Taken Away (7 page)

Dom surfaced, so close that his wake submerged me for a minute. His face was raw and streaming. ‘Can't . . . ' There was no breath in him to finish. The next swell pushed him against me and we both nearly went down, gripping each other in a panicky realisation of the danger we were in.

We were up to our necks. Each swell hid the beach from view and filled our mouths with water. And we weren't just battling the cold anymore; our clothes were so heavy! The water sucked and tugged at our leaden jumpers and trousers, using them to drag us under and out.

I tried to say, ‘We need to get back.' But my chattering teeth and repeated mouthfuls of water garbled my words. Dom understood me. He nodded and we began to drag each other to shore.

A choking gasp made us turn back. It was the old man. He'd broken the surface just a few feet from where we stood. For a moment he just lay there looking at the sky; then he began to slip quietly under again. Without a thought, I grabbed the scruff of his neck. Dom took hold of his shoulder and we laboured to shore, the old man an unresisting weight that we towed behind us.

We staggered out of the waves like a drunken resurrection, making our way up the beach with the old man slung between us. He could hardly support himself, but with our help he managed to totter along. Dom and I were shivering uncontrollably, our clothes a tremendous, chafing weight. I'd heard people say they thought they'd
die
of cold, but until that day I'd had no concept of how that might feel. It took all my concentration to just put one foot in front of the other, and when we got to the path and the wind hit us full blast I nearly stopped dead at the icy shock of it.

Dom began shouting, his voice broken and wavering. I was barely capable of taking one step, then another, but Dom was still using his noodle, trying to get the old man talking.

‘Wh . . . where do you luh . . . live, mister?'

The old man didn't even lift his head. Dom's teeth began clicking like epileptic castanets. He was shaking so badly that his head wobbled, but he kept pucking the old man, yelling at him to tell us where he lived. There was no response. The old man didn't even open his eyes. But he did keep dragging one foot in front of the other, so we just kept going with him.

When we staggered and stumbled our way to the little shop on the harbour, the young wan behind the counter shrieked and ran into the back room. Her mother came tumbling out, her hands to her face. ‘James!' she cried. ‘Oh, James, you old fool! What happened to you?' She rushed around the counter and claimed the auld fella. He stumbled into her care, his blue eyes blinking without comprehension into her face. ‘Oh, you silly old
sod
,' she said.

We stood in a miserable shivering huddle in the middle of her tiny shop, water literally pouring off of us. She looked at us over the old man's shoulder. ‘What happened?'

We glanced at each other and came to a mutual decision.

‘He fell in the sea,' I said.

‘And youse rescued him? You little angels, youse! God bless youse, lads! God bless your hearts.'

‘Wuh wuh . . . we wanted to buh . . . bring him home to his fam fam family . . . '

‘James doesn't have a fambly!' cried the girl.

I don't think Dom even heard her. He was shuddering in great jerking spasms now, his arms wrapped around himself. I began to feel sick, I was so cold. My head felt like someone had driven a metal spike from temple to temple. I started to sway on my feet.

The shop woman looked alarmed. ‘Don't be worrying about James now, lads. Sure, doesn't he just live three cottages down? Sarah and I'll get him all fixed up. Have youse far to go? Will I phone someone for youse?'

‘Wuh wuh . . . we're uh up by the huh huh huh . . . ' I tried.

‘Hurdy . . . guh guh . . . gurdies,' finished Dom. ‘Nuh . . . no phone.'

‘Well, run, boys! Run.'

And we did, turning stiffly and shambling out the door on numb legs. She shouted after us as we did our best to sprint up the harbour. ‘Run, boys, or youse'll catch your deaths! Run and don't stop 'til youse get home!'

‘WATERLOO'

OUR WATERLOGGED ENTRANCE
into the kitchen froze Ma and Dad into slack-jawed shock. We took full advantage of their momentary paralysis to stutter out the phrase that undoubtedly saved our skins.

‘O-old man f-fell in sea . . . we p-p-pulled him out.'

Ma blinked, twice. Then she gripped Dad's arm.

‘Get them out of those wet clothes,' she said, and bolted up the stairs.

Dee peered through the sitting-room doorway, her mouth and eyes delighted little ‘O's of wonder. Dad dithered from foot to foot while we just stood there, flooding the floor and shuddering helplessly.

Finally Dee pointed and said, ‘Bom 'n' Pap all wet, Daddy.'

That woke him. ‘Yes. Yes. Shite.' He was over with us then, stripping us of our wet clothes, flinging them into a dribbling heap by the door.

Ma clattered down the stairs, arms full of towels. Dad pulled off our socks. We were too cold to do anything but lift our legs for him one at a time as he peeled the wet wool from our icy feet. The towels were huge, and warm and fluffy. They smelled of plastic shop-wrappers. One of them still had a tag on it. Ma ripped it off with a grimace.

As they towelled us down, Ma and Dad pushed us into the sitting room and up to the fire. All this time, Dad was giving us the third degree on what had happened.

Ma kept muttering, ‘That poor old man. That poor old man. Was he a bit touched, love? Was he wandering? Is that why he fell in the sea?'

‘Dunno, Ma.' Dom's head was wagging to and fro as she chafed him dry. He was staring blankly into the fire. I knew how he felt. It was all I could manage to stay on my feet and let Dad dry my hair. I think we'd used the last of our energy just getting home.

Ma was really fretting over the old man. ‘Oh, I hope he's alright. What did that woman
say
, Dom? Did she know him? Was she kind? Lift your foot, love, let me get these dry socks on you.'

