Sleepwalkers (34 page)

‘Yes, Ma’am, everything is fine.’

Toby began to fidget roughly one minute after Anna and Ben had marched out of the room and left him and Terry behind in the squat. He sat down on the floor, got up, rolled up his sleeping bag, puffed up his pillow and then, fresh out of ideas, sat down again. Terry was hunched over his computer, obsessing about some new mind-altering chemical that ‘they’ were putting into children’s cereal, and didn’t want to be disturbed. Toby muttered to himself, ‘
I’m nobody’s puppet, I’m nobody’s puppet
.’ He muttered it over and over as he wandered along the corridors, looking for something to do or someone to talk to.

He stared at the slogans on the walls.

Our Principles Are Not Negotiable!

Amandla!

One Nation Under CCTV.

The words seemed empty and smug. All these stupid words and catchphrases were just a substitute for action. Stupid, idiotic, clichéd hippies, he thought, just wasting their time in here with their clever, empty phrases. Too clever to do anything.

He thought about his parents, and he imagined them laughing about him. Why didn’t we go for them? he wondered. They knew more than they said, he was sure of that. Why didn’t Ben and Anna listen to him? Why go without him?

Toby created furious arguments and answers which defied logic, his anger focused on two people, fired by Anna’s words: ‘I’ll kill him.’ Her words pushed him along the corridors to the exit. He unscrewed the metal door to the outside, unseen by anyone.

Standing in front of the squat, a little dazed, a little scared at how he’d be able to travel alone, Toby nearly turned back. But then he felt the cash in his pocket and remembered the night before. Stung by shame and anger, he marched ahead.

The night before had started badly and then got worse. After Anna and Ben had dropped them off, Terry had bumped into Daz who had invited them to a ‘session at his pad’. At first they were both excited, imagining naked chicks handing out spliffs and free love. And while their hopes were raised when Daz opened the door and they spied two women kissing behind him, they soon found themselves being berated by bearded men with pseudo-intellectual diarrhoea. Everyone seemed angry, no one seemed to like anyone else, and even the massive black dude who was smoking something fruity refused to share his junk with them, calling them ‘liggers’.

It wasn’t long before Terry and Toby were standing alone, alienated, by the door, ignored by everyone. They did try to join in, but what they thought was a harmless conversation would suddenly split into raised voices. Phrases like,
Could you be any more bourgeois
? or
You just can’t free yourself from your colonial instincts, can you, General
? spilled out of any and every
conversation. And when they tried to talk to the lesbians again, they were sent packing at the line, ‘Every man’s a potential rapist, accept it and stop apologising.’

Soon, he and Terry slipped out and returned to their room, where they sat on their sleeping bags without much to say.

‘So much for the revolution,’ said Toby. Terry smiled, powering up his computer. Toby went over. ‘Got any games?’ he asked, crouching down next to him, but Terry pushed him away. His screen fizzed with data that Toby couldn’t understand.

He lay back on the floor. Someone had painted various constellations against a dark-blue wash. It was a paltry substitute for the real thing. He sat up again and threw an empty can at Terry. It missed but Terry glanced up at him.

‘What?’

‘Let’s do something.’

‘Go hang out with the dykes if you’re bored.’

‘I dare you to go down there and call them that to their faces.’

‘No chance. They’d wear my nuts round their neck as a bloody trophy.’

‘Terry, this is shit. I’m so bored.’

Terry shut the laptop. ‘So what do you want to do?’

‘Go out.’

‘No way.’

‘What, we’re just going to sit in this shit-house for the rest of our lives?’

‘Last time we went out, you pooped in your pants.’

‘I didn’t, and screw you very much, but that was different.’

They were grinning now. ‘Come on, mate. Let’s go out, sink a few. Be normal. No one’s going to find us.’

Toby jumped up and rushed over to Ben’s bed, pulling out a roll of notes from the bottom of his sleeping bag.

‘You know that guy kills people with his bare hands?’

‘Come on … please …’

Terry eyed the money in his hands. Toby winked at him.

‘You know you want to.’

‘Okay,’ said Terry, ‘one pint. But if you ever tell Ben or Anna then I’ll cut your throat while you’re sleeping.’

