by Liam Brown
‘Well, I guess it’s time to find out who’s been naughty or nice,’ he said.
The men laughed along good naturedly as Rusty proceeded to hand around a set of old socks – one for each of us.
‘Now don’t forget to hang these up in your tents tonight,’ he said. ‘Else Santa won’t be bringin’ you nothin’ – ya hear me?’
The joke dragged on for a while, with Rusty insisting we called Bruno Rudolph and instructing us to leave out a carrot and a large glass of brandy, until it was time to turn in. We took our socks and bid each other good night.
‘You lot better be up extra early!’ he called to us as we ambled towards our tents. ‘I mean it! I’ve got a surprise planned for you in the mornin’. Ho, ho, ho!’
*
Despite my exhaustion, it took me a long time to fall asleep that night. For one thing, Al Pacino was stationed directly outside my tent. I’d noticed he’d developed a bad cough lately, and every few minutes he would hack violently, sending solid-sounding lumps whistling through the night air. It wasn’t just that though. My head throbbed with festive nostalgia. I remembered my own childhood Christmases spent with my parents, a time when magic still existed and Santa Claus didn’t carry an air rifle. Then of course there was my own family. The first Christmas I spent with Lydia, years before the money and madness ruined everything. It was an unmitigated disaster: an under-cooked turkey abandoned in favour of a frozen pizza; later my mother, drunk and abusive on the phone. Yet none of it mattered. Our love and our youth combined to make us bulletproof. Everything was ahead of us then.
And of course, there were the Christmases with the kids. The ritual dangling of stockings, the manic five a.m. shrieks as they woke to discover a sack literally splitting with presents. The tears and tantrums over missing batteries and un-assemblable toys. There were arguments about which TV channel to watch, the battle over Brussels sprouts, the living death of the endless post-dinner Christmas afternoon, with nothing to watch, nothing to open, nowhere to be. But none of that mattered. I saw that now. It was part of it. It was Christmas. It was perfect.
And where were my children tonight? Were they lying in bed, listening for sleigh bells? For footsteps on the roof, for a rustling in the chimney?
Or were they lying awake, listening for their daddy instead?
*
I opened my eyes. It was still dark. I rolled over, intending to go back to sleep. Then I stopped. Something was wrong. Someone was in my tent. I sat up to look around. Instantly I felt a hand press hard over my mouth. The hand smelt of fire and dirt and dog. I began to wriggle, trying to break free, but the man pulled me closer to him, squeezing me so tight I heard the faint crack of something deep inside me. After that I stopped moving.
‘Surprise,’ said the man.
TWENTY-SIX
It was all so obvious. The building of the fire. The preparation for the ‘feast’. I saw now that I’d made a terrible miscalculation. I should have risked running earlier, perhaps the morning we’d followed Hopper’s footprints through the snow. Or even earlier. Months earlier. I should have left the night they’d turned on Marshall, or right after the chickens died, or before the whole ridiculous business with the swan. Or earlier still. The moment Rusty had leapt from the bushes and flattened me. Before I’d even entered the bloody park in the first place. Before I’d lost my job, or ended up in bed with Tamara, or gambled away my house and my marriage and my children’s futures. Before, before, before! My head spun as I considered the near infinite junctures I’d passed on the way to reach this point. So many missed opportunities to make the break, to cut my losses, to change course. Now all I was left with was the familiar hollow remorse of having stayed too long in the casino, of not cashing out while I was ahead.
They say a good gambler knows when to quit. Yeah, well, they would say that wouldn’t they. Those pious, self-satisfied people, with their dreary, drama-free lives. No, like most clichés, the idea of quitting ahead originates with people who don’t live by the roll of a dice, the slice of a pack. In my world, there was no quitting. Not really. Not when there was still money on the table that could be in your pocket. No, for gamblers there is only winning and losing, all or nothing. The winners stayed alive long enough to see off all other competitors. You became big and bloated and bilious enough to swallow everyone else. Or else your luck failed and you withered away. Walking was never an option.
