Tunnels (42 page)

"I think we've seen the last of them,"
Cal
said with a laugh.

"Yes," Will agreed faintly as he slowly got to his feet. Wave upon wave of the fever ebbed through him, and he felt as if he was going to pass out again. He could quite happily have lain back down, opened his coat to the cold, and gone to sleep right there and then on the icy sidewalk. The only way Will could get down the remaining stretch of the slope was with
Cal
supporting him, but they eventually made it to the bottom and into the subway station.

"So even
Topsoilers
like to go underground," he said, looking at the dirty old station, long overdue for renovation. His manner was instantly transformed; he seemed genuinely at ease for the first time since they had emerged onto the banks of the Thames — relieved that there was a tunnel around him rather than open sky.

"Not really," Will said listlessly as he started to feed change into the ticket machine while Bartleby slavered over a
lichenlike
patch of freshly deposited chewing gum on the tiled floor. Will's shaking fingers fumbled with the coins, then he stopped and leaned against the machine. "It's no use," he gasped.
Cal
took the change from him and, as Will told him what to do, he finished paying for the tickets.

Down on the platform, it wasn't long before a train arrived. Once aboard, neither boy spoke. As the southbound train gained speed,
Cal
watched the cables rippling along the tunnel sides and played with his ticket. Licking his paws, Bartleby was propped on his haunches in the seat next to
Cal
. There weren't many people in the car, but
Cal
was aware that they were attracting some pretty curious glances.

Opposite Cal and Bartleby, Will was sitting slumped against the side of the car, soothed by the chill glass on his temple as his head lolled against the window. Between stops, he drifted in and out of a fitful sleep, and during a period of wakefulness saw that a pair of old women had taken the seats across the aisle from them. Snatches of their conversation drifted into his consciousness and mixed with the platform announcements like voices in a confused dream.

"Just look at him… disgraceful… feet all over the seats… MIND THE GAP… funny-looking child… LONDON UNDERGROUND APOLOGIZES…"

Will forced his eyes open and looked at the two women. He realized immediately that it was Bartleby who was the cause of their apparent distress. The one who was doing all the talking had purple-rinsed hair and wore translucent white-framed bifocals that rested crookedly on her poppy red nose.

"
Shhh
!
They'll hear you," her companion whispered, eyeing
Cal
. She either had badly dyed hair or was wearing a wig that had seen better days. They both held identical shopping bags on their laps, as if they were some form of defense against the miscreants sitting opposite them.

"Nonsense! Bet they don't speak a word of English. Probably got here on the back of a truck. I mean, look at the state of their clothes. And that one — he don't look too bright to me. He's probably on drugs or something." Will felt their rheumy eyes linger on him.

"Send them all back, I say."

"Yes, yes," the old ladies said in unison, and with a mutual nod of agreement fell to discussing, in morbid detail, the ill health of a friend.
Cal
glowered furiously at them while they gabbled away, now apparently too preoccupied to pay further attention to anyone else. The train came to a stop, and as the old ladies were getting up from their seats
Cal
lifted the ear flap of Bartleby's Tibetan hat and whispered something into his ear. Bartleby suddenly reared up and hissed in their faces so forcefully that Will was shocked from is feverish stupor.

"Well, I never!" the red-nosed woman cried out, dropping her shopping bag. While she retrieved it, her companion bustled and pushed her from behind, trying to hurry her up.

In a flap, both women
stuggled
off the train, shrieking.

"Horrid urchins!" the red-nosed lady huffed from the platform. "You blasted animals!" she screamed through the doors as they slid shut.

The train moved out, and Bartleby kept his eyes fixed demonically on the flustered twosome as they stood on the platform, still puffing with indignation.

His curiosity getting the better of him, Will leaned over to his brother.

"Tell me… what did you say to Bartleby?" he asked.

"Oh, nothing much,"
Cal
replied innocently, smiling proudly at his cat before he turned to look out the window again.

* * * * *

Will was dreading the last half-mile to the housing projects. He staggered along like a sleepwalker, resting whenever it became too much for him.

When they finally reached the apartment building, the elevator was out of order. Will peered into the
grafitti
-strafed grayness with quiet desperation. That was the last straw. He sighed and, steeling himself for the climb, stumbled toward the squalid stairwell. After a stop on each landing to allow him to catch his breath, they eventually reached the right floor and made their way through the obstacle course of discarded garbage bags.

There was no response when
Cal
rang the bell, so he had resorted to hammering on the door with his fist when Auntie Jean suddenly opened it. She clearly hadn't been up for long — she looked as tired and crumpled as the moth-eaten overcoat she'd evidently been asleep in.

