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'Tell me about Eddie," she said. "Not the Street of the Gods stuff. Tell me about you, and Eddie."
"We worked a lot of cases together," I said, after a while. "Eddie's ... powerful, but he's not the most subtle of people. There are some problems you can't
solve with power, without destroying what you're trying to save. That's when Eddie would turn up at Strangefellows, asking for my help. Not openly, of course. But we'd talk, and eventually the conversation would come around to what was troubling him, and then he and I would go out into the night, and find a way to put things right that didn't involve hitting the problem with a sledgehammer. Or a straight razor.
"And sometimes . . . he'd just appear out of nowhere, to back me up. When I got in over my head."
"This sounds more like partners than friends," said Joa
"He's a killer," I said. "Razor Eddie. Punk God of the Straight Razor. These days he kills with good rather than bad intentions, but in the end all he is, is killing. And he wouldn't have it any other way. Hard to get close to a man like that. Someone who's gone much further into the dark than I ever have. But... he turned his life around, Joa
"I've tried to be a good friend to him. Tried to steer him towards a different kind of life, where he doesn't have to define who he is by killing. And
he... listens, when I have bad times, and need someone I can talk to who won't repeat it. He warns people away from me, if he thinks they're a threat. He hurts people, if he thinks they're pla
"I killed him in the Timeship to put an end to his suffering. I've always been able to bite the bullet, and do what has to be done. I never said it was easy."
"John..."
"No. Don't try and bond me with me, Joa
"Is that why your only friends are damaged souls like Razor Eddie and Suzie Shooter? Or do you deliberately only befriend people already so preoccupied with their own i
"You don't know me," I said. "Don't you dare think that you know me. I am ... who I have to be. To survive. I live alone, because I won't risk endangering someone I might care for. And if it's sometimes very cold and very dark where I am; at least when I do go down, I won't drag anyone else with me."
"That's no way to live," said Joa
"And you, of course, are the expert on how to run
your life successfully. A mother whose child runs away at every opportunity. Let's talk about some of the questions you have to consider, before we go any further. What if, we finally go to Blaiston Street, find the right house, kick in the door and find that Cathy's actually very happy where she is, thank you? That she's happy and safe and doesn't need rescuing? What if she's found someone or something worth ru
Joa
"All right," I said. 'Try this one. What if she is in a bad place, and we haul her out of there, and you take her back home with you? What are you going to do to ensure she won't just run away again, first chance she gets?"
"I don't know," said Joa
come this far for her, gone through so much for her... will make an impression. Make her see that I do care about her, even if I'm not always very good at showing it. And if nothing else, this whole experience should give us something in common to talk about, for once. We've always found it difficult to talk."
"Or listen. Make time for your daughter, Joa
"I had managed to work that out for myself," said Joa
I nodded and smiled, and after a moment she smiled back. It wasn't going to be as simple or as easy as that, and both of us knew it, but recognising a problem is at least half-way to solving it. I was pleased at how far she had come. I just hoped she could go the distance. We sipped our Cokes for a while. The Fifth Dimension finished "Aquarius" and went straight into "Let the Sun Shine."
"That future we ended up in," Joa
"No," I said. "At least, not at present. It's got to be
tied in to what I inherited, or perhaps stand to inherit, from my missing mother. I never knew her. I have no idea who or what she really was. No-one does. My father found out, and the knowledge made him drink himself to death. And this was a man well used and inured to all the worst excesses of the Nightside."
"What did he do here?" said Joa
"He worked for the Authorities. The ones who watch over us, whether we like it or not. After my father died, I went through his papers. Hoping to find some kind of legacy, or message, or just an explanation, something to help me understand. I was ten years old, and I still believed in neat answers like that then. But it was all just junk. No diary, no letters, no photos of him and my mother together. Not even a wedding photo. He must have destroyed them all. And the few people who'd known both my parents had vanished long ago. Driven away by... many things. None of them turned up for his funeral.
"Over the years, all kinds of people have come up with all kinds of theories as to who and what my mother might have been. Why she appeared out of nowhere, married my father, produced me, and then disappeared again. And why she didn't take me with her. But no-one's ever been able to prove anything out of the ordinary about me, apart from my gift. And gifts are as common as freckles among the sons and daughters of the Nightside."
Joa
coining here, the Brittle Sisters of the Hive recognised your name. They backed off, rather than upset you. And they asked to be remembered, when you finally came into your kingdom."
I had to smile. "That doesn't necessarily mean anything. In the Nightside, you can never be sure which ugly duckling might grow up to be a beautiful swan, or even a phoenix. So if you're sensible you hedge your bets and back as many horses as possible. And never make an enemy you don't have to."
Joa