The Bombs That Brought Us Together

by Brian Conaghan

  Me too.

  Like I said, clever cookie.

  A week before we were due back to school the guy in the tie who reads the news interrupted our programmes with an extraordinary special announcement. By the look in his eyes I knew that the special announcement wasn’t going to be a joyous one. The news guy looked as if he’d been howling floods of tears just a few seconds before the cameras rolled. He managed to hold it together for the extraordinary special announcement:

  Good evening, residents of Little Town. It is with great sadness that I inform you of tonight’s imminent events. Our intelligence reports indicate that Little Town will come under a sustained attack sometime before midnight … We expect this criminal act to be catastrophic for some of our residents …

  The news guy continued speaking but what came out of his mouth, or rather what entered my lugs, was nanananananananananananananananananananananananan instead of words and sentences. People talk about having a numb feeling when something drastic happens. I thought they meant a numb feeling like when it’s F-word cold outside and you’re freezing your rocks off. How wrong was I? Me, Mum and Dad sat in our triangle of numbness, staring at the television news guy as if it was his fault that Little Town was about to come under attack. While he advised us of what we should do, everything he said sounded like an inaudible slur.

  •If you have them, assemble in the basements or bunkers of your homes.

  •Turn off all lights in your homes.

  •Under no circumstances go outside.

  •Do not drive.

  •Good luck and stay safe.

  When the numbness wore off I sat shaking my head. Dad sat with his hands on his thighs, stiff. Mum sat on the edge of her chair with her knees pressed together, like people in wheelchairs do. She took two puffs on her inhaler before shaking it to check how much she had left.

  ‘Attack us for what reason?’ I asked.

  ‘Because they can,’ Mum said.

  ‘It’s easy,’ Dad said. ‘They want our Government out and they want to come in instead. To control from within.’

  Mum and Dad still said Government – they still believed in the sense of Government – but really they should’ve said Regime.

  ‘But they don’t live here, they’re not from here,’ I said.

  ‘Try telling them that,’ Mum said.

  ‘They think some parts of Little Town should be theirs, and to get it they think they should overthrow our Government,’ Dad said.

  ‘But that’s a good thing, no?’ I asked.

  ‘No, it’s not a good thing, Charlie,’ Dad said.

  ‘But I thought you hated our Reg– … Government, Dad?’ I said.

  ‘That may be true, if you can call them a Government – more like a cabal of hoodlums! I want them overthrown through democracy and diplomacy, Charlie. Not with bombs and bullets.’ Dad pointed to his head and mouth. ‘I want to do it with this and this.’

  ‘So why do they want our land?’ I asked.

  ‘They say they have a right to it,’ Dad said.

  ‘It’s written somewhere apparently, Charlie,’ Mum said, taking yet another puff.

  ‘Your mum’s right,’ Dad said.

  ‘So? Some guy writes it somewhere and everyone believes him?’ I said.

  ‘That’s about the size of it,’ Dad said.

  ‘That’s hardly a law,’ I said.

  ‘It’s illegal, that’s what it is,’ Mum said.

  ‘That’s what they believe,’ Dad said. ‘That’s what they live by.’

  ‘And so that means you have to start bombing people out of their homes just because you believe in some tripe that was written, like, a million years ago?’

  ‘It’s a world gone wrong, morally mad,’ Mum said.

  ‘That’s just crazy stuff,’ I said.

  ‘I couldn’t agree more, son,’ Mum said.

  I bowed my head and tried to gather my thoughts. Mum stood up and looked out of the window. The news guy was now off our telly screen. Our screen was blank. Obviously all the television-making people had done a runner. No chance would I have stayed peering through a camera; I’d have been offski too. Stuff that, waiting to film bombs being fired straight at you.

  Mum whispered from the window, ‘So this is it then?’ and just before she sat down she said, ‘The place is deserted.’

  In all the books I’d read about bombs and coups and death there is always this big moment of panic before everything hits the fan. But that was fiction. Here in the reality of Little Town my family sat in silence. A strange sort of calm washed over us. Usually at this time of night Mum would be busting my chops to do the dishes, tidy my room or to stop ripping her knitting. Instead we sat in the silence of our own thoughts.

