Runaways

by Joe Layburn

  I prefer to use my thought-voice.

  “It’s a gift. You should use it for good. Not to frighten people.”

  I heard the floorboards creak as he shuffled from one foot to the other. I waited for him to say something but he didn’t reply.

  “I’ve touched a nerve, haven’t I? Why do you use your gift to terrorise people when you could do so much good with it?”

  Silence again.

  “I bet it’s because you’ve been hurt. Someone’s rejected you – a partner, your family maybe. You’re behaving this way because you’re mad at the world.”

  That’s when he slapped me round the side of the head and sent me tumbling to the floor.

  I lay there for a few seconds wondering if he would attack me again. I hadn’t felt this angry since Cable Street.

  HOW DARE YOU? HOW DARE YOU STRIKE ME?

  Georgie told me that when he first heard my thought-voice it was like a nuclear bomb going off inside his head. When I’m desperate to talk to someone, or they’re trying to block me out, I do the equivalent of screaming at the top of my lungs. Then they feel intense pain.

  This Jack, whoever he was, began to scream. At the time I didn’t think about it, but he sounded less like a grown man than a teenager. He fell heavily against the door frame, then collapsed onto the landing floor.

  I sent a whole ocean of thought-waves crashing over him.

  HOW DARE YOU BREAK INTO MY HOUSE? HOW DARE YOU THREATEN ME?

  I heard him stagger down the staircase, bouncing off the walls. He wrenched open the front door than pulled it shut behind him.

  Of course, I felt relieved that I’d driven him away, but then I wondered if I’d been reckless. I wasn’t really sure what effect I’d had on him. Once I’d managed to knock Georgie unconscious by mind-screaming at him. What if Jack stumbled into the road and fell under a bus? I know Melissa thinks I’m soppy sometimes, but I felt I should try to make things better.

  I called after him. It was a soothing voice now. It’s Fatima. I know that you can hear me. Please don’t be afraid.

  For a moment there was silence, then, faintly at first, I found his thought-waves rippling back to me.

  Leave me alone. Please just leave me.

  Soon, I’d located him. I was inside his head and what I found there made me gasp. He was not some bogeyman. This creature who’d been threatening Omar, Georgie and now me, was not an adult at all. He was just a boy.

  Why do you want to hurt us, Jack? It seems to me you’re only hurting yourself.

  His troubled mind was whimpering now.

  I just want to be left alone. I keep hearing you all reaching out to me. I don’t want to part of anything. I just want you to leave me be.

  Not to sound big-headed, but sometimes I think I understand what’s really on people’s minds quicker than they do themselves.

  Jack, I don’t believe you do want to be left alone. Wasn’t it you who contacted us? You’re pushing me away with one hand. But with the other you’re reaching out for our help.

  Again there was silence.

  Think it over, Jack. We have the same gift as you, but we want to use it wisely. Join us, Jack. It’s never too late to change.

  Melissa says I’m too good to be true sometimes - she calls me ‘Little Miss Perfect’. But I was being sincere with Jack. I wanted him to know that I meant every word I said.

  JACK

  You have to understand, I hate happy families. I get angry just seeing them walk down the street. I’m there shivering with a blanket wrapped around me, and some cute little five-year-old with golden curls squeals, “Mummy, Daddy, what’s wrong with that boy? Why is he sitting there like that? Why is he so dirty?”

  Then the parents get embarrassed. They hold on to their little angel extra tight. Maybe the mum, who’s all made-up and rich-looking, starts to blush and stammer, “Just keep walking, darling. I’ll explain later.”

  Then off they go, hand in hand. I wonder what they say later when they’re back in their safe, warm houses with the cream-coloured carpets and cupboards crammed with food.

  “It’s all very sad, darling, but you see, he hasn’t got a nice home and parents who love him.”

  Maybe they just change the subject and forget I even exist. Like I say, I hate happy families.

