by Kim Newman
You bring it up. ‘We’re not as close as we were,’ you say.
‘What did you think, Keith? That we’d get married?’
The contempt and disgust Laraine puts into the word are a shock. Laraine has what she really wanted: Sean dead, her free. Where do you fit in?
You have the sort of petty rows you once had with Clare. Laraine, having known you since birth, has more ammunition.
Every nag begins ‘You always did …’
… make lousy coffee. … forget to clean the bath. … dream too much.
Laraine withdraws into herself, besieged by ghosts. She says she sometimes thinks she hears Sean in the next room, humming the Ghostbusters theme.
It’s natural. She’s used to the idea of him in the house. You had the same thing when Clare moved out, and Clare is not under a compost heap with a dent in her brainpan.
Mary comes back every few days. Sean’s car is found. And they track his credit card, which hasn’t been used since he bought his ticket.
‘If he’s left the country, he isn’t using his own passport,’ Mary explains. ‘But that’s possible.’
‘Is there money missing?’
‘I can’t say.’
You’re relying on the dodginess of the Discount Development to cover for you.
‘One thing bothers me,’ Mary says. ‘Why did he use his credit card for the train? If he bought a plane ticket, he must have used cash.’
‘You have to give your name when you buy a plane ticket. If he has a fake passport, it won’t match his credit card.’
‘Sure. But if he had the cash for an air ticket, why not buy the train ticket out of it?’
God, this is just like Columbo.
‘You think Gatwick was a feint?’ you say. ‘That he’s still in the country?’
Mary nods.
Now is the time. ‘Mary, I don’t know if I should say anything, but … well, Larry has told me Sean wasn’t what he seemed. He used to … get violent with her.’
Mary thinks.
You’ve made a mistake. She’s remembering James. He got violent too.
‘Bastard,’ Mary says.
She approved of James battering Hackwill. Rough justice. Would she approve of you and Laraine killing Sean? That’s going down a very strange route.
‘If a man did that to me,’ she says, ‘I’d kill him.’
If you want to take Mary into your confidence, go to 141. If you try to throw Mary off the track, go to 152.
127
You call in sick, claiming flu. You can manage this only for a few days before you’ll need to see a doctor or risk losing income you can’t afford to sacrifice.
Reg Jessup is dead.
Hackwill pays back in kind.
Control your family. Or lose members of it.
You get a heavy wrench from the car toolkit and keep it on a hook by the door, hidden behind the coat-rack.
You can’t ask the police for protection. That would mean explaining why you need it. And why you didn’t shop James as soon as you knew he’d gone outside the law to continue his war with your old school bully.
You can’t even ask James. He has to be in Somerset, in case Hackwill goes for Mum or Phil.
This should be between Hackwill’s gang and the Marion brothers. But it isn’t. It’s spread out. To J and J, the copse would seem as remote as the burning of the Alexandrian Library. Even Chris doesn’t get it. And you never told Mum about Rob Hackwill at the time. It didn’t do to snitch to Mums.
Laraine gets in touch, a bit hysterical. She’s had the same phone call. She lives alone, in Bristol. You tell her to go on holiday. She protests that she has a job and a cat.
How did you all get anchored like this? Jobs, mortgages, family, pets. They’ve made you vulnerable. They’ve given you a last ditch to defend.
You’d send Chris and the twins to her parents’ in Brighton, but how do you know Hackwill isn’t having you watched? You could be ready in the flat with the wrench while Hackwill’s balaclava boys are calling on Chris’s parents.
This was private. How did it get to this?
After three days, you have to go back to work. You tell Chris — who still doesn’t take it seriously — not to let anyone in while you’re gone, and give her instruction in the use of the wrench.
Driving back from school, you’re certain you’ll find the flat door open and your family gone. As you get stuck in a traffic jam, the worry becomes a certainty.
Chris is making tea. The twins are simultaneously asleep.
You’re so relieved that you cry. Then, taking advantage of a rare moment of peace, you make love with your wife.
This can’t go on.
Being cold about it, the best thing would be if Hackwill killed one of your family and then James killed him. It would be over.
And you’d still have a family. Most of one.
You remember Sophie’s Choice. It’s Chris’s favourite book and movie, but you’ve never understood it until now. Which would you let go to save the others? Chris for the twins? One twin for the other? Which?
First, you could do without Phil. You barely even know him. Then, agonisingly, it would have to be Laraine. Then Mum. Then — God, you can’t be thinking this — your wife.
No, this is all wrong. First, you’d die yourself. To save everyone. That’s right.
You need James alive to avenge you, to end the cycle.
If James were to kill Hackwill now, before Hackwill strikes at you, would that be best? Why do you have to stick to this move-and-counter-move deal? This isn’t chess.
Yes, James should kill Robert Hackwill.
You’re a PE teacher, not Michael Corleone. How did you get to this? You take to hugging your wife often.
Finally, they come. Three of them. Balaclava helmets. Professional home-invaders, like the police or soldiers.
You are home in the evening.
‘It’s about your brother, sir,’ says a voice on the entryphone.
You think it’s the police and, with relief, buzz them in.
