Pinprick (8 page)

I love how clean snow makes everything look, and the way it highlights intricate details in everyday things that wouldn’t normally grab your attention, like each individual twig on a bare tree or how a spider’s web is turned into jewellery. With each step we took our booted feet vanished up to our knees. There was nobody about and the quiet was apocalyptically silent. We were both wearing a ridiculous amount of layers. It was the only way to convince our mothers we’d be safe and warm, but the wet and cold still crept in. We’d be freezing cold by the time we got home, but it would be worth it.

The Decoy Pond was almost indecipherable. The large pond sat within a ring of trees, a few growing out of the sides of the pond. It was rumoured to be bottomless but we both knew that was bollocks. I mean how could something be bottomless?

Apparently, in its time, the pond had swallowed no end of junk and yet it showed no signs of its bad diet. Legend has it that one of Dury’s relatives was driving his tractor home one night after drinking too much home brew when he drove straight into the pond. The pond consumed him without even a hiccup and he was never seen from again.

Much to our disappointment, someone had beaten us to the lake and had spoilt the fresh snow over the ice. An array of rocks and dead branches were scattered on the thick ice, whatever its previous visitor could find to try to penetrate the icy shell.

We were still cautious even though we spotted dozens of footprints in snow on its surface. My heart beat like a snare as I eventually lowered my foot onto the ice. It was solid. I put all my weight on the foot on the ice then lowered my other boot. When he saw I was safe and that no ominous cracks spider-webbed from under my boots Johnny soon stepped of the bank and onto the frozen pond.

We stuck to the sides of the pond as something or someone had told me that that’s where the ice was the thickest. We slipped and skidded all over the place and held each other upright.

After we’d walked maybe two thirds round the circumference of the pond we came to one of its features. Jutting out of the pond like a gigantic skeletal hand was the top of a dead tree. The branches were like many fingers that dangled over the ice. In the dark, it was a bit creepy and I couldn’t help wondering what we’d do if it tried to grab us.

Johnny decided to climb up the dead tree to see how far up it he could get. He wanted to snap off a couple of small branches as souvenirs. Even altering it slightly would make a huge difference, because all the people that came here knew it’s every knot and twig. There were numerous amateur artists here at different times of the year who tried to capture its stark silhouette in contrast with the pond’s beauty. If we defaced the tree it would a way of making our small mark on history. Johnny was up the trunk in seconds and then he straddled it and reached out for the thinner more spindly branches. I think he intended to snap one of the skeleton’s fingers off.

Johnny had grabbed a branch and was bending it backwards and forwards in an attempt to snap it off. I remember the look of concentration on his little ratty face and the way his protruding front teeth dug into the flesh on his lower lip.

Suddenly, there was this almighty CRACK and the bough broke and fell. In a split second, the branch he straddled snapped off and smashed through the ice, taking Johnny with it. I swore and ran to the hole. There was nothing to see apart from a length of the broken branch. I stared into the black hole of icy water, at a loss for what to do. I felt as cold as the water I was staring at. It was then I heard a dog barking madly and saw what at first looked like a Yeti hurtling across the ice. As the figure got closer I saw it was a man in a thick brown parka. The hood was zipped up so the fur lining surrounded his face. He ran like the devil was behind him. He reached towards the broken branch that stuck out of the water and grabbed at it with two shovel-sized paws.

“Help me pull!”

I reached down and got my hand on a massive knot on the branch and heaved with all my might. As we dragged the branch out of the pond my heart almost burst with exertion. I watched as inch by inch the bough reappeared out of the black. Just when I thought I’d lost Johnny for good we saw his little pale hand clutching at the fallen tree branch.

The mystery hero grabbed his hand and swept Johnny out of the pond in one swift motion. Johnny wobbled on his feet and almost fell over. The stranger half carried him off of the ice and helped him to sit down. Johnny shivered uncontrollably before he rolled onto his side and vomited brown water onto the ice. He was saturated and all I could think about was that he might catch hypothermia. I didn’t know how long anyone could endure that kind of temperature for.

A black Labrador appeared from nowhere as Johnny’s saviour unzipped his huge coat and wrapped Johnny in it like a swaddling baby. The dog nuzzled at Johnny’s face affectionately and the giant gently brushed her away. Johnny’s little face peered out of the hood at me; his teeth chittered as he tried to speak. He pointed a shaky finger at the bough we’d pulled out, “W-we g-got our br-branch!”

“You total fucking spazmo!” I said, laughing bitterly.

