Num8ers

by Rachel Ward

  “And what do you want?” I looked at his camel-colored overcoat, the fat gold signet ring on his finger, and the Rolex half-hidden by his crisp white shirt cuff.

  “I want to help you.”

  “And you get…?”

  “A percentage, of course.” He fixed his hard gray eyes on me. I couldn’t avoid seeing that, middle-aged as he was, he still had another thirty years of hustling, wheeling and dealing ahead. “I’m not a charity. We’ll be in this together, Jem.”

  “No. Fuck off.”

  “You what?”

  “Fuck off. I don’t want any of it — I don’t want your help.” I spat it out like a swearword. “I don’t want your money. I don’t want fame. I don’t want to be a poxy celebrity.”

  He looked at me like I’d lost my marbles.

  “You have no idea what you’re saying. You can’t walk away from this. You’d be mad to.”

  “I know what I’m doing. I know what I want. And I want you to leave.”

  He held up his hands. “Let’s not be hasty. You’re under a lot of stress here, I know that. I’m going to leave you to talk it over with your mum here. Give you a bit of space. I’ll be right outside.”

  Sitting in the corner, Karen had been watching all this. I thought of her little house back in London, with the wallpaper peeling off the damp patch in the kitchen. She’d struggled all her life without money. What would it mean to her if I went along with all this? I knew she only had a few years to go. Perhaps this guy could make sure that those last ones were the best years of her life.

  “What do you think, Karen?”

  She shook her head. “You know what I feel about all this. It’s gone too far already. If you start giving interviews and writing books, it’ll just get worse.”

  “But I could get you things — a bigger house, with more of a garden for the boys.”

  Her face softened. “They’d like that, wouldn’t they?” she said. “But you don’t have to get me anything, Jem. We’re alright where we are. His kind of world — it’s a fantasy, it’s not real. I know you, Jem — that’s not what you really want, is it?”

  Maybe she did know me after all. I grinned at her.

  “No — it’s all bullshit.”

  Karen opened her mouth to object to the language, then shut it again and came over to give me a hug.

  “I don’t want any of it,” I said. “I want it all to go away. I should never have told anyone.”

  “It’s alright. It’ll be alright.” She was still holding me, but I eased away.

  “But it won’t, will it? This sort of thing feeds on itself. Now that it’s out there, there’s no stopping it.”

  “I think you could stop it yourself.”

  “How?”

  She looked straight at me, clear-eyed. “Just tell them…tell them you made it all up. That it’s not true.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  The last time I’d had to stand up and talk to a group of people had been back at school: “My Best Day Ever.” When was that? A month ago? I couldn’t remember. I’d stood up at the front of the classroom that day, and I’d told the truth, at least the truth as I saw it. That hadn’t exactly turned out well. Now I was getting ready to stand up in front of a crowd of strangers — the sick and dying, journalists, people like that agent, God knows who else — and call myself a liar. I was going to deny the truth that had dogged me my whole life.

  “OK, let’s do it.”

  Karen gave my arm a squeeze. “Good girl,” she said. I think she honestly felt I was coming clean. She’d never believed me, and she was pleased now that I was owning up.

  We walked out of the vestry and into the abbey. Well, there were way more than fifty people there now. It looked like there were hundreds milling around, all keeping near to the vestry door. As soon as I appeared, the noise level rose, and people started moving toward me. Karen steered me through them toward the front of the abbey, where Anne was standing with Stephen, the rector.

  “Jem wants to make a statement,” Karen told them. “Where’s the best place?”

  “Well—” Stephen started to say, when the pushy agent guy elbowed his way to the front and butted in.

  “I’d totally advise against a general statement. We need careful media handling with a story like this. You’re much better with some specifically negotiated one-to-ones. Come on, let’s get you back to the vestry.”

  He put his hand on my arm. I tried to shrug him off, but his grip was pretty viselike.

  “Get off me!” I yelled. “I don’t belong to you, and I’m not going to do a deal with you.”

  He looked genuinely shocked, and puzzled, like he didn’t understand what I was saying.

  “Weren’t you listening to me in there?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I was listening. But you weren’t. You never let me get a word in edgewise. I’m not interested. Now get your hand off me, or I’ll bite it.”

  He removed his hand, but he didn’t back off. Instead, he leaned in close to me.

  “I can’t believe someone would waste such an opportunity. You’re either very naïve or very stupid.” His voice was pitched low now, but Karen and the others had heard him.

  “She’s neither,” said Karen firmly. “She’s her own person, and she’s made her own decision. Now I’d like you to leave her alone.”

  Vic did move away then, but he didn’t leave the abbey, he stayed at the back of the crowd, watching.

  “You’ve got something to say, have you?” Stephen was asking.

  “Yes. I think it’s time…time I stopped wasting everyone else’s time.”

  Anne glanced worriedly at Karen, but Stephen nodded and looked relieved.

  “Good. I’m glad. This farrago has gone on long enough. You can speak from here.” There was a slight step up into the part where the choir sat, but it only brought me to the head height of most of the crowd.

  I looked up at the pulpit. “What about up there? There’s a microphone, too.”

  He went redder in the face.