You make it to the wrench, but have to drop it. You had a blunt instrument ready, but they bring guns.
Chris is on the sofa, hugging the twins. They have no idea what’s happening but pick up on their parents’ fear and grizzle. Chris desperately tries to keep them calm. You are in an armchair.
Three guns — pistols, barrels extended by silencers — play around the room. The leader of the men takes off his balaclava. Your heart dies. If you’re allowed to see his face, you aren’t expected to live.
‘Hello, Keith.’
It’s Shane Bush. One of Hackwill’s old mates.
‘We’m a long way from Ash Grove, ain’t we?’
You barely knew him. He was just a thug. Now, he’s a killer.
‘Sorry about this, but local gov’ment be a good job. Lot o’ opportunities these days.’
‘Shane,’ you say. ‘This is my wife, Christina, and my babies, Joseph and Juanita. I beg you, don’t hurt them. They aren’t part of this.’
‘Hwaa-neeta,’ Shane laughs. ‘Bleddy daft name.’
By telling him the names, you hope to reach him, to make them seem real to him, to make it harder to kill them. It obviously hasn’t worked. Are Shane and his friends on drugs?
They’re people too. It can’t be easy. They must have screwed themselves up to this.
‘You don’t want to hurt babies,’ you say.
You look at the eyes of the others. If you break their solidarity with Shane, you’ve a chance. They’ll all be guilty. One of the three might have qualms, or be afraid of getting roped in with the others.
‘Yurr, Shane,’ says one. ‘Her with the teats. Can I fuck her?’
You try to stand up. Shane puts a bullet in the wall behind you. The silenced shot is a thwick sound. You freeze. Chris is crying. Juanita, screech a little higher than Joseph’s, starts up, loud.
Shane is impatient. ‘Your kid brother’s a bloody sight harder than you, Keith.
’
Of course he is, you think. He doesn’t have anyone to lose. Not like you do.
Another balaclava comes off. Not the rapist wannabe, but the smallest of the three. Long blonde hair falls out of a bun. It’s a woman. Her cold eyes are familiar but you don’t know the face.
‘Don’t kill my babies,’ Chris implores the woman.
It doesn’t get through. The woman looks disgusted with Chris and revolted by the twins.
‘Quiet them down,’ she says.
‘Mary,’ says Shane, almost whining, ‘you said I could do the talking.’
‘You’re a fuckhead, Shane. Always have been.’
A name dredges up. Mary Yatman.
She sees you recognise her. ‘Yes, that’s right, Keith. It’s an Ash Grove reunion.’
She was a little monster as a kid. Obviously, she’s grown up to be a big monster.
‘Reg Jessup is dead, Keith,’ says Mary. ‘Your boy did it. Trained to kill in the Marines. Give him a medal, eh? But that means we have to pay back and take it to the next level. Like Space Invaders. You kill one of us, we kill all of you.’
All?
‘Be a waste to kill teats,’ says the wannabe rapist.
‘Shut up, Grebo,’ Mary says. ‘Or I’ll shoot you in the balls and let you bleed.’
Mary holds her gun casually. Shane and Grebo — ? — hang on to theirs as if they were their dicks. Mary lets her wrist flop, but you know she’s more comfortable with the firearm, probably better with it.
She wipes a strand of hair from her face.
‘Here’s the deal, Keith. Death is going to happen in this room. Soon. Either we kill you, or we kill wife and two point four. It’s your choice. Think about it.’
She begins to whistle the theme to Top of the Form.
You look at Chris’s wide, horrified eyes. You look at the twins, flesh of your flesh, your genetic future. You try to conceive of a world without you in it.
Mary finishes whistling.
‘It’s make-your-mind-up time,’ she says. ‘So?’
If you say ‘Me’, go to 139. If you say ‘Them’, go to 153.
128
In 1982, the week after your father’s funeral, you’re in Sedgwater, hurrying to the Lime Kiln. You’ve arranged to meet friends you haven’t seen in a while. The country is about to go to war over the Falklands. From the Corn Exchange steps, a shaggy, outsize young man harangues passers-by. You quicken your step and hurry on past him, eyes down. You spend the evening arguing about the Falklands War. For the first time since Dad died, you feel the numbness wearing off. You get heavily into an argument, pointing out that Galtieri wouldn’t have invaded in the first place if Thatcher’s defence cuts hadn’t pulled the fleet out of the South Atlantic and practically run up a flag on Goose Green saying, ‘Invade, Why Don’t You, We Wouldn’t Mind.’ Warmed up by beer and argument, you all go for a curry afterwards. You pass the ranting loony again, but are so deep in criticising Paul Mysliwiec’s patriotic trigger-happiness you don’t even notice him.
Read 7, and go to 9.
129
Vanda never says she’s sorry. She resents you for being weak enough to take her back. You tell her it’s for the children, but she knows you’re lying
One night, two months after she comes back, she tells you the worst thing. ‘I forged your signatures.’
You had guessed.
‘Aren’t you going to explode?’
You shake your head. You don’t want her to see your tears.
‘Keith,’ your wife says, ‘you’re pathetic.’
You are promoted to assistant manager. Proudly, you tell Vanda.
