“Hang on.” I puffed and repositioned my backpack so the straps didn’t dig in.
Silence checked his phone again and his mouth moved. Hurry, he mouthed at me. He pointed to himself and drew a finger across his throat.
We jogged for at least five or six city blocks, weaving in and out of traffic. Silence jaywalked most of the time. Taxi drivers beeped at him, but other cars stopped as if he was a policeman directing traffic. Some smiled and waved us past and Silence bowed his thanks.
Outside the center of the city, buildings were smaller, the people less harried. We cut through an underground parking garage and came up in a quiet lane where seedpods burst under my feet. I wondered if that was how roller-skating felt. We worked our way through winding streets and alleys into a residential area where rows of old terraced houses were strung along like paper-chains. Some looked abandoned and unloved, with gappy picket fences like a mouthful of rotten teeth. Climbing vines shrouded the fences and spread over the footpath. There were windows so thick with grime, you couldn’t see through them. Some houses had been renovated and restored: porches swept clean, Audis parked outside, topiaries in pots by the doors.
My feet burned in my tight boots.
“How much further? Where are we going?” Even with the cool breeze I was sweating and out of breath.
Silence grabbed my hand and pulled me into another alleyway. The smell of something recently dead made me gag.
It was unnaturally quiet.
“Is this where you live?”
Silence pursed his lips. Shhh. Crooked his finger again. Follow me. He pressed on a panel in a timber-slatted fence and it swung open like a trapdoor.
The garden beyond was a jungle of tangled, shoulder-high weeds, except for a narrow path trodden through the middle. I stepped over a patch of singed grass, perfectly round like a crop circle, where a fire must have started but not caught. A massive fig tree leaned over a rickety fence; its roots had punched through a concrete path.
He led me past a shallow, stagnant pond covered with a layer of green scum. The air around us vibrated with the hum and click of insects. A black and eel-like thing uncoiled and slid under the surface; something else skittered away through the tall grass, leaving a trail of waving stalks.
“Nice place you have here,” I joked to cover my unease.
Silence frowned and pressed a finger to his lips. Shhh.
We exited the jungle under a drooping veranda at the rear of a terraced house. Yellowed newspaper was taped to the windows. The door was padlocked shut. Silence crept along an uneven stone path and tapped on a darkened window that I figured must lead to a basement or cellar. He waited. When nothing happened, he reached up and knocked gently on a ground-floor window. Taptap . . . taptaptap . . . tap. Nothing. Again, the same sequence. Taptap . . . taptaptap . . . tap.
“Maybe there’s no one home,” I whispered.
Silence slumped. He slid down the wall and wrapped his arms around his knees.
I looked up at the window and a white face appeared. I gasped and took a step backward. “There’s someone in there.”
Silence scrambled to his feet and waved at the face. He pulled me over to the basement window. A snap, a click, and the window shuddered open, leaving just enough space to crawl through. Silence went first, dragging my backpack with him. He gestured for me to follow.
I hesitated for a moment. I stared into that gaping hole, then looked back at the sunlit garden. I had a fear of dark, enclosed spaces that bordered on claustrophobia. My heart was beating too fast. Another sinuous movement, a hissing noise in the sun-striped grass, and I grabbed Silence’s hand and let him pull me into the cellar.
He reached through the window and hauled my swag after him.
Inside, the air was damp and cold. There was nothing but an old fridge and crates of empty bottles and cans.
Swift and sure-footed, Silence moved toward a steep staircase over the other side of the room, my backpack slung over his shoulder.
I stayed perched on the sill to let my eyes adjust to the dim light.
The girl who let us in sat on the bottom step of the staircase. She looked about sixteen. Everything about her was faded: her short yellow hair, washed-out blue eyes, denim jacket. She was so thin and pale she seemed almost transparent.
She chewed viciously on a fingernail and glared at us.
“You’re in trouble,” she taunted Silence, without taking her eyes off me. “You’ve had two lockouts and you’re sixty down on your contributions.”
