'The boy?' said O'Dell.
'Down in the cellar,' said Wayland.
'Then your job is done. I will have work for you again. Soon.'
O'Dell held out Wayland's payment.
Wayland had little need of those things money could buy - not any more. What he needed was respite from the cancer, and the man before him had his brand of medicine on tap, all wrapped up in enough cash to cover his room and board for a few months. The cash was fine. The pills, better. He didn't know what was in the pills. All he knew was that he should have been a couple of years in the grave. And yet here he was - playing hooky and loving it.
The man still gave Wayland the fucking creeps, though. Enough to keep their dealings simple and quick, enough that he never asked what happened to all the kids over the years. He never would ask, either, because there were plenty of things about O'Dell it wouldn't be healthy to know. Curious about their fate, definitely - but not enough to ask, or care.
'You may leave, my friend,' said O'Dell.
Wayland didn't need to be told twice.
O'Dell would sort out the kid and close up when he was done, and Wayland was quite happy to leave the weird bastard to it.
*
George had only been down in the dark for long enough for Wayland Redman to drink one and a half cups of tea. George had no idea how long it had been, but without any of the doubt that an adult might have entertained the boy knew he was as good as dead - he accepted it without question, while an adult might have wasted time railing against.
By the light of his candle George sent up a small prayer. He thought about his dad, his mum, his teachers, his friends. He didn't believe in God. Not really. But he prayed nonetheless, though without hope. Just him, the candle, but then...a feeling. A blankness.
The other one.
Now he knew why sensed no danger back at the supermarket. Whoever created this aura, this dead space, was far more gifted than George.
The man with fire in his eyes, he thought.
He was never sure where these thought came from, but not entirely surprised by them, either. These thoughts were natural for him, something he'd always had and never spoken of. The thoughts were clear enough - something of the mind, something of emotion. His gift came with words and wisdom beyond his years, too, so George understood very early on that to tell anyone would be bad.
The dark man has come for me and he wears so many crowns they weigh him down.
Brightness filled the cellar. A man stepped into the light, silhouetted for a moment in the fluorescents above, and began to descend down the wooden stairs. Some children might have screamed, or cried, or pleaded. George did none of these things. He blew out the candle.
Don't feed him, came the next thought. Flames will only make him stronger.
The other man laughed - a horrible flat sound, and far too close.
'George Farnham,' he said in a voice full of good humour and long teeth. 'I believe you know me already. We are well met.'
George would have been bright and intuitive even had he not known the answers to questions if they were in a person's head. Like how he knew his dad was DEAD. Like how he knew all the times his mum was COMING with her friend John.
Some words and concepts didn't resonate with meaning for George like they might an adult, but he knew enough to dread the dark man before him.
But, too, something blossomed deep inside George. A candle just for him, a brightness in his mind. Hope? A chance?
No, he thought. Not that. Not with this man.
But that light would not go out.
'Come along, George. Let's have a chat, shall we?'
The man's words were easy, but his tone wasn't. It was off, stinky, like fish. George hated fish.
'You're a dickhead,' said George, dragging out the strongest word he could muster. George's dad told him not to swear, but his dad was DEAD. This man was the cause of it. He couldn't bring himself to say the bad swears, even now. George was a good boy.
'George Farnham...such a tongue on you! I do believe we're going to have some fun before this is all over. What do you think of that?'
'Just let me go.'
'I can't, Master Farnham, because you're special, aren't you? You know that, right?'
George saw no sense in denying it. He knew the dark man was special, too. He felt it in the blackness that surrounded them both, heavier than the shadows in the cellar.
George nodded, and wondered. Could the man in front of him feel, see, hear the hope in George's head? Did he see the shape of things to come?
'You know things, don't you, young man? And you don't know how.'
CAREFUL, thought George. Don't say anything else.
'Do you see the future, George?'
George forced himself to say nothing. He wouldn't even let himself move, and looked away, too, like he'd learned to do if he ever had to lie to his parents.
'Good for you. Good for you, George.'
George didn't see the future, but it was all laid out before him. A jigsaw puzzle, but one with the big pieces for little kids.
Two words popped into his head. THE MILL.
Nothing but black, dangerous images when he thought of those words. People full of pain and empty of everything else. As those words came into his mind his fear grew and he could not help or fight it. His bladder let go. He felt ashamed and afraid...but that different thought, one of his older and wiser thoughts, came to him again and it was a whisper, like a secret: CAREFUL.
'Ah,' said the man. 'You see it. Yes, George. You're coming with me. We're going to the Mill. You'll like it there, George, because though you don't understand it...shit, you're only eight...I'm about to save your life.'
The man leaned forward. He might be able to read minds. Fire did dance in his eyes, and his whole face was dangerous and crazy - but the man lied with every word. He leant in further, and waved his left hand fast, right beside George's eye. George couldn't help but react. As he did, the man jabbed out with a syringe he held in the other hand, unerring even in the shadows, into the thin tissue of George's neck.
