The Bunker Diary

by Kevin Brooks

  Step 5: I waited. I sat down on my bed and stared at the grille in the ceiling. Read my thoughts, Mister, I thought. I broke your clock. Punish me. I broke your clock. If you want to carry on messing with the time, you’re going to have to come down here and fix it. Did you hear what I said? I broke your clock. Come on, punish me. What’s the matter? You scared? Come on …

  Click.

  The lights go out.

  I hear voices outside.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Shit, what now?’

  ‘Hey!’

  Then,

  Knock, knock.

  ‘Linus?’

  It’s Jenny.

  ‘Go back to your room, Jen,’ I call out. ‘Just stay calm. It’ll be all right.’

  ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘Nothing. Just go back to your room, get into bed, and lie still.’

  Then I hear the hissing sound. I look up at the grille. I can smell it, the smell of chemicals, growing stronger.

  Step 6: I grab a bin liner from under my bed and rip a hole in it to make a collar. Pull the black plastic over my head and roll it tightly around my neck. Grab the damp sheet from the door. Tear off a strip, dip it in the water-filled saucepan, wind the strip round my mouth and nose. And now the chemical smell is getting stronger. The air is pungent, gassy, hard to breathe. Eyes stinging. I drape the damp sheet over my head, wrap it round, round and round, over my head, eyes, mouth, nose, tuck it into the bin-liner collar. Breathe easy. Pour water over my cloth-wrapped head. Get into bed. Pull up the blanket. Breathe easy. Concentrate … stay awake. Lie still … go limp … play dead.

  The gas keeps coming.

  Hissing in the dark.

  How long?

  One, thousand … two, thousand … three, thousand … four, thousand …

  Count.

  Concentrate.

  Stay awake.

  How long?

  Minutes.

  Getting heavy-eyed.

  Count.

  One, thousand …

  Think.

  Stay awake …

  The hissing stops.

  The lights come on.

  I’m still alive.

  I’m conscious.

  Sick, dizzy, dopey … but conscious.

  Now I just have to wait.

  A minute.

  Keep quiet.

  Five minutes.

  Lie still.

  Ten minutes.

  Listen.

  Tkk-kshhh-mmm …

  The lift door closing.

  Nnnnnnnn …

  Going up.

  G-dung, g-dunk.

  The lift stops.

  Pause.

  A whirring.

  Clunk … click … nnnnnnnn …

  The lift coming back down.

  Step 7: I grab the saucepan, empty it, get out of bed. I run. My legs are jelly, my head’s all over the place. The air is foul, thick with gas. Quick, get to the lift, back against the wall, grip the saucepan. Stay awake. It’s coming down … nnnnnnn … here it comes, here He comes … g-dung, g-dunk … get ready … the door’s opening … mmm-kshhh-tkk.

  Raise the saucepan, ready to strike.

  Ready.

  Ready …

  Nothing happens.

  Wait.

  Come on …

  Where are you?

  Nothing.

  Where are you?

  I stood there for a long time. Back to the wall, saucepan raised, heart beating hard, hazy head wrapped in plastic and wet cloth, eyes streaming … and I knew He wasn’t there.

  He wasn’t in the lift.

  I’d failed. I knew it.

  Eventually I had to face up to it.

  I stepped away from the wall and looked inside the lift.

  The only thing in there, positioned carefully in the middle of the floor, was a grubby £10 note folded into the shape of a butterfly. It was my £10 note. I don’t know how I knew, I just knew. It was the £10 note I’d had in my sock when He got me. The one He’d taken from me a lifetime ago.

  Now everything is really bad and it’s all my fault. Everyone except Jenny and Russell hates my guts for putting them through another dose of the gas. Even Russell was a bit frosty for a while.

  ‘You should have discussed it with me,’ he said.

  ‘You would have told me not to do it.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘You would. I know you would. That’s why I didn’t tell you.’

  ‘Well, anyway, it’s done now.’

  It’s done, all right.

  The food’s stopped again. The heating’s off. We don’t even have a clock any more.

  And that’s not the worst of it.

  It’s not even close to the worst of it.

  This morning something really terrible happened. He raised the punishment to another level. Even now, I can still hardly believe it.

  I was lying in bed shivering, trying to work out what I felt worst about. The cold? The hunger? The emptiness in my head? The ache in my bladder? There wasn’t much I could do about the first three, so I decided to act on the fourth. I got out of bed, wrapped the blanket round my shoulders and started for the bathroom. As I left my room I saw Bird standing over by the lift. He looked across at me, then quickly looked away, making a big show of ignoring me. I muttered something under my breath and wasted ten seconds or so staring moodily at his back. Then Fred loped down the corridor towards the kitchen and I turned my attention to him. Shirtless, pale, and tired. He nodded at me but didn’t say anything. I waited for him to pass, and was just about to turn down the corridor when I heard the lift coming down. I paused. I knew it was going to be empty, foodless, but I still had to wait and see.

  The lift is the thing.

  The thing.

  It’s impossible to resist. You can’t ignore it. It’s like checking your pockets for cash when you know they’re empty. You’ve already been through them twice, you know they’re empty, but you still have to check them again, just in case.

