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Un,

       Deux,

       Trois…

       Bleeeaa-urghhh!

      Although her eating habits (if you wanted to get pedantic about it – and Kelly did, because she was) were ridiculously orderly (the Weight Watchers’ manual was her bible; she drew up a special weekly menu and stuck to it religiously, counted every calorie, took tiny mouthfuls, ate with tiny cutlery – just like Liz Hurley), so it wasn’t actually a problem, as such; more of a…a preference, really. She simply preferred her food fat-free. It was a Life-Style decision (the kind of thing they were always banging on about in magazines and on the telly), and so all perfectly legitimate (especially when your own mother was too big to cram herself into an average-size car-seat – used the disability section on the bus – belly arrived home seven seconds before her arse – hadn’t seen her toes since 1983 – Feet? They had their own fucking passports down there).

      Kelly came from a bad family.

      No. No. That was just too easy. They weren’t bad as such (no, not bad) so much as…as known…as familiar…as…as –

       Notorious

       That was it

      And only locally. Only in Ashford –

      

       Well…

      – and maybe in Canterbury. And Gillingham (where her older sister Linda supported The Gills – I mean really supported them – with a fist-guard, business cards, a retractable-blade). And in parts of Folkestone. And Woodchurch. And some of those smaller places which didn’t really matter (except to the people living there).

      In the local vicinity, basically. It wasn’t national or anything (no special reports on Crimewatch UK – aside from a small, pointless item on Network South East – November 2001. And that didn’t really count. It was probably just a quiet day – a craft fair had been rained off in Sheppey or something – and they had to fill up the time somehow, didn’t they? Yeah. So the Broads copped it again – Uncle Harvey; Dad’s oldest brother; the world’s shonkiest builder –

      Blah blah).

      Notorious.

      Like the Notorious B.I.G. The rapper. That fat American dude who got shot –

      

       Bang

      – dead. And then they made a documentary about him. And she’d watched it. And they’d said that he was actually a really nice guy (underneath. But fat. Very fat. That was partly what he was famous for. That’s essentially what the BIG stood for). And his mamma loved him (which had to count for something). And when he died they made a tribute song for him. With Sting. And Puff Da – Di – Daddy.

      Notorious.

      Isn’t that what Ashford people –

      

       Gossips

       Wankers

      – liked to call the Broads? Wasn’t that the word they preferred?

      Kelly sniffed.

      Did it have to be a negative?

      Notorious?

      

       As in train robber?

       As in sex offender?

      She pinched some pearlescent pink lipstick from the corners of her mouth.

      I mean, wasn’t Mother Theresa notorious? A notorious saint? (Remember that thing Kane told her – about Mother Theresa not being a saint at all. About how Catholics always wanted to keep the poor people poor by making them have lots of kiddies. ‘Contraception murders love.’ That’s what he said she’d said –

       Her mantra

       Didn’t sound very saintly, huh?

      – but he was laughing as he’d said it. Maybe he was just taking the fucking mick. Like always. The fucker.)

      Hang on…who was that…that Russian geezer they’d called a prophet who actually had sex with just about everybody? And Boney M wrote a song called Ra-Ra-Rasputin all about his various pranks and everything?

      Wasn’t he notorious (didn’t they mention it somewhere in the lyric?)? And when they shot him dead, didn’t he keep on getting up again? Like Freddie Kruger? Didn’t he just keep on rising? Like Jesus or something?

      

       Don’t remember Mother Theresa pullin’ any stunts like that –

       An’ if she did the papers would’ve been full of it, ’cuz Kane says The Pope owns the media –

       Or is that the Mafia?

      Uh…

      

       Hold on a sec…

      Did everybody notorious always end up getting wasted?

      Couldn’t you be something plain and simple like a notorious doctor (if you hadn’t killed a patient? What about the bloke who created the first test-tube baby? Did he qualify?)? A notorious priest (if you hadn’t messed with a choirboy)? Could you be a notorious…a notorious sweetheart? Yes?

      No. It didn’t sound right. A notorious flirt, maybe.

      Kelly frowned and tucked in her skirt so the wind wouldn’t lift it and show off her thighs. It was a little short –

      

       Should’a thought of that

      – and the fabric was rather flimsy (for something supposedly military

      – although she’d never yet seen anyone wearing a mini-skirt in a situation of mortal combat. Except for Lara Croft –

      

       Tank Girl

      That pretty cow in Alias…

      – and she always did okay).

      Kelly was sitting on a wall outside the Elwick Road Villas. It was a high wall facing a main road in Ashford’s town centre. Her brother, Jason, had taught her how to climb it (before they’d put him away. Joyriding. His thirteenth formal offence –

      

       Aw…

      Unlucky for some, eh?).

      Jason always knew the best route and the shortest cut (it was a fancy wall, built from some kind of rock –

      

       Limestone?

       Granite?

      – there were bits where you could find a hand-hold and a foot-hold. Where you could pull yourself up).

      Kelly took another bite of her celery. A car honked its horn at her. She didn’t look towards it, merely raised her middle finger –

      

       You twat

      – and pulled her hood down lower.

      Yeah. Notorious slut –

       Stop thinkin’ about it

      Jason was her middle brother. Jason Broad. Twenty-one last

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