Winter Damage (28 page)

His breathing was thin and worn like it had journeyed a million miles to get from his lungs to his mouth and she pulled his collar tight and told him everything would be OK. This was the only time she would ever lie to him. He was not OK and things weren’t OK. Butch was dying, the first of them to be heading the way all of them would be heading soon enough.

‘Sonny’s gone for some wood. Only thing she’s good for, right?’

Butch smiled and he tried to speak.

‘What is it?’ She leant forward until her ear was close to the sucking that was his breathing.

‘Thank you,’ he whispered.

Ennor’s eyes filled with tears and they dropped heavy on to his cheeks.

‘What you got to thank me for? Should be me thankin you,’ she sobbed. ‘Stupid boy.’

Butch shook his head. ‘Thank you,’ he said again. ‘For bein you.’ He started to cough and his hands went to his chest, every word, every breath an excruciating punch of pain, too much.

Ennor must have screamed out loud because Sonny and Trip came running towards her and she shouted a jumble of words that were both comforting and startling but it was too late. Butch was dead.

Hours, days and weeks could have passed her by and Ennor wouldn’t have noticed them or counted them. There was no luck in counting, no lucky seven and no good fortune in the colour red. She lay on her back and saw crows circling the dead hour before bed and she knew they were the lucky ones, the free. Sonny gave her the blankets that they had piled on to Butch but had left him one. He lay beside her as still and as cold as a pebble washed up from the shore.

‘He’d bin ill a long time,’ said Sonny from out of the darkness. ‘Trip said.’

‘What he know?’

‘A lot, sister. I know everythin.’

Ennor sat up and saw that they had made a fire and were sitting awkwardly beside it. She must have passed out. Two children with faces like cold-bitten tramps, resigned and dirty and worn. Children used to the rhythm of winter’s homeless bash and bang and all of them broken souls with one dead awaiting the ground.

‘This is my fault,’ she said. ‘All this and everythin up to this. I should have known. He’d bin badly beat cus of me.’

Sonny shook her head. ‘I int listnin. Trip, block your ears.’

‘Not talkin to you,’ he said.

‘Dint ask you to. Block your ears cus your sister’s talkin bull.’

Ennor moved closer to the fire and gave them back their blankets. ‘Don’t swear.’

‘You did,’ said Trip.

‘When?’

‘Said “for fuck’s sake, Trip, shut up.’’’

‘That’s different.’

‘Why?’

Ennor took a deep breath. She knew there were things Trip didn’t understand, couldn’t. Butch was lying dead on the tarp between them and here he was with the usual hair-splitting questions.

‘Just leave her be,’ said Sonny and she put a finger up to his mouth. ‘Leave it.’

‘We’ll have to bury him,’ said Ennor.

Sonny nodded.

‘Put him in the ground one way or the other.’

‘Yep.’

‘You got ideas?’

Sonny shrugged. ‘I guess diggin would do it.’

‘The ground’s hard as rock.’

‘I got me axe.’

‘It’ll take for ever.’

‘Then for ever is how long it’ll take.’

Ennor gripped hold of Sonny’s arm, she wanted to thank her but despair caught in her throat.

‘I know,’ said Sonny as she stood up and she wrapped her blanket around Ennor and Trip’s shoulders.

‘Might start diggin down there by that tree.’ She pointed towards the bottom edge of the field and nodded. ‘Next to the hedge. Farmers don’t plough that far out.’

Ennor watched her lead the horses down the field with the axe handle sticking from her jeans pocket and a little lump rose up in her throat.

‘What’s Sonny doin?’ asked Trip.

‘She’s diggin Butch a grave.’

‘Why?’

‘Cus he’s dead, buddy.’

‘What she doin with the horses?’

Sonny was hammering at the frozen snow and scraping it clear with her boot. ‘She’s feedin the horses,’ she nodded. ‘Findin them grass.’

‘What we got to eat, sister? We int eaten all day.’