  It’s the dads I glare at most when they pass by. I know why they get to me. I talked about it with Mrs Ali, my counsellor. That’s when I was still at home in Leeds and going to secondary school. She said I had to come to terms with the fact that my own dad, who walked out, wasn’t perfect, and neither was my step-father. Most of what Mrs Ali said was rubbish, but she was spot on about that. My dads were “not the best role models”.

  What they did teach me was how to use my fists. Both of them were handy like that. To be fair to my real dad, it was mostly just slaps and smacks I got from him. But Davey, my step-dad, used to punch me when he got mad. This ugly, squashed nose of mine is all thanks to Davey. Every time I see my reflection in a shop or restaurant window, I think of him.

  So where was my mum? Why didn’t she step in? Well, it turned out she loved Davey more than me. I told her straight, “If he ever touches me again, I’m off.”

  She replied, “Don’t make me choose between you, Jackie. You’re my baby, but he’s my fella and I need him.”

  Of course, Davey paid for her hair and her holidays and her drinks till she fell off her barstool every night. How could I compete with that?

  Next time he hit me, I left.

  It was when I reached London that I started hearing voices - lots of them. I thought I was going bonkers. It was like my head was a scanner and it was tuning in to all these different radio stations. These kids - and they were all kids -sounded like they belonged to the biggest, happiest family of all time. But I didn’t need anybody. I wanted to be left alone.

  At night, when I was trying to get to sleep under a railway arch or in a subway, I’d hear them chattering, joking, sharing, comforting. I didn’t want to listen in, but I couldn’t help it. Their happy babble drove me crazy. One name kept coming up in their conversations: Fatima. She was the one I grew to hate the most.

  In the end, I decided to get back at them. I’d find out where they were going and follow them around. Frighten them. Maybe even hurt them.

  Fatima and her brother Omar lived in Whitechapel, in the East End of London. I’d heard of Whitechapel. My step-dad was obsessed with true crime books and the ones he read the most were about Jack the Ripper, the Victorian serial killer.

  It gave me an idea. I’d talk to them after all, but I wouldn’t be Jack, the real me. I’d be Jack the Ripper, returned from the dead. See how they liked that!

  And it worked. It was a brilliant trick -like impersonating another person’s voice. I created this character in my mind - a bogeyman, a murderer. When I used telepathy with Fatima and Omar and their special friend Georgie, I could make myself be him.

  My name is Jack. I know that you can hear me. Please be afraid!

  But it turns out I was only fooling myself. Fatima saw through my act. She understood just how lonely I was. I’d never known anyone like her. I wanted to be her friend.

  GEORGE

  I was hungry, but for once, thanks to Omar, I had money in my pocket. The windows of the first café I came to were clouded by condensation so I couldn’t see in. I eased open the door which seemed to have warped in its frame.

  Inside it was like the engine room of an old steamship – cutlery clanged and everyone seemed to be talking at once. I found an empty table in a corner and sat down to look at the grease-stained menu.

  Behind the counter, wrestling with a large machine that seemed to be pumping out tea, coffee and smoke, was a grouchy looking man with dark, slicked back hair.

  “All right, all right,” he shouted at some workmen who were moaning that he’d not produced their orders.

  Next to my table sat an old woman. Her face looked crinkled and yellow like a book that’s been left o
ut in the sun. She was murmuring softly to herself. In front of her was a cup of tea she’d barely touched.

  “Kid, you can’t sit there. You’ll have to go.”

  It was the owner. He pushed his greasy hair back from his face then gestured with a thumb towards the door.

  “I just want some beans on toast,” I said. “I’ve got the money. I’ll give it to you up front if you like.”

  “Take a look at yourself, kid. You’re no good for business.”

  I glanced down at my hands. They were filthy with dirt.

  “Just go,” he said. “And don’t come back.”

  The old lady stirred back to life. For a second I thought she might defend me.

  “Oi, Melv!” she called to the owner.

  “What?”

  “It’s disgusting, innit? The state of kids today.”

