by Mark Ayre
He wondered about Charlie. Thought about Luke, and how he had swept in and taken the boy and wondered. Wondered how far they had got. The police would go looking and probably find him. Yet, in the back of his mind, hidden away, he couldn’t help but see images of himself walking into this village, not long from now, the missing boy in his arms. Saved. James, the hero and Luke, tied up ready for a jail cell.
Yes, of all the images and thoughts that haunted him, this was one he didn’t mind at all.
CHAPTER SEVEN
It is everything the village is not.
A biting winter cold replaces the cool summer breeze, a pelting rain subs in for the clear black skies, and the quiet, natural darkness of the town is displaced by a city full of winter lights, burning like a thousand unquenchable candles, all visible from even this vantage point, down a flight of stairs, almost below a bridge on the manmade stone bank of a river.
Below him, he hears the water coursing, crashing relentlessly from right to left. He looks at it and sees not the blue he expects, but a dirty black, created by the night sky and so much of the city’s waste, dumped without ceremony or apology into the water’s depths.
He steps to the edge of the bank, toes wiggling in his shoes over the black. Above him, the rain continues to fall and with its downpour and the river's never-ending race from somewhere to nowhere he knows he’ll never hear anyone approach. Yet, he never turns.
Why? Hard to say. Maybe he knows what happens next. Perhaps he thinks he deserves it. Part of him probably wants it, for what he’s done. Part of him feels the punishment will be justice.
Whatever the case, he never looks, though his neck strains, wanting to defy him. The survival instinct kicking in and he kicks it right back out again.
He will not look.
For a long time, he stands in that rain, over the water and, eventually, someone comes. A figure in a tight black coat with a too small hood descending the steps with care, worried he might slip and fall if he goes too fast. Knowing to smack his head on the stone could all too easily be fatal.
The care pays off, and the figure in the too small hood makes it to the bottom. He stares at the man who looks into the river, a brick in his hand, clutched tight in a glove that is slick with the rain.
He approaches.
At the river, the man does not hear the approach, but maybe he senses it because his toes curl and his fists clench. The strain in his neck becomes too much, and he begins to turn, begins to speak.
It is already too late. The brick is swinging. The blow halfway struck before the two men make eye contact. Brick meets skull, and the man at the riverside goes down, falling to his knees, hitting the ground like the raindrops and adding blood to the already drenched surface.
Pitching towards the racing water, James sees his face in the black mirror, his hair matted with blood that is running down his forehead and over his eyes. He is dizzy, and losing consciousness, but he feels the boot in his back as he is shoved forward, plummeting off the bank and into the dark water, waiting to grab him with ice hands, and drag him to his -
Woods. None he has seen before but a blend of the village and the city, all those years ago. These trees he knows go on forever. For eternity. He does not know how he knows this, but he does.
Walking. He is moving without any sense of why or where when he hears it. The sound of playing. Of boys being boys.
There is shouting, but no arguments. Only laughter and make-believe as the boys run between the trees that, to them, represent gateways to imaginary worlds.
Still walking. Approaching the laughter. Drawn to it as a bee is drawn to honey. Through the leaves above, the sun breaks, drenching him in laser beams of light every few metres. He might like to stop under one of these and bathe in the sunshine, but he cannot. He is not in control.
A clearing, and he know this space, almost the size of a colosseum, is a perfect circle.
They are playing in the middle of this gladiators arena, running in circles, chasing each other as a dog chases its tail. With no hope of catching, nor any need to.
There are three of them, and he knows each of them although their faces are impossible to make out, as though they have been blurred for a Crimewatch video.
He is looking at his old friend Toby, at the boy Charlie he has never even met, and at a boy he would not recognise now. A boy named James who in some way became the adult that watches and in another ceased to exist long ago. He continued to watch and doesn’t move until it gets nasty.
One second it is invisible guns and sticks for swords, and the next Toby has a brick, much like the weapon of the riverside attacker and one he cannot have found in these woods of magic and possibility.
James tries to shout, but there is no sound here. He runs but gets no closer. He can only watch as the brick is swung and Charlie goes down. There are tears and blood, and then Toby is on Charlie. He is screaming, and the brick is high. He is going to brain the boy, and one James isn’t getting any closer and the other rolls into a ball near the action, unable to help though he knows he should. Crying instead, praying for it to be over. To be better, though no one ever fixed anything by wishing.
Faster and faster big James runs, but to no avail. He can only scream in silence as Toby - with mad, non-human eyes - lifts that brick to its highest point, and brings it down down down and -
“Ah, you’re awake, good. Coffee?”
She didn’t wait for an answer, turning to the machine in the corner and starting it up. From his position by the door, leaning against the frame, he watched her. Staring at the device as though it was technology from another world. Though, it wasn’t just the machine that amazed him.
“Come, sit,” Christina said, turning to see him still standing in the doorway. She withdrew a breakfast bar stool and patted the leather. He looked at this as he had the coffee machine, and she gave him concerned eyes.
