All Sorts of Possible (12 page)

Faster and faster the fresher, most recent memories started to come to Daniel .

Speaking to Daniel in the hospital . . . cooking supper . . . hearing a doorbell . . . walking with Daniel into his living room . . . the light bulb moving as it tied a
knot in the cord . . . resting and talking to Daniel as the light bulb swayed above
themand­thenMasoncominginto­theroomandLawsonbeingsickandholding­thesilversignetringandtellingDanieltoopen­hisheartmoreandhishandexplodingfromhisarm­bloodspatteringacrossthewallsofthelivin­groomandfeelingsolittle­painitwasshockingandthen­fallingforwardandexpecting­tohitthefloorbutonlyplungingintoa­blackbottomlesshole—

Daniel opened his eyes, panting in the heat like a dog, and wiped his brow with a shuddering hand.

Bennett sat with him until he was calm, reassuring him gently that he was safe in the park.

Daniel looked through the notebook at everything Bennett had written down. He stopped when he saw a strange doodle, a figure of eight lying on its side. ‘What’s this?’

‘You said Lawson was drawing a symbol, practising it again and again. It’s the best I could come up with the way you described it. It sounded like the sign for infinity.’

Daniel studied it. Shook his head. ‘No, it was more like . . .’ Pausing, he tried to remember it and then he drew the crude shape of a cartoon bomb. Bennett looked at it and
shrugged.

‘It’s not how you described it.’

Gradually, in the heat of the sun, Daniel fell asleep.

When he woke with a start, Bennett offered him a can of Coke, and Daniel could smell the whisky fumes drifting off it.

‘You were having a bad dream,’ said Bennett, waggling the can in front of Daniel’s nose, making the Coke fizz inside the can. Daniel took a sip and handed it back. ‘Do
you get them a lot?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘About what? Being underground again?’

‘Yeah. I’m back there, in the dark, with my phone, the rock shining back, the corners jutting out and catching the light so they look like teeth. Like the rock’s about to eat
me. And sometimes it does.’ Daniel sat up and let the sunshine melt across his face. ‘It’s not just dreams. Sometimes a pothole widens when I’m crossing a road and I have to
stop until it’s shrunk back down. Or every so often a car goes by and I watch it, studying the road, hoping nothing happens. Even the water running through the pipes at home can set my heart
pumping.’

Bennett offered him the can again. ‘Maybe you should speak to someone.’

Daniel shrugged. ‘It’s not all the time.’

Bennett nodded. ‘You can tell me anything whenever you need to.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I have another idea I’ve been waiting to spring on you. Maybe we should go to Lawson’s house. Perhaps we can find something there that might help.’

Daniel tapped his fingers on the grass. ‘Mason said not to go back.’

‘He won’t know as long as we’re careful. We could just look around.’

Daniel drained the Coke can and squeezed it in the middle and tossed it into the bin beside them, the whisky buzzing in his head. ‘OK,’ he said.

They sped down the quiet lane towards Lawson’s house, their bikes spinning grit on to the verge. But, as soon as they saw Mason’s blue BMW pulled over on the grass,
they had to brake hard, drawing black marker lines on the asphalt.

A mountain of rubbish had been built up in the front garden. There were suits still on their hangers. Stacks of newspapers tied with string. Carpets rolled into grey tubes.

Frank emerged with an armful of black curtains and threw them as high as he could on to the pile, like a thunderhead falling from the sky, until they landed and became an entrance into the
mountain instead.

‘Guess they’ve moved in,’ whispered Bennett.

And all Daniel could think was how sad Lawson would have been to see everything going up in flames. But, as they cycled away, he wondered if it really had been him thinking that or whether it
was the part of Lawson left inside him that felt that way.

The two of them went to the hospital and sat with Daniel’s dad, listening to the machines keeping him alive. Daniel stroked his father’s hand and then he washed his
forearms gently and carefully as if they were made of fine china. He spoke to Bennett as he did so, explaining his father was still in an induced coma to give his brain time to heal which was why
the ventilator was breathing for him and he was being fed through a tube into his stomach. Daniel stopped speaking when his voice started to crack and break apart, and the only sounds were the
machines beeping and sucking and whooshing.

