‘You don’t talk about your mum much,’ she said. ‘I’d love to hear about her.’
‘She was a cunt. That’s all you need to know,’ he said. ‘I’d piss on her grave, if I knew where it was.’
‘Max, we could find out I’m sure. Not that I want you to piss on it, but we could leave some flowers…’
Max turned his head to her so their foreheads were pressed together.
‘That’s why I love you, Neen, you see so much good in things. And even though I know you’re wrong, it’s nice to see the world hasn’t yet destroyed you.’
‘The world is a good place, Max,’ she said, kissing him. He kissed her back and turned to look down at the swarming crowds far below, the tops of their heads still pressed together.
‘I imagine being up here with a big red button,’ said Max. ‘And I can press it at any time and it will drop a bomb on the lot of them, put them out of their misery. A nuclear bomb would vaporise them all.’
‘What about us?’ asked Nina.
‘You’re with me, Neen. I’ve got the red button. I rule the world, and you’re my queen.’ He grinned. It was a malevolent grin, devoid of warmth.
Nina went to say more but was interrupted by a young lad coming to tell them that the tower was about to close. Max rolled over onto his back and checked his watch.
‘I make it four minutes to, so we’ve still got four minutes,’ said Max.
‘My watch is set by GMB,’ said the lad. He was young and slim with bucked teeth.
Max got up. ‘GMB?’
‘Yeah,’ said the lad.
‘And what does “GMB” stand for?’ asked Max.
‘I dunno, all I know is that it’s time for you both to go. We’re closing.’
Nina got up from the glass walkway.
‘It’s GMT, you moron: Greenwich Mean Time,’ said Max.
‘Come on, let’s go,’ said Nina, pulling at his arm.
Max eyeballed the young lad, who noted the crazy look in his eyes. His head shrank back into his neck and he smiled awkwardly.
‘What are you smiling at?’
‘Nothing,’ said the lad. He now looked scared.
‘Come on, Max…’
‘You think something’s funny?’
The lad shook his head.
‘And for the record, dickhead, we’re still on British Summer Time. BST,’ said Max.
If Nina hadn’t been so afraid of him kicking off, she would have laughed. Did it really matter that this lad, who was probably on minimum wage, didn’t know the difference between GMT and BST? And Max’s watch had been running slow, so the lad probably had the correct time. She finally pulled Max away, and they took the lift down to ground level and joined the teeming masses.
They walked back to the guest house to collect their bags and then took a bus out to an estate where Max’s mate lived. Nina had been nervous about meeting Max’s friend, worried what he might think of her, or if she might come across as stuck-up or uncool. But it was a quick transaction. A tall, scally looking lad with yellow teeth and bad skin met them outside a terraced house, and took them to a small Renault, which looked a treacly brown colour in the dark. Max peered through the windows, and then he climbed into the inside with the lad and revved the engine, their faces elongated in the shadows cast by the interior light. Then they came around to the bonnet and the lad shone a torch as they peered in. And that was it.
‘Take it easy, love.’ The lad winked at Nina as he loped back to his house with a wedge of folded over £50 notes.
‘How much was it?’ asked Nina, as they put their bags in the boot.
‘Fifteen hundred quid,’ he said.
They got in, and she saw it was clean and neat, and there was a CD player.
‘It’s nice.’
‘It’s more than nice, it’s a fucking bargain.’
‘Why was it a bargain?’
‘Ask me no questions and I tell you no lies.’ He grinned and leaned across and kissed her.
It was a long journey home, and there was heavy traffic on the M40, so they came off the motorway and took the back roads. They were on a quiet country lane near Oxford, with no streetlights or cat’s eyes in the road, nothing but the outline of the tarmac in front. Nina was dozing off, lulled by the motion of the car, when suddenly a dark figure stepped out from the side of the road. They hit it at full speed, and in a blur it rolled over the bonnet, up the windscreen then off the back of the roof. Max hit the brakes and the wheels screamed. The car skidded to a halt in the opposite lane, stopping close to a ditch.
