Kill All Enemies

by Melvin Burgess

  I came to a halt next to them.

  ‘There, love,’ I said. ‘There, love. We’re all here, aren’t we?’ She looked at me over his shoulder, and she tried to smile. Then Barbara came huffing up behind, her and Dan, and they ground to a halt too. There we stood, all four of us, watching Billie cry. In a moment she pushed Rob away. She came over to me and gave me a kiss. Then she went to Barbara and put her arms round her and just stood there hugging her.

  Barbara looked astonished. She held her tight. ‘You’re coming home, Billie, right now,’ she said firmly. Billie nodded. Barbara glanced at me, and I nodded, and she led her off, still crying. I watched after her. And – I was a little hurt, if I’m to be honest. There I was waiting for her, and it was Rob and Barbara she turned to. But – she’d done it, hadn’t she? She’d let them in. She wasn’t even trying to hide those tears. Barbara will take care of her. And Rob – well, he was so far from her usual crowd, he might have been another species. He was a nice lad. Since when did Billie end up crying on the shoulder of a nice lad?

  She was learning.

  There now, I thought. Maybe we’re getting there after all.

  Rob

  So I’m walking home and I’m thinking, Life cannot get any better than this. I have everything I ever wanted. I actually had the courage to ask Billie to go out with me. I don’t think she’s going to say yes. But you never know. At least I tried.

  And then I get to the door. And I remember.

  It’s been two weeks since I came back from Mum’s. I was certain he was going to go yesterday, but it turned out the car had been up for its MOT. It’d been given the all-clear in the afternoon. Today was Sunday. He’d be thinking how she’d be at home, most like. He’d go today, surely.

  Yeah. Today. It has to be.

  I touched the bonnet of the car. I do that every day I come home.

  It was warm.

  It was all quiet in the house. Philip was in the kitchen cooking something. The door was open. He nodded as I went past.

  ‘All right, Rob?’ he said.

  ‘OK,’ I said. And I thought, It’s cool! He’s not gone. Wow. I felt good again. I went upstairs. Davey was in. I could hear music coming out of his room.

  ‘All right, Davey,’ I shouted. I went into my room and put the computer on and waited for it to start up. I was thinking that Philip was a bit odd down there. I don’t know, something about the way he looked at me.

  The computer got going. I stood up and I went to Davey’s room.

  ‘Davey?’ I called – not too loud in case Philip heard. ‘Davey? You OK?’ He still didn’t answer. I rattled the doorknob, but he’d locked it. ‘What’s going on?’ I called, although there was no reason to think anything was going on. He often locks the door.

  Philip turned up at the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘Leave the lad alone, you big monkey. He’s tired,’ he said. So I went back into my room and faffed around a bit. But then I crept back out and tried his door again.

  ‘Davey,’ I called softly.

  ‘What?’ he said, and his voice was a bit off, you know what I mean, a bit off?

  ‘Let me in,’ I said.

  ‘Go away,’ he said.

  And I thought, for no reason, I’m not having this.

  So I turned the doorknob and I leaned very quietly, but with all my weight, against the door. It was only a little bolt and it just gave. I could hear the screws pull out. Davey was lying on the bed with his face away from me.

  ‘Davey?’ I said, and I went over to him and grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him, and I could see at once that some bastard had hit him. The whole side of his face was bright red. Then we had this tussle where I was pulling at him to get a look, going, ‘Let me see, let me see,’ and he was pulling away and trying to hide it, going, ‘Leave me alone, leave me alone.’ Some bullying bastard had really done a job on him – his eye was out here and his face was red and he’d been crying.

  I was steaming.

  ‘Who did this?’ I said. ‘Who was it, who did this to you? Was it Riley? Who did it?’

  And he was going, ‘Leave me alone, leave me alone, stop it, stop it,’ and cracking up and crying as he spoke. And then suddenly he turned round, and I could see the full thing then – bloody nose, fat lip, black eye, bright red skin – and he hissed it right in my face.

  ‘Why are you asking me that? You know who did it! You know who did it. You bloody know!’

  He turned away and started crying proper then. I went back into my room. I sat down and played on the PC for a bit – I don’t know how long, maybe a few minutes, maybe longer. Then I got up suddenly and I ran downstairs. I ran down, before I had time to think. Before I had time to bottle out.

  Philip knew. He came out into the hall and he had his belt folded double in his hand.

  ‘Think you’re ready for it, do you, then?’ he said.