  ‘Can’t they just live here with us … in harmony … or whatever?’ I said. ‘It’s not as if they’re perfect.’

  ‘It’s not as easy as that, Charlie,’ Dad said.

  ‘It’s not, Charlie,’ Mum said.

  ‘Why?’ I said.

  ‘The fact is, they don’t like us and we don’t care much for them. We’re not compatible. End of. And anyway, replacing one controlling Regime with another is hardly a progressive move, is it?’ Dad said.

  ‘Our ways are different, Charlie,’ Mum said.

  ‘But how can I not like them when I don’t even know any of them?’ I said.

  ‘But you do know them,’ Mum said.

  ‘No I don’t,’ I said.

  ‘What about your wee buddy across there?’ Dad said, pointing at our front door.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Duda fella,’ Dad said.

  ‘Pav?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He’s not one of them,’ I said.

  ‘He is, Charlie,’ Mum said.

  ‘He’s only from there,’ I said. ‘That doesn’t make him one of them.’

  ‘I’m not so sure,’ Dad said.

  ‘But Pav and his family don’t want our land; they only came here for protection, like refugees. Pav’s dad earns an honest crust. It’s not like they pure love our Regime or anything.’

  ‘We know this, Charlie, son,’ Mum said.

  ‘And he was a major player in some brainy job back in Old Country.’

  ‘I know this,’ Dad said.

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  ‘This is Little Town, Charlie. We do know a thing or two about who comes in and who goes out. People talk … well, whisper. People listen,’ Dad said.

  ‘So if you know what he did why can’t he get a similar job here then?’

  ‘It’s not as simple as that, Charlie,’ Dad said.

  ‘But he has the skills,’ I said.

  ‘And so do many Little Towners,’ Dad said. There was anger in his voice. Maybe it was fear. ‘Our Government don’t want skills, they want control, or men who’ll exercise that control.’

  Dad was meaning people like The Big Man.

  ‘So you’re telling me that people in Old Country don’t like Pav’s family, and people in Little Town don’t like them either?’

  ‘It’s not a question of like, Charlie,’ Dad said.

  ‘But they came here in order to feel safe,’ I said.

  ‘They are safe here,’ Mum said.

  ‘Try telling them that,’ I said.

  ‘Well, they’re probably safer here than they were in Old Country, aren’t they?’ Dad said.

  ‘Not after tonight they won’t be,’ I murmured.

  ‘You don’t know that, Charlie,’ Mum said. ‘We don’t know what will happen tonight.’

  ‘They’ll probably launch a few warning shots,’ Dad said. ‘Without much damage, just to remind us that they’re right there over the border, watching. It’s all about control and paranoia.’

  ‘But what happens if Old Country soldiers find Old Country refugees living in Little Town?’ I said. ‘They’ll definitely know the names of those people who left.’

  Mum and Dad shifted their eyes to the floor. Then my mind flashe
d towards poor Anne Frank and her family. I’d read the book about their hiding exploits at school once.

  Surely Pav’s family wouldn’t have to go into hiding from Old Country soldiers? Surely they wouldn’t have to go into hiding from folk here who think they’ve just arrived from Old Country to pinch their land, nick their jobs and dilute their culture? I looked at Dad. I looked at Mum. Surely no Law family member would grass them up. I looked at Mum. I looked at Dad. Surely not.

  ‘They hate Old Country more than you do,’ I said. In truth I didn’t know this as a fact, but why else would they come here if they didn’t? They had to hate Old Country.

  ‘Well, I’m not too sure about that,’ Mum said, and sat back in her chair, taking in a big puff.

  Dad sat back in his chair as well. Both let out a massive sigh. Me too.

  Dad broke the stalemate.

  ‘Well. I suppose we best do something about these bloody bombs then.’

  And it arrived. My chest felt compressed; the reality of it all jolted my emotions into action. I looked at my mum and dad and cried.