As George gawped, then later, while he drifted down, just two words remained in his thoughts: THE MILL.
*
Wayland Redman checked no one watched before he keyed in the number to enter his home. He was a careful man, a dangerous man, and a sneak.
Already he'd put O'Dell and the kid from his mind. Neither the dark man nor the boy mattered. He thought about getting a good night's kip, and a decent breakfast in the morning, and very little else troubled him.
Inside, quietly, he passed through the low lights set along the hallway that led him to his bedroom. His walk became a shuffle, his back stooped.
He made it to his room with no problems. There, he undressed swiftly, managing buttons and zips with deft, strong fingers - he didn't suffer at all with his joints. He took a set of flannel pyjamas from the wardrobe that stood against the wallpapered wall and slipped them on, along with his slippers and bathrobe.
The room had an en suite toilet, where he brushed his teeth well and pissed poorly. He was still grimed from the road and from the warmth of the day and the night. A little water on his face was the best he could do, and a good rub with a thin old towel instead of soap, which he never seemed to get.
His room was hot - stifling, even. It always was. The heating stayed on in winter and summer whether he liked it or not (and he didn't). He'd rather not sleep in anything at all, but there was only so much he could do. It wasn't, after all, up to him any longer. But at least the window opened. He pushed it out as far as it would go, but the night was still and there was no breeze. At his bedside, he removed the dressing gown and kicked free of his slippers, then popped himself up onto the bed. Someone came toward his room - just soft footfalls, out in the hall.
Bugger, he thought. He worked up some spit and let a small trickle loose down his chin, but it was only Roo. She was a good girl. He could get away with a little more when she was working the night
shift.
She insisted on being called Roo though her name was Rowena, but she always seemed to have a smile ready. She poked her head round the doorframe.
'Still awake, Wayland?'
'Yup,' he said, tailing back a bit on his act. Roo wasn't daft as some. Down the hall, Maureen yelled out and they both jumped, then shared a smile.
Maureen only ever said 'Help me'. Same thing, over and over again. It got wearing.
Wayland nodded and gave Rowena a wink.
'Easy, tiger,' smiled Roo. 'Can I get you anything? Glass of milk?'
Wayland shook his head and mumbled something unintelligible, like an old man with only half his marbles might.
'Okay, honey. Night.'
'Night,' Wayland muttered.
Roo left to check Maureen. Maybe the old bitch had fallen out of bed again. He hoped she broke her hip. People their age died of broken hips.
Could happen, he thought.
It was Roo who occupied Wayland's mind while he drifted into sleep, rather than the day's jaunt or George Farnham or the dark man or noisy old bitches.
Great tits, he thought while sleep crept over him. In the night, he dreamed about driving a kitchen knife right between them. In the morning he woke up with a wood-on like teak.
'Would you look at that,' he said to himself as he got up. 'A God-damned miracle.'
He even had to sit to piss.
'Miracle,' he said, and brushed his teeth while his old man cock fell to sleep again.
It was still hot, but the day hadn't started bad at all. Wayland slid into his slippers and gown and headed to the dining room of the residential home with the other doddery bastards, looking forward to his kippers and eggs.
*
IV.
The Orphan
George's mum's name was Eleanor. She liked it when John fucked her hard and called her name.
'Eleanor...sweet Jesus...Eleanor. God. Fuck...I'm coming.'
Things like that.
Eleanor's husband's name was David, but she didn't want to worry about that right now. Currently, Eleanor was on all fours, flicking channels on the TV while John bashed away at her enthusiastically from behind.
'John, wait. Stop...'
'Can't...not...now...'
'Just fucking stop!' she said, and pushed back hard with her arse just as he tried to stick his finger in it and got his fat finger jammed right up there.
Swearing, she bucked to one side, just as John came all over her duvet. His finger cracked as it popped free and he swore, too.
'Fuck's sake, John!'
'You nearly broke my fucking finger!'
'Fuck off, you shot a load on my fucking duvet! On my arse, I said!'
On the TV, the camera swung around from the reporter, and there it was - David's car, in the supermarket car park, right behind the woman with a microphone that was probably more prop than necessity.
Eleanor turned up the television and ignored John bitching from behind her. 'Because of the dangerous nature of the spill, we can't film closer, but I can tell you the fire is still raging behind me. Government...'
'Fire?' said John.
'George...' she said.
'George what?'
Eleanor ignored John, who was busy wiping his cock on balsam tissues from a flowery box beside her bed. She scooted around so her arse wasn't poking up anymore.
'Once again, I must stress that these scenes were taken earlier, before the quarantine was put in place. In a statement given earlier this evening police admitted they were unable to extinguish the blaze and are now working solely on containment. Fire crews and rescue vehicles have been drafted from outside the county and the spokesman added that the quarantine is a purely cautionary procedure at this time...'
She listened for a while longer. John was already buckling his belt, getting ready to leave. Eleanor paid him no mind, and tuned into the report.
Quarantine?
