Gypsy Jane. Jane Lee
doing my best to be with John all the time. After I had been with Brett for about five years one of this girl’s mates told me she didn’t like what was going on at Mary’s house. I asked her straight out, ‘What do you mean?’ She looked frightened and said she wasn’t going to be the one to tell me. ‘Don’t play mind games with me because I don’t play them. You will tell me or I’ll do you.’ And she did. Brett and Mary had been having an affair. I couldn’t believe it. My best mate and my man.
I flew round to Mary’s with a knife in my hand but she wasn’t in. She was lucky she wasn’t. So I went to Rosie’s and by now I was sobbing. Rosie said she didn’t believe Mary and Brett were having an affair and calmed me down. We had a drink, got stoned on marijuana and I said, ‘She can have him.’ Then Mary knocked at Rosie’s door and I went for her.
I started to beat the living daylights out of her with my bare hands when she screamed, ‘I wouldn’t do it to you. He tried to pull me but I gave him a knock-back.’ I stopped beating her when she denied it and calmed down. But later that day I confronted Brett but I didn’t believe him when he denied it. He had slept with my best mate. I was certain of it. So I kicked him out of my flat. He kept begging to come back, saying he hadn’t done it. He even took me to Mary’s to get me to confront her again. He got her to say nothing had happened and she even said that she’d lied about him trying to pull her. I knew in my head he had cheated on me but my heart didn’t want to believe it. So like an idiot I took him back. But the love had died. I tried so hard to love him after that but I hated him instead.
We moved to Rainham in Essex to try to make a fresh start and, believe it or not, I stayed with him for another five years but it didn’t matter how hard he tried, what we had was dead. We got married to try to make things work but I couldn’t make love to him anymore. He made me feel sick and, when he tried to touch me, I froze and I made excuses. In fact, I had a headache for five years. We used to fight all the time about it. I really tried to make myself get over it for John’s sake because I wanted us to be a family but, no matter what he did, nothing could bring the love back.
He wasn’t bringing in much money so I turned my hand to collecting and restoring old furniture. That was my escape. The weeks, months and years passed by and, in a way, I was happy because, by staying with him, I was keeping my family together for my son. It was only at bedtime it got bad and most of the time I pretended to fall asleep on the sofa and he would go to bed on his own. I should have left him when he betrayed me but we live and learn and, if there’s one thing I learned about myself, it is that everybody only gets one chance and, if they fuck it up, they won’t get another. I can take a lot on the chin – the fights and the letdowns – but to betray me… well, that’s another story. I am not ever going to forgive. That’s what is inside me. I’m not going to say sorry about it because it is just the way it is. I tried but it just isn’t in me and I reckon there are a lot of people out there who may be able to relate to that.
I used to tell myself that Brett was what I call ‘proper’ but I think I always knew he wasn’t that tough. Sure enough, I soon found out he wasn’t. After we had been in Essex for a few years Brett and his mate rented a garage in Purfleet where they did car repairs. Brett fell out with the garage owner and was shitting himself. I knew they knew where I lived and they had my number. ‘How could you be so stupid to bring trouble to our door?’ I said. I asked Brett how much he owed. But now Brett was as white as a sheet and started panicking.
‘You don’t know them,’ he said and ran out, leaving me and John.
The phone rang and I answered it. The bloke on the line asked for Brett and I told him he wasn’t in. He said, ‘I’ve told your bloke I’m coming around tonight for my money and, if he hasn’t got it, I’ll leave that house looking like there has been a bloody massacre.’
Well, as I listened on the phone, I wasn’t happy with Brett but, at the end of the day, he was my Brett. I did exactly what my mum would have done in the same situation and protected my family. I took a deep breath and then I said, ‘You come down my path and you won’t ever be getting off it alive. I’ve got two rottweilers and a sawn-off waiting for you. Come on. Bring it on.’
He hung up on me. I hadn’t got two rottweilers really. I’d got a Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Buller, and my sawn-off was buried at the pickle factory. I couldn’t even go and get it as I didn’t know what time they would be coming. My 15-year-old cousin Kathy was with me and she had more balls than most grown men. I knew they were coming that night at who knew what time. So Kathy and I were all alone and Brett wasn’t even answering his phone. He was hiding.
Coward, I thought to myself. He had got us into a war and it was me that was going to have to stand and fight and get us out of it. I was so pissed off with Brett. By bringing his problems to my door he’d shown himself to be a bigger idiot than I thought he was.
I boiled up a big chip pan full of fat and I gave Kathy the sledgehammer while I armed myself with my samurai sword. Then we waited with my loyal Staff by our side. The Gran had taken over and I was ready for a war.
These men are scum, I told myself. Just like Brett. I mean, if you’ve got a problem with someone, you don’t go trying to scare their bird and kid, do you? Whoever this garage owner was, if he turned up he would come proper unstuck, as I was not your normal bird. In situations like that I’m not afraid to admit I am one sicko. Especially when I think me and mine are in danger. I’m sorry but that is the way it is.
We sat up all night waiting and I love Kathy with all my heart for sticking with me. It looked like we were in an old-school war and she was as loyal as they come. After that night she became my soul mate and will be until the day we both die. I was so proud of her. But I was relieved that it hadn’t come to anything. Of course, I’d have gone to war and given it my best and, believe me, a few of them would have got hurt. And yet all I wanted was to lead a violence-free life and look after my son. Oh, how I tried to have a normal, happy family. Brett phoned the next day, still shitting himself, and I told him it was safe to come home. When he got back I told him he was out of order and that he should have sorted something out before it had come to this. ‘You’ve been asking for trouble and don’t you ever bring it to my door again,’ I told him. I thought how I would have died for that man when we first got together. But first he betrayed me with Mary and now he had left me to face the consequences of his falling out with the garage owner and I just didn’t know how he could have done that to me. But I just told myself that he was part of my family and I would just ignore him. I was going to live with him but I didn’t have to love or trust him. I knew I had to be prepared for it to happen again. I also knew that I couldn’t rely on Brett for my safety, much less to bring in money. I decided that the only way was for me to start looking after myself. I’d had enough. I had tried to turn my back on crime for John’s sake but life just wasn’t letting me go straight. It was then that I decided to get right into guns and, believe me, I put my heart and soul into it.
I knew it was no good having a gun that was buried miles away at the pickle factory. So I went and dug up the sawn-off in case of future emergencies. I only knew a little bit about guns. Basically, I knew how to load one and pull the trigger so I decided I needed to know more. I went to my local library and got loads of books and read up. I found out that, if a gun is over a hundred years old, you can own it legally as an antique. And it can work just as well as any other gun. So you can legally own a Colt .45, for instance. Bullets, however, are not legal but I discovered bullet-making gear is legal. Shells are legal and so is the firing cap. The only thing that is not legally available is gunpowder. I needed some black powder and I got it from fireworks.
I learned how to make a bullet in ten seconds. That meant I could put together six bullets in a minute. I learned to strip a gun down to all its parts so that you wouldn’t even know there was a gun in the house. In ten minutes, I could put it back together, fully loaded and working. I bought a rifle at a military fair that had been used in the Boer War. This rifle could blow a hole through a elephant but it was legal because it was an antique. Soon I had a collection of weapons – and they were all legal. I could go and put the sawn-off back in its place at the pickle factory.
Now it was time to learn how to use my weapons