And now, finally, my luck had run out.
*
I lay prostrate on the icy floor, my hands bound with a coarse length of rope. I had been dragged from my tent and beaten, though not with any real commitment. I suspected it was simply a way of sending a message. Lie still. Do not run. We will hurt you if you try to escape.
I’m not sure how long I lay there, bleeding and broken beside my tent. At some point morning had blistered over my head, a foul blue light that stung my rapidly swelling eyes. I wasn’t sure what the men were waiting for. They hovered close by, muttering among themselves. Eventually I was hoisted from the ground and slung over Ox’s shoulders. As they carried me through the camp and down the slope, I recalled another time, months earlier, when I’d been carried to the lake on a sea of hands. That was how it had all began. My baptism. My rebirth. It seemed strangely appropriate that it should end so similarly, with me surrendering all control, a sacrificial lamb, my life in the their hands.
When they finally dumped me on the floor of the marl pit beside the stack of firewood, I finally realised what my fate was. I was to be roasted on the Christmas bonfire I had helped build the day before. Again, there was something fitting about it. To have gathered the wood that would cook me. After all, wasn’t that what I’d been doing all along? I only hoped the end would be quick.
*
‘I expect you’re wonderin’ how it’s come to this, eh, sonny?’
I had passed out. Or perhaps I hadn’t. There was a wooziness to the world that made it difficult to keep track of time and place. I opened my eyes to find Rusty silhouetted against a background of absolute white. With the halo of the new morning behind him, he almost looked like an angel.
‘Because I’ve got to be honest, Adam,’ he continued. ‘I’m kind of wonderin’ myself. Now, you know I like you. Hell, I’m the one who invited you here in the first place and treated you as one of my own. We all did, ain’t that right, boys?’
The men murmured in agreement. There was an odd theatricality to the proceedings, as if I was being put on trial. Rusty was to be the judge of this kangaroo court, while the other men acted as jury, and later, executioners.
‘And sure you were always a little odd. Not as proactive as the others, shall we say? A little self-absorbed. You had a few funny ideas about this and that. But we let it slide. We felt sorry for you. Besides, you seemed harmless enough…’
I didn’t move, didn’t speak to offer an opinion. There was no point.
‘Which was why I couldn’t believe me bleedin’ eyes when, during a routine tent inspection, we discovered this little treasure trove of goodies!’
Rusty brandished the evidence with a theatrical flourish.
This was what I had been waiting for. The charges against me. I squinted and saw the tatty outline of a birthday card, a stick of deodorant and an empty box of chocolates, the possession of which I presumed would sentence me to death. As Rusty held up the incriminating material for the men to see, a few of the empty wrappers fluttered down to me, the brightly coloured cellophane glistening like baubles on a tree.
‘So!’ Rusty roared, showering me with flecks of brown spit. ‘This whole time us lot were sat around starvin’ to death, you had your own private supply of grub waitin’ for you in your tent. No wonder you couldn’t wait to get to bed each night. Makes me wonder what else you had stashed away. A nice steak dinner? A lamb hot pot maybe?’
The men’s murmurs grew louder.
‘Traitor!’ Fingers yelled.
‘Not only that, but according to this little card, it looks
like he were havin’ his meals hand delivered. “Dear Dad”? Thought you’d get the family in on the act, did you? Not to mention the fact that you brought people here, to our home. What did you think this was, a bleedin’ campin’ trip? The Great Interactive Homeless Experience? Thought you’d come and rough it with us for a few months before you scurried back to your nice little life, eh? You disgust me! I thought you was one of us, Adam. Turns out you’re nothin’ but a bleedin’ tourist!’
