by C. J. Tudor
I wait for the significance of this to dawn. Moss grows around my feet. Glaciers form and melt.
“I’m sorry,” he says eventually. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m asking if you could check that he got back here okay last night. I’m worried about him.”
“Oh, well, I wasn’t on last night. That was Georgia.”
“Right. Well, would there be anything on the computer?” I nod to the ancient-looking PC squatting on an untidy desk in one corner. “He would have had to ask for a new room key card. There must be some record?”
“Well, I suppose I could check.”
“I suppose you could.”
The sarcasm drips right over his head. He plonks himself down at the desk and taps a few keys.
Then he turns. “No. Nothing.”
“Well, could you call Georgia?”
He debates this with himself. I sense that getting Duds to do anything even slightly outside of his job remit is a gargantuan effort. To be honest, it looks as if even breathing is a gargantuan effort for Duds.
“Please?” I say.
A deep sigh. “Okay.”
He picks up the phone. “Hello. George?”
I wait.
“Last night, did some bloke called Mickey Cooper come back without his key card? You might have had to replace it? Right. Okay. Thanks.”
He puts down the phone and walks back to the desk.
“And?” I prompt.
“Nah. Your mate didn’t come back here last night.”
1986
I’d always imagined funerals were held on gray, rainy days with people in black huddled under umbrellas.
The sun shone on the morning of Sean Cooper’s funeral—at least for the start of it. And no one wore black. His family had asked that people wear blue or red. Sean’s favorite colors. The colors of the school football team. Quite a few kids came in the school kit.
Mum chose me a new pale blue shirt, with a red tie and dark trousers.
“You still need to look smart, Eddie. To pay your respects.”
I didn’t really want to pay my respects to Sean Cooper. Didn’t really want to go to his funeral at all. I had never been to a funeral before. Not that I remembered. Apparently, my mum and dad had taken me to my grandad’s, but I was just a baby then and, besides, Grandad was old. You expected old people to die. They even smelled a bit like they were already half dead. Kind of musty and stale.
Death happened to other people, not kids like us, not people we knew. Death was abstract and distant. Sean Cooper’s funeral was probably the first time I understood that death is only ever a cool, sour breath away. His greatest trick is making you think he isn’t there. And death has a lot of tricks up his cold, dark sleeve.
—
The church was only a ten-minute walk from our house. I wished it was longer. I dragged my feet, pulled at my shirt collar. Mum wore the same blue dress she had worn to Fat Gav’s party, but with a red jacket on top. Dad wore long trousers for once, which I was thankful for, and a shirt with red flowers on (which I wasn’t).
We reached the gates to the churchyard at the same time as Hoppo and his mum. We didn’t see Hoppo’s mum often. Not unless she was out in her car, cleaning. Today she had pulled her straggly hair into a bun. She wore a shapeless blue dress and these really old, ratty-looking sandals on her feet. It sounds horrible to say, but I was glad she wasn’t my mum, looking like that.
Hoppo wore a red T-shirt and blue school trousers with black shoes. His thick dark hair had been slicked to one side. He looked different for Hoppo. Not just the hair and smart clothes. He looked tense, worried. He held Murphy on a lead.
“Hello, David. Hello, Gwen,” Mum said.
I never knew Gwen was Hoppo’s mum’s name. Mum was always good with names. Dad not so much. He used to joke, before the Alzheimer’s got too bad, that forgetting people’s names was nothing new, even before he started going loopy.
“Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Adams,” Hoppo said.
“Hello,” his mum said, in a faint, weedy voice. She always spoke like she was apologizing for something.
“How are you?” Mum asked, in the polite tone she used when she didn’t really want to know.
Hoppo’s mum didn’t get the hint. “Not so good,” she said. “I mean, this is all so terrible, and then Murphy’s been ill all night.”
“Oh dear,” Dad said, with genuine feeling.
I bent down to fuss Murphy. He gave a tired wag and sank to the ground. He seemed as reluctant to be here as the rest of us.
“Is that why you’ve brought him along?” Dad asked.