Tiffany’s was half dead when they trotted up to the door, and Toby could tell that the bouncer was giving serious consideration to barring them. But then he sighed and ushered them in, muttering something about Toby’s age. Once inside, they ordered the strongest lager available and sat excitedly at a table. It was the beginning of a great adventure. They were onto their third pretty soon, and if they had ever planned on leaving early those thoughts were long gone. Toby was so happy to be there, he even let Terry loose with his latest conspiracy theory about the way Hollywood deliberately posted 9/11 images into their movies, although it wasn’t exactly clear why.

Toby was about to question him about this when Terry stiffened.

‘Bloody hell, matey. Bird o’clock.’

Toby followed his gaze and saw two girls, late teens, who were watching them. As he caught the eye of one of them, she looked away but then glanced back at him a moment later. To Toby’s horror, Terry gave them a big grin and a wink.

‘That’s it, screw the New World Order, we’re in,’ he said. ‘Come on.’

He got up and headed over towards them and Toby had no choice but to follow. The girls introduced themselves as Bea
and Lara. Toby sat awkwardly at the table, but slowly relaxed when they laughed at his jokes and when he realised they weren’t nearly as old as they first appeared. When they went off together to the loo, Terry patted him warmly on the shoulder.

‘You’re in, nice one. I’ll have Lara, you can have the other one.’

The other one. Bea. Straight dark hair, a small run of spots on her jaw line and breasts pushed forward by a low-cut top.

‘Terry, I’m not really that, um, you know … experienced, when it comes to birds.’

Terry knocked down his beer. ‘Mate, relax, you’re the shy type, some girls dig that. Stop worrying. We’ll just get them a bit more oiled and then see where it takes us.’

Toby did what he was told. He glanced nervously at Bea every now and then, especially when Terry suddenly leaned over the table and kissed Lara hard on the mouth and she responded enthusiastically.

‘For fuck’s sake,’ screamed Bea. ‘Get a room!’

‘That’s the plan!’ leered Terry, and all four of them laughed, Toby a little less enthusiastically than the others.

More drink. Toby’s head started to spin as Lara told them all about her favourite characters in some American reality show and who was dating who (which Terry seemed to find fascinating). He didn’t understand a word of it. He looked around; everywhere people chatted and laughed animatedly. So this is what it’s like, he thought. And then he felt a hand on his leg, under the table. It was Bea. She looked at him with a smile so shy he almost didn’t recognise her. So he smiled back, squeezed her hand, and then suddenly she was laughing,
pulling her hand away so she could wave her hands around, emphasising just how incredible some film was.

Later, he went for a pee, and when he returned only Bea was at the table.

‘They left,’ she said with a coy smile, taking another sip from her glass, and Toby realised he was meant to take the lead here. His heart hit his boots. Clueless.

‘You, er, you want to go too?’

‘You got a place?’

‘Yeah but no.’

‘That’s just what your mate said.’

‘Right.’

‘So what are we going to do?’

Oh Christ, oh no, here comes the laughter, he thought, here comes the sickening moment. At least Terry’s not here to witness it. Just grab your coat and run.

‘If we go back to mine,’ Bea said, ‘you can’t speak. Mum’s home, but she’s always on the diazepam and if we’re quiet she’ll never know.’

‘Cool.’

‘You have to swear though.’

‘I swear. I swear!’

‘And you can’t stay the night.’

‘Er, alright.’

If this was a trap, Toby’s drunken mind thought, then it was the sweetest and cruellest trap ever. She stood and put on her coat, pulling her hair free. When they got outside she nestled into him and pushed her lips to his, her tongue snaking into his mouth. It was his first kiss.

Bea didn’t hold his hand as they took the bus back to her
home. She chatted about school and how annoying her teachers were. He murmured the appropriate comments, but all he could think about was what she would look like naked and how her breasts would feel in his hands.

Bea lived in a house not much different from his last one. They crept up the stairs and slipped into her bedroom. And as Bea slipped off her top and turned her back to him as she unclasped her bra, so his eyes were dragged away to the little-girl posters and the teddy bears on the bed. And then she was naked and to him she looked like a model in a magazine. His legs were shaking and he was praying the jeans were hiding this. Her hands went to his belt and undid it but then she turned and rushed across the bed to a drawer where she pulled out a condom.