Dad handed me my pyjamas. It was only half-two in the afternoon, but I didn't object. There was nothing I wanted more than to slip into warm flannel and curl up by the fire.

‘Poor, poor old man,' said Ma. ‘Poor old man. Do you think he's alright, Pat?'

‘I think he had a bit of drink on him, Ma. I think that's why he slipped.' My words were thick and slow. My eyes kept shutting themselves. I leant on the mantelpiece, soaking up the heat. Dom was somewhere to my left, on the sofa. Dee told him to: ‘Open up your eyeblibs, Bom!'

Dad spoke softly to Ma. They were standing by the door, I think. ‘I'm going to check on the old man, Olive.'

‘Thanks, love!'

I think the boys should go to bed for a while.' ‘

‘I'll give them an extra blanket. Mind Dee for a minute while I get them upstairs, will you?'

I felt Ma take my hand, and she led us up the stairs like sleepwalkers. It was horribly cold once we stepped away from the fire, and I started to shiver immediately. But my bed was warm, because Ma had put hot-water bottles in it. She tucked an extra blanket around me as soon as I lay down. I heard her do the same for Dom, the bunks creaking as she stood on my bed to reach his. I felt the brief caress of her hand in my hair before she left.

‘I'll wake you for the Eurovision.'

The door whispered shut, and Ma crept away down the stairs.

I DON'T THINK I SLEPT
; I never quite lost the sense that I was right there, in my bed. But the world seemed to drift away for a while, leaving just the sound of my breathing and Dom's breathing and the lovely heat of the hot-water bottle at my feet.

After a while, I rose to the surface just enough to know that I needed to move. I rolled onto my back, instantly comfortable again, eyes closing. The blustery wind of earlier had escalated and there was a proper storm blowing outside. Something rattled its way from one end of the garden to the other, and the windows knocked rhythmically in their frames. The TV aerial on the roof creaked and groaned, and to my drowsing mind it felt like I was deep in the belly of some wooden ship. I listened contentedly, smiling. I was just beginning to wonder why things were so quiet in the kitchen when a voice in the bunk above mine whispered, ‘The bad man is here.'

I opened my eyes and stayed very still.

That wasn't Dom. That wasn't his voice!

The wind groaned through the eaves, a low monotone. A spattering of rain peppered the window. It was so quiet downstairs. No TV. No radio. I couldn't hear Ma and Dad. I couldn't hear Dee. It was just me, floating alone inside the noise of the storm – and someone who wasn't Dom, whispering.

‘If we're not careful, the bad man will find us. He'll take you away and we—' The urgent flow of words halted, as though the speaker was listening for something. The gale rushed past the windows in a sudden irritated
shhh
.

I tried to make no noise.

I tried not to breathe.

If I turned my head, I would be able to see the dressing-table mirror. I would be able to look. There was no night-time gloom now – the top bunk would be lit up, clear as the rainy grey twilight that filled the room. All I had to do was look.

But I didn't turn my head. I just couldn't.

And then it came again. That whisper: a sharp, fearful hiss. ‘Do you hear him?'

The bunk above me creaked: the distinctive sound of Dom sitting up.

My eyes got so big it felt as though they might roll out of their sockets. My hands cramped into fists in the blankets. I was staring, staring, staring at the bunk above me. Waiting.

Then I heard my brother's voice: quiet, inquisitive, uncertain.

‘I don't hear anything,' he said.

Dom! Oh God! Dom! Who are you talking to?

I opened my mouth to say something when that stranger's whisper came again. ‘But he's
here
. He's here all the time. He wants us. He'll hurt us! We must be careful.'

Dom answered, his voice low now, nothing but a whisper: ‘Is he here now?'

‘Oh yes. I think so.'

Right above my head, Dom shifted. I could imagine him drawing his knees up and hugging them to his chest: the classic pose for Dom when he was frightened. ‘You're scaring me,' he said softly.

‘Don't be frightened. I'll take a look, shall I?'

More creaking. But not above my head! No. Not where Dom was sitting. This creaking was at the
foot
of Dom's bed. Something was sitting at the end of Dom's bed!

I shifted my terrified gaze in that direction. I could hear something up there, crawling towards the ladder. Something was going to look over the edge. It was going to look over the edge of Dom's bunk.

My fear was panting its way up my chest, into my throat – was building itself up into a scream.

I was going to scream. I was going to scream
right now
.

A small, pale hand grabbed the edge of Dom's bunk. Little fingers curled around the mattress. I could see the indents in the fabric where they gripped tight. There was a pause, as though it was frightened to look, and then a small, pale, dark-eyed face cleared the edge.

It was a boy. Maybe ten years old. White face. Dark,
dark
eyes, underscored with deep lines, surrounded with purple shadows. His cheeks were hollow and filled with shadows. He scanned the gloom of my bunk with fear, his white lips compressed. It took a moment for him to register my presence. Then his eyes jumped to mine. I flinched, terrified by the certainty that we'd done this before: me looking up at him; him looking down on me – a solemn-eyed boy of ten, untouched by the wind and rain.

The child quickly recovered from the shock of seeing me. Then his sunken, sick-looking face hardened into loathing and, without taking his eyes from mine, he hissed to the person up above me – to Dom: ‘He's here.'

The bunk squeaked overhead as Dom shifted suddenly, and I heard my brother gasp in fear. The little white child reached his whole arm over the edge and gripped the middle rung of the ladder as though he meant to crawl down, headfirst. He glared at me and bared his little teeth, and they were black against the snowy white of his lips.

That scream bubbled up inside me and I opened my mouth to let it out.