‘You okay, sweetheart?’ he asked.
Nina said she wasn’t sure. She’d hit the dashboard and her nose was bleeding. Max took the corner of his T-shirt and he dabbed her nose.
‘You’re bleeding too,’ she said, pointing to a cut on his chin.
They climbed out of the car, and it was so dark and quiet, just the sound of the engine ticking over. There were no houses or buildings, and trees and undergrowth lined the road. Their tall black shadows loomed ahead in the light cast by the headlights. A hundred yards up the road a man lay on his back. Max took out his phone and activated the torch. He had a beard and was wearing black, a big coat with baggy trousers and plimsolls. His body was twisted at a funny angle, with his right arm under his back. His face was bloody, and he was wheezing, blood sputtering over his lips. Nina went to help him, but Max put out his hand to stop her.
‘Can you hear me?’ he asked.
The man swallowed with difficulty. ‘Yes,’ he finally croaked.
‘You were waiting for a car, to kill yourself?’
He nodded and winced, tears forming in the corners of his eyes.
‘We need to call for an ambulance,’ said Nina, taking out her phone. Max grabbed it from her and slid it into his pocket. ‘What are you doing? He needs help! Max, this man needs an ambulance!’
The man on the road was now making a terrible whining, gurgling noise. Max crouched down and put two fingers to the man’s neck.
‘His pulse is pretty strong,’ he said, patting down the man’s body, searching under the folds of the long coat for his pockets. ‘Jeez, his hip bone is poking through his trousers,’ said Max, pulling a face. Nina saw the flash of white and red poking through the material of the man’s trousers. He screamed and blood oozed from his mouth as Max reached under him, into his back pocket, and retrieved a battered black wallet.
‘Give me my phone; we have to call for help,’ said Nina.
Max stood and circled the man, who started to plead in gurgling whispered tones. Max went to the grass verge and scrabbled around for a moment. He came back holding a large flat rock.
‘You can make it stop,’ said Max, holding it out to Nina. ‘He wanted to kill himself, but he couldn’t even do that properly. If we were to call an ambulance, that’s not really what he wants. He looks pretty screwed. Probably won’t walk again. They’ll keep him alive but he won’t have the strength to end it. I respect him for calling it quits. I wish I was going faster…’ He hefted the rock from one hand to another and started to laugh. ‘The one time I stick to the speed limit!’
Nina was confused, and in pain from the whiplash. The blood on her chin felt cold. The man tried to sit up, but the oversize clothes bundled around him and his injuries gave him a disturbing jerky movement. He was watching Max through wide bloodshot eyes. He shifted onto his side with a scream and started to crawl and pull away towards the grass verge.
‘Oh, no, no,’ said Max. He placed the rock down on the road, and grabbed one of the man’s legs and dragged him back.
‘Please no! NO, NOOOO!’ shouted the man, and he vomited blood.
Max pulled out a packet of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one; he exhaled and started to go through the man’s wallet, pulling out his driving licence, peering at it.
‘Derek Walton,’ he said, reading. ‘Walton. So they were the Waltons growing up. Wonder if it was a big family? Wonder if they care about him. Probably not.�
� He fished around in the wallet. ‘No money though, and he’s got a card to say he’s diabetic.’ He put the cards back in and stuffed the wallet in his pocket. Nina was rooted to the spot. The man had pulled himself a few feet away from them again. Max went over and pressed his heel into the ankle on the same leg that the hip bone was poking out. The man howled.
‘Max, Stop this!’
‘Nina. He’s a maggot, a pathetic little maggot. You’re just watching him. And you’ve sat there and listened and agreed with me all this time, about how the world works. You’ve agreed to live a life free of rules and bowing and scraping. You need to prove to me that you want to live a life by my rules. Put this man out of his misery. Think of it as a test.’
He held the rock out to her and pressed his heel down harder. The man gave another gurgling wail.
No, Max, no… Please. You have to see that the world is a good place. I agree with what you say, but there is light and dark. There has to be. I love you, you know that.’
