He took the package and zipped it into his tank bag; the money he shoved into a jacket pocket. Then he climbed onto his bike, sparked it to life, kicked it down into gear and he was gone.
Without hesitating, I sprinted off towards the Tube. Sometimes I’d just jump the barriers but it was a risk. Transport police have a habit of being right where you don’t want them to be and I couldn’t risk any delay.
It’s funny how perception changes everything. Normally, I’d consider buying a Tube ticket a quick experience; hardly taking a second. The escalators would move rapidly, barely giving me time to read the many posters. Trains taking two minutes to arrive would be almost instantaneous and walking between platforms would be a short stroll.
Today, however, it was like one of those weird scenes in films where the corridor suddenly stretches off into infinity. The ticket machine seemed to be mocking me, keeping me in suspense. The sign reporting that the next train would be arriving in two minutes seemed to be painted on; two minutes lasting forever. Even the escalators seemed to be running at half speed, with everyone intent on impeding my progress.
Eventually I was on the Circle Line heading towards Notting Hill Gate. I rechecked several times that I was heading in the correct direction, despite the fact I’d checked twenty seconds earlier.
Each station seemed to take ages to arrive and the doors stayed open far too long. The worst thing about the Tube was that I now had time to think. Did the courier take the money and run? Was he now staring at the contents of the package, wondering what it was?
I couldn’t think like that. I had to just keep going. I’d done all I could to avert disaster.
Finally I got to Notting Hill Gate and surfaced onto the street like an insect emerging from its home.
I ran as fast as I could towards the school and as I was running down Jameson Street I felt a vibration on my wrist. One of the lights had changed from red to green. I had no way of telling which location the light referred to but I hoped that it was Dagenham. I guessed that I was still more than one hundred metres from the school so I hoped that it was the care home and that the courier, my new favourite hero, had made the journey on time.
When I reached the school, I ran through the gate but slowed to a walking pace as I headed for the main building. Schools are much more careful of visitors now and if some weirdo turned up panting and sweating and babbling about a small package that needed to go to no one in particular, I doubt that I’d be welcomed in.
As it happened, I didn’t need to worry about finding an excuse into the school. As I got halfway across the yard I felt my wrist vibrate again and, looking down, saw that both lights had now turned green. A small laugh escaped me.
I’d done it; I’d beaten Ethan’s sadistic game.
Instead of entering the building, I headed around the side and found what I was looking for: a sheltered ledge near the kitchen where I could place the package where it wouldn’t be found.
I left the school undetected and, as I half expected, was met by Luther, standing by the open door of the same van. They must have assumed I’d head to the school first. Who wouldn’t?
Luther nodded his head towards the van and I climbed in. The door slid shut and I heard another door slam shut and the van started to move, so I sat on the white rubber floor and leaned on the back wall, my heartbeat beginning to return to normal.
After we’d been driving for a while the tablet came back to life and Ethan’s face appeared again.
“Ah, Mr Hawk. I see that we have two green lights.”
Reaching down to feel the strap on my wrist, “Yes,” I replied.
“I assume that you’re feeling quite pleased with yourself?”
“I’m glad no one was hurt.”
Ethan smiled. “Of course. Tell me, Matthew, which makes you more relieved, the fact that no one was hurt or the fact that you weren’t responsible for them getting hurt?”
“What?”
“Well, there are many people getting hurt every day but you seem to be unconcerned about their welfare. So, do you actually give a fuck that the kids and old folk didn’t die, or do you just feel better because you don’t have to see their faces when you’re trying to get to sleep tonight?”
“I can’t care about everyone but I don’t want to be the reason anyone dies.”
“What a shame.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Ethan smiled and the van came to a halt. I heard the van’s front door open and shortly there was a clunk and the side door slid open.
I made a move to get out but Luther pushed me back inside.
“Let me out!” I shouted at Luther. “I’m done!”
“I’m afraid I’ve asked Luther to encourage you to stay where you are for a moment, Matthew,” said Ethan. “You see, our life-lesson hasn’t quite finished yet.”
“What do you mean? I played your game! You need to let me go now,” but even as I said it I knew it was futile.
“You played the game, Matthew, but you didn’t play by the rules.”
“I did what you asked!”
“I asked that you deliver the packages to both locations in one hour.”
“I did!”
“No, you didn’t. You had some gorilla on a motorbike deliver one. That wasn’t part of the deal and it wasn’t in line with my instructions.”
“Oh, come on! I did it. There was no way I could have made the two places on my own!”
“What’s the point of having a choice if you get both options? When you buy a sandwich do you leave with the money and the sandwich, Matthew? No, you do not. You either have your money or your sandwich. You appear to have both, so you cheated. Cheating brings consequences.”
I was about say something when there was a huge explosion. I was hit in the face by stale-smelling wind and dust. Ahead of me, clouds of grey and black smoke and dust were billowing out of the building in front of me: Liverpool Street station.
