Everyone in the world except us three thinks it’s just an ordinary school day. No one knows that the three of us are on a mission to beat all missions. I’m so nervous about it that over breakfast Mum even asks me if something’s wrong. I just tell her I’m late, and rush upstairs to do my teeth. I don’t want her looking at me too hard in case she figures something out. You can never tell how much of what you’re thinking is showing when it’s Mum that’s looking at you.
Then I set off without the tape. It’s all I have to remember, but my head’s so buzzy I forget all about it until I’ve got to the end of the road, at the corner where I should be going left, to school, but aren’t. Carl will kill me if I turn up without the one thing that was my job. I have to go back.
It’s going to be ten times harder to smuggle the tape out of the house now because if anyone sees me they’re going to ask why I’ve come home again, and I’ll have to make up an excuse, but I don’t have a choice. It’s my own fault.
I open the door extra quietly, pulling it towards me so the latch doesn’t click. From the hall I can hear Mum upstairs getting ready for work. The tape’s in the cupboard under the sink. Thinking I might be able to get in and out of the house without anyone noticing, I slip into the kitchen, but Donny’s there, eating his breakfast.
He looks funny when he’s just got up, Donny. Everything’s squished and rumpled and puffy, so badly you’d think a dog’s slept on his head. It takes about two hours before you see his eyes. For speech, anything more than a grunt is a miracle. So even though he’s right there, munching through his cereal, there’s still a chance I might be able to walk right past him, fetch the tape and leave, without Donny looking up.
I get all the way to the sink without him seeming to notice I’m even in the room. I fish out the tape, quietly but casually, and stroll back in the least hurried way I can manage. I’ve got one foot into the hallway when Donny says, ‘What are you doing?’ His face is still down over his cereal. You’d think he was speaking to the Sugar Puffs.
‘Going to school.’
He looks up at me. ‘Twice?’ he says.
‘Forgot something.’
‘Packing tape?’
It’s right there, in my hand. I can’t deny it. ‘Yeah.’
‘Why are you taking packing tape to school?’
‘For a project.’
‘On what?’
‘Er … parcels.’
I’m not sounding very convincing, so I decide to just run for it.
I’ve got the front door halfway open when Donny’s foot kicks it shut. He stands there in front of me, blocking the way. He doesn’t say anything, he just stares down at me. I don’t look up. I stay still, looking at the door, breathing heavily, waiting for him to let me through.
‘What are you doing, Ben?’ he says.
‘Nothing.’
‘Tell me what you’re doing.’
‘I’m going to school! Let me go!’
‘We’ve got a deal, Ben.’
‘Let me go! I’m late!’
‘Late for school?’
‘Yes!’
‘For your project on parcels?’
‘LEAVE ME ALONE! LEAVE ME ALONE!’
I kick him, hard as I can, on the shin. He yelps and loses his balance. I push him out of the way and, in a flash, I’m out of the door and down the street.
I’m supposed to be at the station by now, but I don’t want to run and look all flustered when I arrive. One of the most important things in the whole plan, Carl said, was that we look natural all day and don’t draw attention to ourselves. So I walk it. It’s the fastest walk I can manage, but it’s still a walk. Part of the plan for looking normal was that we’d all go there on our own.
The station’s about ten minutes away at the bottom of a cul-de-sac. When I get there, from the end of the street I see Carl and Olly, waiting for me under the station awning, next to one another, standing close, but not talking. There’s a bush on the corner, and even though I’m late, even though I’ve been rushing all the way from home, I stand there, hidden behind the leaves, watching them.
It feels like that moment on the way to Wembley, when Carl had crossed over Kenton Road, almost getting hit, and I was still on the other side, watching him through the traffic. I get the same feeling I had then – that I’m in one world and Carl’s in another.
I stare at them, my legs suddenly refusing to carry me any further because I know this is my last chance. If I go down there and get on a train with them, Carl’s going to take us somewhere new. Somewhere bad. Somewhere me and Olly can’t even imagine.
Carl’s looking right at the bush now, staring in my direction, and I begin to think maybe he can see me there, maybe I’m not properly hidden, maybe he knows I’m having doubts. It’s so stupid of me to leave it until now before really thinking about what I’m getting involved in because just by being here, to meet them, just by agreeing to the whole thing in advance, I’ve already left it too late to back out. Carl always makes it seem like you don’t have a choice.
Then a hand grabs my shoulder and pulls me back round the corner. The fright of it feels like an electric shock ripping right through me, rattling my heart and fizzing my veins. My throat constricts to form a scream, just as I see who it is.
Donny. He’s still wearing pyjamas. He’s got one of Dad’s big coats over the top, and his feet are slipped into a pair of trainers. He’s out of breath from running.
‘Where are you going?’ he says.
I can’t answer.
‘Tell me where you’re going.’