Hoppo nodded. “We didn’t want to leave him at home. He’ll just start messing. And if we put him in the garden he gets over the fence and gets out. So we thought we’d tie him up out here.”
Dad nodded. “Well, that seems like a good idea.” He patted Murphy on the head. “Poor old fella. Getting old, aren’t you?”
“So,” Mum said, “I suppose we’d better go in.”
Hoppo bent down and hugged Murphy. The old dog ran a big, wet tongue up his face.
“Good boy,” he whispered. “Bye.”
We all filed through the church gate toward the entrance. More people were milling about outside, some smoking furtively. I spotted Fat Gav and his parents. Nicky stood at the entrance to the church, alongside Reverend Martin. She held a thick sheaf of papers. Hymn sheets, I guessed.
I felt myself tense. It was the first time that Mum and Dad and Reverend Martin had come face to face since the party, and the parcel. As he saw us, the reverend smiled.
“Mr. and Mrs. Adams, Eddie. Thank you for coming on this terribly sad day.”
He held out a hand. Dad didn’t shake it. The smile remained on the reverend’s face, but I could see a flash of something less pleasant in his eyes.
“Please, take a hymn sheet and find a seat inside.”
We took the hymn sheets. Nicky gave me a small, mute nod, and we walked slowly into the church.
It was cold inside, cold enough to make me shiver a little. Dark, too. It took my eyes a moment to adjust. A few people were already seated. I knew some of the kids from school. A few teachers, too, and Mr. Halloran. Impossible to miss, with his shock of white hair. Today, he wore a red shirt for a change. His hat sat on his lap. As he saw me enter with Mum and Dad, he gave me a small smile. Everyone’s smiles were small and weird that day, like no one really knew what to do with their faces.
We sat and waited, and then the reverend and Nicky walked in and music started to play. It was a tune I had heard but couldn’t quite place. Not a hymn or anything. A modern song, a slow one. Somehow, even though it was modern, I wasn’t sure it was right for Sean, who liked to listen to Iron Maiden.
We all bowed our heads as they brought the coffin in. Metal Mickey and his mum and dad walked behind it. It was the first time we had seen Metal Mickey since the accident. His mum and dad had kept him off school, and then they went away, to stay with his grandparents.
Metal Mickey didn’t look at the coffin. He stared straight ahead, his whole body rigid. The effort of walking, breathing and not crying seemed to take all his concentration. He was about halfway down the church when he just stopped. The man behind him almost walked into his back. There was a moment of confusion, and then Metal Mickey turned and ran out of the church.
Everyone looked at each other, except his mum and dad, who barely seemed to notice he had gone. They continued to shuffle forward like zombies, cocooned in their own hard shell of grief. No one went after Metal Mickey. I glanced at Mum, but she just gave a small shake of her head and squeezed my hand.
I think that’s what got to me. Seeing Metal Mickey so upset again, about a boy most of us hated but who was still his brother. Maybe Sean wasn’t always a mean bully all the time. Maybe when he was little he played with Metal Mickey. Maybe they went to the park together, shared Lego bricks and bathtime.
And now he was lying in a cold, dark coffin covered with
flowers that smelled too strong while someone played music he would have hated, and he couldn’t tell them because he would never tell anyone anything ever again.
I swallowed down a hard lump in my throat and blinked fast. Mum nudged my arm, and we all sat down. The music stopped and Reverend Martin stood up and said stuff about Sean Cooper and God. Most of it didn’t make much sense. Stuff about heaven having another angel and how God wanted Sean Cooper more than the people on Earth did. Looking at his mum and dad leaning against each other and crying so hard they looked like they might just break into pieces, I didn’t think so.
Reverend Martin had almost finished when there was a big bang and a rush of air that caused a few hymn sheets to flutter to the floor. Most of the people in the church turned, including me.
The church doors swung open. To start with, I thought Metal Mickey had come back. But then I realized that, haloed in the light, I could make out two figures. As they walked farther into the church, I recognized them: Waltzer Girl’s blond friend and the policeman who had come to our house, PC Thomas. (Later I would learn her name was Hannah and that PC Thomas was her dad.)
