It wasn’t the other boys she was talking about. Lucie had never met any of them. It was Baz. I wanted to ask her why she disliked him so much, but I knew the answer to that already. She thought he was a bad influence on me.
Lucie and I usually walked to school together, ate together at break and sat on our own on the steps outside the school entrance for lunch. Always on our own. Even in a school for weirdos we were weirder than the rest, it seemed.
It was easy to see why Lucie was shunned by most of the girls both at school and on the estate. She didn’t fit in with them at all. She had no favourite pop band. I don’t think she even liked music. She wasn’t interested in clothes or make-up. The boys ignored her too. Most of them were a bit scared to talk to her, the rest just didn’t like her.
In a way, I was her best friend. Sad state of affairs for anybody.
I met her at one of the corner shops the day after the fire. I’d been dying to be out and hear what was happening. I hadn’t slept all night.
“Heard about the fire?” she asked.
It would have been impossible not to have heard about it, it was the top item on the local news that morning. It had taken all night and fire crews from all over the city to contain the blaze.
Did I swallow, did my face go red? “I heard. Did everybody get out?”
“There’s a few in the hospital.”
“Serious?”
She looked at me in that funny way she had. “Goodness, you’re really worried about them, aren’t you?”
“I have got a nice side, you know.”
She shrugged. “If you say so.”
“You seem to know everything. Do you know who started it?”
“It was arson,” she said. “Deliberate. That’s what they’re saying.”
“They can’t be sure of that.” Did I sound guilty? “Dry summer night, easy for things to catch on fire.”
Lucie shrugged. “Forensic evidence. They’ll know.” She fumbled in her rucksack and took out a bottle of juice. Unscrewed the lid and took a long swallow. “And there’ll be CCTV footage of course.”
CCTV! The very thought of it made me shiver. All of us boldly walking in, and even waving. What had we been thinking about?
“The cameras would have been destroyed in the fire… Wouldn’t they?”
I saw the beginnings of real suspicion in her face. “You seem to know a lot about this fire.”
“I have an alibi, don’t you worry.”
“Didn’t even know you were a suspect, Logan.”
I could feel my face go red. “I’m not. I’m just saying… I was with my pals. I didn’t even hear about it till I was home. Vince came in and told us.”
Lucie laughed. “Oh well, say you were with your pals and they were with you. Not a lie anyway. You can alibi each other.”
“We were just hanging about last night, nowhere near any trouble.” I shouldn’t have said a word about the fire in the first place. “Anyway, cops wouldn’t be interested in boys like us.”
Lucie sneered. “Don’t be too sure,” she said.
When I went home that day, I half-expected the place to be filled with black-uniformed cops in riot gear, waiting for me. Instead, the house was empty. No one was home.
I took out my phone. I called Baz. “Have you heard anything?”
“No, mate,” he said. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing. Meet you at the shops?”
“In ten,” he said.
Twenty
The boys were all there. I think we all expected to find the precinct swarming with cops, but it wasn’t. Still, we were nervous.
“I hope those people in the flats are ok.” First thing Gary said. “I hadn’t even noticed there were flats there.”
“I saw them,” Mickey said. He had brought Ricky with him, of course. “But I thought they were empty.”
“Me too,” I said.
“There’s a few of them people in hospital.”
“I’m not going to feel guilty,” Baz broke in. “We didn’t start the fire. It was Al Butler. He was aiming to torch that place from the beginning. So nothing was our fault.”
He was right, of course. Nothing would have stopped Al Butler. But had Baz forgotten he had dared Al Butler to drop the match – double-dared him? Of course he had, and none of us reminded him.
“The police were at my cousin’s, questioning him as to ‘his whereabouts last night’.” Claude tried to make it sound funny. But nothing was funny that day for us. His cousin was one of the usual suspects. Always the first the police picked up when there was any kind of trouble.
“I would have got a real wallop from my dad if he thought I had anything to do with this.” I remembered then Gary saying he had left home a couple of times because of his dad’s heavy hand.
The story of the fire had been on the television, it was all people on the estate seemed to be interested in. People walking past us, huddled in groups, all talking about it.
Baz laughed. “Your dad’s got some nerve, all the dodgy things he gets involved in.”
Gary said nothing. His jaw clenched. If any of us but Baz had said that, I’m sure Gary would have flown at us. Instead, after a moment, he only shrugged. He didn’t want a fight. “My dad’s never started fires,” he said. “My dad’s never been arrested. Doesn’t expect me to be.”
I patted him on the back. “At least you’ve got a dad who cares about you.”
He pulled his shoulder away from me. Gary didn’t like me. I didn’t think any of them did. Not for the first time I reflected if it hadn’t been for Baz they wouldn’t have let me near them.
“Do you remember the CCTV camera? Do you think it really was destroyed?” I had almost been afraid to mention that.
Gary nodded. “All I’ve thought about. We’re on that camera. If it wasn’t destroyed, they’re bound to find out who we are.”
Baz broke in confidently. “No, that Al Butler tore it from the wall, remember, and the rest of it melted. Stop worrying about it.”
