Runners

by Ann Kelley

  Spelling not being Sid’s strong subject, he thought male meant letters.

  The last time he had received a card was years ago from his Gramps. It said that he was looking forward to seeing him again one day, and they would sail a model boat on a pond and he would take him to see the tall ships. Sid didn’t know what tall ships were, but he liked the card, which showed a 3-D image of a man running. You turned it one way and the man stood still and turned it another and the man’s legs were running. He wished he still had it. It had been left with all their belongings in the flat at Brunel Avenue. It felt like a hundred years ago.

  He heard the laughter of girls and thought he must be dreaming. He hid behind a tree as three young women ran by, chasing each other. They wore a sort of uniform and carried baskets. One of them caught the sleeve of another, who dropped her basket and shouted in mock fury at her attacker. They went back to retrieve the nuts that had scattered.

  Sid held his breath, not wanting to give himself away. Who were they? Were these the New-Earthers? It didn’t seem likely that they had kidnapped Lo. They were dressed in pale green T-shirts and shorts and were barefoot. In the dark bedraggled hair of the youngest, who could have been fifteen, was a daisy chain, little white and yellow stars around her head. He had never seen anyone or anything more beautiful. They ran off into the woods, baskets on their arms, still relaxed and playing as if they had no cares in the world.

  He waited until they had disappeared before collecting the nuts that had been missed. They looked a little like acorns, but flatter and with a papery leaf crown. He cracked them in his teeth and ate them. As he followed the girls, his rifle broken and held over his arm, he soon realised that most of the trees were nut trees. There were other trees with fruit dripping from them. He recognised apples and pears and the pale trunks of olives. Others were strange to him. He was surrounded by food. The sunglasses slid down his nose.

  Lo had been bathed in rainwater, her hair scrubbed, cut short and combed with herbs to remove head lice. She wore green shorts and T-shirt and her feet were bare. They had promised she could have her pink dress back soon, when it had been deloused. But now she had to learn to be a Forest Fairy.

  ‘A forest fairy?’ It sounded good. She wanted to be a Forest Fairy like the other little girls. Their names were Sweetpea and Sand.

  ‘I want my wellie boots.’

  ‘It’s nice to go barefoot, you’ll see.’

  ‘I have a splinter.’

  The smiley lady removed the splinter with a clean needle. She picked at the dry skin, carefully, keeping the little girl occupied by singing a song to her and getting her to join in.

  ‘If you go down to the woods today…’ she sang, and eventually got the tiny fragment out. Lo only flinched once. Sid would have been proud of her.

  ‘We’re going to give you a new name,’ the woman whose name she learned was Storm told her.

  ‘But I have a name. My name is Lolabelle Maeve Freeman and I live at 22 Brunel Avenue.’

  ‘Well, Lolabelle, that’s a very pretty name, but in Freedom we all get to have new names. We shall choose yours tomorrow.’

  ‘Why must I have a new name?’ Lo began to whimper and sucked her thumb, longing for Wabbit or Sid to comfort her.

  Storm, who had grey hair, a thin red nose and cold fingers, clicked her tongue and turned away. ‘See to her, will you, Moth?’ The smiley woman scooped Lo up and swung her around in her plump arms, whooping and laughing.

  ‘My little darling, you’ll be happy here, believe me. We have apples and water and lovely tents. It’s safe here. It’s like a holiday camp.’ Lo had never been called a little darling, though Mammy had sometimes called her Sweetpea. And she had never been on holiday.

  ‘But I don’t want another name. Want my own name. Want my pink dwess. Want Sid.’ She sobbed onto the soft warm breast of Moth, who soothed her and patted her hair.

  Presently Lo announced, ‘I want my new name to be called. Little Darling.’

  Moth laughed and said, ‘We’ll see.’ Lo knew what that meant. It meant no.

  ‘Moff,’ Lo whispered to herself, ‘Moff.’

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  IN A CLEARING stood a large yurt and several old caravans, hidden from above by a canopy of evergreens. Sid stayed hidden behind a tree and watched as the three girls went into one of the vans. He couldn’t take his eyes off the daisy girl.

