‘Are you sure?’
‘That’s what I was going to ask you.’
He tutted impatiently. ‘What did you say to her?’
‘Nothing; when we came back from the safe house, she said she wanted some time to think.’
‘And ...?’
‘She’s been up to my house, and she’s stolen something from me.’
‘Stolen? Stolen what?’
‘My notes.’
‘What notes? Oh, you mean ...’ He sat down. ‘Well, does it matter?’
‘It does to me,’ I growled.
‘What I mean is, they’re all in Braille. She can’t read Braille.’
‘These are not in Braille. They’re in standard text.’
‘Oh!’
‘I’m sending Bràithreachas out to look for her. She’s not safe on her own. If anyone were to ...’
‘Oh my God!’
I felt angry and betrayed. I had never wanted her to see into my mind. I had wanted to protect that dark side of my life from her. I didn’t want her to read my ramblings. They were private thoughts to help me live through my nights, written purely to contain my depression. I had passed them to a few people to help win them to our cause. She was never meant to read them. I was distraught at the thought of her seeing into my darkness, but I was more distraught that she might be in danger.
I sent the Brotherhood to look for her. They soon found her. It was easy; she was on her way home anyway. She gave me back my notes. I took them from her and said nothing. If she wanted to punish me for not speaking to her or telling her the truth, she had done so and she knew it. She was ashamed. At least she had the grace to leave me alone after that.
***********************
It was just a few days later and I was down in a club some twenty miles from home. The boys were playing and the place was full. I swung into the bar and looked around me. I gasped; the place was full of the Brotherhood. This was close to my home town and they had come. Eyes turned towards me as I stood awkwardly on my crutches. I noticed, for the first time, the way most of them were dressed. Andrew came up to me grinning. ‘We didn’t invite them,’ he said. ‘They just turned up.’
I was still staring. ‘What the fuck are they wearing round their arms?’ I said.
His grin widened. ‘Matrix Bands,’ he said.
‘You’ve got to be kidding!’
‘Their tribute to you, it’s the latest fashion statement. Apparently, there are people wearing these in the streets and they don’t even know why – a bit of a joke really for those of us in the know.’ He seemed very pleased with himself.
‘Very funny,’ I said wryly, and grabbed his wrists. ‘I see you’re not wearing them.’
He blushed. ‘Oh, no, sorry ...’
‘Andrew, I’m joking.’
‘Even so ...’ He suddenly seemed unsure of himself. ‘Well, it’s really for the young people, I suppose.’ He wandered off.
I shook my head and made my way to the bar. It took some time. People kept stopping me, to smile, to speak, ask my advice or seek reassurance. They thumped their chests with their fists and touched my hand with their lips in what had become known as the Matrix Salute. Some were discards. They wore their bands with pride. They had earned them, after all. They too had scars to hide. The bands all looked different, made from different material and decorated differently; some came right up to the elbows, others simply covered the wrists. It was a bizarre experience. I felt I was in the centre of somebody else’s dream.
I reached the bar as people stretched out to touch me. Sonia was behind the bar; that brought me back to reality with a queasy bump. She came across to me, uncertain. ‘A whisky,’ I said, ‘and could you make it a large one?’
She poured me my drink; people seemed to melt away.
‘David, I just wanted to say ...’
‘Thank you,’ I said, holding up the glass. ‘I expect I’ll want a few more.’
‘David, please.’
‘You stole something from me,’ I said, ‘something precious.’
‘But ...’
‘You stole my memories.’ She stared at me. ‘Everyone has a story to tell,’ I said. ‘But it’s a gift. It was my gift to give, not yours to take.’
‘I did worse than that,’ she said through her tears.
‘What could be worse?’
‘I gave your story – your memories – to your brother to read.’
That’s where she’d gone. She’d gone to the most significant part of my life, the most vital, a sacred place – and she had made it dirty. ‘I will never forgive you for this,’ I said, and I walked away.
I didn’t speak to her again, and I didn’t stay longer than I had to. As soon as the music was finished and my people had spoken to me, I left.