  ‘I think I am,’ I said. I went for him, but he stopped me in my tracks with that belt – whack! – right round the face. God, it stung. He got a couple of blows in with the belt while I was stunned, but I pushed in close, shoved him backwards and swung at him, a big old round swing. He stepped round me, but the hall wasn’t wide enough and I caught him on the side of the face, a deflected blow. It was my first hit. He put his hand to his jaw and smiled and shook his head.

  ‘Is that it?’ he said. ‘Is that all you have?’

  I got another one in; he got one in on my nose. My eyes were watering so much I couldn’t see much. I got a good one on him in the stomach; I could hear the air go out of him. He threw the belt away then, when he knew it was fists or nowt. We tussled up and down the hallway and then he tripped up and staggered and I got a good one, right on the side of his neck. Down he went, down on to the hallway carpet. And you know what I did then? Do you want to know?

  I kicked that fucker all the way up the hallway to the front door. He kept trying to get up, but I just took his legs from under him every time and started again. Bang, bang bang, all the way up the hall to the door.

  ‘Stop, stop,’ he started going. But I didn’t. Eventually I had him up against the front door and I still didn’t stop. I just carried on until I heard Davey behind me calling.

  ‘That’s enough, Rob,’ he yelled. ‘It’s enough.’

  I stopped. I stood there panting.

  ‘Do you want a go?’ I asked Davey, but he shook his head.

  I turned to Philip, down there on the floor. I was on a roll. Everything was getting better and better. Nothing could stop me. Now this. The hardest thing. I’d done it. I’d broken him and his shit spell and I was finally turning back into myself.

  I still had my coat on. There was something heavy in my pocket. I patted it and there it was – Billie’s knife. I took it out. I looked at it in my hand and I thought, I could end this now. I could stop it forever – for Mum and for Davey and for me. He was already moving to get up, but he stopped when he saw the knife. He looked at it and then he looked at me and I looked back. He was going to get up. I could stop him. If you do that to someone, if you stab them, they’re going to be scared of you forever.

  There was a long pause. Philip was panting, looking up at me. And then – then he smiled.

  ‘You haven’t got the guts, have you?’ he said.

  ‘You’d love that, wouldn’t you?’ I said. I didn’t know what I was going to say; it just came out. ‘If I did that, you’d have won, because then I’d be just like you. But you haven’t, and I’m not. So why don’t you just fuck off out and get on with your miserable, sad, bullying little life, before I kick your sorry arse through that door.’ I turned round to Davey, who was standing on the stairs.

  ‘Right, Davey?’ I said.

  ‘Right, Rob,’ he said.

  I turned round and walked off. I said, ‘Twat,’ over my shoulder – just so he knew. I went upstairs back to my room.

  Way to
go, Robbie, I said to myself. And then – then I got on with my homework.

  Chris

  It was science. Wikes. For once in my life, I was early for class. I was waiting outside the classroom near the window by the fire extinguisher. No one knew it yet, but this was going to be my last day at school.

  We had our first gig the other day. Kill All Enemies – Full Speed to Hell. I put out loads of leaflets, but hardly any of mine turned up. It was embarrassing. Alex came, skulked about a bit, then left.

  ‘Didn’t you like it?’ I texted him.

  ‘Like doesn’t even come into it,’ he said. And ever since then I’ve been some kind of pariah. I’ve joined another club. Or, more like, I’ve joined another species. I’ve known these people since primary school and all I had to do was change my musical tastes, grow my hair, put on a leather jacket and – bingo! – there they’re not.

  And it was a great gig. Billie came in with her death growl. Her and Frankie on vocals – what a team! I don’t know if she’ll stay, but fingers crossed. I was on stage for the last number, joining in on vocals. I can’t sing, but the guys insisted.

  ‘Shoulder to shoulder. Brothers,’ said Frankie.

  All their mates were there – forty or fifty of them. And about three of mine. New mates, new life. The eBay shop is trading again. I have the band. Things are definitely looking up. Except for one thing …

  School. No time, no inclination – no go. I thought my parents were on the verge of giving it up, but would you believe it, they’d actually found another way in – with the help of sneaky Hannah. Dyslexia. Apparently the previous tests I did were all wrong.

  I wasn’t surprised. Reading and writing have always been a pain in the neck for me. I sit there and sweat at it, while everyone else just sails away. The trouble is they were four years too late.

  They had it all worked out, of course. The school was onside. They’d found a specialist for me to go to. Oh, there were plenty of apologies. They’d let me down, the school had let me down – but the end result was just the same as before. Work. Work, work and more work.

  I didn’t say anything. Why bother? I’d heard it all before. I knew exactly how to foil their foolish plans before they even got off the ground. It was going to take some balls, that’s all. I might have trouble writing stuff, but balls – I have them in plenty.

