Harvest (39 page)

They both jumped
as
The A-Team
ring tone of
his phone rang out.

“
The A-Team?
”

Craig struggled to get his
phone out of his jeans pockets. “It’s my brother. Sorry. And don’t
mock ‘The Team’.” He leaned forward and took the call.

Darren cheered down the phone
as Craig answered it. “How are you, bruv?”

“
I’m okay, you?” Craig
replied.

“
Yeah, I’m
good.”

“
You get mum’s
messages?”

Craig slouched and sighed, his
irritation edging his tone. “Yeah, yeah I called her earlier.”

There was a pause. “You did?”
There was surprise in his tone.

“
Yes.” Craig snapped
bluntly.

“
Alright, cut her some
slack. She is worried about you. Maybe if you called her a little
more often to put her mind at rest…” Darren must have sensed Craig
switch off, because his brother’s tone changed from nagging to
conspiratorial. “Just be thankful she can’t get your local news on
the internet.”

“
You been looking at
it?”

“
Yeah. I got an RSS news
feed for London scrolling across my PC the whole time I am at
work.”

Craig tipped his head back and
rolled his eyes into his eyelids. “Not you worrying about me too.”
He nodded his head back onto his chest and slumped back into his
seat.

“
It’s natural for
families to worry about each other, isn’t it?”

He couldn’t argue with that.
“Yes, of course, I know that.” He admitted quietly. He hated it
when his brother was right.

“
Don’t worry I haven’t
been telling mum about it all. She would lasso you with her apron
strings and drag you back home.”

Craig grunted, Darren might
think it was funny but he didn’t.

Darren picked up on his mood
straight away. “Jeez, you have a real stick up your arse about
being helped. I remember as a kid you would bust your knee open and
you wouldn’t let yourself cry or let mum or dad clean you up. You
had to do it yourself.”

“
You were the
same.”

“
I’m
three years older than you; you probably didn’t remember my
skinning-my-knee age back then. And even though I’m older
I
have asked you for help in the
past.”

“
When have you ever
wanted my help for anything?” Craig realised his voice had climbed
with his disbelief and he added a laugh to soften it.

“
When I first moved out I
had you stay with me for ages, remember?”

“
Yeah.” Craig admitted
sombrely. “I thought that was just you being cool.”

“
Well it was, because I
am the cool older brother, but it was also because I missed you
guys and I was homesick. I missed you geeking off while I was
trying to get ready for work, or trying to watch TV and
stuff.”

Darren sounded serious. Craig
hadn’t admitted it but it had taken him a while to adjust to Darren
not being at home. Craig felt bad. “Sorry I didn’t realise.”

“
Just check in with mum a
couple of times a week will you. Call or text. Just while all this
is happening in your building.”

“
Yeah, sure. Anyway there
isn’t much you guys can do about a spike in the crime
rate.”

“
Spike in the crime
rate?” Darren repeated incredulously. “Seems a little more than
that bro. I thought your building was pretty safe. It’s weird that
it’s all happening at your place. The news are treating it like a
bit of a novelty.”

“
I know. But seriously
I’m okay down here; I keep my wits about me.”

“
I’m your older brother,
not someone you have to impress or put on a brave face with. I
don’t have any expectations you have to meet to qualify as my
brother.”

Craig’s face got hot and his
eyes moist. “Shut up. Dick.”

“
You’re the dick. I was
thinking; I could take some leave and come down and stay with you
for a bit. I can keep you company, and you can show your
country-brother the city night-life.”

Darren couldn’t come down. It
was hard enough dealing with the strangeness of events as it was
without having to convince him of what was happening. He couldn’t
leave Kelly on her own either. “What about your girlfriend?”

“
Were
engaged and gonna be married in a couple of years time so I’m sure
she will be grateful for a bit of space from me. We could geek off
together. Treat it as a practice run for my stag night. It’s been a
while since we had a night out together.” Craig could imagine it
now, their dance versions of eighties boys programmes like
the
A-team, Knightrider,
and
Streethawk
blaring
from the stereo while they boozed and got ready to hit the town. He
was surprised to find that for the first time he actually missed
home. The realisation was nearly enough to floor him. It would be a
good laugh. Yet it was too dangerous. There was no excuse he could
think of except for a version of the truth. “It has been ages and
that would be great, but I don’t want you down here with all that’s
happening because then I would be worrying about you too. I’m ok
anyway; I’m staying with someone tonight.”

“
Someone?”

“
Yes.”

“
A female
someone?”

“
Yes.”

“
That Vicki
girl?”

“
No.”

“
Hello, Craig’s got
someone else. Who?” Darren was in take the piss mode.

“
Fuck off.”

“
She there?”

“
Yes.” Craig said
bluntly.

“
Put her on.”

“
Fuck off.”

“
You like
her?”

“
Fuck off.”

“
Aw, okay. I’m fucking
off. Speak soon Mr.”

Craig said goodbye, hung
up on him and apologised to Kelly for the interruption. He saw that
she was still flicking through the channels. “Okay, stick
Sex and the City
back on and then
after that we can watch
Topgear
on catch-up TV, and I will show you what real cars look
like.” He actually didn’t care what they watched; it was just nice
being with Kelly.

“
It’s a deal.”

Craig swung his legs back up on
the sofa and got comfy again. He saw that as Kelly was now sitting
with her legs pulled up onto the cushions too, his feet were about
an inch from hers. Sod it, she had told him to make himself
comfortable and he was. If she felt uncomfortable with him being so
close to her then he was sure she would move. She didn’t. They both
laughed at the character of Samantha brazenly returning a faulty
neck-massager she had been using to massage something else.

