How much time did he have? Could he think at all?
Did his whole life flash before him, as it should?
And, if so, did he ask,
Was it worth it?
Was what worth it?
The glory of flight.
This was his thought:
Was the glory worthwhile?
Well, was it?
Worth what?
Dying for.
“NO!”
That was me.
When Bogsy told me to put my hand on his back, I felt the strap I had helped him to test just a few days before. I hadn’t expected to feel it, but instinct said grab it, so I did.
I didn’t push, I pulled.
And when he jumped, I couldn’t have held him, except that the fingers of my other hand had locked on to the mesh at my back.
He threw himself forward in the harness, as I had done in the shed that time; as I’d seen a falcon do once, at a fair, when a man had it tied to his hand, and it tried to fly.
Then he collapsed on the concrete, with me still holding on to the strap. I thought he’d fainted, but he hadn’t. He grabbed my leg. He’d not given up.
And so we fought.
“Mate! Mate!” The policeman is shaking the newcomer by the shoulders. “Mate! D’you know him? He hasn’t gone!”
We fought as we had in the shed, down among the chewing gum wrappers and old apple cores. We fought like that. Only that was for fun. This was high up, on a ledge, with nothing to stop us falling off. We weren’t trying to make each other eat orange peels now. We were fighting for Bogsy’s life. The concrete was cruelly hard. It grazed our elbows and near cracked our skulls, but that was nothing. In our ears, the motorway roared for blood.
The man on his knees looks up, first at the policeman, then at the bridge. What’s happening up there? The two figures have gone. But no, they haven’t—they’re rolling around together on the narrow platform. The man groans again when the struggle brings them close to the edge.
“His dad!” he says, though he can’t tell which is which anymore. He begins to sob. “I’m his useless dad!”
And it could have gone either way. We were equally matched—that is, equally bad. The only thing was, he was wearing the wings, which made it easier for me to pin him down. But, then again, we could have both gone over.
The policeman shakes the other man again. “Pull yourself together!” And as he speaks, the crowd gasps and parts because something is falling toward them. Tumbling out of the sky, trailing feathers, it crashes onto the road.
Not a boy, but a wing.
And it’s followed by something else, smaller, which lands close by and unnerves them because it’s so ordinary-looking.
At one point, with a tearing sound, one wing got ripped right off. I flung it aside and it must have fallen down to the crowd below. Soon after, I lost a shoe, which went the same way. Signals, from us to them, that the Icarus Show was no longer as advertised. If they’d bought tickets, they could have complained. But they hadn’t. The show was free.
“Make contact!” says the policeman urgently. He’s trying not to shout. “Let him know it’s you. Tell him something he needs to hear.”
But the man can think of nothing.
“Come on!” The policeman is losing it now, despite all his training. “Come on, man! Tell him he’s going to be okay!”
The cold wind blows through the bridge and the black night wraps everything in despair.
The man is shrinking into himself. He’s giving up.
But no, he’s gathering himself. He’s getting up.
And now he towers over everyone else. He’s filling his great lungs with cold night air.
And his voice is the voice of a giant, powerful enough to make itself heard over any distance, over all other noise.
“DAVEY!”
Bogsy went limp. To be on the safe side, I sat on his chest, but I knew it wasn’t a trick.
The voice wasn’t PC Horn’s. He hadn’t been able to make himself heard. Someone else must have come. And when I looked cautiously down, I understood.
I was right, someone else had arrived. And I knew who he was straightaway, by his height. The last time I’d seen him, he’d been holding a stack of boxes in his arms. He’d been big and strong enough to carry a TV, a microwave, and a load of books, all at the same time.
Sitting on Bogsy’s chest, I relaxed. I may even have patted his shoulder.
They got us down with one of those cranes they use to fix streetlamps and clean office windows. It had an extending arm with a pod on the end. The pod contained PC Horn, who helped us climb in. Everyone clapped when we reached the ground.
Bogsy went straight to his dad, who gave him a bear hug, wrapping him up completely, for two or three seconds, in his great big coat. Another happy ending.
Then Colin Marsh faced the crowd and said, “Thanks, everyone.” Even though they’d done nothing but turn up to watch. He was thanking Alan Tydman and Rob and Jack, which seemed ironic. He wouldn’t have done if he’d known. But perhaps he only meant thanks for clapping. That must have been it.
Cars kept going past, with their headlights on, and in one of these moments, I caught sight of Alan. He was staring at Bogsy in total amazement. His mouth was open. Perhaps he was just surprised by Bogsy’s face, but I think it was more than that. Things were changing.