Ennor thought for a minute and wondered if Sonny had anything left over from the bartering.

‘Pass me that bag,’ she said to Trip.

‘It’s Sonny’s.’

‘Just pass it, would you?’

Trip pulled the rucksack from off the snow and on to the tarpaulin sheet. ‘What’s in it?’

‘Food, I hope.’

‘Please, God.’

‘Please, God, is right,’ and for once their prayers were answered. They had two tins of beans left, plus two tins of stolen spam and a packet of custard creams.

‘Savin the best for last.’ She smiled.

‘Thank God.’ Trip smiled.

‘Thank God. We’ll have a feast now, won’t we, buddy?’

‘For Butch,’ said Trip. ‘Before he goes to heaven.’

Ennor wiped her eyes and told Trip to go and help Sonny and to tell her she was cooking everything they had. The tears were starting to fall in heavy splashes down her face and she didn’t want Trip to see, not again. They would have a feast and toast Butch and everything that was good about him. Toast him into heaven.

She set about opening the tins with her knife and adding the last of the wood to the fire, enough to heat things through. She thought about their adventure because that was what it was and wondered if Butch’s destiny was written to end like this all along. They would never know, but known things were ending in any case.

When the beans were spitting from the tins and the two slabs of spam heated in the pan she called Sonny and Trip.

It felt strange to be eating when Butch was stretched out beside them.

‘This tastes every bit as nice as anythin,’ said Sonny.

‘I love sister’s cookin,’ smiled Trip. ‘Love everythin she cooks me.’

Ennor laughed. ‘You always say that, buddy.’

‘That’s cus it’s true.’ He nodded. ‘Shame Butch can’t eat none.’

Sonny raised her plate into the air. ‘To Butch.’ She smiled.

‘To Butch,’ said Ennor and Trip in unison.

They took their time to enjoy the food and Ennor told herself that it would be their last meal together. Tomorrow Butch would be in heaven and the ground and they’d all be on their way someplace other.

‘How’s the diggin?’ she asked.

‘It’s like liftin tarmac.’

‘How long you think?’

Sonny shrugged. ‘All night I guess.’

‘We can’t leave him, can we?’

‘Birds will get him or them wild dogs.’

Ennor looked over at Trip to see if his ears pricked to the word dog, but he was listening to something that carried on the evening breeze.

‘Buddy dog,’ he said.

‘I know,’ she said and she put an arm around his too-thin back. ‘Buddy dog’s gone.’

‘No, he int. Buddy dog.’ He got to his feet and stood with his nose and ears pricked. ‘Buddy dog,’ he shouted.

The two girls looked at Trip and then at each other and Sonny put a hand on the reloaded rifle.

Barking resonated up from the valley below, a bark for every shout Trip made.

‘Sit down,’ said Ennor, pulling at her brother’s jacket. ‘It’s them mad dogs.’

‘It’s buddy dog!’ he shouted and pulled away from her grip.

‘Trip, come back.’ Ennor chased after him and Sonny followed with the gun loose in her hands but it was too late to catch up.

The dog appeared in the open gate and jumped at Trip as he ran towards him. ‘Buddy dog,’ he shouted.

Ennor waited for the riot of screams and snapping jaws and she tried to pray but everything happened fast and confusing.

Trip lay twisted in the snow with his arms around the dog and he was crying. Tears of joy, not pain, tears that Ennor had never seen before that moment.

‘It’s his dog,’ said Sonny and she started to laugh. ‘It’s his crazy mutt dog.’

Ennor bent to pat the dog. ‘He’s here for the biscuits,’ grinned Trip. ‘He can have some, can’t he?’

‘He can have whatever he likes,’ she laughed.

‘Did he come alive again? Will Butch?’

Ennor and Sonny looked at each other and then Ennor shook her head. ‘Sonny must have shot a different dog, there was so many.’

‘And Butch?’ he asked.

‘Butch is dead, buddy.’