Silence flipped her the finger, then curled it into a ‘come hither’ for me.
The girl snapped, “And now you bring her here. You’re so screwed.” She ran up the steps, through a doorway that leaked weak light into the cellar.
Silence shrugged, but the gesture seemed forced. He started up the stairs, treading carefully over missing steps.
I jumped down from the ledge and followed him, dragging my swag behind me.
The hallway was almost as dark as the cellar and my boots caught on threadbare carpet that reeked of dust and mold. The walls were papered with newspaper clippings and handwritten notes that looked like shopping lists. More moldering newspapers were stacked in towers all along one side, leaving only a narrow space to walk through.
Silence led me into a kitchen that had nothing but a sink, a single row of chipped cupboards, and an old door balanced on top of two crates. A guy who looked like he belonged to the same era as the house stood by the makeshift table. I thought he must have been about seventeen, eighteen maybe. He wore a shirt with puffy sleeves, overalls, and a bowler hat.
He glanced at me without surprise, boredom even, and went back to peeling an apple in one continuous corkscrew twist.
Silence pointed. Joe, he said.
“Joe?”
“Joe,” the guy confirmed.
“Hi,” I said and stuffed my hands into my pockets.
Another girl came into the kitchen. She moved quickly and lightly for a big girl and her mouth was a tight red slash. She wore all black, her hair was shaved stubble, and she had piercings in her ears and lips.
“Carrie,” Joe supplied.
“Where have you been?” Carrie asked Silence.
Silence gestured at her, then turned to me. He curled his index fingers and poked them from the sides of his mouth like vampire fangs. He wheezed a laugh.
Carrie lifted her arms like batwings and hissed at him. Sure enough, her eyeteeth had been filed to sharp points. The effect was unsettling. She helped herself to a cigarette from the pack in Joe’s shirt pocket, sat on a crate, and surveyed me warily.
“Where’d you find her?” she said. “Does Arden know you brought her here?”
“She just got here,” Joe said. “Where did he find you?”
“At the train station,” I mumbled.
Carrie nodded. “That’s where he found Darcy, too.”
“Who’s Darcy?” I asked.
The faded girl slunk into the kitchen. “Does Arden know she’s here yet?”
“Darcy thinks Silence is hers. That’s why she doesn’t like you,” Carrie said bluntly.
Silence blushed.
Darcy turned away. “You are such a bitch, Carrie.”
Joe bounced his apple-peel twist up and down like a yo-yo. He looked up. “Arden’s upstairs. Go on. Get it over with,” he told Silence.
Everything they said was whispered or mumbled. Joe’s upward glance was echoed by the others and I imagined there was a sleeping giant, or worse, up there.
“Hey, Joe. Shouldn’t you be out working?” Carrie said, and snapped the peel twist.
“Hey, Carrie. Shouldn’t you be out burning effigies or something?” Joe fired back.
“Nah, I’m the brains of the outfit.”
“Well, take your erudite self and . . . ”
Carrie laughed. “Er-u-dite,” she played with the word. “What’s that, some kind of rock? Did he just call me a rock?” she asked nobody in particular.
> Come on. Silence grabbed me by the hand.
“Better knock,” Carrie warned.
“I don’t want to get you into trouble,” I said.
Again, that resigned shrug.
Silence led me up another staircase flanked by more walls papered with clippings. Decades of stories stuck down for reasons I couldn’t begin to understand. The steps were shallow, uneven, and Silence skipped two at a time. It was warmer up there and darker still. The air swam with dust.
Silence stopped outside a closed door. He knocked once.
“What?” growled a voice.
Silence turned the knob and the door swung open. He took a step back and I moved with him. My fingernails bit into my palms and I held my breath.
In the gloom, I could make out two figures lying entwined on a mattress on the floor. There were dozens of photos, or postcards, of old buildings stuck to the wall in the shape of a question mark.
The figure on top rose and crouched on all fours above the person underneath. A face turned to glare at us.
