Dispossession (50 page)

“Not me,” I said. “Remember?”

“Don’t be stupid, I haven’t got time. Get some shoes on, and
a jacket. I’m leaving in two minutes.”

“You’re leaving alone, Hazel.” Marty or no Marty — and
no Marty
, that was the thing,
never any more Marty
— I wasn’t putting myself
back in the cage again. Escaping once was major, twice would be impossible.

“No,” she said. “Hurry up. Or do I have to do it for you?”

She would, she’d do that; I knew, from past experience. A
few years back now, when I was seventeen and only starting to rebel; she’d
crammed my feet into Docs and my arms into sleeves and dragged me out by main
force, and she’d do just the same again if she chose to. And I might be older
now, I might have a body significantly larger than hers, but I still wouldn’t
use it against her. Couldn’t possibly.

So I stared at her, starting to sulk, feeling my grip
sliding to nothing; and said, “I don’t have a helmet.”

“It’s my bike,” she snorted. “We won’t be pulled over.”

“Not the point. People have accidents, on bikes. That’s what
the law’s for. I won’t ride a bike without a helmet, I’ve got too much respect
for my head.”

So she picked her helmet off the table and chucked it over,
and I didn’t have an excuse any more; and I went to the family meeting because
that was what Hazel wanted me to do, and it had been inevitable ever since the
decision was made in her hard and efficient head, same size as mine but so much
stronger.

o0o

We passed a patrol car on the way, not even on the dual
carriageway yet and Hazel was doing upwards of a hundred with no helmet on; and
the car just went on quietly trawling the kerb, the one glance to spot who we
were and they didn’t so much as look our way again, the brief time they could
see us.

No sensible policeman was going to stop a Macallan in a
hurry. One of the laws of nature, that; along with
I always do what Hazel wants.
Or you could
substitute any other member of my family, more or less, in either position
there. Most people did what Hazel wanted, relatives no exception; and me, I
could never come face to face with any of them without kowtowing in the end.
Among other notable absences in my make-up, I seemed to be missing a spine. Even
my escape, my renunciation was only on sufferance; they let me go because they
had no need of me. If that should change, they’d whistle me back soon enough.

As now. I couldn’t believe that they needed me, I thought
that they were whistling only as a matter of form:
this is a family crisis, the whole family should be here
and that includes Benedict; Hazel, will you fetch him, please?
And of
course she’d be only too pleased to renew her influence over her renegade, her
spineless twin.

Influence? Dominion, more like. And she’d always enjoyed
that, Hazel. She might have left me alone, but she had never let go of the
leash.

o0o

And so we came to my uncle’s house that fine and sunny
Friday, and my head was snug in my sister’s helmet and hammering louder than
the engine of my sister’s BMW as she raced it down the valley, down and down,
all downhill from here. And I sat with my arms around her, but it was she who
held me, as she always had; and I watched the swift road unwind in a hurry
beneath my booted feet, and I thought it was dappled with death.

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