Daniel slumped into his chair after he had finished washing and drying his father’s forearms. ‘It’s the not knowing that’s the worst,’ he said. ‘Because none
of the doctors or nurses can tell me if I’m never going to speak to him again or whether I’ll be helping to nurse him back to health after he comes out of the coma. So that’s why
I need to make the fit, to try and help him. I don’t want to leave it up to the world to decide what’s going to happen. I want to make him better if I can. It’s up to me. But what
if I can’t find anyone? What if I wasn’t saved to help him at all? That all along I’ve just been hoping I was.’

Bennett sat in silence for a moment and then he stood up and went round to the other side of the bed and held Daniel until his friend had stopped crying.

His aunt had cooked supper by the time Daniel got home, but he wasn’t hungry, despite not eating since his breakfast of chips.

When he picked up his plate, still heavy with most of the food, she rolled her eyes. ‘You should eat more than that. You’re a growing boy.’

Daniel ignored her and put the plate on the worktop beside the sink. He heard a little sigh as if she might be deflating. But when he turned round she was still there.

‘What have you been doing with yourself today?’ she asked.

‘Nothing. Went to see Dad with Bennett.’

‘I saw you walking around town with your friend earlier; it looked like you’d been drinking,’ she said, scraping her fork round her plate, and the sound caught in
Daniel’s chest.

‘No we weren’t.’

She took a deep breath as if she was sniffing the air for clues. ‘You were chasing some poor man down the street.’

‘You don’t have to be here if you don’t want to be. If it’s all too much.’

‘Daniel, you’re fifteen.’

‘Like I said.’

She smiled as if he had told her a joke. ‘And how do you know I don’t want to be looking after you?’

‘It’s not like you’ve been interested in me before.’

‘Maybe you should ask your father about that.’

‘Well, that’s a bit hard right now,’ Daniel said and she bowed her head. ‘Anyway, kids aren’t your thing.’

‘How would you know that?’

‘It’s obvious.’ His aunt stared right back and something welled inside him and made him say it. ‘Because you don’t have any.’

She looked at her plate and then put down her knife and fork.

‘Actually, I did have a son. He was called Michael. He died very young, before you were born. He would have been just a year older than you.’ She wiped her mouth with her napkin.
‘I never had the chance to have another child. Sometimes you realize that life gives you a blessing only after it’s happened. That’s what real heartbreak is. But I think you know
that now more than most people.’

Daniel gripped the edge of the worktop because his legs seemed not to be there.

‘I know what it’s like to lose someone I loved very much, the same way it was with your mother, and that makes me the perfect person to be here helping you, don’t you
think?’

‘Dad hasn’t gone.’

‘But he might, Daniel, because of how ill he is. And I’m sure you think about that from time to time. It’s something you need to talk about and I’m here whenever you want
to. I worry you’re only telling your friend what you’re feeling.’

She picked up her fork and started eating again.

Daniel walked back to the table with his plate and set it down in front of him and sat down. He began to eat too.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said after finishing a mouthful and swallowing. ‘I’m sorry about Michael too.’

‘Thank you. It was a long time ago.’ His aunt smiled. Nodded. ‘What do you tell him that you can’t tell me?’

‘Who?’

‘Your friend.’

‘Nothing.’ But she gave him a look that told him she didn’t believe him. ‘We don’t talk about anything important. That’s the point.’

They finished the rest of the meal in silence, her eyes flicking up at him as if expecting him to tell her something private and balancing the world between them. But he couldn’t tell her
anything about Mason or Lawson. So instead he ate every grain of rice on his plate and tried to come up with something else.

‘You’re right,’ he said finally. ‘I have been drinking today. Just the odd sip with Bennett. Sorry.’

When his aunt smiled as he put down his knife and fork on his empty plate, he knew that was enough for her for now. She laid her hands flat on the table and took a breath.

‘The consultant in charge of your father wants to speak to us tomorrow.’

‘About what?’

‘About what’s happening next. They’re going to start reducing his sedation in the morning because the swelling in his brain has gone down. They want to see if your father will
wake up. If he starts to breathe on his own.’

‘Do they think he will?’

‘They don’t know.’

‘They don’t know much at all, do they?’

His aunt’s mouth fell open. But the words didn’t come and all she did was close it and shake her head.

