Will nodded, guessing that there had been an alarming technological revolution since his last period of activity. “How’s your head?”
She dropped the memory stick and the pendant into her bag as she said, “I feel a bit groggy, but I think I’m okay. It’ll probably hurt in the morning but …” She stopped abruptly and said, “Sorry, I should have said before, thanks for helping me. My name’s Eloise.”
Eloise—at last, someone with a name he recognized.
“You’re welcome. I’m Will.”
“How old are you?”
“Sixteen.”
“When are you seventeen?”
“My birthday’s in March,” he said, carefully not answering the question.
“October, so technically, you’re older than me, but girls mature quicker.”
“True,” he said, and left it at that. Not only was he much older than her, he was also like an insect trapped in amber. Eloise was heading towards her seventeenth birthday, eleven months from now, but his would never come. One day soon she would be a grown woman. She would marry and have a family and grow old, and he would still be the sixteen-year-old boy she saw before her right now.
“You look sad,” she said.
“I am, a little, but it passes soon enough.”
Eloise nodded, but then looked full of mock suspicion and teased him as she said, “Were you spying on me, Will? It’s pretty convenient that you happened to come along just when I needed a rescuer.”
“I did just happen to walk along at the right moment, but I was coming here to see you.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Why does anyone want to get to know someone else?”
She looked taken aback by the directness of his response, perhaps realizing that he was more mature than the average boy she encountered. She almost looked in danger of being won over, but as if remembering her former frostiness, her face hardened.
“That’s a nice thought, and I’m really grateful to you for seeing off those …” She struggled to think of an appropriately awful word to describe them and eventually gave up. “The thing is, Will, I don’t need any friends right now. I’m here because I want to be on my own. I don’t want to know people.”
“I understand,” said Will, and took a step back, but he hadn’t given up just yet. “There was something else, too. Someone who just died gave me a notebook—it had your picture in it.”
Eloise looked intrigued, but not enough to be won over. Even so, she said, “Was it the Big Issue seller?”
“Yes, did you know him?”
She shook her head doubtfully as she said, “No, not at all really, but he was always talking to me. Like, in a creepy way. When you say a drawing?”
“Of your face. He had another on the wall of his …” He didn’t want to say hovel and struggled for a second or two to remember what they’d been called in the 1980s. “His squat. I imagine that one burned in the fire.”
“They think he killed himself, but I’m sure he was on drugs, so it could’ve been accidental, I suppose.”
“You never sat for him?”
“God, no! Honestly, I didn’t know him. He’d just talk to me if I saw him in the street. And he gave me that necklace, the one you just found, said it was meant to be mine or something creepy like that. You know, I think he’d spent too long in India or somewhere. If I’d known he was drawing pictures of me, I’d have been really freaked out.”
“I can imagine.” Will thought about it and realized she probably wasn’t part of this, that it was wishful thinking to believe she was anything other than a homeless girl. And she was beautiful and pleasant to talk to, but he knew from past experience that it wasn’t safe for him to have friends—perhaps even less so now. “Well, good night.”
He started to walk away, but Eloise seemed to change her mind, or was at least curious, and called after him. “Will, wait there.”
As he turned, she jumped up and stepped towards him, but immediately faltered, as if she’d lost her balance. She stopped and put one hand against the wall, the other on her head.
He was about to go to her aid, but she said, “I’m fine, really. I probably have a concussion or something, that’s all. I just … you didn’t explain why you wanted to talk to me about that guy … actually, forget that, do you think we could go and get a cup of tea or something? I’m feeling a bit shaky.”
“Of course.”
“Good, there’s a vegan café just inside the gate that’s open late. We can go there.”
He nodded, but said, “What is a vegan?”
Eloise laughed. “Are you for real?”
“I beg your pardon?” Will was suddenly having trouble understanding everything she said, as if he was the one who’d been knocked unconscious.
“You don’t know what a vegan is?” He shook his head. “Someone who doesn’t eat any animal produce at all.”
“Oh, I see, like a vegetarian. And are you a vegan?”
“No.” He was disappointed somehow—he’d liked the idea of her being a vegan and him being someone who survived exclusively on the most animal product of all. “I’ll just put my bag away and we’ll go.”
He watched as she dislodged one of the broken panels in the wooden door and pushed her larger bag through it. She picked up the other bag and said, “Okay, Will, let’s go.”
They started walking and as much as he knew it was a bad idea, he was happy not being alone for once. He’d almost forgotten the attack in the church the night before, the rambling prophecies in the notebook, even the very thought of having a destiny. For now, he could think only that she was almost as tall as him, that they were both dressed in black, both pale, walking as one—it was almost as if they were meant to be together.
8
They turned left inside the South Gate and then right into a narrow lane that had been blocked to cars and other vehicles, but would probably have been too narrow for them anyway. Crooked and gabled buildings hung over each side as the lane twisted its way towards the church.
They hadn’t walked far up the lane when Eloise stopped and said, “This is it.”