It was a she. Long-limbed with pale eyes. Her head looked too large for her body and her naked back was moon-white and inscribed with ink. Ribs pressed sharp as blades against her skin. A predator poised over its prey.
The girl released her grip on the person beneath her and stood in one fluid motion. She seemed unfazed by her nakedness.
I realized that her head looked too big because she had dreadlocks that hung like hanks of rope to her waist.
The girl wrapped a sheet around her body. Her gaze flicked past Silence, to me.
“This had better be good,” she drawled. “Another one of your strays?”
Silence cowered.
“I asked to come,” I squeaked.
The girl pulled a cigarette from a pack on the floor and lit it. She sauntered over and leaned against the doorframe.
Her face was feline and beautiful. She looked foreign, exotic. And tall, probably close to five ten. Her skin looked like it had never seen the sun.
“You’re small,” she said and reached past Silence to stroke my face.
Her touch was ice cold.
“And pretty. But you should cut your hair. Don’t you think, Malik?”
The guy on the mattress turned on his side and propped his head on his hand. He grunted. His hair was shaved close to his head, his bare chest smooth and muscular. Around his neck hung a gold chain that he dragged between his teeth, then flicked out with his tongue.
The intimacy of the moment was too much for me. I felt a blush crawl up my throat and flood my cheeks.
“We could use another small one, don’t you think?” she said to nobody in particular. “What’s her name?”
“Li . . . ,” I started.
“Don’t tell me your real name. What does Silence call you?”
Silence relaxed visibly. He pulled out a small, spiral-bound notebook from his back pocket. He scribbled something and showed it to her.
“Friday,” she said, and laughed. “Original. I’m Arden. Do you have people? Did you run away, do you have family looking for you? You look young, what are you? Fourteen?”
“Seventeen,” I said. “There’s nobody. My mother died.” It was the second time I had said it aloud and it hurt just the same. Died. Nobody. Dead. Nothing.
“I’m sorry.” Arden cupped my shoulder with her hand. Her silver eyes bled compassion and something else.
My whole being responded like a divining rod. I leaned into her. She looked like a shadow, but she felt solid and real. Charisma radiated from her in waves.
For some reason I wanted to tell her, right then: I am afraid. I’m afraid of everything. I’m afraid of the dark, of closed-in spaces, of being alone, and of getting too close. I’m afraid that I’ll never again have the life I’ve always known, my feet in the dust and my heart full. I’m afraid of being alive; I’m afraid to die.
The spell was broken by a hacking cough from the bed. Malik reached into a black, rectangular metal box on the floor. He placed something under his tongue and tipped his head back as he swallowed.
Silence dug in his pocket and pulled out the two fifties I had given him. He offered the notes to Arden and she tucked them into the space between the sheet and her skin.
“Well. You have been busy. Now you’re forty up.” Arden let the sheet drop and sashayed over to Malik, trailing the sheet behind her. “Show Friday around. Tell the others. We’ll have an induction tonight.”
She waved her hand—a dismissive flick—and Malik pulled her back down onto the mattress. Her dreadlocks coiled over her shoulder.
The tattoo on her back was harsh against her skin. It read:
No
more
tears
now.
I
will
think
upon
revenge.
A wicked-sharp knife was tattooed beneath the script.
“Mary, Queen of Scots,” Arden said when she noticed my stare.
“Are you Scottish?” I asked.
“Am I Scottish?” She looked at Malik and snorted. “No.” Her gaze slid back to me. “I am vengeful.” She laughed hard and pressed her hand against her stomach. “You should see your face.”
Silence moved toward the stairs.
I followed him and reached behind to shut the door.
At the same time, Arden ducked beneath the sheet and Malik arched his back, as if he was being drawn upward by an invisible thread.
My hand on the doorknob, I was torn between repulsion and fascination. The moment lasted a few seconds, but it was a drawn-out, painful reminder of Vivienne and the nights her door was closed to me.
“Leave it open,” Arden said.
