by Amanda Fleet
The Wrong Kind of Clouds
Amanda Fleet
Also by Amanda Fleet
Lies That Poison (UK)
Lies That Poison (US)
Copyright © 2016 Amanda Fleet
The moral right of Amanda Fleet to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
For all those who believed in me
Tuesday Morning
There it was. The face of the boy he had been searching half the world for, popping out of the computer screen like a firework exploding. A wide smile; the rippled scars from falling into a fire coursing down the right side of his face; a missing left incisor. Patrick had been hunting him for weeks and there he was, in Chicago according to this blog.
Patrick ran a stubby-fingered hand through his thatch of blond hair, pushing it back from a long forehead. He sucked his teeth, picked up a pen and added ‘email Moyenda—tell him Limbani’s in Kent and Mabvuto’s in Chicago’ to the growing list of things to do that perched at the side of his laptop. He wondered how Moyenda would take the news.
He glanced at his watch, closed down his laptop and picked up his dirty coffee cup. Crossing his flat in three steps he reached the tiny kitchen that led straight off the lounge: too small to swing a rat in. Even his slight frame filled the place, making it feel claustrophobic. The blank spaces on the walls of the flat depressed him, but it was just stuff that had gone and maybe life was too full of stuff. Once, he might have dreamed of a bigger place, full of the trappings of consumerism, but this poky, ground-floor cupboard had to do. It wasn’t as if he had a choice.
He peered through the grimy window as he filled the kettle, staring out at grubby communal bins and the desolate industrial buildings beyond the road. His brain was still on the little boy in the blog and how the hell a street kid had got from Africa to America. He scraped out the last few grains of coffee and lobbed the empty jar into an overflowing yellow crate. It bounced back out. Patrick sighed, retrieved it and shoved it into a cranny between several beer bottles, then he picked up the whole crate, perching it against his hip as he manipulated the door. He tottered towards the chest-high recycling bins, glancing up at the leaden skies showing between Edinburgh’s crowded buildings, his brain whirring. How had Mabvuto got to Chicago? Not under his own steam, that was sure. He opened the lid of the bin and started tossing in the bottles, the enclosed yard amplifying the cacophony as the glass splintered, the sound riding over the rat-tat-rat-tat of a long goods train heading slowly out of the city. As Patrick reached the bottom of the crate, he hefted it upwards to tip in the last few shards and his shoulder deflected something solid just before a searing pain ricocheted around the back of his head.
He sprawled to the ground, yelling out, trying to look behind to see his attacker.
‘I can get the money,’ he cried. ‘I really can this time!’
The man had raised his arm again, a club silhouetted against the monochrome sky. Patrick scrabbled forward. Using one hand to propel himself, he groped in his pocket with the other, feeling for his mobile. A blow landed on his ankles. The man grabbed at them. Patrick kicked back, his heel connecting with his attacker’s chin; the hold on his leg died. He scrambled away, his feet slipping on broken glass, bringing him crashing down heavily on his hand and almost knocking the phone from his grip. He could see the gate to the street; it was open. If only he could reach it. The tinny sound of ringing distracted him briefly as he scuttled behind one of the bins.
‘Patrick? Jesus, this had better be good!’
His eyes widened. How had he called her?
Movement in the corner of his eye made him turn. The thug was getting up. He stared at his phone.
‘Summer? Please. You have to help me!’
His voice rode over hers, urgent and panicky. He crabbed sideways, keeping the bin between him and the man, his eyes flitting between freedom and his approaching assailant.
‘There’s no escape, you little fuck.’ The heavy face sneered at him.
‘Patrick? What the—’
‘Help me!’
The man reached him. He kicked the phone out of his hand and stamped down, crushing it into splinters of plastic and electronics. Patrick’s stomach tightened and fear curdled as he saw a thin smile twist the edge of the brute’s lips. The man brought his arm down, his weapon arcing perfectly to connect with Patrick’s skull.
‘You stupid bastard!’ he spat as Patrick slumped against the fence, a stream of blood trickling over his face and dripping steadily on to his shirt.
Patrick stared dully, willing his body to move, but he felt like he was made of string. Crippled, he watched his attacker glance around briskly; then he was heaved on to his shoulder like a sack of coal. Patrick could smell the man’s sweat, feel the scratch of his shirt against his face. He opened his mouth to yell for help but all he could manage was a faint croak.
He was carried through the open gate to a van backed up close with its rear door ajar. Snorting and grunting with the effort, the man opened it, dropped Patrick on the floor of the van and swiftly bound his wrists behind his back with a cable tie, tightening it viciously before repeating the manoeuvre on his ankles. He rolled Patrick into the centre of the van and slammed the doors shut.
It had all taken less than five minutes.
***
Summer Morris stared at the phone, rain dribbling off her hat and down her neck. For some time now, she wouldn’t have pissed on Patrick if he was on fire. Why the hell had he called her?