“Come on we best get you home!” said the man who had saved Johnny.

Then it hit me – I knew who the hero was, even though I hadn’t seen him around the village for a while.

“It’s Karl isn’t it?”

He nodded his pumpkin-sized head and grinned sheepishly; several gaps where teeth were missing only added to his overall jack-o-lantern effect.

He stood up and greeted the black Labrador that jumped and danced at his feet.

“Sit, Sally sit!” The dog sat obediently at her owner’s feet and gazed up expectantly. Karl had to bend down to pat the dog’s head. Then he scooped up Johnny. “Come on, you need to get back in the warm.”

Karl slung Johnny over his shoulder and turned to me. “Can you run fast in this?” he lowered his eyes to the snow.

“No but I can try.”

Karl chewed on his bottom lip, “I know where you both live. Your mate needs to get home quick or he’ll freeze.”

Johnny peered down at me, face pale, teeth chattering.

“Okay,” I said.

“You take my dog Sally home with you, she’ll be good. I’m going to get him home safe.” Karl hitched Johnny up on his shoulder making sure he’d got him in a comfortable position to carry and told the dog to stay with me.

I watched in awe as Karl charged through the snow like it didn’t exist, leaving a furrow three feet deep behind him. It was fucking amazing to witness such strength in a person. He bounded through the snow like a human plough; I pitied anyone who got in his way. I stood at the side of the frozen pond thinking about just how surreal everything felt. Sally, the black Labrador, grinned up at me.

To say my folks were surprised when I came home with Sally would be an understatement. I think my father assumed I’d brought a stray home and his initial reaction was to tell me to get rid of it. Mum and Catherine on the other hand were on her in seconds, covering her with fuss and affection. Dad grumbled under his breath as a hefty portion of Christmas turkey was laid before the dog like a sacrificial offering.

No sooner had I told Mum about what had happened than she was on the phone to Johnny’s mother, quizzing her about her son’s wellbeing. Apparently, Johnny and Karl were both in Johnny’s bedroom watching
Star Trek
. I laughed at the mental image I had of the two boys, little and large, transfixed as they watched William Shatner, whilst Johnny’s mum ran backwards and forwards with sandwiches and soup.

I ate a cold turkey sandwich before I took Sally over to Johnny’s house and found the boys just as I imagined.

Chapter Seven

July 2006

The morning after Shane’s arrival, he woke up early, despite a lack of sleep. He didn’t have much choice, what with the shrill birdsong outside the window.

The weather was still blisteringly hot and intense. The moment Shane stepped outside, in the same suit he arrived in, he realised he’d made a mistake. He never travelled with luggage as he preferred to buy what he needed when he needed it. It was an expensive habit, but he since he usually travelled between cities, it was easy and convenient to go shopping. Being out in the sticks forced him realise it hadn’t been such a good idea. He’d somehow forgotten how isolated the village was and hadn’t checked the weather either. He had to admit to himself that his way of doing things was bound to bite him in the butt sooner or later.

After last night’s awkward dinner Shane was glad to be away from the house. He didn’t have a problem with Catherine or the twins, but Jack was even more of an arrogant arsehole than he remembered.

“What’s the best country you’ve been to?” Jessica asked.

“It’s hard to choose,” Shane answered.

Jack slammed his glass down hard. Jessica ignored him.

“But what if you had to?”

“That’s enough,” Jack said sharply, “Dinner is for eating, not talking.”

“But-”

“No buts,” Catherine looked up from her plate for the first time, “Do as your father tells you.”

“But he’s leaving tomorrow.”

“Yes. He is,” Jack smirked.

He was glad Jack was up and out early and that he didn’t have to put up with anymore of his snide remarks over breakfast. He called a cab.

“Another one?” remarked Catherine with an eyebrow raised.

If you had a hectic career and the money, being driven somewhere door to door was more convenient and that’s what he wanted most in life, convenience. He always favoured the quickest and easiest solutions. Back in London most of the people he worked and socialized with had personal chauffeurs. They would spend hours sitting in traffic while Shane whizzed around on the underground. The chauffeurs and limousines obviously made their inhabitants feel important and were good for impressing their clients, but Shane felt that the crowds of hen parties had cheapened the image somewhat. They looked like supermodel wannabes with their L-plates, feather boas and slutty cackles. Unlike his friends, Shane didn’t need to look important. He was important.

He slipped the taxi driver an extra five pounds to not bother him with idle chitchat and rested his head against the window frame to allow the cool breeze to sweep over his face.