For a moment, I wondered if the blond girl was in trouble. PC Thomas held her arm tightly and half marched, half dragged her down the aisle. A murmur ran around the church.
Metal Mickey’s mum whispered something to his dad. He stood up. His face looked hard and angry. From the pulpit, Reverend Martin said, “If you are here to pay your respects to the deceased, we are about to proceed to the graveside.”
PC Thomas and the blond girl stopped. He looked around the church at the rest of us. No one met his gaze. We all sat, hushed and curious, yet not wanting to seem it. The blond girl just stared down at the ground, as if wishing it would swallow her up, like it was about to do to Sean Cooper.
“Respects?” PC Thomas said slowly. “No. I don’t think I’ll be paying my respects.” Then he spat on the floor, right in front of the coffin. “Not to the boy who raped my daughter.”
The gasp rose from the pews right up to the church rafters. I think a small noise even escaped my own mouth. Raped? I didn’t know much about what “rape” meant (I guess, in many ways, I was pretty naïve for twelve), but I knew it was about making a girl do something she didn’t want to do, and I knew it was bad.
“You lying bastard!” Metal Mickey’s dad cried.
“A bastard?” PC Thomas snarled. “I’ll tell you what’s a bastard.” He pointed back at his daughter. “That child she’s carrying.”
Another gasp. Reverend Martin’s face looked like it was about to slide right off his skull. He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything there was this huge roar and Metal Mickey’s dad charged forward and launched himself at PC Thomas.
Metal Mickey’s dad wasn’t big, but he was stocky and fast and he caught PC Thomas off guard. The policeman swayed but managed to keep his balance. The pair of them wobbled back and forth, grappling in each other’s arms like they were doing some awful, weird dance. Then PC Thomas pulled away. He aimed a blow at Metal Mickey’s dad’s head. Somehow, Metal Mickey’s dad dodged it and threw his own fist back. This one connected, and PC Thomas staggered backward.
I could see what was about to happen an instant before it actually did. I think most of the mourners saw it, too. There were screams, and someone shouted, “Noooo!,” just as PC Thomas crashed into Sean Cooper’s coffin, dislodging it from its place in front of the pulpit and sending it crashing to the stone floor.
I’m not sure if I imagined the next bit, because surely the lid of the coffin must have been securely fastened? I mean, it wasn’t like they wanted it to slide off when they were putting it in the grave. But just as the coffin hit the ground with a horrible, splintering crunch that reminded me a bit too much that Sean Cooper’s bones were rattling around inside, the lid shifted slightly and I caught a fleeting glimpse of one pale white hand.
Or maybe I didn’t. Maybe it was my crazy, stupid imagination again. It all happened so quickly. Almost as soon as the coffin hit the floor, screams echoing around the church, several men rushed over to pick it up and put it back on its plinth.
PC Thomas stood up unsteadily. Metal Mickey’s dad looked just as unsteady. He raised his arm like he might just hit PC Thomas again, then instead turned and threw himself on to the coffin and began to cry. Great, heaving, bellowing sobs.
PC Thomas looked around. He seemed a bit dazed, like he was waking from some terrible dream. His fists clenched and unclenched. He ran a hand through his dark hair, which was all sweaty and disheveled. A bruise bloomed by his right eye.
“Dad, please?” A small whisper from the blond girl.
PC Thomas looked at her, then grabbed her hand again and pulled her back up the church aisle. At the end he turned. “This is not over,” he croaked. And then they were gone.
The whole incident could only have taken three or four minutes, but it felt like much longer. Reverend Martin cleared his throat loudly, but you could still only just hear him over Metal Mickey’s dad wailing.
“I am so terribly sorry for that interruption. We will now proceed outside for the rest of the service. If the mourners could please stand.”
There was more music. Some of Metal Mickey’s family dragged his dad away from the coffin, and we all had to walk outside again, to the graveyard.
I had barely stepped out of the church when I felt the first drop of water on my head. I looked up. The blue had been scoured from the sky by Brillo-gray clouds, now starting to drip rain on to the coffin and the mourners.