She tipped her head back, glared at the clouds and sighed heavily. Her short nails clicked on her phone as her emotions kaleidoscoped with colours she hadn’t felt for months, before fracturing into the hue of a day-old bruise. She recognised the colour as apprehension.
‘Hello! You have reached the mobile for Patrick Forrester. I am either on a call or unavailable right now, so please leave me a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.’
She sucked in a quick, impatient breath.
‘Patrick? What the hell’s happening? Are you okay? It’s Summer. Call me back.’
She hung up and clutched the phone in one hand, wrapping her other arm around herself as she sat on the waterproof rug, drawing her knees up to her chin.
‘Call me back, you bastard. This had better be some kind of prank.’
It hadn’t sounded like a prank. It had sounded horribly like something violent had just happened to Patrick. Summer stared at the rolling hills and glittering loch before her, drumming her fingertips against her knee, for once oblivious to the beauty of her surroundings. She uncoiled long, muscular legs, rearranging them impatiently next to her tripod and camera. The mizzle wormed its way under her collar; the clammy grass was starting to breach the edges of the square she was sitting on.
‘I really don’t have time for your games, Patrick,’ she muttered, shrugging her shoulders to dislodge the damp.
Her thoughts ran back over the phone call. Was it a game? Was it real? If it was real, what the hell was she expected to do? Why call her? Why not call the police?
Why call her?
Summer scrabbled in her camera bag to retrieve the notebook she kept there. She balanced it on her knee, pulled the top off a pen with her teeth, and started to transcribe what she’d heard, working quickly. A m
uffled voice. Speaking English or a foreign language? Not sure. She closed her eyes, screwing her face up as she concentrated. A train in the background? Traffic noises? A train. Yes, definitely a train. The other voice… male, deep, no more than one? What were Patrick’s words, his tone, his emotions? What had happened? Had he been hit? Was that last sound his phone being destroyed or was it something horrible happening to Patrick? She wrote as swiftly as she could, trying to capture everything while it was fresh and raw, and then leaned back and reviewed the notes. Should she call the police? Her guts twisted at the thought. What could she tell them if she did? Where was Patrick when he made the call? She closed her eyes, listening to it again in her head. His flat was near a train line. The noise had kept her awake at nights. A million places were by a train line. He could be anywhere.
Why had he called her?
The signal strength on her mobile flickered between two bars and none. It was amazing he’d even managed to reach her. She dialled 101 but didn’t let the call connect, a slick of sweat forming on her skin despite the cold April air. She didn’t want to talk to the police, certainly not over a shit like Patrick. Too many bad experiences. Too much brainwashing from her parents. She stared at the number, not even starting to rehearse words for a call she wasn’t sure she could make, but a sickening uneasiness suffused her with the colour of marigolds and would not go away, keeping her from tossing the phone back into her bag. She wondered how people without synaesthesia knew when to trust their feelings.
Her insides churning, she hung up twice before finally making the call.
‘Police Scotland.’
She swallowed, her mouth dry. ‘Oh, hello. Er, my name is Summer Morris and I don’t really know who I should talk to, but I think something bad has happened to someone.’
‘Just one moment please.’
She waited. How should she describe Patrick? Could she in all honesty describe him as a friend? It’s not how he would describe her. Why had he called her and not someone else? When they put her name and his into the system, would their history flash up on the screen?
She almost hung up, but the line clicked.
‘PC Mark Collins. How can I help?’
‘Oh, hello. I had a very peculiar phone call from someone just now and it sounded like he was being attacked.’
‘Just now?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right. Could you tell me what happened?’
She explained the mysterious call, giving PC Collins Patrick’s mobile number and all the details she could remember.
‘Do you know where he was when he made the call?’
Summer could hear the impatience in his voice. Her mind ran back over the background sounds and she glanced at the notes she’d made.
‘Not for sure, but it could well have been his flat. Or near his flat.’
‘Which is where?’
‘Edinburgh.’ She gave him the address.
‘Okay. I will pass all this information on to them. Thank you for calling.’
‘Er… is there a reference number?’ she asked, recognising a brush-off. ‘If I wanted to call and ask about this, what reference would I give, please?’
There was an audible sigh on the line before the officer gave her a number. ‘But in all likelihood, Ms Morris, it will be nothing.’
‘It didn’t sound like nothing. I’d appreciate it if you could keep me up to date, please.’
Another sigh on the line. ‘We’ll do our best to find out what’s happened. Thank you for calling.’
He hung up, leaving Summer with dead air. She called Patrick’s mobile again, hanging up as soon as his voicemail message started, and then rang his home number, only to hear his answerphone message.
Turning up her collar against the persistent drizzle, she stared at her scuffed boots. The police would be able to do something. That was their job. Surely she had done everything she could? What more could Patrick reasonably expect?
Especially of her.
She started to stow her camera and tripod, preparing to hack back down the hillside to her beaten-up Land Rover, parked below at the end of a stony track. The green of the hillside was so intense it almost hurt to look at it, but uniform grey clouds had rolled in and looked settled for the day, and anyway, her mood was shattered. She would take no pictures worth a damn now.