‘Do you? Is there an “us” or do you just humour me? I can find someone else, some other girl who wants to be with me…’
‘Please, Max,’ she whimpered, but he fixed her with those caramel eyes burning with orange and pushed the rock into her hands.
‘It can be over in a second, and you’ll be helping him, Nina. You’ll be shining some light into the darkness. If I’d hit a deer, you wouldn’t think twice about putting it out of its misery. You’ll be his saviour. He wanted to die, Nina; he wanted to end it all. And the longer you wait, the longer you keep him in misery and despair.’
Nina took the rock. It was heavy and smooth in her hand. Cool and smooth. She looked down at the man reaching out towards the edge of the road, his head turned to her, wincing, eyes full of fear and face smeared with blood.
‘Max, I…’
‘Go for the face, bridge of the nose, hold it high and bring it down fast,’ said Max insistently. He came to her and smoothed the hair away from her face. ‘You can only talk the talk for so long. You can’t just be a spectator, Nina. I killed Dean to protect you, and you accepted that. You accepted that the rules don’t apply to us. I took a risk for you. I risked my life. Do you believe that?’
‘I do believe that.’
‘Good, then look at this. I had a drink earlier. If we call the ambulance, the police will come. I’ll be tested. They’ll look at how much booze I have in my blood; they can see if I was speeding, which I was. This man stepped out of nowhere and used us to end his life. Or he tried. You can save him and you can save me, Nina.’ Nina was now crying and the man was frantically trying to pull his leg free from Max’s foot. ‘Do this, Nina. Do it now. As an act of compassion, and humanity. An act of love. Step up. Be with me for ever.’ He pulled Nina down to her knees beside the wailing man with eyes wide open, and he turned the rock over in her hands. ‘Lift it high and bring it down fast. Here we have a maggot who knows what he is, and has tried to end it. Don’t take that from him, Nina. Be a good person, stand high with me. Above the petty rules. End him. END HIM!’
Nina suddenly cracked and raised the rock high in the air. She brought it down on the man’s face with a crunch. She lifted it again, a wail bursting from her mouth, and hit his head with a wet thud. The man was still. Max lifted his foot away and stepped back.
‘Look at him, Nina. Look how you saved him,’ he said.
As Nina looked down at the man’s ruined face, the moon sailed out from the clouds and made the blood black. He took the rock from her shaking hands.
‘Go back to the car,’ he said softly.
Nina stumbled back along the road and stopped to throw up on the grass verge. She wiped her mouth with her sleeve and climbed into the car. She put the heater on and sat shivering for a few minutes. All she could see was her reflection from the interior light. Her face seemed long and grotesque, like she was in the hall of mirrors at a funfair. The door opened a few minutes later and Max was covered in blood. It spattered his T-shirt, his face and arms.
‘What did you do?’ she croaked.
‘I made sure no one will find him. There was an old drainage pipe in the ditch. I pulled him in there.’
He led her out of the car and around to the boot. There was a large bottle of water, and he heaved it out, stripping off his T-shirt. Something in Nina took over and she held the bottle high and poured the water all over him as he washed the blood away. He shook his long wet hair and grinned. Then he took the bottle and washed her face, so tenderly. She took off her bloody T-shirt and he poured the water over her body.
‘I baptise you,’ he said with a smile.
They found a towel and change of clothes in their bags. When they were back in the car, Nina had an odd, disturbing feeling. It was a rush, a high. She had proved herself. Proved to Max who she was, and that she was his. He looked across at her and smiled.
‘I love you even more now,’ he said. He started the engine, and they drove away.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Saturday, 7 October 2017
Erika knew she was dreaming; this was the first time she’d been aware of being inside a dream…
She was back in her home town in Slovakia, and it was late on a summer day. The heat had lost its fierceness, and the sun was setting in her direct line of vision. She brought a hand up to her face, shielding her eyes from the golden light, and she saw a young girl a little way ahead of her, running across a huge expanse of concrete. The girl stopped and turned back, smiling. She wasn’t more than eleven or twelve. She was barefoot, and wore a thin blue summer dress, covered in mud and grass stains from playing. Her long blonde hair was in a long plait, and she had strong, pretty features. At first Erika thought it was her sister, Lenka, or her niece, Karolina, but it was another girl, a young girl she had seen often over the years in her imagination. Erika’s body was aching, her face felt swollen, but when she put her hands up to feel her skin, it was smooth and youthful. Her blonde hair was long and tied at the nape of her neck.