“
It’s nice to see you
laugh.”

“
Thanks. I think. Does
that mean you think I am normally a miserable cow?”

“
No. Not at all. A bit
frosty to start with.” He saw Kelly’s mouth drop and he jumped in
to put his comment back in the context he had meant it to be in. “I
mean after today I’m surprised, and pleased to see you laughing.
After what happened I was worried about you.”

Kelly cast her eyes down to the
large glass of wine she cradled in her lap.

“
You told me what
happened up there,” Craig looked gravely at the ceiling thinking
about Kelly’s chase to the roof way above their heads. “But you
haven’t said how you feel. About Harry. About what
happened.”

Kelly swilled the wine around
her glass. “Pretty shitty. It was the last thing I expected. I
thought he might lash out at me or Balin when we cornered him, I
was prepared for that. When he disappeared over the edge it was all
so quick. Like I had missed something. Missed him getting past us,
or something. I didn’t look over the edge, Balin did, but I
couldn’t and yet I can see him in my head sprawled in a tangled
mess at the bottom.”

Craig could see the slush of
Harry’s brain and blood spread out from his head in a splatter.
“Imagination filling in the blanks.”

“
Yeah. Great. I dunno, I
can’t believe any of it. That Harry was capable of doing anything
like what he must have been doing. It all seems so out of
character.”

“
I lived next door to him
for about two years. He didn’t smell too good and was a bit of an
odd character but I would never have said he was anything but
harmless.” Craig shivered at the thought of the grim events that
had been taking place next to his home, sleeping with only a foot
separating his head from the blood and carnage of Harry’s charnel
house flat.

“
The same goes for Malik,
I mean he was a bible-basher and liked a few brandies more than he
should, but he was a nice old guy, a bit hail and brimstone but not
a stalker or someone you would think would try and knife
someone.”

“
Or give you a black
eye…”

Kelly fingered the blemishes on
her face. “Yeah.”

“
You didn’t seem to want
to talk about it earlier so I didn’t mention this to you, but when
you went down to get Balin to do the arrest, and you left me
watching over Harry’s door Cat appeared at the fire escape at the
end of the corridor.”

“
What did she
want?”

“
To
freak me out, I think.” Craig’s skin tightened on his arms and he
felt their hairs bristle as he recalled what she had told him. “She
looked scared. She pointed at me, at Harry’s flat and said ‘It is
in there with Harry’. I don’t understand and I’m not sure I want
to. Nothing came past me when you left to chase Harry. I wonder if
there is still
something
in
there.” He shivered visibly but didn’t care because Kelly was
rubbing her arms too.

“
Cat might not be so
coherent after her coma.” Kelly cautioned with little conviction.
“But then, who knows. I certainly don’t anymore.”

Craig became aware of their
vulnerability again. Sitting in the pool of light that the standard
lamp cast down on them, the rest of the room seemed like some
featureless void that held only shadows. He imagined what the Blitz
was like, sitting in the dark, waiting for something that could rip
through the home that was usually a sanctuary against danger.
Waiting for something they were seemingly defenceless against to
take one or both of them.

“
There is another thing
that bugs me. The station has been trying to get more police
presence on the streets, the local bobby walking the pavements
getting to know people. I thought it was a shame that our community
having the intercom controlled door between us and the world, and
being up in the sky and not in the streets, wouldn’t really get
that relationship with the police. So when I got off work I would
sometimes walk around this place in uniform, chat with old dears
who spend most of their days here, say ‘hi’ to the teens, chat with
the caretaker. You get to know the building that way, and that door
to the roof is always locked. I mean always. There are no railings
up there, there’s barely even a lip between the roof and a big
fall. It is always kept locked, except today. The one time when
someone is seemingly and deliberately heading up there to throw
himself off the building.”

“
It was probably an
oversight. Alec may have been doing some work up there. I didn’t
even know you could get onto the roof to be honest.”

“
Alec was in the crowd
that gathered around outside. I asked if he had been working up
there, if someone could have gotten the key. He had the keys on
him.”

“
You think Alec unlocked
it for Harry to get up there and top himself?”

“
I don’t know what I
think, we stumbled across Harry and it was a fluke. Harry wouldn’t
have known he was going to have to do what he did today. He chose
to run up instead of down, and for the first time I know of, the
door to the roof was left unlocked. I just feel like were on a
playing board and someone is moving the pieces around, keeping
ahead of us in some game where we don’t even understand the
rules.”

“
That’s
it. You need a dose of sanity.
You’re starting to
sound like Rachel now!”

Kelly laughed with him but
their noise was silenced as the intercom buzzer sounded from the
wall and startled them both. Kelly choked a mouthful of wine down
in a spluttering cough and got to her feet laughing once again. “Oh
my God, that’s probably Rachel now! Freaky timing.”

Kelly pressed the door release
at hearing Rachel crackle hesitantly onto the intercom. Rachel had
rung while they had been waiting for their Chinese to arrive, she
had called Cat several times to press for information but she was
not picking up, Rachel had said that if she didn’t get an answer
she was coming over. She was convinced that Cat had some link or
may have seen something that could offer an insight into what might
be happening. Jason didn’t want Rachel to come back to the tower,
but at least he was settled at hers and safe, even if something
happened to her.

Twenty minutes later a flushed
and sweaty looking Rachel disturbed the cosiness that had been just
Kelly and him. Kelly got a glass from the kitchen and offered
Rachel some wine, but Rachel declined and slugged back the contents
of a miniature bottle of spirits instead.