  He stood there for ten minutes. A skinny old woman came out of the yurt and hurried off to one of the vans. He could smell fresh bread baking. His mouth watered. There were chickens clucking among the trees, scraping the loose leafy earth with their yellow claws, red combs flopping over their faces as they pecked and searched. It would be easy to pick one up and strangle it. He could make a firepit and cook it.

  Two of the girls came out of the van, but not his girl. They were giggling and holding hands. He crept to the van, and keeping down, moved to the window. There was a wooden bench. He stood on it and peeped in through red check curtains. At first he saw nothing, then he saw her. She was washing her hair over an enamel basin, pouring a jug of water over her head. She wore a towel around her shoulders. He was mesmerised. Her hair looked like a black stream, or the glossy feathers of a rook. His heart leaped under his ribs.

  ‘Oi, what do you think you are doing?’

  He practically fell off the bench. It was a small square woman, a red stain masking the left half of her face. Her hands were on her hips.

  He tried to run away but she grabbed his arm and although he twisted and wriggled furiously, she held tight.

  ‘No males allowed in here. Can’t you read?’

  ‘Let me go then.’

  ‘Is that loaded?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He was suddenly brave again. Raising the rifle to his shoulder he hit himself in the eye with the stock. ‘Ouch!’

  ‘Well, be careful it doesn’t go off. It’s bigger than you.’ She laughed a long belly-laugh.

  Embarrassed, he rubbed his eye.

  ‘Have some bread before you go?’ Her tone was softer, sympathetic.

  ‘Bread?’ He thought she was kidding, torturing him with the idea of fresh bread. His stomach rumbled.

  ‘Go on, you look hungry, son.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Come on then.’ She let go his arm and waddled off.

  Her caravan was slightly apart from the others, with a picket fence around a small garden planted with fruit bushes, salad leaves and flowers.

  ‘Wait here,’ she told him and disappeared inside. Sid wondered if it was a trick. Was she going for help? Would he be captured, beaten? He didn’t know whether to stay or run. He rubbed his sore eye again. She emerged a moment later with a plate of crusty bread and goat’s cheese. He almost fell on it, but remembering his manners, said ‘Thanks!’ before he shoved it into his mouth, savouring the butter on the bread and the crumbly texture of sharp white cheese. His thoughts were confused. He needed to find Lo and he wanted to see the daisy girl again. He was grateful to this woman, but more than that, he wanted her to hug him, he wanted to pretend that she was his mother. He missed his mother so very much. Tears came suddenly and he got what he wanted – she held him to her, patting his back and shushing his muffled wails. She smelt of bread and clean sweat.

  He blew his nose on the rag she gave him and dried his eyes.

  When he looked at her face he was surprised to see that she too had brimming eyes. She held him to her and kept saying tearfully, ‘There, there. Son, son.’ She eventually pushed him from her. ‘You better hop it before Storm sees you.’

  ‘Have you seen my little sister? She’s called Lolabelle.’

  ‘How old is she?’

  ‘Eight… five. Went missing two days ago. Pink dress, wellies. She’s got fair hair.’

  ‘What did you say her name was?’

  ‘Lo. Lolabelle Freeman.’

  ‘Yes, we’ve got her. She’s safe here. What’s your name?’

  ‘Sid. They took my mam and dad.�
� There – he’d said the words, and saying the words made it real. ‘Why did you take Lo?’ he wailed. ‘She’s my responsibility. Mam said I must look after her.’

  ‘She’s better off here than on the road with you, isn’t she? We’ve got fresh food, clean water. Other little girls for her to play with.’

  ‘Can’t I stay too?’ he implored.

  ‘No males allowed.’

  ‘Why?’

  She shrugged. ‘Freedom rules.’

  ‘Can I see her?’

  The woman took him by his grubby hand and led him through the wood, via dirt paths edged with shells. She left him hiding behind a water butt, went into a large green and yellow camouflaged tent and came out with Lo. He didn’t recognise her at first. She was clean, her hair was short and fluffy and she was dressed in dark green shorts and T-shirt. She was carrying a large white rabbit.

  ‘Lo,’ he called, and she ran to him. He drew her behind the barrel. ‘You okay?’

  ‘My name’s not Lo any more.’

  ‘Whaddyamean?’