When Daniel woke with a start, it was still night and it seemed his bedroom was fast asleep around him, with no sign of anything that could have disturbed him. As he sat up, he
tried to remember what he had been dreaming about, but there were only sad feelings left inside him, a black vapour trapped and swirling in his chest.

And then the silhouette of a large man suddenly moved, as if emerging out of the wall, making Daniel cower back, too scared to cry out.

‘It’s all right, Daniel,’ said Mason calmly. He sat down on the bed, making the springs ping. He grinned and his teeth shone. ‘This is just a dream, nothing but
that.’

But Daniel knew it wasn’t. He tried to move, but Mason’s weight was pinning the duvet tight across his legs.

‘Where’s my aunt?’ he asked. ‘Have you done anything to her?’

Mason shook his head. ‘Don’t worry, it’s only
your
dream, not your aunt’s. Do you get me, Daniel?’ Daniel nodded and stopped trying to move. Mason drummed
his fingers on his thighs. ‘And anything can happen in dreams, my son. Anything’s possible. So I can be here, right now, sitting on your bed, having a perfectly ordinary
conversation.’

Daniel said nothing. He could feel his heart thumping in the soles of his feet. His hands, planted behind him and holding him up, were sweating into the sheets.

‘Now,’ continued Mason, ‘a little birdy told me you came round to Lawson’s house earlier. You and a friend.’ He hooked his thumbs together and his hands fluttered
around like the silhouette of a bird. ‘That birdy flew all the way and told me and I didn’t believe it. I said there’s no way Daniel would do a thing like that without asking me,
not after I told him to stay away from the house. Am I right?’

Daniel nodded. ‘Yes,’ he whispered.

Mason slapped his thigh. ‘Goddam that little birdy. I’ll shoot him next time I see him. Roast him, shall I? Have him for my tea?’

‘Yes.’

Mason sighed. ‘But I like that little birdy. And we all make mistakes, don’t we? Get things wrong. So I’ll let him off this time, shall I? People should get a second chance,
shouldn’t they?’

‘Yes.’

‘OK then.’

Mason got up and brushed the creases out of his trousers and fastened the middle button of his suit jacket. ‘Just a dream, remember?’ Mason clicked his fingers. ‘It’s
just your brain working things out.’ He bent in closer to Daniel, his hot breath sweet and sour and garlicky. ‘Have you found anyone yet? Your fit?’

‘No.’

‘Well, you need to get a wiggle on.’ He looked at his watch. ‘We’re into your last day.’

‘I don’t think there’s anyone out there.’

‘There has to be. You’re just looking in the wrong places.’ Mason made a popping sound with his lips. ‘There has to be someone, otherwise none of what’s happened to
you makes sense. I mean, what was the point of you crawling out of the ground a week ago if today comes and goes and I have to mark your dad’s name down in my little black notebook of things
to
do
?’

‘I was just lucky I got out. I went back to look. There was nothing there. No clues about anything.’

Mason shook his head. ‘Everything happens for a reason.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because life must have a design or what’s the point?’

‘Well, you need to prove it to me then.’

‘No, Daniel,’ growled Mason, ‘I don’t have to prove a thing. It’s you who’s going to have to show me it doesn’t. I have no doubt you have a talent
inside you that wasn’t meant to go to waste. I don’t believe it was luck you came out of the ground. You’re part of some bigger plan, to help your father and get your life back,
and to help me too, by getting me my money and the antique flask I asked Lawson to find.’

‘If my dad wakes up and starts to get better without me helping him, that’ll prove I wasn’t rescued for a reason.’

Mason just grinned. ‘What, you mean tomorrow? When the ward staff try to bring him out of the coma they’ve been keeping him in?’

Daniel opened his mouth, but didn’t know what to say.

Mason shrugged. ‘One of the nurses on the ward keeps me up to date on things. She says the smart money’s on your father not waking up. That he’s too damaged inside.’
Mason tapped his forehead. ‘If there’s just mashed potato in your old dad’s head then the doctors won’t be able to do a thing to help him. It’ll be all up to you to
find a way of making him better if you want your life back the way it was.’

After Mason had ordered him to let him out of the front door, Daniel went back to bed. When a car engine turned over and came to life, he peeked round the blinds and watched the blue BMW driving
up the street, all the way, until it turned the corner and disappeared. He managed to breathe more easily then.