She tucked her notebook into the top of the bag, frustration flooding her head with ochre.
‘Jesus!’ She tugged the zip shut. ‘What more could I have done?’
Her cries disturbed some small birds in the grass and she watched them fly upwards. Her call to the police had been utterly futile.
***
The van turned a corner, rolling Patrick on to a bruised rib and making him groan. Patrick lifted his head, groggy and disorientated. His left eye wouldn’t open but through his right he peered at his surroundings. A crack of light invaded through the edge of the door; he was still in the back of the transit. The hard floor was cold under his shoulders and his arms ached. Wriggling slightly, he realised his hands were tied behind his back with what felt like plastic. A cable tie? Squinting at his feet confirmed his suspicion; a narrow black strip of plastic bit into his flesh above his ankle bone. He licked his lips and tasted the metallic tang of blood. What the hell had happened to him?
His head pounded, retaliating against his efforts to remember. He’d been taking out the recycling. Glass in the yellow crate. Someone had been behind the bins.
He lurched sideways again, banging the side of his head on the wheel arch as the van cornered sharply.
‘Vuck!’
His voice was thick and blunt, his mouth too bruised to aspirate. Where was he going? He listened. Busy road? Quiet road? Was it worth trying to shout for help? Probably not.
He manoeuvred himself painfully until he was sitting up and able to brace his legs against the movements of the van.
Who had it been by the bins? Someone he knew? Some thug back to give him another reminder? They had hit him. Knocked him to the ground, saying something. What?
Phone. His phone had been in his hand. He’d wanted to call the police but he must have hit speed-dial when he fell. Who had he phoned?
Christ on a bike, it was Summer.
Well, could have been worse, could have been Kate. Could have been better, could have been Helen, but he wasn’t stupid enough to have either of them on speed-dial. It was only through sheer laziness that Summer still was.
She didn’t hang up. Would she help?
How can she help, stupid? How can she know where you are? You don’t even know where you are.
We’re slowing. We’re stopping.
‘Help! Help! Help! Help!’
The van door swung open.
‘Shut the fuck up! No one can hear you anyway!’
Patrick squinted at the brightness, trying to see the man’s features against the sudden light.
‘Who are you?’
‘Someone you’ll wish you’d never met. Where the fuck’s your shoe?’
The man climbed into the back of the van and kicked Patrick’s foot. Patrick gazed greedily at the freedom through the door and thought he caught sight of someone walking a dog.
‘Help! Help! Aagh!’
The man swung his boot into Patrick’s face, cutting off his cries.
‘I said, shut the fuck up. No one will help you.’
He jumped back down and slammed the door shut. Patrick reeled backwards, blinking away stars and spitting blood.
The man walking his dog would have seen and heard nothing.
Tuesday Afternoon
Moyenda Mkumba swung off the bicycle as he reached Masala Primary School in Bangwe, on the outskirts of Blantyre. The school was like a thousand others in Malawi—orange-brown mud bricks and a dusty yard, with few trees to offer respite from the blazing sun in the hot season; too many kids and not enough teachers. He didn’t need the shade today. He liked late April. In a few months, the heat would be building and by October
they would be desperate for the rains to come and quench the land, but right now, it was warm enough and dry enough. He smiled. Goldilocks weather.
He propped the bike against the wall, unstrapped his satchel, and ducked out of the sun to read his notes ready for his weekly meeting with the headmistress. Through the open door, the sounds of lessons vied with one another and Chichewa mingled with English. He glanced up and smiled at Chotsani Banda who ushered him into her office.
‘Moyenda! Come in. Come in.’
‘Chotsani. It is good to see you. You look very well.’
Chotsani waved at the wicker chair opposite her desk, her smile wide. Moyenda grinned broadly and sat, resting his empty satchel against her wooden desk. A light breeze filtered through the window behind her. As ever, her desk was neat and ordered with a single pile of files right in the centre. Old wooden filing cabinets stood like sentries along the wall, their brass bindings glowing in the light.
‘How are the boys doing?’ Moyenda shuffled through his sheaf of papers. ‘Is Justin still preferring to hang out at the airport looking for rich tourists to carry their bags, rather than come to school?’
Chotsani laughed, her long earrings jangling as she did so. ‘Yes, although I have explained to him that he will get more money if he can speak English to them and that he should think about the long-term. He could learn how to drive and get work bringing them into Blantyre as well as carrying their bags. He will be all right. He is a clever boy, but maybe he was on the streets for too long. He does not seem to like being enclosed by walls. Or rules.’
Moyenda nodded, smiling wryly, and jotted some notes on his papers.
‘And Henry? Have you seen him recently?’
Chotsani shook her head, her face suddenly serious. She folded her hands carefully. ‘Not for weeks. Nor Tendai. And they were so good—they were always here and doing well in class. They seemed so happy to come to school. I don’t understand. Have they gone back to their families?’