The men were screaming now, baying for my blood. Yet still I said nothing. They needed this, I realised. This spectacle. This catharsis. They had to justify it somehow. To reassure themselves that in killing me, they were righting some catastrophic wrong. That they were not merely monsters. They shouldn’t have bothered. I had raised no objection to the proceedings. After all, was this not the way of the world? Darwin placed no stock in compassion or mercy. It was survival of the fittest, to the detriment of all else. You take the weak and devour them, so you can become strong. Those were the only rules. This was nothing personal. I was simply on the wrong side of evolution.
Rusty stepped over me. The trial was over. Now it was time for sentencing. I watched as he held up the birthday card and tore it in two, tossing the remains onto the pile of wood. Then, as if performing a magic trick, he reached into his jacket and produced a small can of lighter fluid.
‘I’ve been savin’ this for a special occasion,’ he said, aiming a long squirt towards the pile. Next a match was produced, struck, dropped. The fire jerked into life.
The men were silent now, solemn. They crowded closer, blocking the heat from the fire. Rusty searched his jacket again. I caught a flash of silver.
*
I looked beyond the men. Among the trees that fringed the clearing, a bird sat quivering on a branch. It was a robin, it’s breast splashed with shock of red, as if mortally wounded. Clutched in its beak, some small, pink thing writhed helplessly. A worm, plucked from the earth for no reason other than because it happened to be there and was too weak to protest. The robin stared at me with its beetle-black eyes, utterly indifferent to my suffering. It tipped back its head and the worm vanished.
*
As the circle collapsed in on me, time stretched and stalled. I reminded myself that my death would be no major loss to the universe. It was no great tragedy. I thought of Marshall, the look of disbelief as he fell to his knees. I thought of Sneed’s panic, of Zebee alone in his tent. Every day, people faced the certainty of their annihilation head on. I was no different. Perhaps in the end it would even come as a relief.
*
Rusty knelt above me, the knife raised. I searched the men’s faces for any sign of doubt, but there was none. Only hunger. I glanced past them, searching for the robin. It was gone. A strange calmness washed over me. This was it. The ice, the sky, the smoke. I closed my eyes.
And then…
Nothing.
I waited. Still nothing. I opened my eyes and saw that Rusty had frozen, the blade paused midway on its journey to my throat. He turned his head. He’d heard something. They all had. The sound came again, and this time I heard it too, carried on the wind. There was no mistaking it. It was a voice, faint and fragile as glass, but definitely a voice.
‘Da-ddy!’
Someone was calling me.
Olivia was here.
TWENTY-SEVEN
I was dying. Either that or I’d fainted. This was all some terrible nightmare taking place in the microseconds before the knife swooped down and severed the final threads tying me to the world. Because this couldn’t be happening. Not now. The universe couldn’t possibly be this cruel.
‘Da-ddy!’ Olivia called again. Something about her intonation awoke a buried childhood memory, a game of hide-and-seek that had gone on far too long, panic and doubt displacing excitement. What if they weren’t hiding? What if they’d really gone?
‘Da-ddy!’
There was no doubting it now. Olivia was in the park. If anything, she sounded closer. Rusty stepped back, the blade dropping limply to his side as he turned his head slowly, trying to ascertain which direction the voice was coming from.
‘Da-ddy!’
This time he paused, chuckling lightly to himself. ‘This your idea of a rescue party, eh?’ he asked, turning his back on me. ‘Looks like it really is Christmas, lads. We’ve got ourselves dessert too!’
Without a word, the men fanned out into the trees.
*
Rusty paced the perimeter of the clearing with Bruno at his side. Every now and then he would pause to peer up into dark bars of the trees that surrounded us, shaking his head in disgust every minute the men failed to materialise.
Olivia meanwhile continued to call out intermittently, oblivious to the danger she was in. The sound of her voice was like a tonic. Suddenly the ache of my ribs from the boot blows was negligible, as was the frozen earth digging into my knees. All of my pain had at once become remote. It seemed Olivia – or at least the adrenaline her voice injected into me – had endowed me with superpowers. I felt stronger than I had in weeks. For a moment, I felt as if I could break the ropes that bound my hands by simply flexing my wrists. Sadly though, after struggling for a few minutes, I found this wasn’t the case.
