Shuggie Bain

Shuggie would stand well behaved inside the Paki shop [terms that are part of the book’s honest and realistic approach to ’80s life] while his granda bought a noose of sweetheart stouts and a half-bottle of whisky, enough to carry them through Saturday night and discreetly through the Sabbath. The growing boy gave Wullie and Imran something to talk about as the bags were loaded with the alcohol. It was a routine in which neither man was allowed to acknowledge the drink moving between them, as though it would have broken the charade.

Colleen, indirectly through Bridie, had even taught Agnes how to trick the electricity meter, how to open the box with a hairpin without damage to the lock. One Sunday every month she reclaimed her coins and her boys sat eating runny ice cream sandwiches in front of a roaring hot, three-bar electric fire. Silver coins sat in her hand like a pile of jewels, and Agnes would pump some of the coins back through and get double the month’s electric allowance. The meter man’s books never added up. Agnes could picture him down the pub with the man from the Provident, wringing their hands at the industrious mothers of Pithead.

Jinty hated Shuggie because his presence guilted Agnes into periods of dryness. If it wasn’t for him they could have left the shores of sobriety behind and forever sailed a sea of Special Brew.

[...]

Shuggie knew in truth that Louise [Jinty’s daughter] was only a wee bit slow; neglect had made her shy and withdrawn and that made her always a half beat out of step, which the Pit took to be funny-acting. Bridie Donnelly had said that Jinty was just selfish. The special school got Louise away throughout the term and allowed Jinty to dedicate more time to raising her favourite child, Stella Artois.