CHAPTER FIVE
WE JUDGE OTHERS BY THEIR appearance: their eyes, their expression, their clothes or hair.
I learned also to judge a person by their shoes.
I could only put it down to the many nights I spent dozing under pool tables in bars while Vivienne used her considerable intellect to pull beers so she could scrape together enough money for us to live.
My earliest memories were about shoes. Vivienne wouldn’t leave me alone in a motel room and we never stayed in a town long enough to learn who to trust. She’d tuck me under the pool table with a blanket and a packet of chips; I’d doze to the sound of balls ricocheting off the cushion and the clink of pint glasses on teeth. I learned to reset the jukebox when a song played four times in a row and a drunk patron grew maudlin. I watched feet shuffle around the table: leather boots were working men; scuffed flats meant waitress-on-a-break; when stiletto heels got wobbly they went outside with leather boots; thongs were well-worn drunks who slipped me fruit cups under the table; bare brown feet with splayed toes were indigenous locals. Sometimes, there would be a stranger in wedge heels or sandals, or black dress shoes you could see your face in, which meant the Jehovahs were doing country service. There wasn’t much I couldn’t figure out without ever seeing a person’s face.
Downstairs, only Darcy was still in the kitchen. She sat cross-legged on a crate, plucking at the laces on her sneakers. They had been white—now they were covered with puff-paint graffiti and black marker symbols.
“Are you in or out?” she asked bluntly.
Silence put his thumb up.
“In, I guess,” I said.
“Oh goody, an induction,” she said.
“What happens at an induction?” I asked. My stomach was doing flip-flops.
Carrie breezed back into the kitchen. “You pledge your allegiance and we sacrifice a virgin. Oh, that’d be you, Darce,” she said wide-eyed.
I couldn’t help it. I laughed. All the emotion that had been boiling and festering since I’d left Grandfather’s house overflowed. I made my first enemy without even trying.
Darcy fired a poisonous look and stormed out.
“Don’t worry about her. She pulls faces at blind people. See you guys tonight.” Carrie heaved a bag over her shoulder a
nd left.
Silence wrote in his notebook.
Do you have a sleeping bag?
“I have the swag,” I said.
He nodded and led me to a bedroom with scarred floorboards and a sagging ceiling. There were three mattresses. Two showed signs of occupation: pillows, unzipped sleeping bags and jumbled clothes. A makeup bag, an open book, and a one-eyed teddy bear. The spare mattress, leaning up against a wall, was bare and stained.
“Who sleeps here?”
Carrie and Bree, he wrote.
“How many of you are there?”
Eight. Nine with you.
“Are you all renting?”
He shook his head. Squatting.
“How long have you all been here?”
Silence held up six fingers.
“Six months?”
I tipped the mattress onto the floor and a cloud of dust exploded in our faces.
Silence sneezed. Upstairs a floorboard creaked and he looked up, holding his breath.
Come on.
“Where are we going?”
Work.
I went to pick up my backpack but Silence gestured for me to leave it. I stuffed the photo into my jeans pocket and followed.
We left the way we came, through the cellar window. Outside, the sun was warm and the air was still, expectant. We scrambled through the trapdoor fence, into the alleyway. I noted the street name—Jacaranda Lane—and paid attention to landmarks as we made our way back into the city. Individual corner shops and houses gave way to office blocks and furniture stores. Then came the multistory towers, malls, and tramlines.
Breathing felt like inhaling soup.
Silence walked with his head down, shoulders hunched, as if he was heading into a gale-force wind.
So, he picked up strays. I was officially a stray. A street kid. I’d heard about them, read about them. Maybe living on the street was a kind of freedom. Or was it a sentence? It felt like freedom to me then.
We passed under a bridge and walked along a path next to a slow-moving brown river. I kept well away from it. Cyclists whizzed past. I felt lighter without my backpack, or maybe it was more than that. There was a weight gone, a physical burden. It was nice to be led.
Friday Never Leaving Page 3