Part 19 (1/2)
He slipped off his shoes in the hallway, glanced in the fridge to see if there were any goodies, ate half a jam tart... and then he heard the sound from the living room.
His father had only ever smacked him three times, the last time more than a year before. What Jack remembered more than the pain was the loud noise as his dad's hand connected with him. It was a sound that signified a brief failure in their relations.h.i.+p; it meant an early trip to bed, no supper and a dreadful look on his mother's face that he hated even more, a sort of dried-up mix of shame and guilt.
Jack despised that sound. He heard it now, not only once, not even three times. Again, and again, and again-smacking. And even worse than that, the little cries that came between each smack. And it was Mandy, he knew that it was Mandy being hit over and over.
Their mum and dad were at work. So who was. .h.i.tting Mandy?
Jack rushed to the living room door and flung it open.
His sister was kneeling on the floor in front of the settee. She had no clothes on and her face was pressed into the cus.h.i.+ons, and the man from the bakery was kneeling behind her, grasping her b.u.m, and he looked like he was hurting too. Jack saw the man's w.i.l.l.y-at least he thought that's what it was, except this was as big as one of the French bread sticks he sold-sliding in and out of his sister, and it was all wet and s.h.i.+ny like she was bleeding, but it wasn't red.
”Mandy?” Jack said, and in that word was everything: Mandy what are you doing? Is he hurting you? What should I do Mandy what are you doing? Is he hurting you? What should I do? ”Mandy?”
Mandy turned and stared at him red-faced, and then her mouth fell open and she shouted: ”What the f.u.c.k are you doing here?”
Jack turned and ran along the hallway, forgetting his shoes, feet slapping on quarry tiles. He sprinted across the lawn, stumbling a couple of times. And then he heard Mandy call after him. He did not turn around. He did not want to see her standing at the door with the baker bouncing at her from behind. And he didn't want her to swear at him again, when he had only come home because he felt sick.
All he wished for was to un-see what he had seen.
Jack spent that night lost in the woods. He could never remember any of it, and when he was found and taken home the next day he started to whoop, coughing up clots of mucus and struggling to breathe. He was ill for two weeks, and Mandy sat with him for a couple of hours every evening to read him the fantastic tales of Namia, or sometimes just to talk. She would always kiss him goodnight and tell him she was sorry, and Jack would tell her it was okay, he sometimes said f.u.c.k f.u.c.k too, but only when he was on his own. too, but only when he was on his own.
It seemed that as Jack got better everything else in their family got worse.
It was a little over two miles to the nearest village, Tall Stennington. Jack once asked his father why they lived where they did, why didn't they live in a village or a town where there were other people, and shops, and gas in pipes under the ground instead of oil in a big green tank. His dad's reply had confused him at the time, and it still did to an extent.
You've got to go a long way nowadays before you can't hear anything of Man.
Jack thought of that now as they twisted and turned through lanes that still had gra.s.s clumps along their spines. There was no radio, his mum had said, and he wondered exactly what they would hear outside were they to stop the car now. He would talk if they did, sing, shout, just to make sure there was a sound other than the silence of last night.
The deathly silence.
”Whose watch was that in the garden, Dad?”
”I expect it belonged to one of the robbers.”
Jack thought about this for a while, staring from his window at the hedges rolling by. He glanced up at the trees forming a green tunnel over the road, and he knew they were only minutes from the village. ”So, what was the other stuff lying around it? The dried stuff, like meat you've left in the fridge too long?”
His dad was driving so he had an excuse, but his mum didn't turn around either. It was she who spoke, however.
”There's been some stuff on the news-”
”Janey!” his dad cut in. ”Don't be so b.l.o.o.d.y stupid!”
”Gray, if it's really happening he has to know... he will know. We'll see them, lots of them, and-”
”All the trees are pale,” Jack said, the watch and dried meat suddenly forgotten. He was looking from the back window at the avenue of trees they had just pa.s.sed, and he had figured out what had been nagging him about the hedges and the fields since they'd left the cottage: their color; or rather, their lack of it. The springtime flush of growth had been flowering across the valley for the last several weeks, great explosions of rich greens, electric blues and splashes of colors which, as his dad was fond of saying, would put a Monet to shame. Jack didn't know what a Monet was, but he was sure there was no chance in a billion it could ever match the slow-burning fireworks display nature put on at the beginning of every year. Spring was his favorite season, followed by autumn. They were both times of change, beautiful in their own way, and Jack loved to watch stuff happen.