Mickey shook his head. “Anyway, my ma says it’s an insurance job. That happens all the time. The owners set deliberate fires then claim the insurance money. End up with more money than the place is worth. The cops won’t be looking for us. I’m sure of that.”
Ricky let out a yelp and Mickey laughed. “See, Ricky agrees with me.”
“Who was that guy last night, Gary, you said you knew him?” It was Mickey who asked.
“Knew about him,” Gary corrected. “His name’s Al Butler. Bad news. I nearly died when I saw him there. Did you see his eyes light up when he watched the fire? He’s crazy.”
I remembered how blue they looked, bluest eyes I had ever seen.
“I think he’s done that before,” Claude said.
“I think he has too,” Gary said. “He came well prepared for it anyway.” I felt guilty when I thought of my own excitement as I saw the fire taking hold. I wasn’t like Al Butler, was I?
“So he would have done that whether we were there or not, eh?” Claude looked around us hopefully, waiting for someone to agree with him.
“We couldn’t have stopped him,” Baz said. Was he trying to justify daring Al Butler to drop the match?
Did that make it better? That we couldn’t have stopped him? We hadn’t even stayed to make sure those people did get out safely. We didn’t wait to help. No. We were every bit as guilty as Al Butler.
“Do you think the cops’ll come after us?” Mickey asked. His dog looked up at him, as if it understood every word.
Baz answered. “Oh come on. We’re only boys. Nobody’s interested in us. Nobody saw us. I think we should celebrate.” He pulled a wad of notes from his pocket. We all gasped.
“Where did you get that?” Claude asked.
Baz grinned. “Remember the Xbox games? Sold them on the way home.” I waited for him to tell them I’d been with him when he sold them to a couple of junkies hanging around the underpass. I had wanted him to just throw them away, did
n’t want anything to do with them. But when did Baz ever listen to me? I was glad that in the end he didn’t mention me. “Well come on, look a bit happy about it. They would only have got burned up in the fire. We need cheering up.” He was laughing. “The drinks are on me.”
So we all ended up in a local burger bar, courtesy of Baz and the Xboxes, burgers all round.
“Love it here!” Baz said. “You get onion rings so big you could wear them as a necklace!”
He was in a great mood, and that was when he was at his best. He took our minds off what had happened. He made us all laugh.
Mickey tied his dog up outside, but it whined so much he left before he’d even finished his burger.
“Take him home and come back,” I said. “We’re all going to the cinema.”
But he shook his head. “Naw, left him last night and the night before. He’ll be really upset if I leave him again tonight.”
“You’d think he was your girlfriend!” Gary shouted.
“Better than a girlfriend, my Ricky.” There was a softness in Mickey you had to like. I watched him walk away, Ricky padding along beside him, looking up at him, as if he was taking in his every word, and I knew Mickey was talking to him the way he always did.
“Him and that dog of his,” I laughed.
“Mickey and Ricky!” Baz was laughing. “They could be a double act! Like Laurel and Hardy.”
We were all in a much better mood when we went on to the cinema.
We didn’t last long in there. Throwing popcorn about, kicking over cokes, using our phones, annoying everybody. We were all hauled out, and barred from going back.
As soon as we were outside, Gary turned on me. “That was all your fault, why can’t you ever just keep quiet?”
“Me?” I said.
“You started all that throwing stuff about. I wanted to see the movie.”
Baz stepped in. “You didn’t have to join in. Your choice. You could have left… like Mickey.”
Gary stepped back. He’d never stand up to Baz. But he still glared at me. “You’re nothing but trouble.”
He knew the school I went to. They all did. He knew how often I had been excluded. He was waiting for Baz to say something, but he didn’t. Neither did I.
Then Gary was off, running down the street. Claude hurried after him, always best friends. “Hey Gary, come back!”
“Don’t let Gary bother you,” Baz said as we walked home.
I wanted to say, He only puts up with me ’cause you’re here. But how pathetic would that sound? I wanted too to ask why on earth Baz liked me. No one else seemed to. But how pathetic would that sound as well?
It was as if he read my mind. “You and me are alike, Logan. I know we’re completely different, but somewhere in here,” he tapped his head, “we’re exactly the same. Don’t worry, I won’t desert you. You’ll always have me.”
Then Baz left, taking the path behind the shops to his place. One last wave, and he was gone.
A second later, he popped his head round the corner again. “Well, not tonight you won’t have me of course, I’ve gotta go home… but I’ll be back tomorrow. And then I won’t desert you!” I could hear his roaring laugh as he disappeared again.
He had made me feel good. I wouldn’t let Gary spoil my mood. As I lay in bed that night and looked back on everything, now that we were out of danger, I realised it had been a great weekend. Exciting, dangerous, and we hadn’t been caught. We wouldn’t be caught. And I tried to push the surveillance camera and the people still in hospital to the back of my mind.
Twenty-One
My mother works in a call centre. Did I already tell you that? I might have. I told them I wouldn’t be good at writing all this down. Anyway, she’s the one who supports the whole family. I should respect her for that. But I never did. I thought she was a mug. Her boyfriend, husband, whatever, Vince, he’s an ex-soldier, dishonourable discharge if you ask me, though of course he would never admit to it. He was invalided out, according to him. There’s nothing wrong with him that I can see. He’s just lazy. And as for that son of his, thank goodness I don’t have to share a room with him any more. He’s off to train to be a soldier too. Just like his dad.