  ‘I don’t have a new name yet but I’m a Fowest Faiwy.

  I want my new name to be Little Darling.’

  ‘Do you want to stay here, Lo?’

  ‘They have weal wabbits. He’s mine.’ She cuddled the rabbit harder. It struggled and its eyes bulged alarmingly but she held on to it.

  ‘Lo, I’m going to find Gramps and then come back for you, all right? You’ll be safe here. See you later, eh?’ He sniffed loudly.

  ‘You bin crying?’

  ‘Nah, gotta cold. He kissed the top of her head.

  ‘Be good, be safe,’ she said wistfully, and he slipped away into the woods.

  At least Lo was being well looked after. Better than if she was still with him, he reckoned. A load had been lifted from his shoulders. He could move about freely now, with no fear of Lo being taken from him by the TA or the Reducers. If the pirate man was right there were more pockets of resistance like Freedom Farm, dotted about in the far west. There were plenty of wooded valleys between the windswept moors and the sea on both sides of the peninsula. Plenty of places to hide. Like the roundabout. And the military hadn’t found Freedom Farm. Yet. He was struck by a terrible thought: what if Freedom Farm was raided and Lo was taken? He wouldn’t know what had happened to her. He would try to find his grandfather as soon as possible, then go back for Lo.

  It wasn’t until he was on his way with bread, nuts and apples, and a fresh supply of water in his backpack that it occurred to him that he hadn’t asked the kind woman’s name and he hadn’t found out the name of the daisy girl. He thought about the girl as he trudged over the windswept moor, the slender shape of her, her smile, her bowed head and the waterfall of her wet hair.

  He drew closer to Penzance, keeping to the edges of the little fields, taking care not to step on the crops. He saw four farm workers and went towards them. They looked up and seeing that it was only a weedy looking boy, went back to their work. He felt a flicker of anger. They should respect him – he had a rifle hidden under his backpack. As he drew closer to them he saw that they were all women, dressed in dungarees and boots, dark stains under their arms.

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I’m looking for my grandfather – Joe Jenkyn?’

  ‘Don’t know him,’ one said. The others ignored him. He thought how sad and ugly they looked, their mouths down-turned, hair cropped, faces red from the wind and sun.

  ‘Has a monkey puzzle tree in his garden?’

  ‘Better get going,’ one said. ‘Before the bogey man gets you.’ One of them put her arms up in the air and pretended to growl at him. They laughed.

  When he got far enough away so they couldn’t catch him he aimed the rifle and pulled the trigger. He saw the earth explode close to them, and shattered clods of dirt like a sudden dark fountain. They yelled and shook their fists and he laughed, although horrified at what he’d nearly done, and ran away.

  Crossing a couple of wide roads, an old overpass where grass and shrubs were already pushing up between cracks in the tarmac, brown and gold butterflies hovering over them, he looked down on the town and the harbour. A ship lay rusting in the dry dock, and the seawall bristled with spikes and big rolls of razor-wire. Watchtowers dotted the coastline around the bay to Marazion, opposite the island with the castle. The slate roofs were covered in orange lichen, and to his eyes it looked as if a giant had poured orange juice over them. Where he’d come from all the roofs had been painted white to counteract The Warming. Maybe they hadn’t heard about it here.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THERE WAS A market in a disused car park next to the old railway station and yard. He didn’t have to hide any more, now that he hadn’t got Lo to look after. But he kept the rifle out of sight, tucked into his backpack and disguised by his blue T-shirt. Scruffy people sat on the ground with produce on cloths in front of them. There were red-skinned potatoes, plump cauliflowers, turnips, great orange pumpkins, bunches of onions and herbs. A vendor cooked skewered onions and peppers on a charcoal griddle. A woman sold pasties from a tray hanging around her neck. Sid’s mouth watered at the smells.

  ‘What’s in it?’ he asked.

  ‘Potato, carrot and swede, what do you think?’ she said.

  He bought one with the only coins he had and ate it slowly, savouring the pastry, the juicy gravy, the vegetables and herbs. He sucked his fingers and felt almost happy.

  A brass band made up of five women and one man was playing in the middle of the road. It was interrupted by a loud siren blaring from a loudspeaker on a pole.

