Life Ruins

by Danuta Kot

  She shivered as the wind, icy cold from the sea, blew through her jacket. The gate behind her creaked as the wind caught it. Somewhere she could hear the monotonous sound of a door banging.

  It was a horrible place to live.

  And a horrible place to die.

  Chapter 23

  The first thing Jared did when Becca helped him out of the car was to haul himself into the caravan to find the painkillers. He gave himself a double dose – he’d taken so many in the past few days the standard dose wasn’t working anymore – and reached for the whisky. But he’d promised to drive her back. His hand hovered, then he picked up a half-finished can of Coke. It was warm and flat, but it was enough to wash the pills down.

  ‘You OK?’ She was standing in the doorway, clearly unnerved by the smallness of the caravan. He went back outside. ‘Give me a few minutes and I’ll make you a drink or something.’

  The sky had cleared. He could see dots of birds high up in the immense deep blue. He couldn’t imagine a life that kept you confined inside, working in an office in the middle of a city, breathing aircon with people all around you that you couldn’t escape. If his fall had left him in a wheelchair, he might just have topped himself.

  He eased himself onto the crate and watched Becca as she inspected her surroundings. She reminded him of a cat put down in a strange place: edgy, suspicious and alert. ‘Tell me what happened last night,’ she said.

  The pills were starting to kick in. Jared could feel the familiar sensation of distance, of watching himself doing whatever it was he was doing with a mild detachment settling across his mind. Becca was looking at him expectantly.

  ‘There isn’t much to tell. I went to the pub and drank a bit too much. Didn’t mean to, but these days it doesn’t take a lot . . . Anyway, when I got back, I could barely stand up. There was some kind of party going on over on the other side.’ He gestured to the other side of the caravan site. Seeing it through her eyes was almost like seeing it for the first time. The site lay in a slight dip in the land, which meant you had to walk to the cliff if you wanted to look at the sea. One or two caravans were up there in the dead gorse and bracken. They were closed up, windows covered by blinds, sunk down into the ground as though they would never move again. Instead of the sea, the air smelt of rotting vegetation and backed-up drains.

  This was no place for summer visitors – so what the fuck was it for?

  Becca was looking at him, puzzled. ‘What?’ she said.

  He brought himself back to the present. ‘She came from over there. I think.’ He pointed towards the cliff edge. ‘It was dark. She was running. I couldn’t find my key – she was asking me for help, and I couldn’t find my fucking key. There was a car – she heard it, and she started running. I got the door open, but she’d gone. She was here.’ He stood up and went to the side of the caravan. ‘Just here. The car lights – they shone the lights right at her, and she ran that way.’ He pointed back along the path, the way she’d come. He was getting a clearer picture himself now. Why hadn’t she run for the gate? It was visible down the path straight ahead. But the car lights must have blinded her.

  ‘So – did you go after her?’

  Jared nodded. ‘Yeah. I went after her. I called the police and I went after her. I found her,’ he said, ‘in the end. Outside the gate. They’d already . . .’ He didn’t want to tell Becca what they’d done. She didn’t need that in her head. Nobody did. ‘ . . . done what they were going to do. I waited with her for the ambulance.’

  ‘Did she say anything?’

  Jared shook his head. She probably wouldn’t have been able to speak – he hoped she hadn’t been conscious enough to speak, but he could still hear the gurgling breath and the soft, almost silent moans.

  ‘What?’ Becca was watching closely.

  ‘Nothing. Look, I need to move around or I’ll stiffen up.’ He didn’t want to talk about it. He didn’t want to think about it. Buried under the barrier of the drugs was anger – anger at the people who’d done it, anger at himself.

  ‘Did they tell you how she was?’

  He shook his head. ‘I didn’t ask.’

  ‘Don’t you care?’ Now Becca sounded accusing.

  ‘Yes. I care. OK?’

  ‘Yeah, right.’ She shrugged.

