part of town, right?”
“Course it’s the posh part of town. I’m giving you a million, aren’t I?” He cleared his throat. “I’m bloody loaded, boy. They call me Big Load Brian.”
“Your name’s Brian?”
“Nope. It’s Norman, but Big Load Norm don’t sound as good.”
“I thought you said people called you Ninja Fingers.”
He grinned. “Yeah. That, too. You’ve got a nice memory, boy.”
“Big Load Brian doesn’t sound like it’s about money. Sounds like it’s—”
“About how much jizz I can shoot out the end of my lunch box?” he said, smirking. “Popular misconception. Anyway, make no mistake about it, I’m more minted than a bottle of Listerine.”
I noted the ketchup stain on Norman’s Naked Attraction t-shirt, the weathered fade and tears up his jeans—stringy sections of loose fabric no clothes designer would ever have sanctioned—and scuffed Reeboks so worn, I could practically smell the sweat-seasoned mildew with my eyes. Those trainers had been abused so badly they could have taken Norman to court. If he’d told me the soles had gangrene, I’d have believed him. Now, granted, I supposed the richest in society didn’t have to dress up or prove anything. Look at how Steve Jobs dressed or Mark Zuckerberg. But something told me Norman wasn’t amongst the elite. Less Steve Jobs, more Steve outside the Jobcentre in Stourport.
I checked the rear-view extra hard. Still no sign of the footie lads whose car we’d nicked, and no sign of the police either. But how long would it last? As soon as it was called in, the Old Bill would be onto us faster than a mould problem in a tower block apartment at the height of winter. And stealing an orange car from the eighties? As subtle as a brick in the dick.
We eventually pulled up outside a pair of tall open gates to a large Tudor house with a luxurious garden so well maintained it could have passed for an English Heritage site.
“Ha! Gate’s already open,” Norman said. “Your million is so close I can smell it.”
Norman sniffed the air, but I reckoned the only thing he could smell were the acrid fumes wafting off his Stilton shoes.
He slapped me on the back. “You look nervous, boy.”
Of course I looked nervous. I was nervous. Why wouldn’t I be nervous after all he’d put me through?
It was supposed to be a quiet morning. An easy day off. Apply for and receive a loan from NatWest. A jacket potato with cheese and beans for lunch. A cheeky wank in the afternoon. Tarantino movie on the box—after not during the wank. Homemade curry for dinner with keema naan, followed by a game of FIFA on the PlayStation. The most taxing decision I was supposed to make all day was the starting line-up for the said game of FIFA. Next game was against an in-form Liverpool who’d just won five games on the trot. Hell, the planned day off would only have been topped if Amanda had popped round in the evening, but she was working a late which meant no Amanda and probably another more indulgent wank before bed. Might even use the Nivea intensive moisture hand cream if I was feeling particularly extravagant and could keep the suicidal ideation at bay long enough to get it up.
“It’s still not too late to back out of this,” Norman said, snapping me out of my imaginings.
And frankly, that was incredible because he hadn’t given me a chance to back out when he’d smashed in the car window or demanded I get my arse in the car and hightail it out of there. Still, a lifeline was a lifeline. Better late than never.
“Get out of what, exactly?” I said, making sure I understood him.
“This.” He pointed to the Tudor House as if it explained everything. It did not. “Then again, if you want your million, you drive through them gates. But once you do, there’s no going back. Ever.”
His vagueness, aura of stupidity, and track record thus far should have been enough for me to get out of the car and say: “You’re on your own, pal. I’m done.”
But I guess Norman’s stupidity was contagious because instead I eased off the brake and drove towards the house.
No going back.