  I slammed the door behind me.

  I’d walked a hundred yards when I saw two boys of about sixteen. Both were skinheads with green bomber jackets and number one crops - a style I’d seen a lot at my dad’s political meetings. Despite their matching close-shaved hair, physically they were very different.

  A fat skin and a skinny skin, I thought.

  I knew to keep my head down and walk past them - no eye contact. But as I got closer they stopped and blocked my way.

  “You got a light, mate?” the fat one asked.

  Both skins had badges pinned to their jackets, the red and white cross of St George, and various symbols and abbreviations I half recognised.

  “I said, have you got a light?”

  I looked into his close-set piggy eyes.

  “Sorry, I don’t smoke.”

  He moved to let me pass, then grabbed me by the shoulder.

  “Wait a minute. I know you.”

  “I don’t think so,” I muttered.

  “Yeah, I do. I’ve seen you at the British Fascist Party rallies. I never forget a face.”

  His skinny mate started laughing this weird laugh.

  “I’ll tell you who that is, Del. He’s Georgie Smith.

  I could feel the electricity coming off them now.

  “You’re a traitor, that’s what you are - a disgrace to your race. And so’s your old man. I seen him on the TV the other night saying he’s giving up on politics.”

  “I haven’t seen him in weeks,” I said.

  My words were thick and sticky in my mouth. I could feel a muscle twitching madly in my jaw.

  “What’s happened to you, anyway?” the skinny skin said. “You look like a tramp.”

  I ignored him.

  “Oi, if I ask you a question, I expect an answer.”

  He pushed me hard in the chest and I took a step backwards.

  “How come you look like a dosser?”

  I expected him to hit me, but suddenly he dropped his hands. A thick-set figure had crossed the street and was now standing alongside me. He was no older than the skinheads but he was built like a boxer. His nose had been broken so badly it had almost turned round on itself. When he spoke, he snuffled like a Boxer dog.

  “What’s the problem?”

  The skinny skin narrowed his eyes.

  “It’s nothing to do with you, mate. We’re just having a friendly chat.”

  “Doesn’t look friendly to me.”

  The fat skin rolled his shoulders and his neck as though he was limbering up for something.

  “It’s none of your business, mate. Just leave us to it, will you?”

  “I’m making it my business,” the boy said.

  The skinheads flashed a look at each other.

  “Do you know who this is?” the skinny skin asked, pointing at me.

  “Yeah, I know,” the boy grunted. “He’s Georgie Smith.”

  I swung around to look at him properly.

  “Then you know he’s a scumbag and a traitor to his race,” the fat skin said.

  “Look, just run along and play, will you?” the boy said. “If you try and fight me you’ll both get hurt.”

  “Is that right?”

  The fat skin curled his lip and raised his fists.

  “Come on then!”

  He didn’t even see the Boxer boy’s right hook. It landed smack on his fleshy chin. The fat skin collapsed as if he’d been punctured, then lay gurgling on the pavement.

  The other skinhead took a moment to respond. He jumped on top of the boy and punched him twice in the side of his face. The boy barely flinched. He soon had the skinny skin’s arms wrapped up, then he lifted him up onto his back as though he weighed no more than his bomber jacket. The skinhead thrashed and squirmed as they lurched towards a pile of black bin bags by the side of the road. With a drop of his shoulder, the boy threw the skinhead on top of them.

  The skinny skin was coughing and shouting curses but he didn’t seem to want to fight any more.

  The next thing I heard was the screech of tyres as a white police van pulled up on the pavement next to us. The driver jumped out.

  “What the hell’s going on?” he shouted.

  The fat skinhead was back on his feet now, rubbing his grazed chin. “That kid’s a nutter! He just attacked us for no reason.”

  The skinny skin was keeping his distance but he called out too.

  “He should be locked up. He’s mental.”

  The policeman turned to inspect the boy. “Well?”

  He just nodded in my direction.

