Nicholas Dane

by Melvin Burgess

  ‘It needn’t be so bad,’ he murmured. ‘I can help. You can come up here from time to time. It’s nice up here, isn’t it? You like it here?’

  ‘Yes, but...’

  ‘It’s not home, I know. I wish I could offer more. All I can do is offer a few nights, a few games of cards. A little comfort... ’

  As he spoke, Nick was aware of Mr Creal’s hand on his leg creeping upwards.

  ‘Don’t cry. It breaks my heart when you cry,’ murmured Mr Creal. And now there was no mistaking it. His hand moved higher still. Nick froze. Was he... ?

  Mr Creal’s grip on his head tightened sharply. He leaned over, pressing his whole body against Nick’s, swung his leg over his and moved his hand up the final few inches, so that he was cupping him in his hand. Nick was so shocked he froze.

  ‘Don’t be scared, Nick. We all need a little comfort from time to time,’ said Mr Creal. And his fingers began working.

  ‘Sir, Sir,’ whimpered Nick, horrified, frightened and embarrassed all at once. He tried to push the hand away, but Mr Creaks grip on his head tightened until it hurt. Short of fighting him off, there was nothing to be done.

  ‘Don't fight me, Nick. Ah, there we are,’ crooned Mr Creal. The fingers worked more urgently. ‘See? It’s nice,’ he murmured as, against his own will, Nick began to stiffen. ‘Oh, yes, you’ve done this before, I bet. Haven’t you?’ he hissed in his ear. ‘There...there. Yes...’

  It was horrible, but Nick felt utterly unable to help himself. Mr Creal bent his head against him, pinned his legs down tight and worked him in his hand. It was all over soon enough. Mr Creal released him and wiped his hand on a tissue from his pocket. He told Nick to go into the bathroom to clean up, which he did in a kind of daze. Words began to move in his head. ‘Sucking up to an old bloke like that,’ Davey had said. Did he know? Was this what he meant?

  Nick stared at himself in the mirror. He could have fought back, he could have kicked the old sicko in the crutch and run for it. Instead, he’d just let him. How weak he was! He might as well have given him permission.

  His reflection looked sickly at him in the glass, as if he was a stranger to himself.

  Back in the front room, Mr Creal had changed into his own dressing gown, and for a horrible moment Nick thought he was going to ask him to return the favour. But that wasn’t coming - not yet, anyway.

  ‘I’m off to my bed and you’re off to yours,’ said Mr Creal. ‘Here - look. For you!’ On the coffee table was an outsize bag full of goodies - cigarettes, chocolate - more than Nick had ever seen. ‘You’ve been a good lad tonight, you took it very well,’ said Mr Creal. ‘I hope you appreciate what I’ve done for you. We all need a little comfort, Nick. I can see you’re a boy who knows what side his bread’s buttered on, eh?’ He laughed and clapped Nick on the back. Then he stepped forward and took him in a hug. His lips brushed Nick’s cheek.

  ‘Goodnight, sweetheart,’ he murmured. He pushed Nick gently towards the door and patted his bum behind him as he left. ‘I’m just looking forward to my turn, now,’ he said.

  Then Nick was on the stairs and on his way down. At the bottom, Andrews was waiting to escort him back. He wasn’t being trusted tonight.

  As they walked back across the dark grounds, Nick heard a slight noise behind him. It was a dark night, everything was in shadow, but he could just make out a slight figure bobbing along towards the main door and up the steps. It was Oliver, going back to the flat to say his own goodnights to dear Tony Creal.

  ‘Pair a sick little bum boys, you are,’ remarked Andrews casually as he led Nick into the House. Nick turned and made his way back to the dorm. In bed, he lay very still. He’d been tricked, used and humiliated. He felt filthy with it. Sleep was a long time coming that night, but before it did, his shame turned to something else. Hatred. A deep, poisonous loathing began to possess him. Curiously, though, the target wasn’t Mr Creal. It was himself.

  12

  Revenge

  Nick awoke suddenly the next morning. His eyes snapped open. Everyone was still asleep. He lay there very still, not moving.

  A minute later, the whistle blew.

  ‘Oi - where’s my fags, then, eh?’ said a voice. It was Davey, loud and happy.

