Free Original Skin by David Mark Page A

such car will have been procured legitimately. Fears it may even be stolen. He is ashamed of his thoughts and what they say about his prejudices, even toward the person he loves more than any other.
    “We’ll see,” says McAvoy. “The insurance could still pay out.”
    Roisin barks out a derisory laugh. The McAvoys are locked in a battle with their insurers. Their minivan had been reduced to a burned-out shell a week before Christmas, driven into a brick building by a killer who perished in the resulting blast. McAvoy had escaped with only minor burns. Those wounds have been a picnic compared to the resulting insurance headache. The company claims he is not covered for a “work-related” accident. Refuses to pay up. They have passed him between a dozen different departments; all apparently peopled by twelve-year-olds who keep laughing when they read his description of what caused the accident.
    A sudden, halfhearted cry from upstairs causes Roisin to close her eyes in frustration. She is looking tired. Lilah has been difficult all day, grizzling and sobbing, refusing to feed.
    “I’ll go,” says McAvoy, but Roisin waves a hand at him, insisting he go sit down. He does not want to, fearing he will fall asleep as soon as he closes his eyes. She brushes past him, too tired to notice him put out an arm for a cuddle.
    McAvoy stands alone in the kitchen for a while. Looks in the bread bin and the biscuit barrel. Eats a couple of peanut butter cookies and takes a swig of milk from the carton in the fridge to swill the crumbs from his teeth. He looks for some kind of chore. Spots his coat over the back of the small kitchen table, and picks it up to go and hang it in the cupboard under the stairs. As he does so, Roisin appears at the top of the staircase. Lilah is red-faced and wet-eyed in her arms.
    “I’m throwing those trousers away,” she says, nodding at the laundry basket by the bathroom. “Horrible.”
    She reaches down and picks up something from the floor. “Oh, this was in the pocket.”
    She throws him the mobile phone.
    McAvoy had almost forgotten it. He colors as he looks at it.
    “Fancy model, that,” says Roisin, mid-yawn. “You going to try and get it working?”
    McAvoy runs his tongue around his mouth. Opens his mouth to justify his interest, and realizes Roisin does not need him to. Just nods and enjoys her smile.
    •   •   •
    AN HOUR LATER.
    An Irish voice, made snappy by tiredness.
    “He fecking is.”
    Roisin McAvoy is pronouncing that the man on the television is an arsehole.
    McAvoy looks up, wondering whom his wife is talking about. He has been lost in concentration, safe in focused hard work. He takes off his reading glasses and lets his eyes focus on the giant flat-screen TV that stands in the corner of the room. He gives a shudder. It’s the Thunderbird. Mr. Popple-head. Wanchorman.
That Arsehole
, to give him his full title. A Hull institution, he has somehow been elevated to the status of a local legend without appearing to have a single fan. He is a slight, creepy, weaselly-looking chap with a head too big for his slim frame and a mustache that has been shaved bootlace-thin and skin that has been sunbed-tanned to the color of damp sand. To McAvoy he always appears to be trying to remember whether he has left the gas on. How he got the gig presenting the local news has been open to speculation for some time, but there are suggestions it involved a complicated ritual and the sacrifice of a goat.
    “Oh, God, turn him over,” he says, wondering how he has managed to blank out the man’s voice until now.
    “Can’t,” she says. “Help!”
    Roisin is feeding Lilah, one breast flopping over the top of her nightie, poking out from the folds of her leopard-print dressing gown. “The buttons are over there,” she says in mock desperation, nodding at the remote control. It sits taunting her at the other end of the sofa. “I’m stuck.”
    McAvoy takes the hint. He has a tea