  “That would be completely inappropriate…,” he started to bluster, then thought better of it. “Oh, very well, if it gets it over with….”

  He led me up some steps and suddenly I was there, in the dark wooden pulpit of Bath Abbey. He switched on the microphone and introduced me, his voice booming out across the pews.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, please find a seat. Our young…guest…here at the abbey has a few words to say to you.” He spread out his arm, inviting me to step forward and speak, and then retreated down the stairs.

  A hush fell over the crowd.

  I made the mistake of looking down. A sea of faces met me — a sea of numbers. I had nothing prepared: no clever words, no speech, no beginning, middle, or end. And one thing to tell them: a barefaced lie.

  I took a couple of deep breaths.

  “Hello,” I said, “I’m Jem. But you know that, that’s why you’re here.” No reaction. I swallowed hard and continued. “At least I don’t really know why you’re here. I’m just a kid, the same kid I was a month ago, a year ago, five years ago, when no one wanted to know me. I suppose what’s different is that I’ve been saying stuff about knowing when people are going to die. And I suppose you’re here because you think that I might tell you. But I’ve got to tell you…I’ve got to tell you…that it’s all a lie. I made it up.”

  There was a collective gasp.

  “Attention-seeking, that’s all. Boy, did that work. I’m sorry. I’m a fake. You’ve been scammed. You can all go home now — there’s nothing to see here.”

  I turned to make my way down the stairs. People were starting to call out — it wasn’t what they’d wanted to hear. There were angry shouts, but also, rising above the other noise, a scream of genuine anguish — a terrible noise. I turned back and scanned the crowd. The lady screaming was the one in the head scarf, the one who’d touched my hand yesterday. Even though it was unfair of her to look to me for answers, I couldn’t help feeling that I
’d let her down. I went back to the microphone.

  “What did you expect from me?” I was looking at her, talking directly to her, but the whole crowd fell quiet again. “If you want, I can tell you what you came here for.”

  I paused, licked my lips.

  “You’re dying.”

  She clapped her hands to her mouth, eyes wide with shock. More gasps rippled through the church.

  “And so is the guy next to you. And the one behind. And so am I. We’re all dying. Everyone in this church, and everyone outside. You don’t need me to tell you that. But there’s something else.”

  At the back of the church, a door opened. A group of men came in — policemen in uniform.

  “You’re all alive, too. Right now, today, you’re alive and kicking. You’ve been given another day. We all have.”

  The men walked over to the end of the main aisle and started moving toward the front. There was one guy in the middle, way taller than the rest of them, ridiculously tall, in fact, with his head bobbing and nodding to a rhythm all its own. It couldn’t be. Could it? My heart stopped beating, I swear it did, but my mouth kept going.

  “We know it’s all going to come to an end one day, but we shouldn’t let that weigh us down. We shouldn’t let it stop us from living.”

  Spider had come to a halt now, about halfway down the church. He was just standing there, looking up at me, with that big, silly grin on his face. I was talking to him now, there was no one else in the abbey for me, only him.

  “Especially if you’ve found someone who loves you — that’s the most important thing of all. If you’ve got that, then you should appreciate every damn second with them….”

  He flung his arms up in the air then, and let out a great whoop. Other people started clapping.

  I backed away from the microphone and stumbled down the steps. I didn’t care who was looking at me, how many lenses or cameras were trained on me. I ran toward him, through the clapping, cheering, confused crowd, my feet nearly slipping on the polished tiles. Spider hadn’t moved, he was clapping, too, and then holding his arms out wide. I launched myself at him and he gathered me in, swinging me up and around before holding me close. I wrapped my legs around him, clinging like a limpet.

  “What’s going on, man?” he laughed into my hair. “I only left you for a few days and you’ve turned into a preacher! Here”—he bent his face down to mine —“come here, I’ve never kissed a vicar before.” And he kissed me, so tenderly, in front of everyone. “I missed you,” he breathed.

  “I missed you, too,” I said back, and above us, way up in the bell tower, the rods and levers clunked into place and the great abbey bells started to chime the hour.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  “You’re OK, are you?” I searched his eyes for any signs of illness. Nothing, just his number, ever present, unchanging.

  “Yeah, bit tired. Can’t sleep in those cells.” He wiped his big hands over his face. “Kept thinking about you. Wondering where you were. I’d no idea you were holed up in a church.”

  “It’s mad, isn’t it? I kept thinking about you, too. It was making me crazy, thinking about you shut up in a cell. But that’s it now. You’re out. Are they bringing the car here?”

  He frowned.

  “What you talking about? What car?”

  “That was one of my conditions — they had to bring you and a car and some money, and then I’d talk. So we can carry on. Get to Weston. It’s less than thirty miles from here.”

  “Nah, you’ve got that wrong. They haven’t finished with me — they haven’t charged me yet. They just brought me here for a few hours, must be the deal you had, and then they’re taking me back again. ’Xpect they’ll take you an’ all, too.”

  “But they agreed — they signed an agreement! It’s all legal!”

  “What you gonna do? Take them to court?” He shook his head. “You can’t trust anyone, Jem, you should know that. Except me, of course.”