Chaos followed. People started screaming and running. Some cars tried to drive away, some just stopped. A couple of cars ran into each other.
After a few seconds everything stopped. Traffic had stopped and the noise was gone. People standing around seemed to be stuck; not knowing what to do they were standing and staring at the entrance to the station as if it were some monster about to wake.
“See you soon, Matthew,” said Ethan and the screen went dark.
Luther pulled me out of the van, slid the door shut, climbed into the driving seat and pulled away leaving me on the street amidst a crowd of onlookers.
I stood and stared, as everything seemed to happen around me as if I was in a trance. A few people struggled out of the swirling dust coming from the entrance to the station and some people moved forward to help them. Most stayed back, preferring to capture the whole scene on their phones.
Distant sirens became louder and the first emergency vehicles turned up, and within what felt like a few minutes blue flashing lights were everywhere.
I’d apparently been walking towards the station because I felt a hand on the front of my shoulder. “Please back away, sir. This is a controlled area and it has nothing to do with you.”
I looked up into the stern face of a police officer. He was dressed for a motorcycle.
“I need to help,” I said.
“Sir, the best thing you can do to help would be to stand back and let us get on with our job. Step back, please.”
“I just need to go to help,” I said, although it didn’t sound like my voice; I was listening from a distance to someone impersonating me.
“I’m not going to ask you again, move back,” and with that he grabbed my arm and moved me back to the crowd line.
“Get your fucking hands off him, copper!” shouted some guy further up the line. The officer looked up t
he line but turned and walked back to his duties.
A guy appeared in my face. “You OK, dude? FUCKING FASCISTS!” he yelled, the last part at the retiring police officer.
“Yeah, I’m fine. It’s fine,” I replied.
“They fucking love this, you know? They love any chance they get to push people around. Fucking DEMOCRACY, MY ARSE!”
My new best friend pulled away, as quick to dismiss me as to latch on, and he moved his way through the crowd to find something else of more interest to his agenda.
I stood and watched as more fire engines arrived. Some of the crew got out and started laying out kit on top of a large plastic sheet while others climbed into breathing gear and assembled into groups to head into the station.
It wasn’t long before they started bringing out people, some walking, most being carried. Of those being carried some were being spoken to and being handed to paramedics, who quickly took over their care.
Others were brought out and laid on the ground. A guy in a green suit with ‘Doctor’ on the back went over to the prone figures and, after a couple of minutes’ checking, wrote something onto a clipboard, ripped off half of the sheet and stapled it to the clothes of the victim. A cloth was moved over the body and he moved on to the next.
I watched this for some time; it was like a weird stage performance, with everyone knowing their part. Was Ethan right? Did it not matter? If I’d been a few streets away would I have heard nothing apart from a bang and dismissed it as I continued to browse shop windows?
I became aware of some commotion to my right and saw that a news crew had arrived. They’d obviously not been able to drive their van close to the incident and so had had to walk here and were now setting themselves up.
Some pieces of equipment had ‘PRESS’ written on the side. There was a woman messing around with her hair and someone else trying to help her tidy herself up from the hustle of getting there. I didn’t recognise her but she looked like she belonged on the news.
A guy with a square plastic frame was barking instructions to the rest of the crew and the cameraman shuffled himself comfortable with the camera on his shoulder.
Plastic-frame-guy told them all to shuffle around to get the emergency vehicles and the still-smoking entrance to the station in the shot and, once they were set to go, he counted them in from three and the news was made.
When I look back, this was the part that forced a change in me. Despite everything that was happening, this seemed to be the worst part. It was a combination of a few things: the switchable emotion from the news reporter that could be turned on and off between ‘takes’, the glee of some passers-by when they realised they’d managed to photo-bomb the report with waves and other hand signals, the hundreds of people trying to get the best shot on their camera phones, or the occasional comment that came drifting out of the crowd – “I think that’s another dead one” or “That’s gross, get a picture!”
What did it matter? Unless you were in the station when it exploded or had family or close friends in there, who cared? It seemed that people were actually enjoying the event. The news had a new story, loads of people had exciting stories to tell their friends and, while the news will be speculating about this incident for some time, the complaints about the disruption to the train service will probably outlast the nation’s concern over those who are bearing the loss of the dead.
I felt that if people realised the truth about the incident, more would be giving me credit than blaming me and this realisation sickened me.
I turned to walk away but as I did so a hand clamped around my upper arm.
“No, no, no, Mr Hawk, let’s take some time to fully appreciate the situation, eh?”
“Ethan, I don’t want to be here anymore. There are enough vultures picking at the bones.”
“Ah, do I detect some understanding?”
“Why did you do it?”
“I didn’t, you did.”
“You did it.”
“Come on, Matthew, you know you’re responsible. Can’t you feel the culpability?”