Will looked at the timber-framed building, its upper floors overhanging the lane. He remembered when it had been new, in the period after his second hibernation, more upright then, cleaner, but not much different otherwise.
It was called the Whole Earth and the wooden sign that hung out into the street was decorated on each corner with a pentagram, the five-pointed star so loved by magicians and mystics.
“This was a tavern,” he said, thinking aloud. “For a long time it was called the Green Man.”
Eloise looked puzzled and said, “How do you know that?”
“My family lived around here for centuries. I suppose someone must have told me when I was younger.”
She seemed satisfied and walked in ahead of him. It was past ten, but the place seemed busy. Nearly every table in the main room was occupied, mostly by people who looked like Jex or Eloise or some variation of the two of them, drinking soup or eating sandwiches made of coarse bread, sipping hot drinks in tall glass-and-metal mugs.
It was dimly lit with lamps and candles, which suited Will’s eyes, and much of the decoration seemed to hint at witchcraft and magic, as well as other things that appeared to come from the Orient. He couldn’t quite understand the confusion of images and what they all meant together.
Eloise led the way into one of the smaller snugs. There were only two other people in there, sitting in the corner, a woman with glasses and a man with a beard who had the scent of death about him, though Will guessed he didn’t know it yet, judging by his jovial mood.
They sat in a wood-paneled alcove, with a simple black-and-white drawing in a frame on the wall, which appeared to show the seven witches on their pyre. Eloise followed his gaze and said, “I don’t know how true it is, but the story goes that they brought the witches here before they were burned. I suppose that would make sense if it was a tavern.”
&nb
sp; Will looked at her, and wanted to tell her that this building had not been here then, that if it had, those poor women would hardly have been granted its comforts, but he was distracted by the sight of her face directly across the table from him. It was the first time he’d seen her close up.
Her skin appeared a little less pale now that she was indoors. Her lips were full and soft, her eyes the purest blue, a blue that reminded him of the daytime summer sky that he would never see again.
Looking into her eyes had the strange effect of filling him with longing for some half-remembered afternoon, a disjointed sense of peace that seemed lost in time. He tried to remember when that afternoon might have been, but couldn’t place it, almost as if it was an afternoon he was yet to experience, as impossible as he knew that was.
“What are you looking at?”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. I like your eyes.”
“You can have them if you want.” She responded to his confused expression by laughing and saying, “I’m joking. I don’t even know what I meant by that. Thank you. And you have nice eyes, too—kind eyes.”
There had been kindness in them a long time ago, perhaps, but not anymore.
He looked at her hair and said, “Your hair isn’t really that color, is it?”
“I wish,” she said, and ran her hand absentmindedly through it before brushing it back, almost as if about to put it into a ponytail. “It was brown, but you’re right, this is dyed. Isn’t yours?”
“No,” he said simply.
He’d been conscious of the faint discomfort in his arm where the wound had once been, but it flared up now, intensifying so much that he wanted to scratch at it. He didn’t, but only because of the way he imagined Eloise would react.
Even as he fought to resist the impulse, an attractive young woman appeared at the side of their table and smiled at Eloise. She was very thin and tanned, with blonde hair pulled back and a metal ring in her nose. She was wearing jeans and a patterned red-and-yellow T-shirt that was so small and tight it might easily have been meant for a child. Her wrists were adorned with the same array of bracelets and bangles that he’d seen on Jex.
“Hello, Ella, who’s your friend?”
“Hi, Rachel, this is Will.”
The woman turned and looked hard at Will, smiling all the time, then said, “Hi, Will, welcome to the Whole Earth.”
“Thank you,” he said, and waited for her to turn away, his old wound burning furiously. But she continued to stare at him for several seconds, trying to hide what looked like an expression of intense curiosity. It was almost as if she recognized him, and now he wondered if the flaring up of the wound could be a response to her.
“Okay, what can I get you two? Anything to eat?”
“Not for me,” said Eloise. “Just some chamomile tea.”
“I’ll have the same, thank you.”
“Coming right up,” said Rachel, and walked away, the ancient floorboards creaking even under her slight frame. Will couldn’t be sure if the discomfort in his arm subsided as she walked away or if he just imagined it did.
Trying to shake off his suspicions, he said, “She called you Ella.”
Eloise looked around to make sure no one else was listening in, but the couple in the corner were too concerned with each other, laughing intimately.
“I didn’t want people knowing my real name, just in case, you know.” He nodded, assuming she meant that she was a runaway, that her family might come looking for her. As if she’d heard his thoughts, she said, “I’m an orphan, too.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Echoing her question to him the night before, he said, “Was it long ago?”
“When I was a baby—car crash. My parents, brother, and sister, all killed. I didn’t get a scratch. I was too young to remember anything about it.”
“How sad.” Will thought of her growing up, being aware that she’d once had an entire family but never actually knowing them. “Is that why you …?”
He tried to find the right words to express her current circumstances, but she got there ahead of him and said urgently, “God, no! No, I was brought up by an uncle and aunt and, you know, I was at prep school from seven. No, I haven’t wanted for anything.”
“So why are you living in a doorway?”