**********************
I sat on my rock with Hades for company. He crouched next to me, my silent companion. I’d always called it my rock; it had been a friend when I’d been low or in despair, when I’d craved the needle or when the memories of Spider and Amos threatened to overwhelm me. It was a refuge and a reminder. It reminded me of my loneliness.
I could see the lochs stretched out before me. Even at night, when all was gloom and darkness, I knew they were there. I knew that the shadows that had once surrounded me had now moved down into the lochs and were being swallowed up by their deep mystery. The shadows had thought they were safe; they were wrong; just like everything else, they were taken and consumed into a dim, murky twilight.
The night was dark, in the way it can only ever be away from big city lights. It was a wonderful night in the Highlands, a night of stars, with thin drifts of grey cloud and an icy cold moon, bright and hazy in its coldness. It was October and freezing cold. I had no idea what time it was – the early hours of the morning I guess. I was so cold I could hardly breathe, hardly feel my flesh or my bones. My lips felt stretched and dry, and my eyes watered.
Then, a thick woollen blanket was thrown over my shoulders; a flask of whisky was placed in one hand and a cigarette in the other. I looked down at the cigarette. ‘You’ve lit it?’
‘Yep.’
‘It’s been in your mouth.’
‘Move over, Matrix.’ Angus shuffled up onto my rock next to me. We shared the cigarette and whisky in silence. ‘Okay, so she shouldn’t have done it.’
I said nothing.
‘No need to crucify her for it. She’s doing that already for herself.’
‘Oh, I haven’t even started yet,’ I said darkly. ‘I happen to be an expert in torture. She should know. She’s read my notes.’
He was silent for a while. ‘When women fall in love, they can do strange things – and you haven’t exactly been open with her.’ He waited for me to speak. I said nothing. ‘I know a lot about women,’ he observed.
I glanced across at him. He probably did. A lot of women would go for his ice-cold looks. They must have had a shock when they found not ice but fire instead.
‘Unlike Hamish,’ he said. ‘When he was free, he was very popular, but now ... now he’s sitting there waiting to grow old, watching his youth fade in a prison cell.’ He sighed. ‘If he survives, if they ever let him out, he’ll be an old lag. His single understanding will be of prison.’ He stared into the night sky wistfully. ‘But I’ll be here for him, at least.’
I wondered where this was leading; knowing Angus, it was leading somewhere.
‘The fact is,’ he continued, ‘he’s like me. He’s not a man for words. He needs someone to speak for him, to be his witness. There are many like him; some are dead. We should know; we’ve held them in our arms as they died. Some live still but can never speak out. Not the way you can.’ He looked at me with those cold blue eyes. ‘You can make a difference with what you’ve written.’
‘They’re my thoughts,’ I said angrily. ‘I share them when, how and with people of my choosing. I’ve used them to win people over to our cause, to convince them to help us. They’ve served a purpose. They
weren’t written for common knowledge.’
‘Except, they were.’ He jumped to his feet and stood opposite me. ‘You saw those people in the bar tonight. You saw what you mean to them already – and we’ve hardly begun. You’re their inspiration now, and you’ll continue to be so for the future, perhaps for ever. Matrix is bigger than you, he’s a god, and his voice should be heard.’ He paused for a moment. ‘His voice must be heard,’ he said.
I stared aghast.
That was when I finally understood.
There were three people: the old me, the one they had destroyed; there was David, broken, bruised, sad, lonely and uncertain; and there was Matrix, a God, a leader of men, a terrorist, a saviour, the Dream Catcher.
Angus was watching me. I’m sure he knew what I was thinking. He smiled. ‘I’m lucky to know at least two of you.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Sonia simply needed to know the third you, the one you keep closest to your heart, the real you. You canna blame the lass for that.’
He moved back close. ‘Matrix may be invincible but, my guess is, it’s David who needs something warm in his bed at night.’ He held out his hand and helped me down off my rock. I leaned on him all the way home. I was slightly drunk, very tired, dispirited and chilled to the bone.