  Fuck’s sake. ‘I saw her. I already know how she is. I can’t think about it now – the drugs are doing their stuff so I’m not feeling much pain. I’m not feeling much of anything to tell you the truth. If it makes you any happier, you’re right. I let her down.’

  She seemed about to continue her attack, but her shoulders slumped. ‘Me too. I let her get in that car.’

  ‘You don’t know it’s the same girl.’

  ‘Who else is it going to be? Did she have long hair?’

  There was just the face, coming out of the darkness. ‘I don’t know.’

  He was moving better now. The pain was receding, and this slow walk was stretching his cramped muscles. He was aware of Becca watching him. ‘Don’t you get – you know – hooked on that stuff?’

  ‘No. I take it when I need it. When I don’t, I’ll stop.’ Whenever that would be. The pills took the edge off – not just the pain, but everything else, and right now, there was more edge than he wanted to cope with.

  He and Becca had reached the far side of the site, where there was just a fence looking out over flat, dead fields. A police car was pulled up at the end of the path. Jared turned away. He didn’t want to get mixed up in this any more than he already was.

  ‘Do you think they’ll find anything?’

  ‘No idea. Leave it up to them. The rain’s getting heavy. Come on, I’ll make you that cup of tea and then I’ll be OK to drive you back.’

  He led the way back to the caravan. When they got there, the owner, Greaseball Harry, was standing by Jared’s car, watching them. As Jared and Becca reached the door of the caravan, he pointed a finger at Jared’s chest. ‘You. I told you. I want you off here. Today.’

  Jared unlocked the door. ‘And I told you. I’m leaving as soon as I can.’

  ‘Yeah. Today.’

  Jared could feel Becca winding up beside him. ‘Fine by me. You can explain to the police why you’ve thrown their witness out.’

  He pulled the door open and jerked his head at Becca, indicating she should go in. To his relief, she did. ‘Tomorrow,’ he said, holding the other man’s gaze.

  The owner looked away first. ‘That’s what you said yesterday. Tomorrow. I’m here to make sure, right?’ He got into his car. ‘I’ll be back to check,’ he threw out of the window. Jared heard the car pull away as he shut the door, wondering why he’d got into that fight. He was going, as soon as he could. Would getting thumped by GBH make him feel better or something?

  The caravan was so small he and Becca had to shuffle around each other to avoid physical contact. He edged his way carefully past her and pointed at the bed, which, thank Christ, was moderately respectable. ‘Best sit on there.’

  She ignored him and stayed where she was, in the space in front of the kitchen area. ‘It’s too small,’ she said. ‘And it smells funny.’ She was right. It was a mixture of condensation, mildew and the decaying fabric of the caravan. He pushed the door open despite the cold and the air began to clear.

  Becca looked round, then sat on the bed, very stiff and upright while he waited for the kettle to boil. ‘What’s these?’ she said after a minute. She’d found the pictures of the tunnels he’d printed off before he came up here.

  He hesitated, then said, ‘Old railway tunnels. Up beyond Whitby. I found those online and they looked, you know, interesting.’

  ‘Oh.’ She frowned. ‘What are they for?’

  ‘They aren’t for anything now. They’re blocked off.’

  ‘And you go in there?’

  He hadn’t told her that’s what he did, but . . . ‘Yeah. Places like that.’

  ‘And that’s why you fell?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He sniffed the
milk. It seemed OK. More or less. ‘Milk?’

  She’d been watching him with the carton, and made a face. ‘No thanks. Just sugar.’ He gave her the least cracked mug and she wrapped her hands round it, then pulled her legs up and positioned herself in the centre of the bed, leaving Jared wedged up against the hob. She looked at him with puzzled interest. ‘You fell in a tunnel?’

  ‘No. We were having a look round an old blast furnace. They have these ladders up the side. One of them broke, and . . .’ He shrugged. The outcome was obvious.

  She was looking at the photo of the low tunnel in the wall, the one where he’d nearly killed himself. ‘Looks . . . scary.’

