Numbers

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The town’s High Street was full of police informers. Every passerby was a pair of eyes and a mobile phone. While we’d been isolated in the country, I’d started to think we were just getting paranoid, that it was all in our heads, this need to run and hide. My picture on the front page of the paper told a different story. It was real. They were all out to get us. Walking along the road, it felt like it wouldn’t be long now. Even in a sleepy little market town in the middle of nowhere there were hundreds of people out and about: people who watched the news, went on the Internet, read newspapers.

Another thing was bothering me. Try as I might not to meet people’s eyes, I couldn’t avoid them all, and there they were again: people’s numbers. Telling me stuff about strangers, handing me their death sentences. I wanted to walk around with my eyes closed, to blot the numbers out. I didn’t want to be reminded that everyone around me was going to die. The reason was walking beside me, holding my hand. Spider. For the first time in my life, I had someone I wanted to keep hold of. The date on the paper – December 11 – was like a slap in the face. Only four days to go.

“Listen,” he said urgently. “We’d better buy some supplies quickly and then find somewhere to disappear. We’re too obvious here.”

He wasn’t kidding. There may have been a few people walking or driving along who were lost in their own thoughts, not paying us any attention, but everyone else was clocking us. I guess we were a pretty odd sight: two scruffy kids, one ridiculously tall, the other looking like a midget beside him. And I guess my hunch in the car had been right: Most of them didn’t see a black man from one year to the next. There were certainly no other black faces around today. It was like one of those programs on TV, only in reverse – you know, where some white guy goes into an African village and the kids rush up to him, touching his white skin and feeling his hair. Except no one was rushing up to us. They looked at us and looked away. One woman, coming toward us on the sidewalk, glanced up quickly and then made her kid walk on the other side of her, away from us. And I thought, Sod you, whatever we’ve got, it’s not contagious, you stuck-up cow.

We found a convenience store. Spider unwrapped some ten-pound notes from his wad of money and sent me in. I grabbed stuff as quickly as I could: a few chocolate bars and bags of chips again, yeah, but also some sensible stuff this time – water, fruit juice, cereal bars.

The store, squeezed in between an antiques shop and a greengrocer’s, smelled stale. It was packed from floor to ceiling with snacks and drinks, newspapers and magazines, loads of porno ones. It was like a little bit of London parachuted into the middle of nowhere. The guy behind the counter was reading a newspaper as I went ’round choosing. You could tell he was watching me.

I put the stuff on the counter. There were cigarettes behind him, so I asked for half a dozen packs, and then I spotted something else: three or four flashlights huddled together on the shelf. I bought two, and the batteries to go with them. He put the stuff in a couple of bags, watching as I fumbled with the money. He knows, I thought as I stood there. He knows.

He took the money. “Ta,” he said in a gravelly voice, like his vocal cords had been shredded by fifty years of smoking. Then, as I turned to leave, he called out. “Here…”

And I knew the game was up. What was he going to do to us? An old git like that couldn’t stop me, could he? I kept walking.

“Hey, you!” he shouted louder. I turned ’round. “You forgot your change.”

I went back and took it from him silently.

Outside on the street, I gave Spider one of the bags to carry, and he grabbed my free hand in his. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.”

We ducked into a side alley between two shops. It twisted and turned, behind houses and past some vacant lots, then out onto a canal towpath. We followed it along for a bit. A wall sprang up on the other side of me, and a train rattled past beyond it. We came to a tunnel. The path was narrow- a damp, cold, curved wall on one side, a railing on the other to stop you from falling into the canal.

Spider let go of my hand. “You go ahead. I’ll be right behind you.”

It was difficult to see where you were treading, and my ankles kept twisting on the uneven path. Halfway along, I started to really lose my nerve. A figure appeared at the end I was heading toward: a big, dark shape blotting out most of the light. I looked over my shoulder, expecting to see someone behind us, too – it was a perfect place to trap someone – nowhere to go, no one to hear you scream.