I can’t even look at him. My mouth’s clamped shut and my eyes are down to the pavement. My chest’s rising and falling, fighting for air, and my heart’s beating so loud I can hear it in my ears.
Suddenly I’m in mid air. Donny’s yanked me up and pinned me against a fence. He leans in to me, nose to nose, so I can’t not look at him.
‘What are you doing, Ben? What are you doing?’
‘Nothing.’
‘THAT’S NOT GOOD ENOUGH, BEN! TELL ME!’
With my shirt cutting into both armpits, and Donny staring me down, his hands jabbed against my throat, and knowing that Carl’s just round the corner, waiting, it all becomes too much, and I can’t hold in the tears any longer. It’s just an itch in the eyes at first, and a tingling at the end of my nose, but as soon as it happens I know I’m not going to be able to stop it. By the way Donny looks at me I can tell he knows, too, and he puts me down, but even though I’m welling up, I can still see the sad way he looks at me, and I can still see what’s coming up behind him.
‘DONNYYYYYY!!!!’
The second I shout it, he swivels round. Right there, just a couple of steps away, is Carl, arm out, knife pointed straight at my brother’s chest. Just behind him is Olly.
Holding the knife steady, Carl flicks his eyes between Donny and me, his knees slightly bent, ready to lunge.
‘Why d’you bring him?’ says Carl, and you can tell by his voice he’s angry enough to totally lose control.
‘I didn’t!’ I say.
‘WHY D’YOU BRING HIM?’
‘I DIDN’T! HE FOLLOWED ME! I DIDN’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT!’
‘Why’d he follow you?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘WHY?’
‘I DON’T KNOW! ASK HIM!’
Carl turns to Donny, and they stare at one another, the knife glinting in the space between them.
‘Why’d you follow him?’ says Carl.
‘What do you want with my brother?’ says Donny. ‘Why can’t you just leave him alone?’
‘I’M ASKING THE QUESTIONS!’ Carl shouts. It sounds odd, the way he says it. You can tell it’s a line he’s heard on telly.
There’s a long silence while Carl looks from Donny to me and back again, and Donny stares from the knife to Carl. By Donny’s face, I can see he’s figuring something out – making a calculation.
‘Come on,’ says Donny. ‘We’re g
oing home.’
With that, he turns round and reaches a hand towards mine. At first sight, it’s crazy. He’s just standing there now, with his back to Carl and the knife, defenceless. Carl could stab him in an instant, but Donny’s doing nothing about it. He’s not even acting like he’s scared. His body looks relaxed and slow.
I’m the only one that can see his face, though, and from the clench of his jaw and the tightness over his eyes, it’s obvious he’s afraid. He looks right into my eyes, and I suddenly understand what he’s doing. He isn’t just grabbing me and running off. His hand has stopped short of mine so I have to decide what to do. I have to reach out and take it.
It’s my choice. Between him and Carl. And every second I wait is a second he has to spend with his back to Carl and the knife.
As soon as I understand, I take his hand.
I’m expecting him to grab it and run, but he doesn’t. He just slips his fingers round my palm, gives me an extra little squeeze for courage and, without turning, or saying anything, or hurrying, the two of us walk away, showing the full stretch of both backs to Carl.
As we take our first few steps I can hear the stillness behind us. I want to turn and check that Carl’s not coming after us – I want to see what look there is on his face – but I know I have to just do what Donny’s doing. He’s in charge now.
I hear a faint rumbling from up by the station.
‘It’s the train, Carl,’ Olly says. ‘It’s the train.’
I can hear that Carl still hasn’t moved. I can sense his mind whirring, deciding what to do to us, with the train arriving behind him, us walking away in front of him, and the knife still gripped in his hand.
Then there’s the sudden scuffing of trainers against pavement and the sound of four feet sprinting. Sprinting away. They’ve run for the train.
Once they’re gone – once I’ve heard the train come and go, and looked round to check they haven’t come back out of the station – all the blood drains from my legs, and the plug finally comes out on my tears. I sob like a baby, so hard I can barely stand, and Donny scoops me up, puts me on his back and carries me home.
We must look a weird sight, Donny in his pyjamas and an overcoat, giving his little brother a piggyback across Kenton Road in the middle of the morning rush hour. People probably stare. But I don’t notice anything. My eyes are shut, and I feel nothing except the sobs jerking my body, and my brother’s arms firmly around my legs, holding my weight, carrying me home.
Here, Now
That’s why you’d never heard of me. It’s only thanks to Donny. I don’t think things would have gone as far as they did with me there, but I would have been in on it, and it wouldn’t have been ‘Carl Murray and Oliver Ward – The Two Evil Boys’, it would have been three of us.
They’re famous now, Carl and Olly. Someone told me even people in China have heard of them. The newspapers never wrote about me. People didn’t know I was nearly involved unless they were at my school or from my street.