The tinnitus had kept him up most of the night. He thought he noticed it more here just because of how quiet it was in rural Suffolk. When you were used to the constant background noise of living and working in a major city, going to stay in the countryside was almost like going deaf.

He had forgotten how dark it could be in his home town. The darkness had been claustrophobic and he had felt like he was buried alive. There was nothing to distract him from the ringing and so he ended up thinking furiously about how every single one of the specialised medical professionals he had consulted with had failed to diagnose the problem. He had taken the four painkillers that he always kept in his wallet, and with the window wide open, he eventually managed to get a few hours sleep.

As the taxi sped onwards, he focused on his surroundings which were still familiar after all these years. There was a sharp bend at the bottom of a steep hill and then they passed the ominous one storey bulk of Cordell’s Meat Packing Factory. He had taken his first job there, years ago as a teenager.

As the taxi drove towards the factory he noticed that the company name and signage was the same but they had built an additional warehouse behind the older redbrick building. He asked the driver to slow a little as they passed the factory. He saw the same grassy mound that he had intended to sit on during the break on his first shift; he never did do that.

Then Shane saw that the bench where he, Malcolm and Freddy used to spend their breaks had been replaced with a Plexiglas smoking shelter. A dark figure was using it for that purpose.

“Wait!” Shane shouted startling the driver, “Stop!”

The driver pulled the cab over to the side of the road and Shane leapt out. There was a little security box and barrier at the entrance to the factory but Shane paid the middle-aged security guard no attention as he ducked under the red and white striped bar and ran towards the smoking shelter.

The Plexiglas coating was clouded and scratched with age and abuse but he recognised the figure immediately. Hunched over, scraggly brown hair hanging over his Burgess Meredith Penguin nose, was Malcolm.

He was wearing the same brown boots he always wore, along with the same mullet hairstyle. He was still wearing his customary brown leather jacket and scruffy jeans all these years later. Shane stood a few metres away and was momentarily speechless. He watched as Malcolm drew hard on the last few millimetres of his cigarette, always scowling as if he hated the taste but had to do it. He rolled the butt between his nicotine stained thumb and index finger and threw it like a dart player at the ground. His left brown boot heel ground the butt and embers to dust and he stared at his feet.

“M-Malcolm?” Shane stammered.

Something was wrong with this picture, Malcolm hadn’t aged at all. Maybe this was a relative or someone that happened to look like his lost friend’s double. But no, this was definitely Malcolm. He looked just as he remembered him. Was it a ghost then or a vivid hallucination?

“I know you don’t I?” said the apparition of Malcolm, raising an eyebrow. Shane forgot he used to do that. “You’re Cathy Colbert’s brother.”

Shane’s legs gave way beneath him and he fell heavily on his bottom. It was Malcolm. He said the same thing when he first met him. Shane sat on the dirty ground and stared at his lost friend in shock. Then he looked away and contemplated his sanity for a moment.

“Malcolm,” he asked, the name sounding strange on his lips after so many years. “What’s going on?”

“We’ve been waiting so long for you mate” he said, still staring at his boots.

“What happened?” Shane gasped, his other friends were alive!

“Me and the boys have missed you mate, it’s time you came and found us.”

“Where are they Malcolm?” Shane asked even though he was sure he didn’t want to know the answer. “Where have you been?”

Malcolm slowly raised his head and there was something wrong with his eyes. They had no corneas, irises or pupils, just black holes with impossible depths. When he next spoke, it wasn’t in his voice, but in his dead Father’s voice.

“If only you could bloody remember!”

A shrieking wail like electrical feedback screamed through Shane’s head and he felt himself falling into a black abyss.

*

“…God knows mate, he kept going on about his friends and some bloke called Malcolm.” Shane heard a man’s voice with an Indian accent chattering away. When he came round properly he saw his taxi driver, the middle-aged security guard from the booth by the gate and an Indian man wearing a brown jacket. His mouth and chin felt wet and as he sat up the Indian man and security guard crouched down beside him.

“Sit up slowly my friend”, said the Indian man and offered Shane a handful of tissues. Shane wiped his face and saw he had had a massive nosebleed. He peered at the Indian man’s face, and then looked up at the taxi driver and security guard. “Where’s my friend?”

The three men exchanged a worried glance and left it to the Indian man to explain. His friendly bearded face smiled reassuringly and apologetic at same time.