  “They were out of order, officer. They were picking on my friend here.”

  “Is that a fact?”

  The policeman looked at the two skins and raised an eyebrow.

  “Anyway, you can all go home now. Whatever’s happened here is over. Understand?”

  The two skins waited until the policeman was back in his van and the boy and I had gone maybe fifty yards up the road. Then they started calling after us. Well, me, really. I was a disgrace to my race because I had friends who weren’t white. I was a traitor to the British Fascist Party because I’d swapped sides.

  The boy gave me this strange look.

  “And you used to hang out with people like that?”

  I laughed.

  “It feels like a long time ago now. People change.”

  I offered him my hand to shake.

  “I owe you big time.”

  “That’s OK,” he said. “I’m a runaway too. I know the kind of scrapes you can get into. The truth is, it’s me who owes you.”

  I shrugged. What was he talking about?

  “My name’s Jack,” he said. “And I’ve got some explaining to do.”

  I did a double take.

  “Jack?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “The ‘Jack’ who’s been following me?”

  He nodded.

  “But your thought-voice. You sound like an adult - a really scary one.”

  He grimaced.

  “It’s just a trick. I sort of created this character in my mind. When I use telepathy I can make myself be him.”

  I admit I totally lost it. I was screaming curses at him and swinging my fists. He didn’t even put his hands up to protect himself. I’m no fighter, but I know I hurt him. The flesh around his left eye started to swell like an overripe piece of fruit, then a trickle of blood leaked out of his battered nose. I was panting and wheezing and swearing and hitting.

  And he just took it.

  HYUN-MI

  I am in a smart hotel in the Chinese border town where I arrived, half-drowned, a fortnight ago. I have begged for money on the street outside this very building. Now, I am sitting in the reception area on a leather sofa.

  The business travellers checking in stare at me. That’s because I can’t stop smiling. I am wearing new clothes given to me by some charity workers who help North Korean refugees. I have just met a young woman I know only as Sun. She is making arrangements for me to travel from China to a new life in South Korea.

  I have heard so much propaganda about our ‘bitter enemies’ from the South. The two K
oreas were once one country. But war has left us split down the middle. The border between North and South is the most heavily guarded in the world with hundreds of thousands of soldiers massed on both sides. No one can cross it, which is why North Koreans try to escape through China.

  Sun should be my enemy then, but, of course, she does not seem like one and, compared to North Korea, the South sounds like heaven.

  Perhaps it’s her name that makes me want to like her. It reminds me of Sun-joo, my dearest North Korean friend.

  I met Sun-joo a week after my father and grandmother were taken away. She was a street child living in a town two days’ walk from Pyongyang.

  I was sheltering in a deserted railway station when she found me. Outside, snowflakes were falling, fluttering from the night sky like clouds of white moths. I’d curled up on a wooden bench and, though it seemed impossible to sleep when I was so cold and hungry, I must have dozed off.

  “Do you want that newspaper?”

  I woke to find the round face of a teenage girl peering down at me. She was pointing at a rolled up paper further along the bench.

  “I can’t read that well, but I like to tear out all the pictures of the Dear Leader. Some of them I just rip to shreds there and then!”

  I started to smile but stopped myself. Maybe this was a trick, to test my loyalty.

  “Did you know, they arrested an old man at this very station for sitting on a newspaper that carried a photo of Kim Jong-il? The old man said it was an accident - said he’d never sit on the Dear Leader deliberately. But the police would have none of it. They marched him off to a prison camp and. . .”

  She mimed a noose being tightened around the old man’s neck.

  “You don’t believe it?”

  “I do,” I stammered.

  “Doesn’t matter what you think. It’s true - or something like it is. Of course, I would definitely be strung up if they knew what I do with certain of the Kim Jong-il pictures in my collection.”

  She waited for me to respond. I just shrugged.

  “Toilet paper!” she squealed. “That’s all the Dear Leader is good for!”

  I laughed too. I’d never met anyone like her.