  Anyway, the lift came down.

  The door opened.

  It wasn’t empty.

  There was a dog in there.

  I’ve seen some scary-looking dogs in my time, but this … God … this was something else. A Dobermann. One of those big ugly ones. Dark brown, nearly black. Long head, small pointy ears, powerful shoulders. Skinny, bony, half-starved. Burning eyes, bared teeth, snarling black lips.

  We all froze. Bird, Fred, me, the dog. For about half a second, nothing happened. The dog just stood there, staring at us, tall, rigid and silent, and the three of us just stood there too, rooted to the spot, staring back at it. And then suddenly, without a sound, the dog shot out of the lift and launched itself at Bird. No growling, no barking, nothing – just a black streak and a flash of wicked teeth. It was breathtaking. Bird twisted away and threw his hands up to protect his throat, but the dog was on him like a guided missile. It jumped up and sank its teeth into his neck, just above the shoulder, and Bird screamed and fell to the floor with the dog on top of him.

  I couldn’t move. I was petrified. But Fred was already up and running. Before I knew what was happening he was halfway across the corridor, whipping the belt from his trousers as he ran, heading for Bird and the dog. Bird was sobbing now, a terrible, gut-wrenching sound. I could hear teeth on bone. The dog was gnawing on his neck. There was blood all over the place. Fred didn’t hesitate for a second, he just ran up to Bird and the dog and looped his belt round the Dobermann’s throat. He put his knee in the dog’s back and pulled the belt tight, twisting it in his hands, then heaved, pulling upwards and back, tightening th
e belt as he pulled. The dog jerked up into the air, twisting and snapping like a crazy thing, and then Fred swung it round and hammered it down on the floor. Before the dog had a chance to get up again, Fred dropped down on top of it and grabbed its snout in one huge hand, clamping its mouth shut. He hooked his other arm under the dog’s neck, then let go of the snout, locked his arms together, gritted his teeth, and squeezed. Tighter and tighter, pressing down on the dog’s head, crushing its throat … choking, pressing, crushing. The dog struggled horribly, kicking its legs and flexing its body, but Fred had all his weight on it now. The dog couldn’t move. Couldn’t bite. Couldn’t breathe. Fred squeezed harder, groaning and straining, forcing the dog’s head down with all his strength, until eventually I heard a dull snap, and the beast went limp.

  Fred didn’t let go. He sat there for a minute or so, drenched in sweat, still gripping the dog’s head, making absolutely sure it was dead. Then, with a final sigh, he let go. The lifeless Dobermann slumped to the floor, its head flopping loosely on its broken neck. Fred looked at it for a moment, no expression in his eyes. Then he stood up, dragged the dead dog into the lift, and threw it dismissively into the corner.

  The others had come out now. Jenny, Anja, Russell. They were standing huddled together at the end of the corridor, their eyes shocked with fear and disbelief. Jenny was crying and Anja was staring open-mouthed at Bird. Bird wasn’t moving. He lay on the floor with his knees pulled up to his chest and his arms cradled over his head.

  Russell shuffled over to him.

  I crossed over to Fred.

  ‘You all right?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, panting. He wiped sweat from his face and glanced inside the lift. The dead Dobermann was splayed out on its side. Its ears were laid back and its mouth was hanging open, revealing two rows of blood-flecked yellow teeth.

  ‘Shit,’ I said.

  Fred laid his hand on my shoulder. ‘Never a dull moment, eh?’

  Bird’s not dead. He’s hurt quite badly, but he’s not dead. He’s got a nasty gaping wound in his neck and he’s lost a lot of blood. Russell cleaned the wound with water, then left it to bleed. Anja was all for bandaging it but Russell said it’s best to let it bleed. It helps to clean the wound, apparently.

  ‘Will he be all right?’ I asked him.

  Russell shrugged. ‘It’s a nasty bite and it’s near the head. But as long as it doesn’t get infected, he should be OK.’

  ‘What happens if it does get infected?’

  ‘Don’t ask.’

  ‘Is there anything we can do?’

  ‘He needs antibiotics.’

  ‘No chance. Anything else?’

  Russell laughed humourlessly. ‘We could always try praying.’

  So that was Monday. Or Tuesday, or Wednesday …

  That was today.

  Now it’s nearly midnight and everything is quiet. I’m hungry. I’m cold. I’m all mixed up. Was it my fault He sent down the dog? Am I to blame for Bird getting hurt? Or would it have happened anyway? I don’t know. I really don’t know. But whatever the answer is, I’m not going to feel bad about myself. I can’t afford to. I can’t blame myself. I mean, you do what you do, don’t you? You just do it. What else can you do?

  What would you do?

  If you were me, what would you do? Give up? Would you just give up? Would you lie down and cry? Would you just lie down and take what’s coming. Take what you’re given. Take it …

  Maybe I should?

  Maybe I should just give up. Give in. Here, have my life. Go on, take it. Do what you want with it. I don’t care.

  I don’t know.

  Maybe I should try apologizing again, only this time add a bit more grovel to it. I could get down on my knees, close my eyes, tell Him how wonderful He is …

  On second thoughts, I think I’d rather just give up.

