TAKING THE RAP

Sheena and Sasha were inseparable, identical twins born of mixed race, their upbringing was a catalogue of unhappiness, no child deserved the start in life that these two youngsters had.

At the tender age of 3 the girls lost their mother to breast cancer, she was of Jamaican descent and took the identity of the father to the grave with her, as far as the authorities were led to believe she had no known living relatives.

Her toddlers were taken into care and eventually shuffled from one foster home to another always being regarded as too challenging.

Sheena and Sasha grew up with behavioral problems and were very difficult to control,

they were labeled as being disruptive with little regard for authority.

The twins relied totally on each other and kept at bay all those who tried to help them, they were horrible bullies at school, that is when they bothered to turn up, they picked on the weak and the vulnerable as most bullies do forcing frightened youngsters to part with money, their only reward for this was to be left alone, well, until the next time.

The twin girls were certainly a force to be reckoned with and had been expelled from two schools by the age of 14, trouble followed them wherever they went.

Now the pair were17 and Sheena was nearing the end of a 12 month sentence at a young offender’s institution for demanding money with menaces, it was thought that her sister was equally to blame but Sheena being the stronger of the two took the rap for both of them; she was very protective toward her sister.

Sheena insisted that Sasha did not visit her inside but encouraged her to go out and try to find work and somewhere to live, somewhere they could be together when she was released, perhaps Sheena had finally learnt her lesson and was fed up with trying to rebel against the system, who knows?

Sasha took note of what her sister had said to her and never went to visit, although she did write to her on three occasions, well if you could call the scrawl on the paper writing.

Sasha was a different person when faced with life alone, she looked withdrawn and even a little vulnerable, not seeming to be able to cope without her sister to feed off, she missed Sheena immensely.

After months of struggling and being alone Sasha met a local junkie called Robbo, he seemed harmless enough and had the gift of the gab, a real charmer.

Sasha had gone from one doss house to another so the offer of a more permanent roof over her head and a bed was to tempting an offer to miss out on.

As she arrived at the house with Robbo she realized it was just a squat but what the hell she had company and it was free, she just hoped he didn’t want paying in kind,

In that respect even Sasha knew where to draw the line.

After a few weeks Sasha learnt that Robbo was dealing for some local hard nut, being paid enough to survive on and given his own fixes for free, she wondered why these people would trust a junkie like Robbo, but after some of the stories he had told her it seemed obvious that fear was the key, the way they kept control, a force not to be messed with, he had even hinted that people had been snuffed out for trying to rip them off, he was scared, but Sasha thought that most of it was probably bluff and so dismissed it.

The next day Sasha decided she ought to write to her sister telling her where she was, she told her things had not gone well on the job front, but they would be OK once she was out and they were together again, what she didn’t know was that Sheena was due out on early release the day after her letter had arrived at the prison and Sheena had been panicking that she had no address for her twin sister, it seemed the letter had arrived just in the nick of time, now she knew where to find her.

Sasha who was unaware of this went out for the day with Robbo, he said he had a few errands to run and a few contacts to see.

What he took her on was a drugs run around the pubs selling wraps and bags of weed

to the local low life, she couldn’t believe how easy it all was, he just showed up and they just crawled out of the woodwork with fists full of cash.

After the last wrap had been sold he took Sasha for a drink then called in the outdoor on the way back to the squat for a few cans and a bottle of cheap vodka.

As they arrived back in the squat they were greeted by two large blokes who asked him how the day’s business had gone, he said fine and took another package from them and then handed over pockets full of cash, they looked quite angry that Sasha was there and asked who she was?

He satisfied them that she was OK, they said she better be, and gave him some cash back and drugs for his own personal use.

After the two men had gone he snorted some coke and started on the vodka, Sasha had seen Robbo out of his face on drugs before but not like this, she had been drinking herself but was only a little bit tipsy, but as the drugs and booze kicked in Robbo got more and more agitated and tried to force himself on Sasha, she told him no and pushed him away but he was not having any of it, he punched her in the face and climbed on top of her, she was sobbing, pleading with him to stop but he carried on regardless until he passed out and rolled off.