  Nick bent down and pulled out the bag of goodies that he’d flung there last night. He’d been paid, he realised.

  ‘Here.’ He chucked a pack of twenty Embassy over and turned away.

  ‘What’s up with you?’ asked Davey.

  Nick turned to glare at him and half opened his mouth. But what could say? That he’d let Creal wank him off? His feelings were so strong and so complicated, there were no words to describe them.

  ‘Balls,’ he growled, and turned away.

  Anger is a strange snake. You don’t always know where it comes from and you never know where it will strike. It wasn’t the fact that Mr Creal had touched him up and made him come that made Nick so angry. It was because he’d been tricked. Creal had pretended to be his friend. He’d lied, promised, bullied and bribed to get Nick to the point where he’d let him have his way, quite against his own will. He didn’t understand how it had been done, but he knew it had been done, and the worst thing about it was the way it made him hate himself.

  Tony Creal had been playing this game for years and he knew exactly how to get what he wanted. He’d taken Nick at his lowest ebb - let him suffer and then thrown him a line and fondled him while pulling it in. Somehow, his manner suggested, Nick had brought it on himself. And he’d enjoyed it, too, hadn’t he? It felt good. That’s the kind of person he was - a dirty little whore.

  But already as he made his way downstairs with the other boys, Nick’s self-hatred had begun to morph into a another stage of betrayal - rage. A slow burning but steadily increasing fury had begun slowly to possess him. Once again, the target was not the source of his betrayal. In his mind, it began to seem to him that Creal had not been alone in his seduction. Oliver had helped plan the whole thing - sharing out the goody bag, being his friend, all so that Mr Creal could get him where he wanted.

  Oliver knew all along. Why hadn’t he said? Because he was in cahoots with dear old Tony Creal.

  But of course that wasn’t the real reason Nick was angry with Oliver. The real reason was simpler, and darker. Nick needed someone to take it out on. Mr Creal was big, and Oliver was small. That was all it was.

  All that day Nick lived in a daze of despair and rage. His hopes had been raised only in order that they might be dashed. It seemed that there was no escape unless he turned into what Oliver had become - Creal’s little creature, running his errands, doing him favours - and God knows what that might entail, although he could guess what was coming next.

  Davey, of course, knew exactly what had been going on at the flat the whole time. He’d done the same thing himself from to time when he was smaller. He wouldn’t do it these days, but he’d never blame anyone for getting a few fags or sweets just by letting some old geezer squeeze your parts. So long as it didn’t go too far, turning into a little pet like Oliver, where was the harm? His only reaction had been surprise that Nick seemed to like Creal despite it - but who was he to worry about that, either?

  He knew at once something had changed. All during lessons, Nick sat and seethed, hardly able to speak to anyone. When he did speak, it was in a flash of fury.

  Davey had seen it before, he knew what was coming. Nick was suddenly at the end of his tether and he was going to blow. It was just a question of where, and when, and to whom.

  During lunch, he grabbed hold of his friend and gave him a shake. ‘What’s up with you? What ’appened last night? You’re going to get yourself done the way you’re going on.’

  Nick pushed him away and turned his acid gaze onto him. ‘Do you know what goes on up there?’ he demanded.

  Davey’s eyes slid away. Everyone knew what went on up there - it was just that no one ever talked about it.

  Then he looked back. ‘It’s none a my business what yo
u get up to up there,’ he hissed, angry himself. He calmed himself down. ‘Nick, no one’s going to blame you for getting a few extras the easy way. You got to get what you can in a place like this.’

  Nick snorted in disgust and pushed him away. Davey followed after him but the conversation was over. He couldn’t get any more sense out of him.

  It was just a matter of time.

  Davey knew about the sex, but he had no inkling of the kind of manipulation Creal used, or how it made you feel. Oliver, however, knew only too well. He saw the way Nick was looking at him. He knew what lay behind those dark eyes, and he kept his distance.

  If only he had managed to stay out of the way for a day or two until Nick cooled down, all might have been well. But it didn’t work out that way.