  Wednesday, 29 (?) February

  Midday.

  No food.

  We’re still putting a shopping list in the lift every night, but when the lift comes down in the morning the list has gone and there’s no food, no nothing. Just an empty lift. There’s still a few bits and pieces of food left in the fridge, so we’re not starving yet. Just hungry and cold. The heat’s still off and it’s absolutely freezing down here. The walls are filmed with ice.

  Bird’s not looking too good. His neck’s gone red and he’s got a fever. He’s spent the last two days lying in bed, moaning and groaning all the time. Mind you, that’s what he does most of the time anyway, so I’m not too worried about it.

  A disturbing moment. I came across Russell in the corridor this morning. He was just standing there staring at the wall.

  ‘Mr Lansing?’ I said. ‘Russell?’

  He turned and looked at me. ‘Hello there.’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  He smiled. ‘Interview.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘They want to see me about something.’ He winked. ‘Disciplinary procedure.’

  I didn’t know what to say.

  I left him there looking at the wall.

  Jenny’s got a bad cold. At least, I hope it’s just a cold. Her eyes are all runny and she keeps coughing all the time.

  Apart from all that though, everything is just fine.

  Late evening.

  Quiet. White. Cold. Dead.

  I put a note in the lift tonight asking for antibiotics and something for Jenny’s cold. I know it’s a waste of time, but I can afford it. I’ve got all the time in the world. I mean, we might not have any food or heat in here, but the one thing He can’t take away from us is time. He can mess around with our perception of it – or at least He could before I smashed up the clock – but He can’t deny us time. We’ve got plenty of that.

  Plenty of time.

  I’ve been thinking about it.

  Time …

  Tick tock.

  First thing. I’ve just realized what day it is, 29th February. I think it’s the 29th anyway. I think this year is a leap year. I can never remember how you’re supposed to work it out.

  Not that it matters.

  But if I’m right, I’ve been here a month. Actually, it’s 32 days. I’ve just worked it out. 32 days. 768 hours. 46,080 minutes. 2,764,800 seconds. Give or take a day or two. Or three.

  It’s all relative, of course.

  Say I’ve been here a month. I’m sixteen years and four months old (give or take a few days), which is 196 months. So a month to me is 1/196th of my life. But Russell … well, let’s say he’s seventy. Seventy years is 840 months. So he’s been here for 1/840th of his life. And Jenny, in her terms, has been here longer than both of us. I don’t know exactly how old she is (I know she’s nine, but I don’t when she’s ten), but if we say for the sake of simplicity that she’s ten, that means she’s been here for almost 1/120th of her life.

  See? A month means different things to different people. That’s what I mean by time being relative.

  Time …

  Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it. I’ve thought about it so much, I’ve thought myself into a dead end.

  And another thing …

  It’s hard.

  Hold on.

  Let me get this straight.

  Right, it goes something like this. You’ve got the past, the present, and the future, OK? Time-wise, that’s all you’ve got. Then, now, and when. The past has gone. You can’t exist in the past, can you? It’s gone. You can remember it, but you can’t exist in it. And you can’t exist in the future either, can you? It hasn’t happened yet. So that leaves the present. Now. But if you think about it, if you ask yourself what the present actually is, when
it is … I mean, how long is the present? How long is now? This moment, right now, the moment you exist in. How long does it last? A second? Half a second? A quarter of a second? An eighth of a second? You can go on halving it for ever, again and again and again. You can take it down to an infinitesimally small period of time, a squillionth of a nanosecond, and then you can still halve it again. How can you exist in such an immeasurably small period of time? You can’t, can you? It’s too small to experience. It’s gone before you know it.

  But if you can’t exist now, and you can’t exist in the future or the past – when the hell do you exist?

  Time …

  I went to see Russell about it. That’s the kind of thing he knows about, time and stuff. But he was in a daze again. He thought I was someone called Fabian.

  I don’t suppose it matters.

  Thursday, 1 March

  We’re completely out of food now. This morning we shared out the last of the crackers. Two each. Yum yum. There’s nothing like a stale cracker to raise the spirits.

  Bird’s up and about. His neck and half his face have turned a weird shade of blue, and he’s got these horrible purply-red blotches all over his skin. He’s walking about though, so he can’t be that bad. I asked him how he was feeling, but he wouldn’t even look at me.

  He tried to get an extra cracker. He said he was sick, he needed the extra energy. He wanted one of mine. Said it was my fault he was sick, so I should give him one of my crackers.

  Fred told him to shut up.

  It’s funny. Bird hates Fred. I don’t think he hates him as much as he hates me, but it’s pretty close. He thinks Fred’s an idiot. Coarse. Brutal. Scummy. He thinks he’s a lowlife. But now he owes him his life, and he’s not sure how to deal with it. He doesn’t know how to show gratitude. If it was me, I’d just say thanks, thanks a lot for saving my life, and leave it at that. But Bird seems to think he owes Fred something more, like he’s beholden to him or something. So he acts all subordinate, all cringey, but at the same time he can’t hide his contempt for him. It creeps into his smile like a really bad smell.