Toby could feel how hard his heart was pounding in his chest.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he said. She put a finger to her lips, irritated, and he gestured a ‘sorry’ back at her.

‘So …?’ she mouthed, and then whispered loud enough for him to hear, ‘Get your kit off.’

But he couldn’t. There was a scar on his arm that was suddenly burning and he didn’t want to ruin this moment, didn’t want to see the disgust on her face when she saw what was underneath his clothes. But here was a naked bloody girl on the bed, holding a condom and wanting him to screw her brains out. He wanted to touch her so badly, wanted to kiss her again, put his tongue in her mouth, taste her. But still he didn’t move. He knew that this was as close as he’d ever get to being normal.

Bea looked at him warily and pulled the sheets over her body.

‘What are you doing?’ she whispered harshly at him.

Toby didn’t say anything for a while. He just stood there and began to cry. It was too late now to do anything else. Eventually he looked up and saw her staring at him with worried, hostile eyes. Yes, he thought, that’s more like it.

‘Normal service is resumed,’ he said. She didn’t understand and just glared at him, like the kids all did at school. He noticed his belt and flies were undone and wearily reorganised himself, then he turned and left, walking down the stairs and out into the darkness. As he went, he thought he heard her laugh.

When he got back to the squat that night, he was all alone. Anna might have been next door but he didn’t want to disturb her and he was happier to be alone anyhow. Terry returned about an hour later and although Toby let him pretend that everything had been brilliant, inside he seethed.

*

Marching away from the squat the next day, he heard Bea’s laugh in his head. He saw the sneer on her face, the way she’d pulled the sheets over her to protect her from him. He was so angry and ashamed that he took two buses in the wrong direction before he realised his mistake. Eventually, however, Toby reached his parents’ house. It was getting dark and they hadn’t yet drawn the curtains. He could see his mother inside, folding one of his dad’s shirts. He watched her for a moment before going to the front door and ringing the bell. It struck him that most kids his age had their own key and he wondered why he didn’t, but then the door opened and his mother was there. She gasped, her hand fluttering to her mouth before grabbing him and holding him tight to her.

‘I’ve been so worried,’ she said. ‘Oh my love, oh my darling boy. Michael! Toby’s home! He’s home!’

Michael came running through and Toby couldn’t help but grin at their warmth. He needed it. But as his father embraced him, he remembered the way his hand would rest on the back of his neck, guiding him this way and that. Controlling him. And he heard Bea’s cruel laugh again.

‘Where have you been?’ Laura said, shutting the front door behind him and ushering him inside. ‘Oh, you’re freezing!’

He let his mother fuss over him, pulling off his wet clothes before running a bath for him. It was as though nothing had happened. But this time, he wasn’t waking with a start, with no inkling of what he’d been through. He had entered the house with eyes wide open. He stood in his old bedroom and looked around at a place that should have felt so familiar but which now felt fake, like a wobbly film set that he could push to the ground. He sat at his desk and pulled out a drawer, turning it over to see where he used to hide his diary. He wondered why he’d allowed himself to be conned for so long. Because he was young. Because he was little and gullible and stupid. Because they’d trapped him and hidden him from real life. The anger snapped on again and he left his room to find them.

Michael was on the phone when Toby came down the stairs, but he hastily hung up. Laura appeared from the kitchen.

‘Are you hungry? You must be starving. What can I make you?’

‘Don’t you want to know where I’ve been?’ he asked.

‘I assumed you’d tell us when you thought the time was right,’ his mother replied. Her face clouded with that hurt,
anxious look she always had. But Toby’s emotions would not be calmed so easily.

‘I’m not all beaten up, like I usually am,’ he said. ‘Am I?’

‘Well, that’s something, yes,’ she replied.

He was studying their faces, waiting for the performance to end. But they just stared silently back at him.

‘I keep remembering things,’ he said, his voice a little jittery with emotion. ‘Loads of stuff, all coming back to me. Like this one time, I remember climbing this building – so high, Jesus! – and then climbing along this rail and hanging there, just hanging there for ages, until I fell. Why did you make me do that?’