  We didn’t have a basement or a bunker. We didn’t have a lock-up. The shed was too rickety, and it was mine and Pav’s anyway. We didn’t have a cellar. We didn’t have a shelter. We had nothing big and bomb-resistant. The only thing we had was bed covers. Huge duvets. When the bombs came, just before midnight like the news guy said, I was underneath mine in the foetal position, snug as a bug. Mum and Dad were in it with me.

  Then it happened.

  They sounded far away, as if they were on the other side of Little Town, somewhere near the station. The bombs didn’t thud the way I’d expected them to thud.

  There was no BOOM.

  There was no BANG.

  There was no ROAR.

  They echoed like fireworks going off in the sky; the echo was so fireworky in fact that it teased and tempted me to get up from the foetal position and look out of my window, mouth open in awe at the beauty of Little Town’s sky of many colours. Stay under was the call from Dad so I stayed under. At other times the bombs seemed just like cracks of thunder. Definitely not like bombs in the films I’d seen or in the books I’d read. The sustained attack lasted for six minutes. Under the duvet I counted. Six whole minutes of fireworks and thunder.

  After the six minutes of sustained attack a hush came over Little Town. That lasted for seventeen minutes. Under the duvet I counted. Seventeen minutes of Little Town being dead as a dodo. A place fireworked to buggery. I was now going to be living in a desert of rubble and ruin. My new home. Under that duvet I imagined the amount of buildings destroyed, the amount of people missing, the amount of money the clear-up operation would cost and the amount of stress parents would have on their plates. I lost count.

  Little Town was then shunted back into life. A life with a severe limp, that is: the sirens started up; even from under my duvet I could see their blue, red and orange lights illuminating the walls.

  Blue.

  Red.

  Orange.

  Dark.

  Blue.

  Red.

  Orange.

  Dark.

  Blue.

  Red.

  Orange.

  Dark.

  The combination of the police, ambulance and fire brigades’ sirens made a shocking crescendo of sound. Then the screams kicked in again and every sound went up a notch, from shocking to terrifying level. I squashed my face into the pillow, pulled up the sides so it fully covered my ears. Blocking it all out. The noise still managed to find its way through the duvet though, through the pillow and right into my lugs. It was clear that loads of people were out of their blocks. Folk shouting, questioning and just being nosy. People were yelling for their family members who’d been out and about. Screaming for them. I don’t think anyone gave a monkey’s about the dark curfew.

  ‘Charlie? Charlie?’ Mum said.

  ‘Yes?’ I muttered. My face still deep in the pillow.

  ‘Are you OK, son?’

  ‘I’m good now,’ I said, taking my face off the pillow. My mouth and pillow were sodden with saliva. We pulled the duvet from over our heads and breathed normally again. ‘Is it over for the night, do you think?’

  ‘I think so,’ Mum said. ‘Do you want to sleep with Dad and me tonight?’

  ‘No, I’m OK here.’

  So it was all fine and dandy cuddling up to Mum and Dad when I thought we were about to be blown to bits, but now that wasn’t the case, not a chance was I sleeping with them. I was almost fifteen, for God’s sake; time to unshackle the MAN.

  ‘OK, then,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t think the bombs reached us, Mum.’

  ‘They mostly bombed up near the station, I think,’ Mum said.

  ‘Does that mean there won’t be any trains coming and going from Little Town any more?’

  ‘It’s probably too early to tell, Charlie.’

  Mum sat on the edge of my bed and stroked my hair. No doubt she was worried sick for her son’s mental safety. I was fine apart from the wet mouth, clammy hands and bumpy heart rate.

  ‘You should try getting some sleep, darling,’ Mum said, lifting the duvet away from the bed so I could lie down properly. This was going back to the old days of stories and kisses and songs and hugs and alphabets. Mum seemed to enjoy it. I thought it was weird but I put my head down and allowed her to tuck me in, peck me on the head and tell me how much she loved me before she left my room. Classic old-school mummying.