  He grinned. ‘That’s why I do it. It’s fun.’

  And that was a lie. It wasn’t fun. It was terrifying. The more frightened he was, the more compelling it was and the greater the high of the adrenaline rush.

  All the time she’d been here, he’d been testing himself, and now he was sure – well, pretty sure – he’d be OK to head north today. What was the point in hanging round, just to annoy Greaseball Harry? He emptied his cup. ‘OK, I think I can manage the car now. Shall I take you back? Becca, thanks for your help. I’d have been stuck without it.’

  She flushed slightly. It was as if she wasn’t used to being thanked. ‘That’s OK. Sorry I scraped your car.’

  ‘I don’t think anyone’s going to notice. I don’t want to rush you, but I need to get going. I’m not spending the day here with that cunt – sorry – that . . . shit breathing down my neck. And the police. I need to find somewhere to stay. I’m going up the coast. I’ll drop you off in Brid.’

  ‘So where are you going?’

  ‘Whitby. North of Whitby.’

  ‘What about here?’

  ‘What about here?’

  ‘You saw something. You can help.’

  ‘Becca, I’ve told the police what I know. I’ll tell them where I’m going. What else can I do?’

  ‘They don’t care – the police. They never do anything. Don’t you read the papers?’

  ‘What can I do if I stay?’

  ‘Nothing. Same as you did last night. It’s OK. You don’t have to give me a lift back. I don’t need one. I can get back myself.’ She jumped to her feet. He stood back as she pushed past him to the caravan door, stumbling as the gap between the door and the ground took her by surprise.

  Jared watched her as she stalked off down the path and out of the caravan site. What the fuck just happened? And how was she going to get back? There was a bus stop some way down the road, but he had no idea if she knew where it was, and no idea if there was a bus due for hours – or even if there was a bus at all.

  And it was starting to rain again.

  The trouble was, there was enough truth in what she had said to sting. OK, he’d gone in and made a statement, but he had thought seriously about running away – and leaving now still felt a little bit like that. He swore under his breath and went to get his car.

  Chapter 24

  Becca had made it a fair way along the road in the direction of Bridlington by the time Jared pulled up beside her. ‘Get in,’ he said.

  She looked at him and turned away.

  ‘Stop being such a fucking princess. You heard what the guy said. I can’t stay here. Look. Get in. Tell me what you think I can do.’

  She hesitated, then climbed into the passenger seat, dripping water all over the inside of his car, which, fair enough, was a bit beyond damage, and sat with a kind of slumped defiance. He pulled away and they drove in silence until he said, ‘OK. I’m listening.’

  She kept her face turned away from him. ‘I should have stopped her and I didn’t. You should have helped her and you didn’t. Everyone says they’re doing something, but no one is. They don’t even say that it’s Paige, but it has to be.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I feel pretty bad myself.’

  ‘It’s easy to be sorry about something.’

  Her words stung. How did you get it so wrong?

  His father’s face as he looked at the son who hadn’t had the guts to go back.

  Becca remained silent. He realised he was going to tell her. Why? She was touchy and unpredictable and would probably insist he left her by the side of the road so she could walk back – but he thought she would listen before she did that. ‘I do that. I let people down . . .’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘What I said. The stuff I do, you have to depend on your mates.’

  ‘Like going into tunnels?’

  ‘Not so much. I do that on my own.’ And then I only kill myself. ‘Some things, like climbing or . . . or potholing. You go in pairs, or a group, and you look after each other . . . only I didn’t.’

  He’d been twenty. He was starting his final year at uni in Sheffield. He went there for the climbing and the caving. Sheffield was a climbers’ city.

  ‘You can do climbing at uni?’

  It sounded like a genuine question, so he treated it as such. ‘No. Not as a subject. I was reading geology. But I chose Sheffield because it’s close to the Peak District and there’s some of the best rock climbing and caving in the country there. That’s where my dad taught me to climb. When I was a kid.’

