Once A Thief
The sight of the sullen, posturing young lad impressing his mates on the waste ground filled Dilys with unease… and recognition
There were three boys sitting on the waste ground outside the flats when Dilys got back from shopping.
Two sprawled on the scuffed grass, swigging from a can which they passed from one to the other.
The other leaned back in an old chair that had been dumped there.
His legs were stretched out in front of him, his hands in his pockets and a cigarette dangling from his lip in what he clearly imagined was the epitome of cool.
They were just young lads, but something about them caused her antennae to quiver slightly.
A buzz of confused noise came to her ear, but they were too far away for her to distinguish what they were talking about.
Or to tell if the voices she could hear were theirs or an echo from elsewhere…
There was nothing unusual in kids loitering around the estate, but if she closed her eyes and probed with her mind, things changed.
She could smell unwashed bodies, feel them pressing around her, thick with anticipation.
Voices jeered and cheered in the relief that it wasn’t them who stood up there, the object of so much unwelcome attention.
She was part of the crowd, but she wasn’t jeering.
Instead she felt a strange sympathy for the lone figure that had attracted their opprobrium …
With an effort, she banished the intrusive feeling, opened her eyes and welcomed the sight of the familiar litter-ridden space, empty except for the three lads.
Safely indoors, she heaved her shopping onto the kitchen table then went back to slip the chain onto the front door.
She didn’t really think the teenagers were posing any threat, but her ground floor flat faced the waste land. There was no sense in taking chances.
And then there was the recognition she was trying so hard to ignore.
Just how strong was that connecting thread likely to be?
Excellent,” Pete said, tipping up the tin and letting the last of the lager trickle down his throat. “Where’d you get it, Connor?”
“Nicked it,” Connor said nonchalantly.
He’d actually taken the tins from the fridge at home, but no harm in letting the others think he’d stolen it from the newsagent’s on the corner.
He tipped the chair back further on its rickety legs and blew a stream of smoke from his lips.
“Give us a ciggie?” Ben said.
Connor looked down his nose.
“Nah. Last time you had one, you wasted half of it.” He mimed being violently sick.
“Just swallowed wrong, that’s all.” Ben flushed as red as he had been pale on the previous occasion. “Got a bellyful of smoke.”
“I didn’t.” Pete shoved Ben aside. “Give us one, then.”
He held out his hand. Connor resented the faint arrogance in the gesture and let the chair down with a bump.
He stretched, yawned and flicked the butt into the scrub.
“I’m bored. Let’s go over the arcade.”
“Got any money?” Pete asked.
“Enough.” Connor stood up and kicked the chair over. “Enough for me, that is.”
“That old bat’s watching us.” Ben nodded towards Dilys’s window.
“Let her,” Connor said. “We’re not doing nothing.”
He picked up the chair, sat down and swivelled so that he faced the flats. What gave her the right to spy on them?
“Thought we were going over the arcade?” Pete said.
The whine in his voice flicked Connor on the raw.
“When you pay for it, we will,” he said irritably.
The warmth seemed to have gone out of the afternoon. He suddenly didn’t want to be here any more.
He wanted to wrap the smelly, noisy arcade around himself like a cloak to shield him from the world. The excitement of a win beckoned, the coins showering from the slot.
But he wasn’t going to let her think they’d gone just because she was watching them.
He opened his last lager and took a defiant swig before tossing it to his cronies as if dispensing largesse.
They’d drink this, just to show her, then they were out of here.
If he could hold on that long. The thought that she was looking at him set his teeth on edge.
He just didn’t know why it bothered him.
Dilys encountered the boys again the next day. She heard the feet behind her, coming fast.
The three boys ran past, so close that they brushed her arm, sending the strap of her handbag slipping from her shoulder.
Her eyes narrowed as they stopped and turned.
The good-looking one, the leader, glanced at the bag. She took a firmer grip on it and held his gaze for a long moment.
Something shifted at the back of his eyes and he stared back with dislike.
The knowledge that she’d shoved to the back of her mind grew stronger.
The idea of snatching her handbag had only occurred to Connor as he ran past, and then it was too late. He was glad he hadn’t told the others he’d do it, for then his failure would have been too much to bear.
Connor took a step towards her, but she stood her ground. His discomfort grew.
“Go on, Connor,” Pete whispered, nudging him. “Show her you ain’t to be messed with.”
“Ah, come on. Not worth it.”
Making a rude gesture, he swaggered off, exuding defiance to cover their retreat.
He was careful to show no sign of discomfiture but kept up a manic exuberance as he led his troops rioting through the precinct, pushing over displays and swearing at outraged shoppers until security loomed into view and he was able to give the order to scarper.
But he knew he’d been faced down, and the understanding burned.
“We going down the arcade or what?” Ben asked.
“Got any money?” Connor raised a cynical eyebrow as Ben shook his head. “Now why aren’t I surprised? How about you, Pete?”
Pete dug his hand in his pocket and showed the meagre findings.
