Grimsby pt. 1 (Patreon)

Butcher Jones was pacing around in my apartment, poking, prodding and lifting every one of my possessions in the mess. I sat quiet on a chair and made every effort to look at Butcher Jones and not at the mountain of muscle standing at the door, preventing me from running out. Butcher Jones wasn’t that old, perhaps mid forties, and looked slim, almost frail. It was hard to know if his nick name butcher was a sarcasm that stuck, or if there was something more sinister behind it.

“I don’t see much of value around here. Do you?”, Butcher Jones asked, looking down in a kitchen drawer.

“The loan wasn’t for home improvements”, I replied, immediately regretting the slightly sarcastic retort. Why could I not keep my mouth shut? This was what got me in trouble to begin with.

“That’s a shame… Such a shame… Would be awfully convenient for both of us if there was something here I could bring with me, and we would be even. But there isn’t is there?”
“No, sir.”
“And there is no way you can scrape together that amount of money within the week.”
"I think I can work someth..”
“I wasn’t asking.”
“Yes, sir. No, sir.”

I glanced towards the door. The mountain of muscle was standing perfectly still just in front of the apartment door, without expression and just waiting to be told what to do. Lift something. Smash something. Break someone.

“And if you can’t give me my money, isn’t that stealing?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I can’t let people steal from me unpunished, can I?”
“N-No, sir.”

The muscle appeared unarmed, like that would make a difference. Butcher Jones dragged the other chair around the table, placed it in front of me and sat down. He looked exceptionally ordinary. Probably a good thing in his line of work.

“If you sold everything in here, how much could you get from it?”
“£10,000 perhaps”
“Not even close. And that still wouldn’t make us even, would it?”
“No, sir. No, it wouldn’t.”

I wanted to look away, to look down, anywhere, but he held a steady stare into my eyes, and I wasn’t sure what to do. Was it a dare, a game of chicken, some sort of power move?

“I’ll buy it. All this shit, your apartment deposit and you work for me for three months, then we’re even. Is that fair?”

It was so unexpected and he blurted it out so fast I barely registered what he said. Basically he takes everything I own and own my ass for a quarter. There was an unspoken “or else” in there somewhere too.

“Yes…”

“You’re worried about where to sleep. What to eat.” He got up on his feet quickly and patted me on my shoulders. “You’re working for me now, so everything will be taken care of. You still work for Ross’ Repairs?”

“When they have anything for me.”

“I’ll tell them you’ve quit. I have a special assignment for you. An undercover kind of deal. I need you to go somewhere, blend in and just be part of the community for a while. Think you can do that?”

That was how I less than two hours later sat on a train to Grimsby, through Doncaster. The only thing I owned was the clothes on my back. The two most valuable items on me was the £54.30 train ticket and a crappy Huawei phone. The ticket was about to become worthless and the phone was lent to me by Butcher Jones. He took my smartphone after I had recorded a vague “I’m away for a long while” voice message, and gave me the shitty phone to receive assignment updates to.

With a three hour ride I had plenty of time to think through what had just happened. He was right that I didn’t really own anything of value, so walking away from my stuff wasn’t that big of a deal. I might have been able to pay him back if I worked really hard for three months, but to be debt free after three months of “blending in” was pretty sweet deal. Hopefully I wouldn’t have to do anything too illegal.

I only had 10 minutes to switch train in Doncaster, and didn’t have time to grab a lunch bite. It didn’t even dawn on me until on the second train that I couldn’t even if I had time. I don’t have a penny on me. If only I could have had breakfast before I left.

Arriving at Grimsby Town station I didn’t have any further directions. I would be picked up by Declan, whoever that was, and he would tell me what to do.

Some guy decked out exclusively in Nike gear shouted obnoxiously close to me. “Oi! Chayse!” It wasn’t until the third or fourth time I realized that was the name of my cover identity.

“Sorry, mate. Chayse Brown.”
“Fucks sake youse head filled with cotton innit. This way.”