  It was way too noisy to sleep. I was way too adrenalin-pumped. The real reason I didn’t want to sleep was that I was afraid I wouldn’t wake up again. I was scared the bombs would come back and bounce off my head. That they’d return to our part of Little Town and I wouldn’t see the light of day again because of them. Or worse, I would be stuck under an avalanche of debris and dust and left for days on end before finally perishing from dehydration and lack of vital-organ oxygen. But the amazing thing was that I did see the light of day again and I did manage to get some sleep. One minute I’m lying watching the blue, red, orange, dark spin around my room, listening to the muffled street sounds and thinking about Pav and how he and his mum and dad were coping with all this, how they were processing the fact that it was their people who’d done it, their mob’s mental politics who lobbed bombs at us, and the next minute I’m creaking my eyes open at sunlight sneaking through my window. It wasn’t as if I’d slept like a baby, but I’d slept.

  The next morning was spent glued to the telly screen until something or someone came on. The news guy eventually returned with his eyes even more mangled than they had been the previous night. It was clear this man definitely hadn’t slept like a baby. He said that he was broadcasting from a secret and secure location because of circumstances outwith our control and went on to tell us about the criminal devastation Old Country had caused. You could hear a smidgen of a pin being dropped in our house when he was reading out the list of destruction.

  DEVASTATION OLD COUNTRY HAD CAUSED

  •Shopping Area: bombed to smithereens.

  •Train Station: bombed to smithereens.

  •Metal Factory near Station: bombed to smithereens.

  •Sports Stadium: bombed to smithereens.

  •Little Town’s Town Hall: bombed to smithereens.

  •Three Hundred and Twenty-Seven Souls (and Rising): bombed to smithereens.

  In his secret location the news guy shuffled in his seat. He then paused. The pause gave the viewers time to swallow what he’d told us. Once again we sat in open-mouthed silence. Mum puffed her inhaler and then put her hand over her mouth and shook her head. Dad’s eyes had a look of revenge about them. As always Dad broke the silence, but when he said, ‘Rotten murdering bastards,’ it wasn’t meant as a conversation starter.

  The news guy perked up once more and told us about the many things that weren’t bombed to smithereens but merely seriously damaged or semi-destroyed:

  •Some Schools: just damaged.

&
nbsp; •The Bicycle Tricks Park: just damaged.

  •The Big Supermarket: just damaged.

  •Mobile Phone Transmitters: disabled.

  •Six Hundred and Forty-Two Souls (and Rising): just damaged.

  All this info left me with some serious questions of my own to mull over:

  •With the transmitters down, how was I going to find out if people were OK? Mainly Erin F.

  •How were we going to be educated?

  •Where were we going to do bike tricks now?

  •How in the hell’s fire were we going to get scran in our bellies?

  •Who was going to help the relatives of the hundreds of poor souls with all their tears and pain?

  And the biggie:

  •Was The Big Man dead?

  12

  Monsters

  After the bombs came I didn’t get out of bed for two days except to watch news on the telly. Mum and Dad were glued to the sporadic news broadcasts, trying to find out as much information as possible. Apparently, Old Country soldiers were spreading through Little Town, but we hadn’t seen any yet. I read, slept, thought, shook and one time cried when I heard people wailing outside. It was probably all in my mind but the smell of everything crept into my room: a pungent mixture of burning, blood, dust and death. It dried my throat and latched on to my skin. I worried about Pav and his family, wondering if they were huddled behind a wardrobe, too scared to show their faces. Hungry. Exhausted. Terrified.

  I thought about Erin F and wondered if I’d ever get to see her again. Tears filled my eyes. In fact, who would I get to see again? More tears.

  On the third night there was a thud. I thought I was still dreaming. The non-dream part was Mum telling me to stay in my bed, Dad saying through gritted teeth not to make a sound or else we’d be next. He didn’t say next though, he used another word.

  The first THUD made sure I wouldn’t be finishing my dream. The second THUD woke me up proper. And the third THUD shuddered my innards. I got up and went to see what it was. Mum and Dad were hunched together at our main door, listening to what was happening at the other end of our shared block. Directly outside Pav’s place.