“Are you okay? You look rather shaken. You did sleep okay, didn’t you? I know that bed isn’t the comfiest. I’ve been meaning to replace it for years, but you know how it is. Life gets in the way. Please, sit.”
“I slept great, thank you,” he said, approaching the bar but not taking the proffered seat. On the kitchen counter, the machine started making an odd beeping noise. Some form of alien communication, no doubt. “Cops asked me to make a statement first thing.”
“Well, that’s the police for you,” Christina said at the machine. She reached up and grabbed a mug. “But you’re a guest of the Barneses now, and I won’t have you rushing off before you’re ready. Certainly not on an empty stomach. Milk? Sugar?”
“I, uh,” for a moment the simple questions stumped him. “Neither, thanks. Black.”
“Nice and simple. If only my children were so easy to please.”
She spun with grace, taking the mug from one side and placing it on the breakfast bar on the other in one motion. Again she patted the seat, and this time her eyes met his, told him he was getting no choice in the matter. With no desire to have her drag him into place he sat in front of the coffee, clutching it as a child might clutch a safety blanket. The heat felt good against his palm, though he wasn’t cold, and the smell was like an army sent to fight the dregs of his nightmares. Alone they couldn’t beat it, but a sip of the liquid might be the secret weapon to knocking them off for another day. That and the kind words and actions of the woman who still looked upon him with concern.
“What’s on your mind?” she asked, palms on the bar.
He saw flashes of those nightmares from last night and wished they would fade as wholly and reliably as those from his youth. The simple ones of monsters and gremlins and other such nasty but unrealistic things.
Her eyes demanded response, and he could have told her all of this. Wanted to, in a way, but held off. Because there was something about those nightmares that unsettled him. He didn’t want her to think less of him, and he felt it unwise to let her know how badly Charlie’s disappearance had affected him. He fished aroun
d for something else to say, and his eyes caught once again on the coffee machine in the corner.
“I live in the city,” he said. “A city. Always have.”
A pause, consideration.
“Everyone thinks of cities as being huge and villages tiny, but it’s not like that. I mean, there’s more land. So the city itself is technically bigger, but everything else is smaller.
“I grew up in this tiny two bedroom terrace, and all the rooms were cramped and stuffed together, and it’s all like that. The roads are narrower, and the parks are smaller and even the coffee machines. We had this little French Press that made horrible bitty coffee, and you have this machine, and I bet -“ he picked up the cup and sipped. It was hot, but it proved his point. “Yeah, it’s nicer. So much nicer, thank you.
“I’ve always hated the city for boxing me in but this place… you live somewhere like this, and you have all the space in the world.”
He looked past her, out the window into a garden that ran at a slight decline to trees at the bottom, just a small clutch of them. Put all the gardens together in the block where he’d grown up, and they wouldn’t equal this. He saw that and said something he wasn’t expecting.
“I’m house hunting. I want to live in a place like this. I’d love to live in a place like this.”
The words fell out and left embarrassment in their wake. He felt tendrils of it reaching up, touching his cheeks and burning them as the coffee had his lips. He picked the drink up and sipped again, using it as an excuse to dip his head and break eye contact with mother Barnes.
“House hunting,” she repeated, as though tasting the word. “Well, I like the way you describe our little village. All the space in the world. I suppose it is a bit like that, though it’s not quite as idyllic as people make out. We have crime -" an awkward cough, a pause. Then she pulled the emotion under control - "as you've seen. But house hunting is always an exciting time. We bought this place 25 years ago. Mark was a baby and -“ she stopped, a sudden darkness flashed across her expression, then it was gone - “I’m used to stopping there but I suppose you’ve seen the letter, so there’s no point pretending I’ve only one son. We bought it when Mark was a baby and Luke almost two. It was exciting. Stressful, but exciting. The start of a new adventure.”
She wasn’t quite looking at him. Falling into the memories of a time when she had two little boys, both as perfect as each other, and neither would ever let her down. James saw the smile the past generated and was loath to pull her back to the present, but needed to.
“What happens now,” he tried, caution riding his tone. “With Charlie?”
“Nasty business,” she said, taking a swig from her mug. “We should be happy, in a way. He’s with his father. He’s safe. But it hurts more. Opens old wounds. We were hoping never to think about him again. I’ve no doubt that’s why he left the letter. To ensure we continue our punishment.”
James wanted to push on that, but Christina was busying herself, and it was clear she didn’t want to go into detail. Perhaps he would have found the confidence to ask anyway, but she pushed the topic in a different direction.
“Breakfast, what would you like?” she moved to the fridge as she spoke, swinging it open. “I can do you the works. Egg, sausage, bacon, mushroom, beans. Think we even have hash browns.”
“I don’t need anything, honest,” he said. “You’ve done more than enough.”
But she was already pulling eggs and bacon from the fridge and waved a hand in his direction.
“Nonsense. I’m a hostess and to deprive a hostess her chance to put together a nice big breakfast for her guest is bordering on insulting. You look as though you have a healthy appetite. You can have the works, and then, if you’re feeling ready, you can make your statement.”