Before I had time to work out if it was a ribbing or genuine insult, he was walking towards the ticket hall. He looked to be about my age, perhaps even younger. Unkempt hair, tired look and an unlit cigarette in the corer of his mouth. He was dressed in hideous trainers, grey Nike air joggers, a Nike air sweater in a few different shades of grey, and a black back pack.

“Ere we are. Get changed. All of it.”

He pulled out a filled plastic Tesco bag from his backpack and handed over to me. I looked at him quizzically, and he impatiently motioned towards the handicap restroom.

While desperately trying to avoid having me or any piece of clothing touch the floor, I replaced my shirt, T-shirt, jeans, socks, underwear and shoes with the items from the bag. It wasn’t like a massive downgrade. My underwear were all supermarket packs, my Levis and shirt second hand, and the rest was mainly a difference in style. But once I had the new sneakers, white socks, Lacoste polo, and Nike joggers on, I certainly looked like I had been downgraded. But I couldn’t deny that Declan and I looked like mates. I was here to blend in.

“Hey, you got anything to eat.”
“Take this”
He handed over the cigarette from his mouth.
“No, thanks. I don’t smoke.”
“You do now. Jones’ orders.”
Begrudgingly I put the damp end in my mouth.
“Light?”
“In the car”

The car, a beaten up, green Vauxhall Corsa, was parked illegally just outside the station. Once inside he tossed his backpack with my clothes in the back and tossed me a lighter.

“I should light it in here?”
“Why not?”

It was probably a good thing to start smoking on an empty stomach, as my coughing turned into nausea while Declan almost couldn’t handle the car as he was pissing himself. Once he had recovered from laughter he promised to teach me properly after the appointment.

“What appointment?”
“A do-over at the barbs’. Mr. Jones want you to look proper mint ASAP.”
Declan took back the cigarette, put it in his mouth, and then fumbled in the pile of trash in his door compartment. He found what he was looking for and tossed me a small pack of something.
“Nicotine patches?”
“I reckon ya needed help until ya lit fags proper”
“Thanks, I guess.”
“And put yous trackies in ya socks like a proper lad”
“Like this?”
“Mint fucker and a”
Apparently that was a yes, because he looked approvingly at what I’ve done to my socks. It felt wrong.

We stopped in a residential area, and at first I didn’t even see the hair dresser. It was located in the basement of an apartment building. As we entered a middle eastern man greeted us with a big smile and offered us tea. Declan declined for both of us and proceeded to give short instructions for my haircut. Skin sides and four mills top. I didn’t really know what that meant, but only a few minutes later I could see the result. An oval island with short hair on top of my head, and essentially no hair elsewhere. It was almost a shock what huge difference it made. I looked brutal in an unpleasant way. Seeing the actual shape of the skull, specially in the back, weirded me out. My ears looked bigger too.

“You gonna havta like do yous every 2 weeks hear me? 4 mills.”
“I hear you”
“Let’s do ears then.”

Declan laghued way to much about his own joke before instructing Muhammad to pierce both earlobes and insert a cheap looking glass healing stud. Mohammad told me to keep them in at all times for the next two months. Definitively not remove them at all for the first few weeks, or it could start to bleed.

“You have time to mint brows?” Declan asked Muhammad.
“I have time.” he answered.

I had no idea what they talked about, but Muhammad swapped to a different trimmer attachment and did a few well practiced strokes over my eye brows. He then picked up a spool of black thread, pulled out an arms length and twisted it in some weird way. Finally he put it against my skin and using a process I’d never seen before pulled out hairs, shaping the eyebrow. It hurt like hell. I grabbed my trackies and clenched my fists white.

“You want any slit?” He asked me.
“Aye, two on left” Declan answered for me.

Muhammad used a different trimmer and carefully shaved two slits in my left eyebrow. As he stepped aside I didn’t see myself in the mirror. In less than 30 minutes I had been totally transformed. Between the brutish haircut, punk eyebrows and douchy ear studs there was little of me left. I had an uneasy feeling that this was moving way too fast, like I was being erased. But then that was the point with undercover, wasn’t it? I could understand why Butcher Jones wanted this done before I met anyone local.

“Oi, pose here. I’ll send a snap to Butcher”, Declan directed.

 “Trackies out of yous socks again.”

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