  It was early evening - sports. Oliver, as usual, was let off and spent the time weeding in the vegetable garden. Meanwhile, out on the pitch, Nick was in trouble again. The prefects were like a pack of hyenas, they could see that he was in danger of losing it and had started to pick on him - teasing him, winding him up, tackling him harder than they should have. The games master, Mr Peake, took pity on him and gave him a break by telling him to go and bring some spare footballs from the cupboard. As Nick trudged over to the sports hall he saw a small blond figure running round and going into the loo. Nick glanced over his shoulder to check that no one was following him, speeded up his step and followed Oliver inside.

  It was as silent as the grave in the toilets - Oliver must have spotted him. Nick pressed the doors to the cubicles until he found the locked one, then he went and stood on the toilet next door. There, sitting on the loo, looking up at him, face as white as a sheet, was ...

  ‘Oliver,’ said Nick.

  He went round and pushed the door through with his shoulder and stood there watching coldly while Oliver pulled up his pants and began to weep. Curiously, so did Nick.

  ‘You never told me.’

  ‘I thought you knew.’

  ‘You bloody little liar.’ Nick clenched his hands and stepped closer.

  ‘Let me through,’ squealed Oliver. He tried to push past, but Nick had his shirt in his hand. He shoved him up against the wall.

  ‘And all the time he was giving it to you right up the arse, wasn’t he? You little bum boy. Wasn’t he?’

  Oliver didn’t answer. He buried his head in his arms and began to wail.

  ‘Mercy!’ he begged. ‘Mercy! Mercy... ’

  ‘You like it, don’t you?’ rasped Nick. ‘That’s it - you like it. Don’t you? Don’t you?’ Oliver knew the time had come. Desperately, he tried to push Nick aside and escape, but he was cornered. Nick simply flung him to the floor, and lifted his boot.

  Afterwards, he remembered very little of it - just a picture in his mind of the little body curled up on the floor and him kicking and stamping, kicking and stamping. He remembered how, once or twice, he had bent down to shake his victim, almost as if he was trying to waken him from his nightmare. Fortunately for both of them, Oliver’s cries for help had been heard and the other lads arrived to drag him off. It wasn’t easy. Nick was possessed. All the sadness, the injustice, the violence, the abuse, everything that had happened to him since the day his mother died translated itself into this terrible attack on the wrong person. Twice he broke away and went back to relaunch his attack on the injured boy.

  It wasn’t until the prefects turned up that they got him off. Andrews and another lad hauled him backwards and dealt him a vicious blow to the kidneys that had him heaving on the floor. They dragged him out of the cubicle. They were furious. He’d done Oliver some real damage and they'd get into serious trouble for letting it happen on their watch. They got him down among the urinals and gave him a serious kicking themselves, but Nick hardly felt a thing. All he could hear was what Oliver had been shouting at him over and over again during the attack ...

  ‘I don’t like it!’ he had screamed. ‘I don’t like it, I don’t like it, I don’t like it,’ over and over again.

  If there was one thing Mr James loathed, it was bullying. There were plenty of fights at Meadow Hill, but this was a particularly severe one. A much bigger boy on a younger, smaller one. Reports had to be made. The Dane lad could very easily be charged with assault, if not actual bodily harm - if not Grievous Bodily Harm itself. His victim had been so badly beaten that he’d had to be sent away to the local hospital. More reports! The whole thing was incredible.

  If there was one thing Mr James loathed more than bullying, it was reports of bullying. That sort of thing was absolutely not to be tolerated at Meadow Hill.

  The boy had been left to stew in the Secure Unit for a day and a half and fed on bread and water. His only visitor had been Mr Creal - if anyone could make him see sense, it was Tony Creal, but according to him the villain was far from repentant. He had actually threatened Mr Creal himself. Unbelievable. Not with violence of course - he wasn’t so stupid as to attack someone bigger than he was - but with accusations.

  ‘He’s a cunning one,’ Tony Creal had said. ‘He’s saying he’s sorry about the boy he beat, young Oliver Brown, but I can’t say I see much sign of real repentance. He’s just parroting, I’m afraid. But he did threaten to accuse the staff of just about every form of abuse under the sun if we took things any further.’

  ‘Abuse? Here? What sort of thing?’ asked Mr James. He shook his head.

  ‘Violence from the staff. Sexual abuse as well, he says...’

  ‘Of course he’s just making it all up.’

  ‘Yes, of course. But he could cause a lot of trouble. You know how mud sticks.’