Don’t know what the army’s coming to with soldiers like that. No wonder we lost an empire.
Both Mum and Vince were out the night I heard the news on TV. It was a couple of days after the fire. Mum was on a late shift; don’t know where Vince was. I’d been trying to avoid watching the television, always worried that they might show my face from the CCTV footage, rescued somehow from the warehouse. All I did know was some of the residents from the flats were still in hospital. I was just sitting down to my tea when the news came on, and the fire was the first item. It was on before I could switch over to another channel.
“Whoever did this will be caught,” a policeman said. “The response from the public has been excellent. We do have suspects. We are pursuing all leads.”
Suspects? Was he talking about us?
There was an Asian man interviewed, his fire-damaged shop behind him. It had been on the other side of the block, but not far enough away to escape the flames. “This shop was my livelihood,” he was saying. “Now, I will have to begin again.”
“You must be very angry about that,” the reporter asked him.
But the man shook his head. “I believe in karma. What goes around, comes around. They will repay in another way for what they have done.” He said it very quietly, it was softly spoken, yet his words sent a chill through me.
Karma.
I knew it would freak me out, but I couldn’t stop watching. I had to hear everything they’d say.
And then they went back to the night of the fire. I had to look. My eyes were drawn to the screen.
The warehouse was ablaze, and everything around it too: mountains of flames billowing into the sky. Fire engines were there, tackling the blaze, firemen balanced on the tops of ladders, their hoses shooting water over the flames. Then the same reporter came on again with the backdrop of the ruined wreck of the building behind him, still smouldering.
Did I feel guilty?
Yes, guilty about the people in the flats. Guilty about the Asian man who had lost his livelihood. But not about the warehouse itself. Hadn’t Mickey said the owners would claim insurance and end up with more money than it was worth?
Then the screen focused on one man. The reporter introduced him as the owner of the warehouse where the fire had started. An old man, he looked tired, as if he’d been up all night. But there was something more than tiredness in his voice. There was anger.
He stared right into the camera, and when he spoke, his voice didn’t sound old, it was cold as ice. “I’m telling you out there, the people who did this, if you’re watching,” he paused, “you will be caught.”
“Have you any idea who might be responsible for this?” the reporter asked.
The old man didn’t even glance at him. He kept his eyes fixed on the camera. I felt he was looking straight at me. It was me he was talking to.
“I just want them to know. If they’re watching. You won’t escape justice. Don’t for a moment think you’re safe.”
Twenty-Two
I couldn’t get those words out of mind. Don’t for a moment think you’re safe.
In my dreams that night they were coming closer, cloaked and masked, men in black heading my way, so that I woke with a start, sure they were in my room, standing in the corner, watching me.
Everywhere I went over the next few days, I imagined them waiting for me. They knew where I lived. They were following me. I was always looking over my shoulder.
I almost ran into Lucie one day at the shops, bowling her over because I wasn’t looking where I was going. “Are you expecting someone?” Lucie’s gaze followed mine.
She had noticed a change in me. She had told me as much at school. I had avoided going home with her, afraid that if these imaginary men saw me with her, she might be in danger
too. I looked guilty at that moment, I know I did. But I only told her I was having more arguments with my mum and Vince, and she seemed to accept that. I didn’t want to talk to her in case I blurted out the truth.
I almost said I was waiting for Baz, then changed my mind. I never even mentioned Baz’s name to her. She had no time for him.
It was later that day before I met up with Baz and the boys. I hadn’t seen any of them since the burger bar, and it turned out I wasn’t the only one who had watched that item on the news. Claude and Gary had too. “What do you think he meant?” Claude asked. “‘Don’t for a moment think you’re safe.’ What’s that all about?”
Gary was even more bothered about it than I was. “I wish we’d never went into that place.”
In front of the boys, I didn’t want to look as scared as I felt.
It was Baz who spoke: “He was an old man. Talking rubbish.”
“He said it as if he meant it,” Gary said. “And he’ll have sons.”
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist,” Baz said. “The old geezer had to say something. Had to sound hard.” He laughed, and so did I. “You don’t think you could handle an old geezer like him if he came after you?”
It was a dare he threw at the rest of us. He began stumbling about like an old man, waving an imaginary cane in the air. His voice was scratched and sickly. “You boys… In my young day, you would have been caned, got the birch! The birch, I tell you. Or capital punishment – aye, that’s what you need. You wouldn’t do it again after that, eh?”
Why did Baz always make me feel better? He wasn’t scared. So why should I be? He was right. I had made too much of that old man’s comments. So had Gary and Claude. The old man had to say something, didn’t he?
“Just remember,” Baz said. “That camera was destroyed in the fire, but even if anything was left, CCTV’s always fuzzy. Even if they’ve got it, they won’t make us out, and anyway we’ve not got a criminal record. How are the police gonny find us?”
Devil You Know Page 6