Sasha sat up shaking, holding her eye where his fist had connected, she was too distraught to think clearly and stood up and kicked him in the crotch as he lay lifeless on the floor and then did it again just for good measure, she looked over and saw the package that the two men had left and went over and unwrapped it tearing at the brown paper, inside she found more drugs than she had ever seen in her life, more than Robbo had sold that day anyway.

She filled her pockets and a cloth bag with the drugs and ran off into the night, she thought she could sell them and use the cash to rent a room somewhere, anywhere as long as she escaped from this nightmare.

The night was very cold and seemed to last forever, as Sasha tried to get some sleep huddled in a shelter in the local park.

At last the morning came bringing with it a cold breeze and fine drizzle, she knew she just had to wait until the pubs opened and then perhaps the same low life would come out of the woodwork and hand her fistfuls of cash the same as they had done for Robbo, how hard could it be?

Sasha’s eye looked a mess and was bloodshot and swollen it seemed an age before the pub doors opened at 11 o’clock where Sasha was waiting outside to go in.

After about an hour she started to see faces she recognized from the previous day and decided to try her luck, she first asked two men standing by the fruit machine and was told to sod off, she asked a young bloke in the corner who was sat on his own and to her surprise he asked how much?

Bloody hell she thought, what do I say now?

She asked what he normally paid for a wrap, the question made him suspicious and he told her he wasn’t interested.

The barman clocked what she was doing and went over and asked her what the hell she was up to?

He recognized her as the young woman, who had come in with Robbo the day before,

Sasha started to cry and ran from the bar.

As she crossed the street outside she saw Robbo limping up the road toward her making his way to the bar looking very unkempt and angry, she crouched behind a parked car and hid until he had gone inside.

Sasha thought she would be better off trying again in the evening when the punters had sank a few beers, providing that Robbo wasn’t in there and the same barman wasn’t working, well at least it was a plan, even if it wasn’t a very well thought out one.

Sasha passed the day walking around the town window shopping, sitting in a café nursing a cup of tea for over an hour or more, she even went into the library which she thought was amusing as she had never read a book in her life.

She found a small quiet back street pub where she passed the early evening away, waiting until about 9-30pm before going back to visit the same bar again.

She poked her nose to the glass and looked through the window, there was a woman behind the bar and there was no sign of Robbo, she was in luck, or so she thought.

She went into the bar and ordered a half pint of orange squash, she was right Robbo wasn’t in there but the barman was, he was sat up the corner having a pint after his shift had finished.

He quickly made his way to Sasha and told her he wanted to talk to her and said it was very important.

He asked her to join him at his table and said that Robbo had been in and said his stash had been stolen, he said that Robbo couldn’t remember what had happened last night as he was well out of it, but he said when he woke up his balls were the size of lemons and you and the drugs had gone.

He told Sasha that he feared for Robbo’s safety, as these people he deals with don’t play nicely, he begged her to take the drugs back to Robbo at the squat he said he’d   never seen Robbo look so scared in his life.

Sasha thought for a moment and asked the barman if he would go with her as she was afraid, he reluctantly agreed saying he didn’t like getting involved, but finished his pint and gestured to the door.

It took about ten minutes to walk to the sguat which was in darkness, Robbo always kept candles just inside the door as the electricity had been cut off for some time.

Sasha let herself in and lit a candle handing it to the barman, then lit one herself.

They entered into the hallway looking in the downstairs rooms but they were empty,

Gingerly they climbed the stairs to the first bedroom, the barman went into the small bedroom first and gasped in horror telling Sasha not to look as he saw Robbo’s battered body lying on the floor beside a single mattress.

Sasha saw the blood soaked body and ran into the bathroom to be sick.

A deafening scream rang out as she saw the body of her sister Sheena submerged beneath the water in the bath, she had arrived hoping to see her twin sister, but the people who did this must have thought it was her.

Once again, Sheena had taken the rap for Sasha, but this time the cost was a little higher.

• Read other works of Ray Boorman
• thebigredone1hotmail.co.uk(Spam Protected - Please type eMail-Address by hand)