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Trip sat cross-legged by the fire with the dog’s head on his lap and he fed it bits of meat and biscuit. Ennor listened to him talk to it like he was his best friend, his confidant. He told the dog that he had been shot and that it was a miracle because here he was, alive and without blood.

‘A miracle dog.’ He nodded to himself. ‘Special.’

Down at the edge of the field Sonny had made a small fire for herself, a tiny beacon to work by and perhaps a little heat. They had carried Butch’s body down to where his final resting place would be, wrapped in his blanket from home, his shroud.

She hadn’t wanted him to go just yet, still had things to say, chatterbox things like he was still company of a kind. Sonny said it was best, especially for Trip. ‘These things stay with kids for ever,’ she’d said, like she knew.

Butch’s body was barely visible from where she sat. A small grey bump in the snow, smooth and round and immovable like a rock, her rock.

She looked at Trip and smiled. He was asking her a question.

‘What is it?’

‘We got tea?’

‘Tea’s all gone, buddy, and the pine needles. You thirsty?’

Trip nodded.

‘I’ll boil some water.’

‘Hot water to drink?’

‘It’s good for you, good for your tummy.’

Trip laughed and shook his head. ‘You’re crazy, sister.’

She lumped clean snow into the pan and wondered if she’d ever get to use a tap again, or cook on a stove, or more than anything, sleep in her own bed. She wondered if the trailer had been emptied by the landlord yet. Maybe he’d piled everything into the yard and put a match to it, or sold it. He was a mean bastard.

‘We’re goin in a boat tomorrow,’ Trip told the dog. ‘Can buddy dog come?’

Ennor shrugged. ‘We’ll see.’

When the water was boiling she poured it into the three tin mugs. ‘You be careful drinkin this,’ she said. ‘Don’t drink it straight away. I’m takin this one down to Sonny.’

She could hear the swearing from quite a way off. The tiny figure bent to the ground with mud on her hands and cuss on her lips.

‘How’s it goin?’ she asked.

‘It’s goin just about.’

Ennor passed her the mug and snuggled her own.

‘My hands are killin.’

‘You want me to take over?’

Sonny shook her head. ‘No point two of us sore and dirty more than ever. Besides, you need your energy for tomorrow.’

Ennor wanted to ask Sonny if she was coming to the Scillies in the morning, but suddenly something had them distracted.

‘What’s that?’ she said.

‘Voices. Where’s the gun?’

‘Up by the fire.’

‘Go get it quick.’

Ennor ran up the field and she told Trip to be quiet.

‘What is it?’ he whispered.

‘Don’t know, maybe strangers. Come with me.’ She strapped the rifle crossways to her chest and filled her pockets with the remaining ammunition.

‘Strangers who?’ asked Trip.

‘From the town, now come on, hurry.’

They ran down to where Sonny was standing in the dark, her fire trampled to smoke and the axe steady in both hands.

‘Who d’you think it is?’

Sonny shook her head. ‘Don’t know. Maybe they saw the fires.’

‘Will they pass?’

Sonny crouched to the ground and beckoned to the others to do the same. ‘They won’t pass, look.’

‘What?’

‘They’re standin at the gate.’

‘Maybe they don’t see us,’ said Trip.

‘They see us,’ said Sonny. ‘Wouldn’t have stopped otherwise.’

Ennor told Trip to take the dog and stand in the hedge behind the animals. ‘Keep your eyes closed,’ she told him, expecting the worse.

‘You got bullets in that gun?’ asked Sonny.

‘Course.’

‘You know you might have to use it?’ She looked across at her friend and Ennor nodded. The two girls stood their ground and watched the boys’ silhouette fill the gap in the hedge.

‘It’s those lads from the town.’

‘I’d say so.’

‘What they want with us?’

‘The horses,’ said Sonny as she edged forward. ‘They want the horses.’

‘What you want?’ she shouted. ‘Got nothin to give so just keep movin.’