The girl smiled and beckoned for Erika to catch up with her, then turned her head and started running. The sun dipped down behind a large building opposite and Erika could now see that they were on the wide flat roof of the theatre in town. The girl reached the edge of the roof and sat with her bare feet dangling down. Below was the town square, paved in a mosaic of grey and white stone, and in the centre, a group of children played by a fountain. Handsome buildings lined the edges of the square and, painted in pastel, blues, greens and pinks, looked almost edible, like sumptuous icing. Erika and Lenka had often played on the roof of this theatre, and it had been a building site for most of their early years. She reached the edge of the roof and reached out to touch the girl’s hair, which sparkled in the sunlight.
‘Watch me jump, Mum,’ said the girl.
‘No!’ started Erika, but the girl gripped the edge and pushed herself off, hurtling towards the square below, arms and feet flailing, hair flowing out.
Erika moved forward and peered over the edge; the drop was a dizzying eighty feet, but there was no little girl lying broken on the mosaic stones in the square. There was just the sound of laughter as the children played below and the gentle spatter of the water in the fountain. She searched the square and found the girl paddling in the fountain, unhurt, and waving up at her.
‘Mum… she called me Mum,’ said Erika. She knew it was a dream but the words felt real in her mouth. She could smell the summer air, and the little girl, the way she smiled, it was the combination of Mark’s face, and hers.
It was the baby, the girl she had decided not to keep, and even though she knew she would wake up soon, she just had to see her; she had so much to say to her. The golden light blurred as her eyes filled with tears, and a terrible sob worked its way up from her chest. Erika hurried to a doorway to the side of the roof. She wanted to say sorry and hold the girl. She hurried down the bare concrete stairs inside; the half-built theatre was just as she remembered growing up, playing in the concrete building sit
e.
When she emerged out into the square it was winter. There was a foot of snow covering the ground, and the Christmas market was in full swing. Erika looked back. The theatre was now complete with glass in the windows and a poster for the Christmas show. She turned back to the fountain and saw it was now covered over with wooden boards, and a nativity scene, and beside it was a huge Christmas tree. The little girl was dressed in a bright red winter coat, standing by the nativity scene. A group of people moved in front of Erika blocking her view, and she pushed through them,
‘I’m here! Mum’s here!’ she shouted, but her voice couldn’t carry across the noise and crowds. A Christmas carol was playing, ‘In the Bleak Midwinter’. The crowd parted just a little, and Erika saw the girl again, looking around lost. Erika pushed her way through the people laughing and drinking mulled wine and approached the nativity scene. The girl now had her back to Erika, and the hood was up on her red coat.
‘It’s okay, I’m here, Mum’s here,’ said Erika, but as she put her arms around the girl, the coat crumpled. There was nothing inside. Erika gripped it harder, but all she had in her hands was an empty red coat. She put the material close to her face, and breathed in, but all she smelt was antiseptic. Everything began to fade. The square, the Christmas market, the music and the smell of hot food, and it was replaced by a cold numbness.
Erika opened her eyes and the inside of a hospital cubicle came into focus. She didn’t feel pain, and she was lying on a soft bed, almost floating. Her vision sharpened and the soundtrack of the A & E filled the air: feet moving past; the low murmur of voices; the swish of a curtain; pills rattling in a tray. She lay for a few minutes, breathing, tears flowing, aware that she had been dreaming, but shocked at what her subconscious had inflicted on her.
The curtain opened and a tiny doctor came in. The woman can’t have been more than four feet tall and she looked washed-out, with grey hair and a stern face. The only colourful thing about her was the hot pink stethoscope around her neck.
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