Now, something had had happened. It was as though autumn had crept up without anyone or anything noticing, casting its pastel influence secretly across the landscape. happened. It was as though autumn had crept up without anyone or anything noticing, casting its pastel influence secretly across the landscape.
”See?” he said. ”Mum? You see?”
His mum turned in her seat and stared past Jack. She was trying to hide the fact she had been crying; she looked embarra.s.sed and uncertain.
”Maybe they're dusty,” she said.
He knew she was lying; she didn't really think that at all. ”So what was on the news?” he asked.
”We're at the village.” His dad slowed the car at the hump-back bridge, which marked the outskirts of Tall Stennington.
Jack leaned on the backs of his parents' seats and strained forward to see through the windscreen. The place looked as it always had: The church dominated with a recently sand-blasted tower; stone cottages stood huddled beneath centuries-old trees; a few birds flitted here and there. A fat old Alsation trundled along the street and raised its leg in front of the Dog and Whistle, but it seemed unable to p.i.s.s.
The grocer's was closed. It opened at six every morning, without fail, even Sundays. In fact, Jack could hardly recall ever seeing it closed, as if old Mrs. Haswell had nothing else to do but stock shelves, serve locals and natter away about the terrible cost of running a village business.
”The shop's shut,” he said.
His dad nodded. ”And there's no one about.”
”Yes there is,” his mum burst out. ”Look, over there, isn't that Gerald?”
”Gerald the Geriatric!” Jack giggled because that's what they called him at school. He'd usually be told off for that, he knew, on any normal day. After the first couple of seconds he no longer found it all that funny himself. There was something wrong with Gerald the Geriatric.
He leaned against a wall, dragging his left shoulder along the stonework with jerky, infrequent movements of his legs. He was too far away to see his expression in full, but his jowls and the saggy bags beneath his eyes seemed that much larger and darker this morning. He also seemed to have mislaid his trademark walking stick. There were legends that he had once beaten a rat to death with that stick in the kitchen of the Dog and Whistle, and the fact that he had not frequented that pub for a decade seemed to hint at its truth. Jack used to imagine him striking out at the darting rodent with the knotted length of oak, spittle flying from his mouth, false teeth chattering with each impact. Now, the image seemed grotesque rather than comical.
His mother reached for the door handle.
”Wait, Mum!” Jack said.
”But he's hurt!”
”Jack's right. Wait.” His dad rested his hand on the stock of the shotgun wedged beneath their seats.
Gerald paused and stood shakily away from the wall, turning his head to stare at them. He raised his hands, his mouth falling open into a toothless grin or grimace. Jack could not even begin to tell which.
”He's in pain!” Jack's mum said, and this time she actually clicked the handle and pushed her shoulder to the door, letting in cool morning air.
”Janey, remember what they said-”
”What's that?” Jack said quietly. It was the sound a big spider's legs made on his posters in the middle of the night. The fear was the same, too-unseen things.
His mum had heard it as well, and she snicked snicked the door shut. the door shut.
There was something under the car. Jack felt the subtle tickle of soft impacts beneath him, insistent sc.r.a.pings and pickings, reminiscent of the window fumblers of last night.
”Maybe it's a dog,” his mum said.
His dad slammed the car into reverse and burnt rubber. The skid was tremendous, the stench and reverberation overpowering. As soon as the tires caught Jack knew that they were out of control. The car leapt back, throwing Jack forward so that he banged his head on his mother's headrest. As he looked up he saw what had been beneath the car... Mrs. Haswell, still flipping and rolling where the cha.s.sis had sc.r.a.ped her along the road, her hair wild, her skirts torn to reveal pasty, pitted thighs...
His father swore as the brakes failed and the car dipped sickeningly into the ditch. Jack fell back, cracking his head on the rear window and tasting the sudden salty tang of blood as he bit his tongue. His mum screeched, his dad shouted and cursed again, the engine rose and sang and screamed until, finally, it cut out.
The sudden silence was huge. The wrecked engine ticked and dripped, Jack groaned, and through the tilted windscreen he could see Mrs. Haswell hauling herself to her feet.