He stopped at my front door. ‘Do you need a bed?’ I asked.
He often slept over, especially since the arrival of the baby. He shook his head and walked away into the night. I went inside alone. The house was silent and full of shadows. I walked over to my window overlooking the lochs, and I stood gazing out. I loved this view. The lochs spread out before me in all their dark mystery. Except it wasn’t dark; it was full of stars.
‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ said a voice beside me.
I was crying. ‘Yes,’ I whispered.
Sonia took my arm and led me to my bed. She unstrapped my leg. I remember thinking, how bloody unromantic is that? Taking a man’s leg apart.
She undressed me. I flinched at her touch, but it didn’t stop her. Soon I was completely naked and shivering. She pushed me down onto the bed and covered me. I looked up at her. Slowly she took off her own clothes until she too was naked, and then she lay next to me. I lay on my back. She curled up in a ball on her side, tucked into me; she fitted perfectly.
‘I love you,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve always loved you. I always will love you. You are the most beautiful man I’ve ever met.’
I gazed up at the ceiling. ‘You haven’t always thought that,’ I couldn’t resist saying.
‘I haven’t always been clear-sighted, clever or understanding,’ she replied.
‘True.’ I turned over onto my side with a groan so that I could look at her. I meant to tell her how beautiful she looked lying in my bed; instead, I said, ‘That hurt!’
She smiled softly. ‘Which bit shall I rub better?’
I turned over onto my back again. ‘None of me; just keep me warm. I want to sleep.’ And that is exactly what I did do. I slept. And there were no nightmares.
It was wonderful.
***********************
So, my first night with Sonia was not one of passionate lovemaking. I’m not going to give all my secrets away, now am I?
All I can say is that Sonia moved in with me shortly after, and Fraser Drummond finally realised he had lost her to the Devil’s Child. He never forgave me. Often after that I would be out in the village and, all of a sudden, I would feel a chill run down my back. I would turn to find Drummond there, watching me with those dead, grey eyes of his. He never said anything, but I knew that he hated me. I felt it. I understood it. I had taken from him the one thing that had stirred his cold heart, and he would never forgive me.
The night that Sonia came to me was the night I made the decision to publish some of my notes one day – not all of them; some of them I could never share; some of them exposed me too much.
It was an important decision. Angus was right. I had to speak out. When wild deeds and history had passed, the truth needed to live on. My people deserved it; they deserved that much.
Chapter 68
Elijah came to stay soon after. True to form, my brother had to find out. Reading my notes wasn’t enough; he needed to understand more. So he decided to pay Amos and Spider a visit, and he took some people with him, including my best friends Phaedo and Crusoe.
***********************
In the early hours of an October morning, I heard banging on my front door. It took me a while to get out of bed and down there. I opened the door to find the three of them, pale and anguished, holding a body in their arms. I turned to Sonia. ‘Get the doctor,’ I said. ‘Tell him to bring suptex.’
I turned to my brother. ‘How much did you pay for him?’
‘Don’t ask.’
‘Great. You’ve made a handsome contribution to Fabian.’
‘We couldn’t just leave him there!’
‘Bring him in.’
We undressed him. He was barely conscious, and his body was a mess. It looked like mine. Spider had been practising his gruesome artwork on it. I remember thinking how unimaginative people could be. Elijah had the same tattoos, burns, cuts, even bruises, as I had. At least he had kept both his nipples. Such strange thoughts passed through my mind as I undressed and bathed him. Elijah, however, was also very different to me. I could tell straight away that Paula had not been one of his clients. He had at least been spared that. He didn’t bear the distinctive marks from Paula that my body had. He wasn’t blind either, but he was missing both his legs from the knees down.
Andrew was prompt. He took one look at him lying there and said, ‘Oh, dear God, not again.’ He had recognised Spider’s handiwork too.