  Simultaneously, many of the market shoppers and vendors dropped everything and all ran in the same direction along the sea front, following a man yelling, ‘Thief, thief!’ They chased after a skinny woman clutching a large cauliflower. Soldiers piled out of an armoured vehicle and bundled her into the back. The dropped cauliflower rolled across the road like a decapitated head and came to a stop in the gutter. The man who been robbed picked it up and blew at it to remove the dirt. The rabble turned back to their market, looking almost disappointed. Sid made no eye contact with anyone. He bypassed the market place and headed for the other end of the town, passing an old swimming pool set next to the sea wall. Next to the entrance there was a sign – Jubilee Pool – and above it – Territorial Army HQ. He could see that the pool was empty of water but filling up with people in uniform. On the road were parked jeeps, just like the one in which he and Lo had been placed after his parents were taken away.

  His stomach churned. He turned away from the pool and walked quickly along the road in the opposite direction to the market place.

  There were plenty of women on old bikes with baskets on the front. Not many men, he noticed, only ones in uniform. No kids. He felt conspicuous.

  His rifle was concealed by his side, the bag over it. A city kid, Sid knew to keep to back-alleys and lanes to avoid crowds. A bold brown rat ran down a flight of granite steps as he climbed up them. He thought how there would be fewer rats if the authorities hadn’t killed all the dogs and cats to save energy and food. How the rats had no natural enemies so now they had drains, sewers and rubbish to themselves. Even the huge gulls seemed intimidated by them, leaving the rubbish when a rat attacked.

  Soon people would have to eat the rats, he thought, now that meat was scarce, and he wondered why no one had thought of it before. Rat would probably be as tasty as rabbit. Rat pasties. Yuk. Rabbit pasties would be a good idea. Perhaps he could supply rabbits to the pasty maker? He didn’t fancy eating gull though – fishy, tough, greasy things, they’d be.

  As he came out of a steep lane onto the promenade, he saw huge piles of rusting vehicles acting as a barrier to keep the sea back and presumably to stop refugees getting in. Part of the sea defences. He had seen them used like this before, cars and old tellies and computers, all useless now there was no petrol and no electricity for most people.

  Penzance was bigger than he remembered it. But he had been onl
y four or five when he was here before. A little kid, like Lo. In spite of the awful weather, Gramps had taken him to the beach, but he hadn’t gone into the water. The waves were too high and greedy. They would have grabbed him and dragged him under, his Gramps had said. Instead, they had flung pebbles into the sea.

  Now he had a firearm and he was on a quest with big responsibilities. Find his grandfather and fetch Lo from Freedom, and then they would live happily ever after. Possibly.

  He crossed a small metal bridge over rushing water, rusted ships to either side of it. He found himself by another harbour where a dozen or more fishing boats had been scuttled, sunk and broken like toy boats in a bath. Doors swung creaking on empty sheds that still smelled of fish, even though there had been no fish landed here for many years. Hungry gulls screamed above. There was a small public garden on his right. It hadn’t yet been planted with food crops. A deflated football was high and dry in the empty pond. He went in and sat against a wall, facing the lowering sun, the orange and pink washed sky, took out a chunk of bread and chewed it thankfully, thinking of the plump woman with the red-stained face and remembering that she had called him Son. Maybe she had lost her own son? Maybe he had been disappeared, reduced? He curled up on the dry grass, hidden from the road by the low wall, and slept.

  He dreamed of a girl with daisies in her hair smiling down at him. She was on a swing and she kept swinging closer and closer to him and then she fell off.

  He woke, aching and cold. It was still night-time; gulls called to each other through the dark. He looked in his backpack for his T-shirt and put it on over the khaki one. He wondered what had happened to Mal. Had he taken the Exterminating Angels to look for the roundabout den? Were they still searching for Lo? He shivered and watched the pinpricks of stars and listened to the waves crashing over the harbour wall. His head itched unbearably and he took out the scissors from the first aid kit and hacked at his hair, cutting it as close to his head as he could without hurting himself. He remembered he had some of the Reducer’s cash left and wondered if he could find a shop when it was light, for a nit comb, but then thought better of it. Finding Gramps was his priority.