‘Warwick’s only approved the promotion because you’re no threat to his job.’
Since she came back, Vanda communicates only in isolated sentences, sharp and calculated as a boxer’s jabs.
She won’t make love with you. You can’t remember the last time she did, before she went away. You didn’t notice at the time that your love-making had become infrequent, but it must have.
She is good with the kids.
It’s not much of a comfort, but you hear Sean is almost wiped out on Black Monday by the stock-market crash of 1987. He has to scrabble around for a job in the ruins of the City, his dreams ashes. Vanda is quietly exultant. She hates him because he threw her over for a skinny teenager.
You congratulate yourself on not getting into Sean’s schemes. If you had, you’d now be the one who got wiped out.
The recession affects you, though. Escalating mortgage payments start to bite badly. The preferential package offered to bank employees turns out to be nastily structured. Hidden penalties come into force and snap like man-traps.
Warwick orders you to get tougher on customers who default on loans. And to sign up those who don’t to pension plans and all manner of insurance, taking advantage of the general panic to bind customers to ever-heavier regular payments.
It’s hard. You understand each and every sad story you hear. Lost jobs, negative equity, evaporated savings, the recession, split families. You feel you’ve lived through all the tragedies.
That’s what it’s like. Vanda at home with her icepick insults. Warwick at work with his overseer’s whip.
But people like you. Candy, who you think might feel a little sorry for you, takes care to be kind. And your customers, especially those in trouble, appreciate the consideration.
The world divides. People with power over you treat you with casual contempt, but people over whom you have power are genuinely fond of you.
You wonder who you are. You feel hollow, defined only by the contempt or indulgence of others. You yourself have ceased to matter.
Sean, you hear, has tried to kill himself; but botched the job. So he’s worse off than you.
If you’d done something, he’d be better off. You’d all be better off.
And so on.
Begin again?
130
James, despite his leg, takes the lead. After all, he’s been in battle before. He’s the only one who knows what to expect.
You and Victoria follow.
You’re feeling hyper. You’ve seen death and it’s terrifying, but you’ve rarely felt so alive. You can taste life. It’s almost sexual. And almost pure, like your feelings for your children. You’re doing the right thing. No compromises. You might not live past sunset, but you’ll have made a difference.
You make it to the fourth floor. Smoke is all around, filling the stairwell. James moves into Hackwill’s open-plan office suite, firing rounds.
You follow him, keeping an eye out. There are monsters here.
James kicks away a desk. Someone in a suit is curled up, snivelling, trouser-crotch stained. He puts up shaking hands and can’t get out a coherent sentence. It’s Sean.
James cocks his gun, but doesn’t fire.
Sean squirrels out of the way, back towards the stairwell. As he passes, he pulls out a knife and sticks it into Victoria’s leg. Running at a crouch, he tries to get to the door. You shoot him in the back of the head.
Without thinking, without making a conscious choice, you have killed. You are a killer. You can’t afford to think about that now.
Victoria extracts the blade from her leg and throws it away. Sean has stuck her in a muscle. Her leg seems to contract. She’s obviously in a lot of pain. Bastard Sean.
Mary steps out of a store-room, arms wide. She has her gun but it isn’t pointed at any of you.
‘We have to talk,’ she says.
James nods.
‘The place is on fire. Unless we stop this, we’ll all die.’
The smoke is thick, stinging your eyes. Victoria coughs badly.
‘So?’ says James.
‘I don’t want to die,’ Mary says.
‘Should have thought of that when you threw in with Hackwill.’
‘You weren’t hiring then,’ she says.
The strangest thing about this is Mary’s uniform. It’s not an outfit you ass
ociate with guns.
A door at the other side of the open space bursts and flames run in.
‘Hackwill’s in there.’ Mary nods towards the store-room. ‘You can have him.’
‘She killed Graham,’ Victoria protests, through pain.
James is focused. This is about Hackwill.
‘And you killed Gompers,’ James says.
Mary beckons to him.
The fire is spreading. Air pours in through the shattered windows, feeding the flames.
‘You bitch,’ someone shouts, exploding out of the store-room. Mary shoots him in the heart. He falls. It is Shane Bush, a long way from Ash Grove playground.
‘Come out, Hackwill,’ says James.
The councillor does, hands up. ‘I surrender,’ he says.
James laughs and chambers a bullet.
‘Get on with it,’ says Mary.
This isn’t battle. This is murder.
Do you say anything?
If you protest, go to 138. If you let James continue, go to 164.
131
As Vanda walks away, leaving her suitcases on the doorstep, you know she’s silently sobbing. There’s no place for her anywhere in the world.
You harden your heart.
You have to.
Within a year, you’re married again. Candy turns out to be a super mum to Jason and Jesse, and you have a daughter together. You want to call her Janet, but she insists on Kim.
You become assistant manager. Candy tells you Tristram Warwick is afraid of you.
‘It’s your dad. Customers still ask for Mr Marion and he thinks they mean you. He’s self-conscious about being an outsider. Probably because he’s gay.’
You are surprised. You didn’t know Tristram was gay.
‘Keith, you’re so sweet,’ Candy says. ‘You’re like someone from the fifties.’