  From where I stood by the window, I could see the box of coloured pens sitting on Wikes’s desk, waiting to be put to work destroying young minds. Alex and Mickey and a couple of the others looked at me curiously as they walked past into the classroom – all trotting in willingly, like lambs to the slaughter. Me? I had the means of my deliverance right there, hanging next to me on the wall by the window.

  I didn’t have long to wait. Wikes came round the corner into the corridor – and – great! He had the dep head with him. Perfect.

  I was going to go out in a blaze of glory.

  I waited until they got good and close. I didn’t want to blow it by letting them get away. I gave them a little smile as they approached. I felt shy now it came down to it. I mean, they had no idea what it was about. Neither did I, really, except I knew it was for Rob and for Frankie and for Billie and for me too, and for anyone else who has to spend years and years and years having to do stuff they hate, just because no one has the imagination to let you find something else to do. I hoiked the fire extinguisher out of its cradle when they were about four metres away. They stopped in their tracks.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing, Trent?’ barked Wikes. The dep head just ogled me, like he couldn’t believe it.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘But yes,’ I said. I lifted it up, pulled out the pin and …

  There was nowhere to hide. They turned and ran so I had to chase them up the corridor, just so they knew there was no mistake. It was them I was after. I got ’em good. I got ’em so good, they started slithering around on the foamy goo and ended up on their bums, nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, covered in white foam like a pair of penguins in batter. I emptied the extinguisher and then I swung it round and chucked it through the window. Crash! I love the sound of breaking glass. Then I turned round and I walked out of that useless dump forever.

  Acknowledgements

  The idea behind this book was what you might call ‘found fiction’ – starting with real people and the real stories behind them. Since those first interviews, of course, the whole thing has been changed … characters have been developed and merged, others invented, situations removed, blown up, turned around … in short, it has been fictionalized. But I hope that many of the people I spoke to when I was putting the book together can find traces of themselves in these pages.

  As a result, there are a great many people to thank. I had a major advantage writing this one, as the project was first commissioned by Channel Four, with a view to making TV out of it. Lime Pictures, the production company, provided a researcher to help me, which made a huge difference to the collection of material. My thanks then to C4 for the original commission, even if it got no further than script stage, and especially to Tony Wood who sold the idea to them in the first place. Also to Tim Compton who script-edited the early stages, and most especially to Natalie Grant, the researcher, who helped so much in the early stages. I wonder how many of them you recognize, Nat?

  A big thank-you to Kaye Tew from MMU, the first person I spoke to, and her son, Callum.

  I talked to a great many people at PRUs, care homes and other organizations around the North West. Organizations of this kind vary enormously in this country, but along with a few grim ones I came across some wonderful places, staffed by people who were truly inspirational. I’m thinking of Karen and Jenny in Didsbury, Lisa and Joelle in the Wirral. Also Rob Loach in Harrogate and everyone in the wonderful PRU in Blackburn. Fresh fruit in every room and flowers in the corridor – so much that I much admired.

  As for the young people I spoke to, and who impressed me so much – special thanks to Jamie, Jamie, Matt and Jay from Kill All Enemies for spending so much time telling me their stories – and not least for letting me pinch the name of their band for my book. These guys turned themselves into kind and generous people by sheer strength of mind – and through music. And of course, special thanks to Bobby-Joe – a true warrior and an inspiration to many people.

  There are a great many more – I could go on for pages. If you’re not here it’s for one reason only; among so many wonderful stories, from staff and students alike, you can’t use them all in just one book. I could write three more and not repeat myself once.

  I’d like to thank all the people who helped with the actual manuscript: Mary Byre for her excellent suggestions, and all the good folk at Puffin – Sarah, my editor, and Wendy Tse and Samantha Mackintosh for their work on timelines and for getting the words in the right order.

  Finally, many, many thanks to Anita, my partner, who spent days and days reading and re-reading the book, editing, advising and coming up with some marvellous ideas when I was going word-blind. She was tireless, ruthless and uncompromising, and Kill All Enemies wouldn’t be half the book it is without her.

  Thanks to you all – I hope you like the book.

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)

  Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, R
osedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  penguin.com

  First published 2011

  Cover Photograph © Leila Culter / Alamy

  Text copyright © Melvin Burgess, 2011

  All rights reserved

  ‘Duality’ words and music by Craig Jones, Sid Wilson, Chris Fehn, Mickael Thomson, Michael Crahan, Nathan Jordison, Paul Gray, James Root and Corey Taylor © 2004. Reproduced by permission of EMI Music Publishing Ltd, London W8 5SW

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Typeset by Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Falkirk, Stirlingshire

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

  ISBN: 978-0-141-96751-6