  ‘And the police sniffing about as well,’ groaned Mr James. They’d had the devil’s own job convincing the police that they could deal with the little beast on the premises. The inspector on the case had made it clear that if anything like that level of ferocity occurred again, charges would have to be made.

  ‘That’s the very last thing we want,’ agreed Tony Creai. ‘Think of the paperwork ... Think of the damage to our reputation ...’

  Mr James peered through his glasses at the lad standing in front of him. It made him feel physically sick to look at him - although to be fair, it might be because he’d neglected to take any of his wife’s little blue pills this morning. The Valium was a steadfast friend in difficult days, but it did make him feel woozy, something he couldn't afford when he had police inspectors, social service directors and God knows who else insisting on speaking to him on the phone.

  Nicholas Dane. A monstrous villain, if ever he saw one. The lad was bruised from head to foot from all the fighting he’d been involved in over the past few weeks. Almost every day, apparently. Mr James snorted in disgust. He wasn’t even any good at fighting, judging from the colour of his face.

  ‘How much younger than him was his victim?’ he asked the two prefects who were standing guard over the monster.

  ‘Two years, just a little lad, Sir,’ replied Andrews, who of course was only too delighted to help Nick into trouble. ‘A good lad, too, Sir. Everyone likes Oliver.’

  It was such a lie, Nick turned to stare at him, but Mr James swallowed it whole.

  ‘What an incredible thug you are, Dane!’ he exclaimed. ‘A bully and a coward. Vile, Dane. You are vile. You’ve let me down, you’ve let the Home down. You’ve let this lad Brown down and most of all, you’ve let yourself down. Look at you,’ he went on. ‘You were offered a fresh start and now this. And this lad was a friend of yours, I believe. Incredible.’ He looked at the report on his desk and shook his head. The Brown boy had a cracked rib and a broken nose, among other things. What a mess! Mr James glanced anxiously at the two prefects standing behind the miscreant. He hoped they would be enough to hold him if he went berserk again. Animals like this - you never knew when they would go mad...

  Now what? The Brown boy had gone to hospital. A report. The Secure Unit. Another report. The police. A third report! Reports everywhere - and guess who had to read them? Mr James. Three reports f
or one incident. It was paperwork gone mad. At least he could rely on his friend and right-hand man Tony Creal to write the wretched things. The reputation of the whole Home would suffer because of this one nasty little thug.

  ‘Well?’ he demanded. ‘What have you got to say for yourself?’

  He didn’t expect any reply. Boys like this could hardly speak, usually. The most you could expect was an adenoidal grunting. But to his surprise, this one proved to be positively voluble - but in the most disagreeable way. ‘I want to make some complaints, Sir.’

  ‘Complaints?’ Mr James gazed around the room in amazement, as if he expected the furniture itself to recoil in horror. He’d been warned this would happen, but he was still amazed. After what he’d done, the boy wanted to complain! The barefaced cheek of it took his breath away.

  ‘I know what I did was wrong. Sir, but there are things going on you should know about.’

  ‘This is unbelievable. What sort of things?’ demanded Mr James, before he could stop himself.

  ‘Mr Toms, Sir. He beats the boys up with his fists. And he uses a snooker cue. Surely that’s wrong, Sir. And Mr Creal

  ‘Mr Creal? You have a complaint about Mr Creal? Have you any idea how respected that man is?’

  ‘He - he tried to interfere with me, Sir.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He tried

  ‘I heard you!’ roared Mr James. He looked anxiously again at the boys standing behind him. This would never do.

  ‘Not only that, Sir, but he has boys stay in his flat late at night, when we should all be in bed, Sir. That’s not right, is it, Sir?’

  ‘Right. I’ve heard enough of this ‘But can’t I make a complaint, Sir... ?’

  ‘You have just committed one of the most violent acts that this Home has ever witnessed. If you were a few years older, you’d undoubtedly go to prison for it. Do you really think anyone is going to believe your pathetic attempts to cover yourself? Making unfounded accusations against a respected member of staff...a man renowned for his care and dedication... a man always ready to do his bit... a man... ’ Mr James, who had been working himself up into a greater and greater frenzy of anger as he spoke, finally choked on his own rage and ground to a guttural stop. He took a sip of water from the glass before him to try and calm himself down.