On the other side of the fire, Rusty continued to prowl. Every second that passed he grew more agitated, his fingers twitching as he chuntered to himself. Olivia hadn’t called out for a few minutes and fear seeped into the vacuum she left behind, sapping my strength. I needed to get to her. I needed to go now.
Rusty’s back was still turned. I looked around, calculating the number of steps it would take me to reach the cover of the trees. If only I could get to my feet. I tried rocking over onto my side, but only succeeded in planting my face into the ice, bashing my teeth against my lips in the process. I tasted blood again, but managed to swallow my yelp. I glanced up, terrified. Thankfully, it seemed Rusty hadn’t noticed.
‘Da-ddy!’
Olivia’s voice was like a defibrillator, jolting me back to life. She sounded closer than ever, perhaps just beyond the trees at the top of the pit. It was now or never. Risking a final glance in Rusty’s direction, I rolled back over, using my momentum to hurl myself up onto the balls of my feet. The moment I was upright I lurched towards the bushes – five steps to the trees, four steps – not looking behind me, not stopping – three steps, two steps – I knew I was being too noisy, but Rusty hadn’t called out yet and maybe, just maybe my luck was going to hold – one step…
Inches from the trees I froze.
A scream echoed out, high above me. A girl’s scream. It only lasted for a moment, before stopping abruptly. I felt my strength drain away as dread coursed through my veins, threatening to shut off my air supply.
‘Goin’ somewhere, sonny?’
I span around. On the far side of the clearing, Rusty was facing me. Even at that distance I could make out the malice on his face, his mouth twisted into a mocking grin. I held his gaze for a second.
And then flung myself into the trees.
*
Within moments of entering the woods, I understood I’d been mistaken. I was no superhero. Despite the imminent danger I was facing, the many months of malnutrition had left me weak and sluggish. Coupled with my recent beating and the icy terrain, I found it almost impossible to scramble up the steep slope of the pit. With my hands still firmly fastened behind my back, I slipped several times. Halfway up, I twisted my ankle, and for one awful moment I teetered on the brink of falling backwards. I somehow managed to stay upright and kept going, dragging my useless foot behind me while I recited my daughter’s name under my breath, like a prayer.
Olivia. Olivia. Olivia.
Meanwhile, Rusty was closing in on me. So were the others. I could hear the crash of foliage, the cry of startled birds, the snapping of twigs. The grunts and curses of starving men. Any moment I expected Bruno to pounce from the bushes. I pictured his jaws clamping around my ankle, my arm, my throat.
Another bark sounded nearby, and surely within seconds Bruno would be on me. Last bets, please! It was time to choose. I opened my eyes and began to run, aiming for neither the camp nor the farm, but towards the woods that divided our territory from the rest of the park. My plan was to head for the old playground, hoping Olivia might think to return to the place we’d first met.
I powered through the ice, my lungs burning, the ropes biting into my wrists, my ankle pounding. I ignored the pain. Behind me I heard footsteps, yells, ferocious snarls – certain death. I ignored them too. If I was a religious man, I might have called on a higher power to deliver me from evil, to spare my only daughter, to light the way. But I am not a religious man. Instead I prayed to the closest thing to a doctrine I’d ever followed. I thought back to Seventy-Seven Steps to Sterling Success. I didn’t have a mirror in which to visualise my reward, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t need one. Because for the first time I understood exactly what success – true success – looked like.
And it didn’t have a thing to do with money.
*
I was halfway across the woods when the shout went up. It was a man’s voice, though this time it wasn’t Rusty. The noise seemed to ricochet off the trees, again making it difficult to discern exactly where it had come from. Was it a cheer of victory? A bellow of frustration? It was impossible to tell. Against my will, I pictured Butcher’s leering face as he towered over Olivia.