I couldn’t say anything. I knew the arguments but they were pointless. No amount of logic and reasoning would change the truth. It was me. I did this. I am responsible.
“Yes, that’s right. Finally you see it.”
We both watched the continuing drama. At one point I heard someone say to someone else, “We might as well go. The good stuff has finished.”
Ethan had let go of my arm but we both just stood there. Eventually, Ethan broke the silence. “I’m pleased you’ve finally seen it, Matthew. I don’t think we need to see each other anymore for a while. This is yours; make sure your future decisions are made with more care.”
He shoved a small backpack into my chest and instinctively I grabbed it. I turned around but he’d already gone.
I shoved myself through the crowd and walked away.
10
It’s been nearly five weeks since Ethan had given me the backpack and life had returned to normal. For the world around me, it was like a wound; the incident at the station had scabbed over and finally the scab had fallen off and, aside from a small scar, everything was as it was before.
True to his word, I’d not heard from or seen Ethan since the incident, although his influence continued.
After leaving the crowd I’d found a quiet place to check the backpack. It was full of cash: fifty thousand pounds. I have no idea why Ethan had given me the cash but I had assumed it was some sort of test. I failed this one too.
I’m sure that if someone had told me this story I would have told them that they should have thrown his stinking money into the river; refused his blood money. To my credit, at one point I did find myself standing on a bridge over the Thames holding the bag over the side. However, it seems that having principles is much easier when you’re not actually holding a bag of stinking cash and listening to your hungry stomach groaning. Don’t judge me unless you’ve actually had the option.
It started small: a meal here, a new pair of shoes there, a justification along the lines of “I’m too upset to draw; this will keep me going until I’m feeling better.”
I wasn’t wasteful; I’d rented a small studio-flat south of the river where it was cheaper and yet, aside from that, I had no plans and no idea what I was going to do next. So, here I sat, on the steps at Trafalgar Square on this still-warm but overcast day, wasting time.
However, some guy I met via Claudia said I could have some casual work at Camden Market, so I could technically have a plan if I wanted.
Now I had somewhere decent to live, an offer of work and some cash to keep me going until I was sorted. I guess my story could end here. In fact, if I’d decided to go to Camden Market this morning instead of Trafalgar Square, my story might have ended here as I slipped into the grey sea of humanity just doing what it needed me to do to get by.
However, as I contemplated heading to the Tube to catch a train to Camden Town, my eyes refocused on someone standing some distance from me but staring in my direction. It took me a while for the realisation to dawn but finally I was in the here-and-now.
Monique.
I felt a knot tighten in my gut. It’s not that I had any dislike for Monique, but seeing her was seeing Ethan; a part of my life I would have given anything and everything to erase.
The cold truth of it was that I had already given everything.
We looked at each other for a few seconds. I knew that I should probably wave or smile or do something, but I just sat there staring. She started towards me and came to a halt in front of my feet.
“Hey, you in world of your own, eh? Not see me?”
“Oh, hi Monique. Yeah, sorry, I was miles away.”
“I not seen you for ages and you’ve not been working with Ethan.”
“No.” I couldn’t think
of what to say. “I’ve been working on other stuff.”
“Counting the pigeons, no? Does it pay well?”
She was teasing me so I forced a smile.
“What’s wrong with you, are you sick? You look very miserable.”
“I’m fine, I just have a headache.”
She didn’t look convinced. “So, you have too much headache to have coffee?”
“I’m not much in the mood for coffee, Monique. Sorry.”
She watched me with suspicion. “If you have no work I can ask Ethan. Maybe has something for you.”
I let out a snide laugh. “No thanks. I’ve done enough ‘work’ for Ethan.”
“You not like working for Ethan? Ethan is good boss. Pays well.”
Staring off into the distance, “Yeah, he pays well.”
“So why you not like working for him?”
“I just don’t, OK? He’s not the sort of person I want to be involved with.”
“Why?”
“Look, I just don’t, OK?”
“Hey, he’s good man. Hard working and gave me chance when no one else would help.”
“Yeah, he’s a saint.” The sarcasm was obviously strong enough in my voice to bridge the language gap.
“Don’t be nasty with Ethan. If you don’t want work for him, then OK, but don’t criticise him. He is good man. Helps people.”
“Like Karen?”
A flicker of guilt struck me as I saw the pain on Monique’s face at the mention of Karen.
“Ethan helped Karen as much as he could.”
“Look, just leave it, OK?”
“No. You’re arsehole for talking about Karen. Karen was friend and Ethan helped her. You have no right to say bad things about her or Ethan.”
I suddenly felt angry. “How blind can you be? Ethan killed Karen.”
Tears were running down Monique’s face. “How dare you! You don’t know what Karen has problems. You don’t know how Ethan tried helping her. Ethan help me too, did he kill me too?”
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