“Thanks,” said Colin Marsh to Peter Horn’s dad, and PC Horn said, “Don’t thank me, mate. Thank him.”
I was standing alone, by the crane. Colin Marsh came over and shook my hand. His hand was huge, and while mine was in it, it felt warm and safe.
He said, “I owe you one,” and I said, “S’okay.”
Then PC Horn was shouting something about sorting out a car. Colin Marsh went back and they all moved off down the road. I didn’t go with them. There seemed to be a car in the ditch. In all the excitement, they left me behind.
Our two bikes were just where we’d left them, a little apart from everyone else’s. I guessed he’d come back tomorrow for his. Right now, he wouldn’t be thinking about it. He wouldn’t want to bother with unimportant things. Or people. There’d be lots, I guessed, from the past few weeks that wouldn’t matter to him now.
Just before I set off, I lifted my hands from the handlebars one at a time, to blow on them briefly. I knew they’d only stay warm for a second, but I did it, all the same.
And that’s when I heard the footsteps. Someone was running up the road. Not fast—almost stumbling—but nonetheless running, pit-pat on the tarmac. Louder and louder, coming toward me.
“Oi, wait!” called a voice.
It was him.
He’d slipped away from the rest, and come back.
In the headlights of a passing car I saw that, although his face was still bad, both eyes were open again. He was panting so much that at first, when he reached me, it was hard for him to speak. He bent over with his hands on his knees, elbows out, and, from that position, said, “Thanks.” More panting. “Thanks, okay? For getting my dad.”
I didn’t, I wanted to say. Him thinking I had was like when he’d thought I’d been clever enough to work Icarus out. I knew it was no good pretending anymore. I’d never be clever enough for him. I swallowed.
“It was Maisie,” I said. Because suddenly that’s who I realized it had to have been.
I waited for him to say Oh and go back to his dad. Up on the bridge, he had called me stupid.
But he just said, “Well, anyway. Thanks.” He didn’t seem to mind.
“She must have phoned your mum,” I went on.
And suddenly he laughed. “She’d know the number: We never changed it!”
Maisie had not only shown me how to save Bogsy, she’d saved the day, too.
I caught his mood and laughed myself. I put on a posh accent. “Jolly good show!”
I hoped he’d pick up on it, call me “old chap” or something. But he didn’t. With Bogsy, you never quite knew where you were.
>
Then I had an idea and tried something else. In my normal voice, I said, “Happy birthday!”
There’d be hours and hours of trouble ahead, for sure. Talking and trouble, for him and for me. Meadows and Marsh: It sounded like part of the landscape. But for now, we didn’t need to think about that.
He didn’t pick up on the happy birthday, though. He looked quickly over his shoulder to check his dad was still off by the car. Then he picked up his bike. “C’mon. Let’s go.”
He didn’t say where. Home, probably, but you never knew, with him. It was exciting.
Neither of us had lights, it turned out, which was a dangerous thing. You could be stopped by a policeman for that, but PC Horn was down in the ditch and didn’t even notice.
After all—I mean, after the things that had happened that night, and compared to the ones that might happen tomorrow, next week, next year—it didn’t really matter.
Hey. My turn now. Me.
Not him anymore.
He’s all right, but he gets things wrong. I been reading this. He’s not gonna mess up the ending.
And he’s got that wrong. This isn’t the ending. Not if you ask me.
But he did get some things right.
Or I wouldn’t be here.
And something she was right about. It’s good to work with someone. Better than working on your own. Yeah, me saying that.
But you got to have ambition.
I’m gonna paint the Mona Lisa. He can watch.
He makes it sound too cozy. Wants it to be like his railway book. It’s not. He thinks I’m gonna go back to building walls. But that was then.
You can’t go through what I been through—
You can’t go through what I been through and not change.
I might rebuild his old shed. Or I might knock it down. With his old cat inside. Not so cozy, see?
I might even—
I’m gonna build the Eiffel Tower.
He’s all right. And I got ambition, enough for us both. We’ll be okay.
Time to hit the road.
Hey, world, you ready?
I got plans.
PS Only joking about the cat.
Copyright © 2017 by Sally Christie
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920, by arrangement with David Fickling Books, Oxford, England. SCHOLASTIC and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc. DAVID FICKLING BOOKS and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of David Fickling Books.
First published in the United Kingdom in 2016 by David Fickling Books, 31 Beaumont Street, Oxford OX1 2NP.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available
ISBN 978-1-338-08161-9
First edition, January 2017
Jacket art © 2017 by Tree Abraham
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Jacket design by Ellen Duda
e-ISBN 978-1-338-09500-5
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The Icarus Show Page 14
