‘What will happen to Mary?’ asked Alice.
Hanley turned and smiled. ‘She’ll go someplace safe, sweetheart. Somewhere she won’t be able to lie any more.’
‘It’s not her fault—’ Alice began, but Hanley interrupted.
‘I know what she is, sweetheart, you don’t have to tell me again.’
Some weeks later we were on the beach building sandcastles.
‘Was Tony Staines a wanker, Mummy?’
‘Yes, darling.’
Of the many facts, myths and conjectures I have drip-fed my daughter, the one she finds most fascinating is that the world’s population is divided between those who are and those who are not wankers. I had long stopped trying to prevent her from using the word. There seemed little point.
‘How many are there, Mummy?’
‘You’ll have to find that one out for yourself, darling, I’m afraid. But best not to think about it too much, eh? You just concentrate on making friends.’
Friends. Those strange people on their strange islands who one day drift into your waters and wave hello. I have some now, and I scan the shoreline for them morning, noon and night. But there’s no sign. Sometimes I stay up after Ed goes to bed, listening to the crickets and trying to convince myself of how lucky we are to have found this utopia. Hanley sometimes stops by on her evening rounds and we’ll have a drink or two on the porch. I’ll ask her: has she heard of anyone passing through Florida? Someone looking for us? Bryce said they would make for the shore, after all.
‘Nope,’ she always says. ‘’Fraid not.’
So I smile and smoke one of her Winstons beneath the warm, safe canopies of the Florida palms, trying not to appear too restless.
But I am. Because we’re nothing without our friends.
Alice and I were admiring our sandcastle, and Arthur’s attempts to destroy it, when Ed arrived on the beach. He no longer wore the sling the nurse had given him after his altercation with Mary, though he still carried his arm tenderly.
He crouched excited. I shaded my eyes.
‘Have you heard something?’
‘No. But I met someone.’
‘Who?’
‘A man who sells cars. They’re not what you’d call new but they work, and he has fuel as well.’
‘We don’t have any money.’
‘No, but we do have a boat. And he wants one.’
We watched each other for a while. Then I held out my hand and he took it.
So that is how we bid a thankful goodbye to the Black Buccaneer and Sheriff Hanley’s utopia, and one June morning found ourselves sitting in a rusty yellow 1973 Ford Gran Torino station wagon with five tanks of gasoline in the back.
‘Mind how you go!’ said the black-haired, gold-toothed man named Edmonds. ‘She’ll go with you to the ends of the earth, you mark my words. But hey –’ he pointed through the open window; crickets buzzed in the field behind ‘– watch out for Texas, you hear?’
We nodded. He grinned. Then he banged the roof and swaggered back to his yard, where an ancient dog welcomed his return.
We were on a dirt track facing north. Alice and Arthur were buckled into makeshift child seats behind.
‘Where are we going, Mummy?’ said Alice.
I looked in the rear-view mirror.
‘To find our friends, sweetheart. We’re going to have a wee adventure. Is that OK?’
She nodded, beaming. Arthur babbled his own feelings on the matter.
I turned to Ed.
‘Are you all right driving?’
‘I don’t have much choice, do I, stumpy?’
‘It’s an automatic. I’m sure I could manage.’
‘No, I’m good. You navigate.’
We pulled away onto a long, straight road. I closed my eyes as the Florida air blew in, and the sun warmed my face, and I let my distance unravel like the road before us.
Just me. Me, a huge blue sky and an old car full of the people I love.
Yes.
I’ll take that.
Acknowledgements
The last page of The End of the World Running Club produces a mixed response. Some love the ending as it is, whereas others feel a little cheated and want to know exactly what happens next. For my part, I wrote it that way because I felt Ed’s journey (at least his inward one) was complete, and this is why I promised myself I would never write a sequel.
I have my editor, Gillian Green, to thank for convincing me otherwise. Her ever-patient persistence finally made me realise that, actually, it wasn’t all about Ed, and that the other characters needed their stories completing too. Thanks, Gillian, I had such fun writing Beth’s (yes, even the bit with the foot.)
Thanks as always to my wife Debbie, who helped me brainstorm (winestorm really) Beth’s character and story into something beyond the obvious.
Thanks to Katie Seaman, whose meticulous copy-editing skills made such a difference to the final manuscript.
Thanks to everyone with a sailing background who reads this book, for not complaining about the bits I get wrong.
And finally thanks to my father, Norrie, for his enduring love and support, for his advice on the high seas, and for letting me borrow the Black Buccaneer …
Read more
Make sure you’ve read Adrian J Walker’s gripping survival thrillers
When the world ends and you find yourself stranded on the wrong side of the country, every second counts.
No one knows this more than Edgar Hill. 550 miles away from his family, he must push himself to the very limit to get back to them, or risk losing them forever …
His best option is to run.
But what if your best isn’t good enough?
Read more
Every dog has its day …
And for Lineker, a happy go lucky mongrel from Peckham, the day the world ends is his: finally a chance to prove to his owner just how loyal he can be.
Reg, an agoraphobic writer with an obsession for nineties football, plans to wait out the impending doom in his second floor flat, hiding himself away from the riots outside.
But when an abandoned orphan shows up in the stairwell of their building, Reg and Lineker must brave the outside in order to save not only the child, but themselves …
THE BEGINNING
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Del Rey, an imprint of Ebury Publishing,
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Copyright © Adrian J Walker, 2019
Cover image: Head Design
Cover: www.headdesign.co.uk
Adrian J Walker has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this Work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This novel is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental
First published by Del Rey in 2019
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9781473551169
The End of the World Survivors Club Page 33