Before she could answer, Rachel returned with two mugs of chamomile tea, the clear liquid visible through the glass tumblers, which sat inside ornate metal holders. His wound didn’t twinge, so maybe he had been imagining it.
“Two cups of chamomile tea and these are on the house.”
“Thank you,” they said together, Eloise sounding surprised. Rachel smiled at her, but once more, Will noticed her staring at him as she turned to walk away again, her eyes fixing on him for just a moment too long.
He knew he was striking in appearance, but he sensed there was more to it than that, even if he couldn’t work out what it was exactly. Whether or not the sensation in his arm had been a response to Rachel, there was still something odd in her reaction to Will.
Eloise hadn’t noticed anything and said, “Rachel and Chris are really cool. Made a load of money in the dot-com boom, did the backpacker thing for a while, bought this place. They’re in their thirties, you know? Seriously, I hope I’m still that cool when I’m their age.”
He’d understood only half of what she’d just told him, so he repeated his earlier question. “What happened to you? Why are you living in a doorway?”
She looked embarrassed and bit her bottom lip. “It was a mistake, something that just … okay, here goes. My uncle and aunt divorced when I went to prep school— they didn’t have kids of their own and I think they only stayed together until I was old enough to board. I’ve spent holidays moving between the two of them ever since, mainly with my aunt actually, even though she isn’t the blood relative. Tell me if this is boring.”
“Not at all, please continue.” Will had the feeling she hadn’t had the opportunity to talk about this to anyone for some time and there was something soothing for him, too, in the sound of her voice, in the simple comfort of human company, of sharing space with another person.
Eloise tried to sip at her tea, but found it too hot and put the mug back down before continuing. “Anyway, this summer, neither of them were around. Uncle Matt was on business in China with his new girlfriend. Aunt Lucy was on a round-the-world cruise—I mean, how tacky is that? So I was left at Lucy’s house, which is in the middle of nowhere, and I don’t know anyone, except the maid who doesn’t speak English. So I fell into a real slump, and then I found out that one of my supposedly best friends had invited another friend, and a boy, over to her family’s place in Italy and hadn’t even told me.”
She paused and made a renewed attempt at the tea before she said, “Okay, that doesn’t sound much, but I was feeling really sorry for myself, feeling all alone in the world, like no one would miss me, and I was hating the thought of going back to school, so I just didn’t … go back, that is. I got the train up here and just didn’t go any further. It was easy really.”
“So you’ve been living on the streets ever since?”
The man in the corner overheard him and glanced around in concern, craning his neck to try to see who else was in the alcove. Will shot a glance back at him, disconcerting enough for the man to turn away. He almost felt like going over and telling him—that sickliness you feel, it’s in your blood and your heart, and you don’t know it now, but you’re already as good as dead, so dead that I wouldn’t even feed on you.
“Two months. It wasn’t too bad at first, but I have to admit, now that it’s getting colder …” She sounded distracted and then said, “If I’m honest, I feel like a fraud.”
“Why?”
As if it hardly needed stating, she said, “Because I’ve had a privileged life, and the people who are living on the streets here and everywhere else are doing it because they’ve got no choice. You know, kids who’ve been abused, people with addictions. I mean, even those kid
s who were hassling me tonight, and thank you, by the way. Did I thank you for what you did?”
“You did, and I didn’t do very much.”
Eloise nodded, uncertain, and said, “Well, thanks again anyway. But those kids have probably had a lot less in their lives than I’ve had.”
Will thought of them, wearing white in winter, wondering how they could dress in such a way and be as badly off as she imagined. He didn’t doubt that they were from the lower ranks of society, but at first sight, their lives were clearly removed from the poor of nearly every period he’d so far witnessed.
“So if you feel like a fraud and the weather is growing too cold, why do you stay?”
Eloise looked even more embarrassed and stared at her tea for a few seconds before saying, “Partly, I suppose, because it’s just so difficult to admit that it was a mistake. My latest plan is to hold out till Christmas, then go back and say I was researching a book about being a teenager living on the streets. But it sounds pretty feeble, doesn’t it?”
“You’re a writer?”
“I’d like to be.” She pointed at his drink and said, “You haven’t touched your tea.”
“No, I’m not thirsty.” He knew that didn’t sound like much of an explanation, so he added quickly, “Perhaps you did what you did for a reason. Perhaps you’ve stayed for a reason—you just don’t know what it is yet.”
Teasing, she said, “You mean, meeting you?”
“Perhaps,” he said, smiling, enjoying the fact that she would never imagine what he’d really meant by it.
“We’ll see.” She finished her tea and pointed at his. “Are you going to drink this?” He shook his head and she swapped the two glasses so that his was sitting in front of her. “Anyway, now that you know everything about me—what’s your story? How are you an orphan? How long have you been here? Where are you staying? All the important stuff.”
Before he could respond, Eloise put her finger to her lips, though she’d hardly needed to warn him someone was coming. The irritation in his arm had quite suddenly become more intense again, close to the pain he’d briefly felt on his first reading of Jex’s book.
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