“It’s just us four here boss. You were confused and then you collapsed. Don’t worry though my friend, there’s an ambulance on the way.”

Shane got to his feet and pointed at the seat in the smoking shelter. “I saw my friend Malcolm sitting right there!”

The Indian man shook his head.

“Mate”, the security guard said wiping the sweat off his face, “you came through there,” he gestured to the red and white striped barrier, “running like bloody billy-o and went up to matey here,” he pointed to the Indian man, “ and after a few seconds sat on your arse, said something about your friends and fainted.”

Shane shook his head, that wasn’t what happened. That’s not what he saw, not what he saw at all.

“I’ve got to go,” he said.

“We called an ambulance mate, let them check you over first” the security guard insisted, the Indian man nodding in agreement. Shane caught the taxi driver’s eye, “I’ll give you an extra twenty if you get me out of here before the ambulance gets here!”

“Come on!” The taxi driver’s eyes lit up and he walked towards the factory entrance.

“You need help. You can’t just go-” protested the Indian man.

“Phone them back and cancel it.” Shane called over his shoulder.

By the time Shane caught up with the taxi driver, he had started the cab and had turned the wheels into the road. Shane jumped in the car and as the cab sped away he heard the approaching sirens.

He didn’t know why he insisted on rushing off to avoid the ambulance, the rational side of him thought it would have been better to let the medical professionals take a look at him.

Irrationality had taken over as the events of the past half hour weren’t exactly rational. Even though he doubted they would find anything other than high blood pressure, he was very much concerned about the way his audible disturbances had escalated. Maybe it was the stress of coming back home after so many years coupled with his anxiety over the prospect of his Mother’s funeral and the fact that most of the village would probably be there.

He closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind of all the questions he had no hope of answering.

*

Shane never went shopping so he didn’t really know where to begin. Almost everything he purchased was either online or bought for him by somebody else. After paying the taxi driver handsomely he marched into the first promising shop he saw, which happened to be a Marks and Spencer’s, and asked the first member of staff to summon the manager. Within a second’s glance, the skinny, grey haired manager recognised him.

“Ah Mr Colbert,” he said offering a hand, “I read you’d be back in this area, may I offer my deepest sympathy for your loss.”

“My loss?” Shane said puzzled.

The manager frowned uncomfortably, “the loss of your mother sir?”

What a bloody idiot! That’s not going to do my character profile a lot of good.

“Yes of course,” Shane smiled awkwardly, “of course. I’m a struggling a little in this heat we’re having. A few circuits must have blown.”

After what just happened? No kidding.

“Well how may I help you?” the manager smiled politely.

“Right, well I’m not one for shopping at all so I was wondering if you have someone available who can help kit me out with two or three days clothes whilst I see to some other business in town.”

“Certainly,” said the manager. Shane’s designer suit hadn’t gone unnoticed and he happily imagined the amount of money they’d take.

“I will see to it myself,” he paused and gestured to a nearby staff member; “if you could just give young Daphne here your specifications and measurements then I will have everything ready for your return.”

The manager bid him good day and left him with Daphne.

*

As he walked along the High Street, the multitudes of people who stared at him or asked him if he was Shane Colbert wore thin rapidly. He was grateful when a couple shook his hand and said that he was doing a good job. It made a change of late, especially after the story that was released after his mother died. Well, it wasn’t even much of a story; just a rehash of his great big mystery. It had come into the public eye not long after he’d caught the ation’s attention for the role he played in putting the Homeless Housing Scheme into action.

He had saved a lot of lives and brought hundreds of people back from the brink of addictions that would have killed them. The HHS had started out ten years ago in a deserted housing estate in South London when he purchased a total of five hundred properties; two bedroom flats in a massive horseshoe shaped tower block. It was condemned and up for demolition so he paid next to nothing for it and was then able to pay the best builders in the country to restore it. Once it was complete he started his campaign. Huge billboard posters, flyers, and bus advertisements asked all the homeless people who could get there to do so. He offered them modest accommodation, healthcare, jobs with a monthly wage and free rehabilitation. The only conditions were that everyone with an addiction had to pass through rehab. There would be regular drug tests and random searches in place. There would be zero tolerance for crime and no unapproved mixed sex living arrangements. Everybody who occupied a flat - two per dwelling - would work for him. A mess hall was built in the courtyard at the centre of the estate and all provisions were provided.

At first this caused uproar amongst the population of homed people as they saw it as a glorified prison. They argued that it took away people’s independence and freedom of choice.