Some people said Donny should have called the police and got the boys stopped before they arrived, but that was my fault, too. I made him promise not to tell anyone. I said we had to save the police as a threat. I thought Carl would return from the trip wanting to get his own back. I never knew he wouldn’t return at all. And I never knew what he was going to do. I thought he was just going to scare her.
Donny took the blame for not calling the police. He never told anyone I wouldn’t let him. It’s thanks to Donny that all I got was you. You’re my punishment. Carl and Olly got Borstal. I got a social worker. I got you – you and your boring, boring visits.
People changed after it happened. Once word got round, everyone wanted a good look, wanted to know who I was, but no one would talk to me. At school, everyone avoided me, even Blob. The teachers were kind, but in a nosey, curious way, and I could tell they secretly hated me. Mrs Sparks locked her gate, so I couldn’t get balls out of her garden any more.
After a while we moved house, to where people didn’t know who I was.
On the day we left, Lucy came round, and the way Rachel looked at her when she appeared from behind the removal van was like something in a cowboy film. I thought Rachel was going to draw a gun and shoot her, but she didn’t.
They only talked for a few minutes, but it must have made a difference because now Rachel gets a letter from her almost every day. Rachel must write back, but that’s the kind of thing you’re not allowed to see or discuss or know about.
She listens to drony music instead of thumpy music these days, but I think she likes it here. She goes out again now, like a normal person. Donny hates it, but he’s leaving home soon. Our new garden’s like a jungle, so Dad’s happy, always out there with his tools, chopping things down and digging things up. He says he’ll make it so there’s space for football, but I’m not bothered.
Everyone’s different now, even Mum. She often looks at me in the way you’d stare into a well, trying to see what’s down there. I never did anything bad to anyone, but just because I was Carl and Olly’s friend people think I’m partly to blame. She never says it, no one ever does, but sometimes I know even my own mum’s thinking it.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Maggie O’Farrell, Felicity Rubinstein, Tony Lacey, Sarah Lutyens, Brian Rea, Zelda Turner, Susannah Godman, Helen Fraser, Richard Sved, Kate Webb, Saul Venit, Alex Garland, Matthew Sweet and John, Sue and Adam Sutcliffe.
Footnotes
1 Apparently that happened once, and they died, and no one ever found out whose fridge it was. According to Oily. This is a footnote, which is a place to put extra information at the bottom of the page. I might use more later, but only if I remember.
2 I once knocked a plate off the wall when I was doing it, and I had to pretend I’d been throwing things around because it sounded too stupid to say I was practising crossing the room without touching the floor. The plates on the wall had only just gone up, too. They’re not for eating off, they’re for decoration. Donny says no one knows why, but when people hit forty they suddenly start wanting to put plates on walls. He says the urge lies dormant in the bloodstream until your fortieth birthday, then suddenly you wake up and think, ‘That wall needs a plate on it.’ I don’t really understand what he’s talking about. Dormant means sleepy.
3 A gold Ford Capri (with a spoiler) that would look cool if it ever got washed and if it didn’t have a crunched-in headlight. It would be exciting to be in a car crash, but only a small one.
Praise
‘Sutcliffe is an unflinching observer of the primitive power struggles
underlying both child and adult interaction. His darkest novel yet’
Observer
‘Funny and shocking’ Esquire
‘Sutcliffe’s skill lies in his ability to invest everyday situations with
excitement and adventure. He allows readers to become young again,
and reminds us just how difficult and perplexing life can be when you
are ten’ New Statesman
‘Short, sharp shock of a novella about a childhood friendship which
spins out of control’ Time Out
‘Horribly and plausibly disturbing’ Geoff Dyer, Sunday Times
‘A neatly turned tale about two friends, ten-year-old Ben and Ollie,
whose lives are wedged apart by Carl, a boy whose fearless nature and
sinister intentions make the book read something like a suburban Lord of
the Flies. A bleak, fast-moving comic tale, full of strong set pieces’
Big Issue
‘Sutcliffe’s concentration on the tunnel vision of egocentric youth
powers the story onward with the chilly pulse of a horror movie’
The Times Literary Supplement
‘Funny, convincing, tragic’ Image
‘Sharp and pitiless, quietly horrifying’ Independent on Sunday
‘Sinister, exciting, intense. So credible at times it’s hard to believe it is<
br />
fiction. Spot-on’ Sunday Express
A Note on the Author
WILLIAM SUTCLIFFE was born in London in 1971. He is the author of five previous novels: the international bestseller Are You Experienced?; The Love Hexagon; New Boy; Whatever Makes You Happy and, most recently, The Wall. His work has been translated into more than twenty languages. He lives in Edinburgh.
Bloomsbury Publishing, London, New Delhi, New York and Sydney
First published in Great Britain by Hamish Hamilton 2004
This electronic edition published 2013 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Copyright © William Sutcliffe, 2004
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved
You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
eISBN 978-1-4088-3653-8
www.bloomsbury.com/williamsutcliffe
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Bad Influence Page 13