“No use looking at me,” Connor said. “Mum’s throwing a wobbly over something.”
He cast his eyes heavenwards in pantomime exasperation.
He’d thought he’d got away with his raids on the fridge, but his mother had surprised him by putting her foot down.
“You took that lager, Connor.”
“So?” He hunched his shoulders.
“You’re sixteen, too young to be drinking, that’s what’s ‘so’. And you took that fiver from my handbag last week.”
“No, I never!” he said angrily. “Don’t go blaming me ’cos you can’t remember what you spent it on.”
His mother sighed. She was sure the money had been there, but maybe he was right. There were so many calls on her purse it was possible, but she ought not to let him get away with it.
One thing could lead to another. Just look at his dad.
She decided to give him the benefit of the doubt on that issue, but returned to the attack on the other.
“You’re spending far too much time hanging about with Peter Harvey. He’s bad news, Connor. Mrs Carter says you just mess about in class and never do your homework properly.”
“Homework’s for losers,” he muttered.
“Ending up unemployable’s for losers,” she returned sharply. “Get real, Connor. It’s your life you’re playing with.
“If your mates want to waste their chances, that’s their look-out.
“You’re better than that. You’ve got brains. Why don’t you use them?”
He didn’t care to acknowledge that he was bolstered by her faith in him.
His homework that evening was done more thoroughly than had been the case for months but, when the last book had been tossed aside and he looked in his secret stash for a can of lager, there was none there.
His good mood evaporated as he remembered the old girl. OK, so he was becoming too used to having a drink, but he would be the one to decide when and if to cut it out, not her.
If she hadn’t been staring through her window, giving him the evil eye…
And he’d been going to nick her handbag, but then he hadn’t.
He was determined she should pay for one last can. Then after that, he’d give it up. The cigs, too. He didn’t really like them, anyway.
His chance came a couple of days later, when he was mooching across the waste ground, alone for once. He glanced automatically at Dilys’s flat, and saw her emerge with a large plastic bag in her hand.
She went towards the rubbish bins. She hadn’t noticed him and, from the sound of voices, she’d found a neighbour to gossip with.
And she’d left her front door ajar.
His heart beating nineteen to the dozen, Connor crept over and pushed the door wider.
There, on the kitchen table, was the saggy brown leather bag she’d had slung over her arm.
He could even see the edge of her purse beckoning to him.
He wasn’t a thief. Nicking a few cigs and the tinnies he’d taken from his own fridge didn’t count, right?
But she owed him. He’d take what was his due, that was all.
It was only a few steps to reach the table. His hand closed around the purse and he drew it out of the bag with wild elation fluttering inside his chest.
The faint noise made him look round.
Dilys stood just inside the door. No worries. She was as small as a sparrow. All he had to do was brush past her.
But his feet seemed to have grown roots that held him to the floor.
“Once a thief, always a thief?” she said. Not loudly, but with an edge that cut him like a blade.
“Yeah, right.” He tried bluster. Part of him wanted to tell her he wasn’t a thief, that it was all her fault for staring at him.
He couldn’t say the words. They made him sound like a dork.
He wanted to throw the purse back on the table, but his fingers wouldn’t let go.
Before he knew what she was going to do, she stepped forward and touched him above his heart.
The air changed; it smelled open and sharp and pungent through the dust that clogged his nostrils.
He felt as if he were high up, his feet bare on rough wooden boards. His breeks felt suspiciously wet, and a coarse rope lay close around his neck.
He wanted to grab the rope, to keep it from tightening, but his hands were bound.
Beside him, a shoulder pressed against his, trembling uncontrollably, and a confused shouting battered at him, as physical as blows.
For a moment, he thought he recognised her in one of the crowding faces below him. Not yelling like the rest, caught up in the entertainment, but looking at him with sorrow.
“Back then, you had no choice. Steal or starve.”
The old woman’s voice was like a bridge back to the safe present. “You stole and you paid the price, but now you can follow this path, or you can take another. You choose.
“Just remember what happened the last time and I know you’ll be all right.”
Connor felt himself released and drew a deep breath, feeling the air rush harshly down into his lungs.
He looked at the purse with shuddering aversion, thrust it into her hand and brushed past.
“You’re mental, you know that?”
She was trying to scare him off – that’s all she was doing. The old dame was nutty as a fruitcake. Ha! Wouldn’t catch him within a mile of her again.
What was it she’d said? Something about having a choice this time. Wasn’t that what his mum had said as well?
Dilys didn’t know why she had been blessed – or cursed? – with this ability to recall lives previously lived when others were granted the grace to forget – or how she could sometimes make the memories real for others.
Still, hearing his footsteps pelting away and remembering the skinny, frightened boy on the scaffold, she reckoned he had a chance now.
He wasn’t a bad lad – just the product of the ages in which he lived.
Once, he might have been a thief.
But not this time round.
We’re sharing another crime-themed story from our archives every Monday and Thursday during April. Watch out for the next one!