James managed a thank you and drank more of his coffee. The nightmares had shaken him, and he wasn’t that hungry, but he sensed making breakfast was more for Christina than him. A distraction from missing her son and grandson. If that’s what she needed, he was happy to accommodate. After all, she had been more than kind to him so far.
The smell of frying bacon and sausages filled the air, the scent so good it made him dizzy. Again he was dragged back to mornings from his youth, grainy coffee and the smell of nothing more than stale cereal in the pantry. If they had a full English, it was a special treat, and he’d felt like royalty. Now he let that smell take him away, only being pulled back to the real world when Christina spoke.
“There’s something we need to discuss, and it’s going to be difficult for me.”
His heart lurched. Having known Christina 12 hours, there should have been nothing she could say that would cut him deep, but there was. ‘There’s something we need to talk about’ were trigger words, sparking nerves James was unable to quench with rational thought.
“It’s about last night,” she said to the hob. Her arm rose and fell, and there was a crack as the egg split against the pan, spilling its guts. The sound sent him an image of a brick falling. He clutched his head, tried not to groan as Christina went on.
“I know you saw me, and I can only thank you for not saying anything. Many people would have - or used it even. The fact you’re my son’s age might make me see you as a boy, as I often do him. Mother’s trait, I’m afraid. Not that I’m your mother. I’m getting a little flustered.”
Still, she didn’t turn, although her hands now lay flat by her side, the sizzling in the pan continuing unmolested. She lifted her arms and shifted the sausages and bacon a few seconds before crossing the room to the coffee machine.
“You’re an adult, is what I’m saying,” she continued, bending and opening a cupboard. “So let’s talk like adults about what you saw last night. George and I have discussed it and agreed this is the best line of action. Honesty is the best policy and so on. Do you understand?”
She rose, plate in hand, glancing at him before crossing back to the sizzling pans. She twisted the knobs of the hob, and the flames vanished. As she served, he tried to grasp what she was saying, but even as he replayed the words, he couldn’t work it out.
“I don’t really -“ then he got it, and almost whispered ‘randy teens’ as he did.
He stared at Christina, remembering the green dress she had worn at the party and the way that same dress had flicked behind the dashboard in the horny teen car.
“It was you and George,” he said. Not a question, just working it out and verbalising his thought process. He should have recognised the car, though he hadn’t been thinking about it.
“Well, yes,” Christina said, turning, plate in hand. “Oh, don’t give me that look, I’m embarrassed enough.”
She walked around the bar and placed the plate in front of him. The rising steam carried a delicious smell so strong he was sure it would lift him, carry him away. It was nice enough to distract from the point at hand, and he barely registered Christina’s next words.
“Pardon?” he said, too afraid of losing the conversation to pretend he had heard.
“I said -“ pulling cutlery from the draw, placing a knife and fork on either side of James’ plate. “It’s difficult, for us. For any parents, but especially us. We’re well-respected members of the community, and here we are, sneaking out of our anniversary party to, well, make love in a car. I could die just repeating it and - why are you smiling?”
He hadn’t known he was, so wasn’t quick enough to wipe the look from his face. Found it difficult even when he tried, although she seemed put out by it.
“I think it’s amazing,” he said, then, off her look. “Honestly, I do.”
“Please elaborate,” she said. “For I fail to understand what can be so amazing about two parents in their fifties trying to… you know… in the back of a car. Unless you mean it’s amazing we made it work logistically, and I can tell you, there might be something to that.”
“You’re in love,” he said and, although that was it at its heart, he knew it wasn’t enough. “I mean,
you’ve been married thirty years, and you’re still in love. There’s still enough passion that you want to sneak out like teenagers to get off in a car.
“I know it’s stupid, and maybe weird, but I think that’s the most wonderful thing. My parents couldn’t stay in one room together for more than a minute but you - you’re amazing. I won’t tell anyone, either. Of course, I won’t, if that’s what you’re asking.”
He couldn’t tell if she was annoyed or confused or touched. Then she smiled, and he thought maybe the middle and certainly the latter.
“You’re a sweet boy, James. I know I’ve said that but it’s true.” She smiled and pointed at the meal in front of him. “Now eat your breakfast, and I’ll drive you to the police station. I’ve got a busy day ahead.”
“Will do,” he said, and just managed to stop himself adding ‘mum’ at the end.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“You’ve done enough, you know? You can leave whenever you want.”
Police statement supplied. A repeat of the previous night with the letter added, though George had already been to the station to tell the police about that.
Regardless, he had been kept for an age, and had stumbled down the steps after, drained and ready to drop.
Christina was waiting for him, tapping her fingers on the steering wheel and doing little else. She waved as he crossed the road and he couldn’t hide his surprise that she was there.
“You didn’t have to wait,” he’d said, sliding into the car beside her.
“I know.”
She’d offered to take him to the B&B, or even the train station if he wanted, but he’d said no. Told her he was happy to help but it was more than that. He needed to help. This he couldn’t say and they went back and forth on what he should do until they pulled up outside the village secondary school, and Christina told him he’d done enough.