People hadn’t brought brollies, so we all huddled, in our bright red and blue, shoulders hunched against the rapidly increasing drizzle. I shivered slightly as the coffin was lowered slowly into the ground. They had taken away the flowers. As if to say that nothing bright and alive should be lowered into that deep, dark hole.
I thought the fight inside had been the worst bit of the funeral, but I was wrong. This was the worst bit. The rattle and scrape of earth on the wooden coffin lid. The smell of damp dirt under the waning warmth of the September sun. Looking into that gaping chasm in the ground and knowing there was no coming back from this. No excuses, no get-out clause, no note your mum could write to the teacher. Death was final and absolute and there was nothing anyone could do to change it.
Eventually, it was over and we all began to file away from the graveside. The church hall had been booked for people to eat sandwiches and drink afterward. “A wake,” it was called, my mum said.
We had almost reached the gate when someone Mum and Dad knew stopped to talk to them. Fat Gav and his family were just behind them, talking to Hoppo’s mum. I could see Metal Mickey’s family, but not Metal Mickey. I guess he must have been somewhere around.
I found myself standing, a little lost, on the edge of the graveyard.
“Hello, Eddie.”
I turned. Mr. Halloran walked over. He’d put his hat on to keep off the rain and held a packet of cigarettes in his hand. I’d never seen him smoke, but I remembered the ashtray in his cottage.
“Hello, sir.”
“How are you feeling?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know really.”
He had this knack, that most adults don’t, of making you answer him honestly.
“That’s okay. You don’t have to feel sad.”
I hesitated. I wasn’t quite sure what to say to that.
“You can’t feel sad about everyone who dies.” He lowered his voice. “Sean Cooper was a bully. Just because he’s dead, it doesn’t change that. It doesn’t mean what happened to him isn’t tragic either.”
“Because he was just a kid?”
“No. Because he never got the chance to change.”
I nodded, then asked, “Is it true what the policeman said?”
“About Sean Cooper and his daughter?”
I gave a small nod.
Mr. Halloran looked at his cigarettes. I think he really wanted to light one but probably didn’t think he should i
n the churchyard.
“Sean Cooper was not a nice young man. What he did to you—some people would give that the same name.”
I felt my cheeks redden. I didn’t want to think about that. As if sensing this, Mr. Halloran continued, “But did he do what the policeman accused him of? No, I don’t believe that’s true.”
“Why?”
“I don’t believe that young lady was Sean Cooper’s type.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t quite sure what he was saying.
He shook his head. “Forget it. But don’t worry about Sean Cooper anymore. He can’t hurt you now.”
I thought about stones at my window, bluey-gray skin in moonlight.
“Hey, Shitface.”
I wasn’t so sure.
But I said, “No, sir. I mean, yes, sir.”
“Good boy.” He smiled and walked away.
I was still trying to digest all of this when someone grabbed my arm. I spun around. Hoppo stood in front of me. His hair had already fallen out of its combed-back style and his shirt was half untucked. He held Murphy’s lead and collar. But there was no Murphy.
“What’s happened?”
He stared at me, wild-eyed. “Murphy. He’s gone.”
“He slipped his collar?”
“I don’t know. He never has before. It’s not loose or anything…”
“D’you think he’ll run home?” I asked.
Hoppo shook his head. “I don’t know. He’s old and his sight and smell aren’t so good.” I could see he was trying not to panic.
“But he’s slow,” I said. “So he can’t have gone far.”
I looked around. The adults were still talking, Fat Gav was too far away to get his attention. I still couldn’t see Metal Mickey…but I saw something else.
Drawn on a flat memorial stone near the church gates. Already starting to fade and blur in the rain, but it caught my attention, because it was wrong. Out of place, yet also familiar. I walked closer. My limbs prickled with goosebumps and my scalp felt too tight for my skull.
A white chalk man. Arms raised, a small “o” for his mouth, like he was crying out. And he wasn’t alone. Next to him, someone had drawn a crude, white chalk dog. I suddenly had a bad feeling. A very bad feeling.