  “But they lied. Bastards! What are we gonna do now? How are we gonna get away from here?”

  He sighed. “I don’t think we are, Jem. This is it — we’ve got a few hours. We’ll just have to make the most of it. Like you said up there.”

  “But that’s not right, Spider. We’ll never make it now. We’ll never make it to Weston. I wanted to walk along the beach with you, have fish and chips like you said….” I had to stop there, as I was choking over the words. He put his long arm ’round me.

  “Don’t get upset. It doesn’t all have to be today. We can do it another time. Face it, they’re gonna put me away this time, probably you, too, but I can wait. I’ll wait for you, if you…?”

  “Of course I’ll wait for you. I waited fifteen years to find you. I could wait another fifteen if I needed to, but…” How could I say it? But time’s run out. There is no more after today.

  “But what?”

  “Just…just…I dunno. I just don’t think it’s going to work out.”

  “’Course it is. Sometimes things are really simple — I love you and you love me. That’s all we need. Whatever happens, we can get through it.”

  Why can’t things be like that? He loved me and I loved him, but the number in my head was telling me that he was going to die today. And the numbers had never been wrong. Leaning against him, breathing in his muskiness, I suddenly got a sick, sick feeling. There was nothing wrong with Spider. He wasn’t lying beaten up in a police cell. He wasn’t ill. Tattoo Face was gone, and there was no one chasing us with a gun or a knife.

  The only thing threatening him was me. I’d made it happen — I’d drawn him back to me on the fifteenth of December 2010: 12152010. I saw the number and somehow I knew its message would come true. While I existed, the number existed. I was the number and the number was me. I don’t know if anyone else, anywhere in the world, saw them, or if the numbers they saw were the same ones I saw, but once I’d seen one, that was it. They didn’t change, they didn’t go away. Anne was right: I was a witness, but maybe not just in a general way. I was a witness to the end of particular people on particular days.

  There was only one way to deal with it. The only way to cancel that number out was to remove the person who saw it.

  I stood up slowly and looked around. I couldn’t expect the keys to be back in the drawer in the vestry, but I knew Simon always had some on him. He was talking to Anne in one of the side aisles, keys glinting in a big bunch at his waist. I ran up to him and lunged at the keys. I had them unhooked from his waistband before he knew what I was doing. Pushing him aside, I raced to the tower door. There were so many keys, so many, but I got the right one, second try. I didn’t look back, not once, I just wrenched open the door, slipped through, slammed it behind me, and locked it, shutting out all the raised voices, even the one I longed to hear. Especially the one I longed to hear. But it was there in my head as I climbed the spiral staircase.

  “Jem, what the fuck…? Jem!”

  As I stepped out onto the roof, horizontal rain lashed into me. I locked the door at the top of the staircase and picked my way across, over to the tower. In those few seconds, my clothes were soaked, jeans flapping wetly around my legs. Once I was in the tower, I knew what I had to do. Ignoring the other side doors, I went up until I found the bell-ringing room, then across and up the top staircase. I didn’t bother securing the last door — the other three or four would slow them down enough. It would be far too late by the time they got to me. I was breathing fast and hard, my chest hurting with the effort. My legs were wobbly from the climb, and the wind buffeted at me, almost knocking me over. I put both hands on the stone parapet to steady myself.

  From far below, I heard shouting. I wouldn’t let myself look down. I kept my eyes on the rooftops and the hills beyond.

  I waited until I’d caught my breath a bit, but not long enough to lose the adrenaline rushing through my veins. Eyes on the horizon, I gave a little jump and, using all the strength left in my arms, pulled myself up onto the stone
wall. I crouched there for a second, getting my balance, and then slowly, with arms outstretched, got to my feet.

  The rooftop pool across from me contained a handful of swimmers, defying the storm above them. I knew now for sure that I’d never be one of those people. I would never be anything other than what I was now — a girl who, for fifteen years, had brought death and destruction to those around her. A girl who’d been stupid enough to start to believe in love, and who now knew that there was only one way to save the boy who loved her.

  Perhaps, after all, I had seen my own number.

  It had been reflected in Spider’s eyes all along.

  12152010.

  The day I said good-bye to it all.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  My toes were curled inside my shoes, as if that would help them grip on to the wet stone. I tried to stand as tall as I could, to face the end with dignity, but the wind and the rain were mocking me. They knew that in the scheme of things, I was tiny, nothing, and by blowing me around, soaking me, they were putting me in my place. It took a surprising amount of strength just to stay up there — the weather was blasting in from the front of me, trying to knock me back onto the flat roof behind. I could lean into it and not fall, except it would suddenly change; the wind would drop, and then I was flailing my arms about, reeling on the edge, toes gripping even harder.

  I guess my mistake was thinking. I didn’t just get up and jump, that would have been the way to do it. But not me, I had to stand there for a bit with my mind full of stuff. If I jumped, would the wind actually blow me backward? How long would it take to fall? Would I feel it, when I made contact with the ground? Would I actually hit the ground or the pitched roof? Was this really meant to happen? Was this my life, fifteen years and no more? Did I have a future, lying somewhere out there, waiting for me, and was I about to cheat it?