Elijah went through his hell, and I stayed with him. I was sitting at his bedside, when he turned his head, opened his eyes and saw properly for the first time. His whole body shook with fear at the sight of me. The first thing he saw was the Fabian mark on my neck. Then he saw my strange, yellow eyes and web tattoo. I would have been a bit of a shock.
I leaned forward. ‘It’s okay, my friend,’ I said. ‘You’re safe.’ He stared at me. I touched my neck. ‘I’ve been to the same place as you; Amos did that,’ I touched my cheek, ‘and that. The eyes are my father’s fault. I can blame no one but genetics for that.’ Elijah stared at me for a moment longer, and then he smiled.
The human spirit is pretty amazing.
***********************
We could have sent Elijah down to one of the safe houses – and part of me felt that this was the best place for him – but I had a surge of irrational selfishness. He had been to the same hell as me. He felt like a brother. We had all been to hell of course, every last discard, but Elijah’s was mine. His rescuers felt the same. They didn’t want to let him go. They stood in my living area ready to fight me for him.
My brother was an impetuous man. ‘We never found you,’ he said. ‘When I saw him in that room, in that squalor, at the mercy of those bastards, it was you lying there. I swear I saw you there. I never found you. I never even knew. I wasn’t there for you when you needed me most. I broke my last promise to our father. I promised him you would never come to harm. I’ll probably burn in hell for my failure, but at least I know what it looks like now.’
‘He can stay,’ I agreed, ‘but there’ll come a time when this house will no longer be safe, and then he must leave.’
‘That’ll be the time when he comes to our house,’ said my brother.
And so it was agreed; Elijah stayed. We found him a wheelchair. He moved into my bedroom downstairs. He became known and loved throughout the village, and I taught him to deaf sign since Amos had ruined his mouth with the lock.
To be fair to him, I did tell him about the safe houses. I did give him the option to go and live with others like us, but he chose to stay, and the Brotherhood gained an extra pair of hands.
We needed it.
Things were moving fast.
Chapter 69
It wa
s one of those large ultra-modern cafés that sat on the highway hoping to pick up the trade of passing motorists. There were too many items on the menu for them to do anything really well. It relied on a deep freezer, packets and tins. It needed to be quick to satisfy the traveller in a hurry, and so it sacrificed freshness. It was one of many.
This café called itself The Green Giant. It was large, sprawling, ugly and painted green, and it sat in an ideal position for anyone travelling north from the Midlands. It should have satisfied the appetites of travelling families – it was cheap and cheerful, and there was a small playground to the side – except for one thing: its dominant client group had claimed it completely. Even if they weren’t hanging around drinking, eating, swearing, smoking and urinating against the walls, they were on their way in order to do so.
The roar of the motorbike, the burst of exhaust and the black leather and helmets of bikers – young and old – were The Green Giant’s trademark.
The original owners had not wanted the bikers as their customers. They watched in despair as the bikes slowly took over, pushing the ‘normal’ travellers away. They watched as broad men swaggered into their pristine interior, put their feet up on the tables, took knives to the woodwork and swore at the staff. They learned words they never knew existed before, and they watched in fascinated horror as their tidy life became an oily mess. Flowerbeds were trampled on, the children’s swings were used as weapons and the motorbikes and various spare parts spread grease and oil all over their brand new car park.
They sold up. They sold the place for a fraction of what they had originally paid for it to a couple who were dedicated followers of Satan. The Green Giant never looked back.
The roar of the motorbike defined the Green Giant, and it was a wonderful recruiting ground for Matrix. We found it and many others like it.
I remember the day we arrived. Our van pulled in. We were the only four-wheel vehicle in the whole place. Bikers stood around outside drinking, smoking and eating huge sandwiches or pies. They were leaning against dirty walls, sitting on upturned boxes or sprawled on their bikes. They were disorderly, defiant, dirty, and they smelt of sweat and leather. The doors of the café were wedged open with more bikers, male and female, young and old, from the different biking gangs. Sometimes there were fights between them, but usually they just ignored each other. The Green Giant and cafés like it were considered neutral territory.
The Dream Catcher Diaries Page 43