'They were supposed to go to the supermarket, then across town for new shoes. That's David's car,' she said.
'What are you talking about?'
'I think you better leave.'
'Suits me,' said John. He finished buckling his belt, hitched his jeans a little higher and tucked his t-shirt in. He pulled a cigarette from his jean pocket, which he lit.
'Jesus,' said Eleanor. 'Not in here!'
'You're worried about my cigarette? Worry about my jizz on the quilt, love,' he said. He flicked his ash on the carpet before leaving.
'Fucking arsehole,' said Eleanor as she got up.
She stripped the bed, still naked, and put everything in a heap by the bedroom door. A quick shower and three text messages and two phone calls to her husband's phone later, she was out the door and on the way to the supermarket in her BMW X3.
*
John was an arsehole - Eleanor was in no doubt about that. She knew, too, that David was the best thing that'd ever happen to a woman like her. But she needed something her husband just couldn't give her. She needed someone who'd fuck her. She needed dirty, like she couldn't get from David, because he was so fucking nice.
And she always felt like shit after seeing John. She thought that maybe she needed that, too. Eleanor really didn't like herself very much.
I'm a bad wife, a bad mother, and a bad person. Full house, baby.
A couple of tears escaped as she drove, and the bright headlights of the oncoming cars nearly blinded her. She wiped her eyes clear and shook her head, like she was shaking off the bad then getting with the good persona that she strived for most days.
It wouldn't do to find David and George and for either of them to get wondering what was going on with her. Sometimes she thought George knew...something. He looked at her like he knew. Of course he didn't. He was just a smart kid, and he picked up on things. Nothing more than that.
She thought back to a conversation she'd had with George a couple of weeks before.
'It's OK, Mummy,' he'd said, entirely out of the blue.
'What's OK?'
'Oh...nothing,' he'd said.
But the thing of it was that he'd been helping her with the dinner - washing vegetables. They hadn't been talking, even, and George's tongue had been sticking out a little as he concentrated on his task.
Damned if she hadn't been wrapped in guilt about John while she cooked.
She shook her head again, this time at the red rear lights of a line of cars in front of her. A car pulled from the queue to make a three-point turn. Moments after it passed her, others seemed to get the message and do the same.
It took her forty minutes or so to reach the front of the line, and when she did she was good and angry. It wasn't even where she wanted to be. A roadblock, and still at least half an hour of driving left to get to the supermarket.
But even if she could get round the block, it probably wouldn't do her any good. It wasn't a police barricade. These were military vehicles.
It began to rain. Just specks, turning the lights ahead into red or white diamonds across her windshield. The air cooled, just a little, but not enough. Never enough, when it's hot and you're crying. As she waited, the rain got heavier and she put the wipers on full. Her attention drifted for a while as the sound of the wipers lulled her, and the tiredness that came from anger and boredom and frustration stole her energy.
As she nodded off her head fell forward and she grunted.
'Shit,' she said and wound the window down before shaking her head back and forth. Stationary or not, she figured falling asleep behind the wheel with the engine running was never going to be a safe thing to do.
There was now a gap in front, maybe five cars long. She put the car in gear and rolled forward slowly and as she came closer to the barricade, she saw it wasn't just some safety precaution, this quarantine. It was worse than that. The soldiers at the barricade were armed. Not with little pistols, either. They held rifles across their bodies.
The last time she'd seen soldiers holding their weapons like that for real, and not o
n TV, had been in Northern Ireland, nearly twenty years ago. Those soldiers hadn't been fucking around, and these weren't, either.
She rolled closer still, running her words through her head, discarding them. A soldier held up his left hand, palm up, to let her know to stop. His right hand remained on the grip of his rifle. Hers the fifth car in line now, and even though this was English soil and no one was at war, fear made her suddenly cold.
Another soldier, this one armed, too, walked toward Eleanor's car.
The sight of armed soldiers was frightening enough, to her, but she feared for her family more. George was her only reason for getting up in the morning at all, and David was a lovely, lovely man. Maybe not the man she needed, but she couldn't live without him, either.
Her heart pounded as she buzzed her window down. The soldier didn't ask her to step out.
'Quarantine, ma'am. You're going to have to turn around.'
'My husband and son were at the supermarket. I saw the news...I'm worried.'
'I understand,' said the soldier, his face stern and serious. 'Can you give me their names?'
She did, and he told her to wait in the car while he walked back to the barricade. He had a radio on his shoulder, which he spoke into for a while. Then he came back to her.
'I'm sorry,' he said. 'We don't have anyone by either name.'
'You have a list I can check? Can I take a look? Maybe there's been a mix up...'
'No mix up, Ma'am. You really have to turn around and go home. I'm sure they'll turn up. They probably left already and you just missed them on your way here.'
'I saw my husband's car on the TV. They must still be inside, or...God...hurt...or...'
'We've searched the entire area, ma'am. Everyone within the zone is accounted for... Now, turn around.'
The Dead Boy Page 4