It was OK, though; the way behind me was clear apart from Spider. Not a trap after all, just a bloke walking along the canal.

We came toward each other in the dark. I wasn’t sure he’d even seen me; he just kept coming toward me in the middle of the path, like he was going to barge straight through me. He was silhouetted against the disk of light at the other end, his features blotted out. As he got nearer, I thought, He’s black, that’s why I can’t see much of his face in here. Then he got within twenty feet or so, and I saw with lurching horror that his face wasn’t black – it was blue.

It was blue and crawling with tattoos.

I swiveled around.

“Run, Spider! Run, run, run, run!”

He caught the terror in my voice, didn’t question me, just turned, and we ran. I could hear Tattoo Face behind me, heavy steps on the crunching gravel, breath rasping in and out of his lungs. It was so narrow in there, our bags were catching on the wall and the railing.

Spider slowed for a second, and I drew level with him. “Ditch the bags, Jem. Leave them there.”

I dropped what I had and he let me get past, then he threw the bags he was carrying back down the tunnel, straight at Tattoo Face. Even as I ran, I could hear the guy grunting, trampling plastic and cans under his feet. We were out into the open air now, belting back along the towpath the way we’d come only a few minutes before. We’d slowed him down with the bags, but not by much. He was a big bugger, but he could shift. I didn’t want to look behind, but I couldn’t help it, and when I looked over my shoulder, he was bearing down on us like a bulldozer.

“Here!” Spider grabbed my arm and hauled me off to the left. We ran down a rough slope until we reached another path, feeding off the main one. It led to a railway bridge: grim black riveted metal covered in graffiti. “Come on!”

We clattered up the steps. As we hurtled across the bridge, a train passed underneath us; must’ve been an express, because it blasted through, filling my ears with the sound of high-speed metal. It masked the noise of Tattoo Face’s footsteps, but as we started to go down the steps on the other side, I could feel the vibration of the bridge as he thundered across. He was right behind us.

The bridge opened onto a street, terraced houses one side, railway the other. Houses meant people – surely he wouldn’t kill us in front of witnesses. Would he? I started yelling, screaming as I ran, “Help! Help us! Call the police! Help us!”

There was no reaction. Either the houses were empty or people, hearing the noise, just sank deeper down into their sofas, turned the TV up a bit louder.

Spider wheeled around. “What you doing? Shut up! We don’t want the police. We just need to get away. Come on!”

“He’s going to kill us, Spider! We need help!” Did a curtain twitch? Was somebody watching us now?

“I’m not going to kill you!” Tattoo Face’s voice rang out along the street. “I just want a nice little chat, kids, that’s all.”

I looked back over my shoulder. The big guy had stopped running. He was standing in the middle of the street, bent forward but looking up at us, hands on his thighs, puffing and blowing. He was struggling to get his breath, but he kept his eyes on us the whole time. Of course, I saw his number. I’d seen it before, at the party. 12112010. Four days before Spider. The same date as the newspaper I’d picked up earlier. Today.

There wasn’t just adrenaline running through me now – this buzz, this awareness, shot through my veins like the first hit of the most powerful drug in the world. What did it mean?

Whatever was going to happen next, Spider would get out of it alive, and Tattoo Face wouldn’t. Of course, I didn’t know about me. Maybe Spider would be the only one to walk away…

Spider and I had stopped running, too. We both faced him in the street and then looked at each other, not sure what to do.

“What do you want?” Spider called out to him.

“You know what I want. You’ve got something that doesn’t belong to you. Something a friend of mine wants back.” The money. “We can talk about it, nice and civilized-like. No need to make a scene of ourselves.” He was walking toward us now, slowly. I could hear the blood thudding in my ears as he kept on coming. Then, to his right, someone opened a door. A middle-aged bloke, holding a big dog by its collar.

“What’s going on? “ he shouted out.