  And Charlie.

  The rat hadn’t been an issue then. His father had taught him to enjoy a challenge, the adrenaline high of attempting a climb that was at the edge of his ability. You want to give it a try? Good lad! That’s what his father said, each time he aimed for a route that was tougher than the one before. But the explorations where one wrong step could kill him? They’d never done that.

  ‘Yeah?’ Becca was fiddling with her phone, but she seemed to be listening. He wasn’t going to tell her the whole story, but as he picked out the bare bones, it ran through his head like a familiar movie, one that might, just might, change its ending if he watched it often enough.

  ‘There used to be mining across the whole area and there’s deep shafts and tunnels – there’s a whole world under there that’s still not mapped, not fully.’

  He and Charlie had set out that morning to explore a mine shaft near Sparrowpit. It was a fine day – he still couldn’t look up at a clear blue sky without a sense of foreboding. They were doing it by the book; they’d got the landowner’s permission and they had the best equipment they could afford. What they didn’t have was a phone that would work underground, but they could communicate with each other well enough by shouting. They had no communication with the surface, but why would they need it?

  It probably wouldn’t have made any difference.

  The shaft was capped by a metal grill, with a trapdoor to allow access. The shaft itself fell away below them, vanishing into the deep ground. They fixed the ropes, and Jared led the way out of the daylight and into the darkness, lit by their head torches and the diminishing daylight above them. Loose crystals fell from the walls, hitting the water far below them with a boom that echoed up the shaft.

  Jared called up to Charlie. ‘It’s flooded.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Charlie sounded excited. This was only his second experience of caving – rock climbing was his thing. ‘But there’s a way off the shaft before you get to the bottom.’

  The slit was in the shaft wall, vertical and narrow. They’d read up on the caves and they knew it led to a chamber, followed by a series of pitches and squeezes that would lead, eventually, to the main cave system and the way out. It would be good practice for Charlie before they tried something more challenging. Jared found the slit and waited for Charlie to reach him.

  He didn’t mind squeezes. The trick was to relax, breathe steadily, let your body flow. Charlie held the equipment while Jared went through, then Charlie passed it to Jared and followed.

  The chamber barely deserved the name. There was no floor, just an edge to skirt round and a low opening that was the continuation of the route. Another pitch, steep, about ten metres, and then another squeeze.

  But Charlie wasn’t liking the squeezes. It was OK at first, b
ut then they came to one that was like a zigzag, a claustrophobe’s nightmare where the passage enclosed the body, the rock grazed your face and it was like being buried alive. Like water, Jared could remember the mantra that ran through his head. Flow like water.

  He went through legs first, and it was a struggle to get his chest through, but he made it. Charlie, slighter, should have found it easier, but he stuck, struggled, started to panic and Jared had to shout to calm him down and get through.

  That was when it all went wrong. The book said they were through the worst of the squeezes, but they still had maybe a couple of hours of rough going to reach the main system and out. After Charlie’s panic, Jared suggested they give up: ‘Look, mate, this is more than we bargained for. We can go back through, get back up the shaft, no problem.’

  But Charlie wouldn’t return through the zigzag squeeze, so they went on. The going was tough, there were a couple of narrow bits – nothing too bad, but Charlie tensed up before each one. The air felt heavy, and beyond the limits of their torches, darkness concealed emptiness and the unknown. All sense of adventure and excitement was gone. All they wanted to do was get out. This was far tougher than the book had said.

  It was Jared’s job to get them through safely. He was acutely aware of the sound of water as he moved on, keeping his hand on the wall, checking all the time for the opening that would lead to the last passage. These caves and tunnels were notoriously wet, full of underground streams. In some places, the only way through was with diving equipment.

  He tried to reassure himself as the dripping became a trickle and the trickle grew stronger and steadier. The water was up to their ankles now and it was still running into the passage. The book hadn’t said these passages could flood. He checked the walls for a highwater mark.