Tattoo Face stopped and turned toward him, held up both his hands. “Nothing. Bit of a domestic, that’s all. My son here’s in a spot of trouble. I just need to help him sort it out. You know what it’s like, don’t you? Kids!”

The guy looked at him, trying to suss him out. “Do I need to call the police?”

Tattoo Face smiled. “No, mate. It’s nothing like that. We’ll sort it out.”

While they were talking, Spider leaned down and whispered, “Back away.” And so, slowly, we edged down the street. Then, as they seemed to be ending their conversation, we turned and started to run again, fast, really fast, legs pumping away like mad.

“Oi!” He was after us again, but we’d got a good start now. We booked down the street. Spider was ripping off his jacket.

“What you doing?”

“Here.” He flung it across the top of the spiked railings to our left, then cupped his hands for me to put my foot into, and almost flung me over. I landed awkwardly, twisting my knee. Spider pulled himself up the other side, crouched on the top, and then jumped down. He grabbed his jacket off the top and helped me up.

“OK?”

I nodded, not wanting to admit how much it hurt.

“Come on, then,” he said, and set off, scrambling down the embankment.

I tried to follow at a run, but it was agony. I dropped down on all fours and sort of scuttled along, taking some of the weight on my hands. Spider looked back.

“What the hell are you doing?” He was down at the bottom of the slope now, by the side of the track.

“I’ve hurt myself. My knee,” I said, wincing as I tried to stand up on it.

“Why didn’t you say?” He started back up toward me, but I heard a thump behind. Tattoo Face was over the fence.

Panicking now, I scrambled toward Spider. He lunged forward at the same time as I was literally lifted into the air, scooped up by a big muscled arm wrapped ’round my waist. There was something cold and hard against my throat. That bastard had pulled a knife.

Spider tumbled forward, then froze, like a sprinter waiting for the gun. “No, no, man. There’s no need for that. Put the knife away. Come on, we can talk. We can talk about this.”

“We don’t need to talk anymore. You need to give me the money, and I’ll let your little friend go.”

Spider got to his feet. Tattoo Face tightened his grip on me. I could hardly breathe. To be honest, I’d been so surprised when he’d grabbed me that I’d just hung there like a doll; now I struggled in his arms, until he dug the blade farther into my neck. “Don’t come any nearer.”

“No, no, it’s cool.” Spider backed away. He was down on the tracks again.

“Spider, just give him the money.” My voice didn’t sound like mine.

He looked at me for a second, his face a picture of agony.

“I can’t, Jem. This is our future. You and me. This is a hotel room and a big double bed. It’s a pint or two in the pub, and fish and chips on the pier. How can we have that, how can we have all that, without any money?”

I had a big lump in my throat. He’d got this all in his head, what he wanted for us. Christ, it wasn’t much, was it? But we’d never have it. We’d never have even that. I started to cry. They were hot tears of frustration and longing, tears of hatred for the ticking clock.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry. I never meant for any of this to happen. I never meant for you to get scared. You’re right, Jem. It’s only money. We’ll get some more. Let her go,” he said to Tattoo Face, “and you can have your money.”

“Yeah, right, soft lad. I wasn’t born yesterday. Give me the money and I’ll let her go.”

“We’ll do it together, yeah?”

“No, you’ll give me the money,” Tattoo Face said evenly, “and then I’ll let her go.”

Knowing Spider, I knew what was coming next. I could see it all in my head in slow motion, but Tattoo Face couldn’t. He let out a great cry of dismay as Spider got the money out of the envelope, took the rubber band off, drew his hand way back, and then flung it up and forward, launching the roll into the sky.

Tattoo Face’s grip slackened. He dropped the knife, dropped me, and hurtled down the embankment to the railway track.

I ran toward Spider and we met halfway. He gathered me into him, pressing me into his chest, clutching at my hair.

“It’s alright. I’ve got you. I’ve got you, Jem.” His voice was thick, he wasn’t far from tears himself. “Let’s get out of here. Leave him to it.”

The air was full of money. The pound notes were still falling all around us as we picked our way up the embankment. I looked back at Tattoo Face, bent over, picking up note after note. You could tell he was mad, really mad, muttering to himself as he puffed and panted his way along, facedown.

Spider had both arms around me. When we got to the top of the slope, he helped me over the fence again. I waited for him to join me, but he was standing there, one hand on the railings.

“Come on, let’s get away from here,” I said.

He looked over his shoulder. I groaned.

“No, please, leave it. It’s only money.”

“Just a hundred quid, Jem. Think what we could do with a hundred.”

I reached through the railings and grabbed his sleeve.

“Spider, don’t.”

He unwound my fingers and kissed them.

“I’ll be back in one minute,” he said and started back down the slope.

“Spider, no! No!” I screamed. He was down on the tracks now. Tattoo Face looked up at him.

“Come back for more, have you?”

“I just want a little bit. My cut – it’s mine, anyway.”

“You’re not having any, you little shit. You go back to your girlfriend, right now, or I’ll give you a good hiding.”

Spider squared up to him. “I’m not frightened of you.”

“Funny, that’s what your gran said when I paid her a visit.”

“You what?”

“I just wanted to know where you were. Bit of information. She wasn’t very cooperative, your gran. Gave me a bit of lip, just like you. Still, she wasn’t saying anything by the time I left her…”

“You bastard! What have you done to her?” Spider launched himself straight at him, charging head down into his stomach. He knocked Tattoo Face off his feet, and they rolled together down the embankment onto the tracks. They were tumbling around, wrestling and landing real punches on each other with the sickening noise of flesh slamming into flesh. Behind their animal grunts and groans, there was other noise building up in the background: the rumbling of a distant train, and sirens, lots of them, getting nearer and nearer.

“Spider!” I screamed. “Just get away from him! Get away!” I don’t know if he heard me.

Suddenly, there was so much happening at once. Two police cars and a van swung into the road, screeched to a halt, and spewed out teams of uniforms. They swarmed over the fence. Two feet down the track, a train came into view, rattling along blindly.

“Spider, get out now!” My voice was impossibly thin against the chaos around me. He didn’t hear, or he wasn’t listening. I couldn’t watch. I turned away and sank down to the ground, knees hugged in, eyes tight shut.

All around me people were shouting and screaming. There was an earsplitting squeal as the driver of the train rammed on the brakes. It seemed to go on for hours. I waited until the noise stopped. I would have to look: I needed to know. I tried to make myself breathe – three breaths in, three breaths out – before I turned around.

Through the railings, I could see the train. It had ground to a halt with the last car level with where I sat. The police had Tattoo Face in an armlock. He was still putting up a fight, even with three of them trying to get him under control. There was no sign of Spider – without wanting to, my eyes scanned along the track under the train. The police were obviously thinking the same as me – some of them were walking along beside the end cars, peering underneath. My mouth was dry. “Oh, please, no,” I breathed to myself.

There was movement on the far embankment, something scuttling from bush to bush. I thought it was an animal at first, then glimpsed it again. It was a person on hands and knees: It was Spider.

He was making his way up the slope and away to the right. When the bushes ran out, he got down on his stomach and crawled on his elbows. I got to my feet and started walking along the road in the same direction. I was limping, but I didn’t notice the pain. I kept my eyes on Spider, and soon enough I caught him looking over toward me. I gave him the thumbs-up and he mirrored me. At the top of the embankment now, he scrambled to his feet and vaulted over the fence.

Below him, someone shouted out, “Oi! That’s the other one! Stop him!”

Spider broke into a run and I did, too – well, as much of a run as I could manage. We ran parallel to each other for a while, and then he disappeared from view, hidden by a wooden fence. We caught up with each other at a road bridge a few hundred feet farther on. He grabbed my hand, and we went for it, blindly running wherever our legs took us.