"What is it?" she said indistinctly, rubbing the nape of her neck and yawning. "I didn't order nothing, and I don't buy nothing from salesmen."

"Auntie Jean, it's me… Will," he said; the blood drained from his head and the image of his aunt blanched, as if all the colors had been washed out of it.

"Will," she said vaguely, and cut another yawn short as it sank in. "Will!" She lifted her head and eyed him disbelievingly. "Thought you'd gone missing." She peered at Cal and Bartleby, adding, "Who's this?"

"Uh… cousin…," Will gasped as the floor began to tip and sway, and he was forced to take a step forward to steady himself against the doorjamb. He was aware of the cold sweat trickling from his scalp. "…south… from down south."

"Cousin? Didn't know you—"

"Dad's," Will said huskily.

She surveyed Cal and Bartleby with suspicion and not a little distaste. "Your '
orrid
sister was 'ere, you know." She glanced past Will. "Is she
wiv
you?"

"She…," Will began to say in a shaky voice.

"
Cos
the little brat owes me money. Should've seen what she did to my—"

"She's
not
my sister, she's a vile… scheming… evil… she's a…" With that, Will keeled over in a dead faint before a very surprised Auntie Jean.

* * * * *

Cal
stood at the window of the darkened room. He peered down at the streets below, with their dotted lines of amber lampposts and sweeping cones of car headlights. Then, with foreboding, he slowly raised his head and looked up at the moon, its shining silver spread out against the icy sky. Not for the first time he struggled to grasp, to comprehend, the vast space that yawned before him, the likes of which he'd never before seen in his life. He gripped the windowsill, barely able to control the mounting sense of dread. The soles of his feet clenched involuntarily and almost ached with vertigo.

On hearing his brother moan,
Cal
tore his eyes from the window and went to sit by the shivering form that was stretched out on the bed with just a sheet over it.

"How's 'e doing, then?"
Cal
heard Auntie Jean's anxious voice as she appeared in the doorway.

"He's a little better today. I think he's cooling down a bit," Cal said as he doused a washcloth in a bowl of water clunking with ice cubes and dabbed it to Will's forehead.

"Do you want to get someone in to see '
im
?" Auntie Jean asked. "'E's been like this for a long time."

"No,"
Cal
said firmly. "He said he didn't want that."

"Don't blame '
im
, don't blame '
im
at all. I've never 'ad no time for quacks — or them shrinks, neither, for that matter. Once your in their clutches, there's no telling what—" She stopped short as Bartleby, who had been curled up asleep in the corner, woke with a protracted yawn, then ambled over and started to lap at the water in the bowl.

"Stop that, you stupid cat!"
Cal
said, pushing him away.

"'E's just thirsty," Auntie Jean said, then assumed the most preposterous baby voice. "Poor puss, are you a
liccle
firsty
?" She took hold of the astounded animal by the scruff of his neck and began to lead him toward the door. "You come with Mummy for a treat."

* * * * *

A lava flow moves portentously in the distance, its heat so fierce on Will's exposed skin that he can hardly bear it. Silhouetted by the vertical wall of streaming crimson behind him, Dr. Burrows frantically indicates something sprouting out of a massive slab of granite. He shouts excitedly, as he always does when he makes a discovery, but Will isn't able to catch the words due to the deafening white noise
intercut
with the cacophonous babble of many voices, as if someone is randomly scanning the airwaves on a damaged radio.

The scene shifts into close-up. Dr. Burrows is using a magnifying glass to examine a thin stalk with a bulbous tip that rises a foot and a half or so out of the solid rock. Will sees his father's lips moving, but can only understand brief snatches of what he is saying.

"… a plant… literally digests rock… silicon-based… reacts to
stim
— … observe…"

The image cuts to extreme close-up. Between two fingers, Dr. Burrows plucks the gray stalk from the rock. Will feels uneasy as he sees it writhe in his father's hand and shoot out two needlelike leaves that entwine around his fingers.

"…gripping me like iron… feisty little…," Dr. Burrows says, frowning.

There are no more words, they are replaced by laughter, but his father seems to be screaming as he tries to shake the thing off, its leaves piercing his hand and threading straight through the flesh of his
pam
and wrist and carrying on up his forearm, the skin bruising, bruising and bursting open and becoming smeared with blood as they twist, interweaving in a snakelike waltz. They cut tighter and tighter into his forearm, like two possessed wires. Will tries to reach out to his father, to help him as he battles hopelessly against this horrific attack, as he fights his own arm.

"No, no… Dad… Dad!"

* * * * *

"It's all right, Will, it's all right," came his brother's voice from a long way away.

The lava flow was gone. In its place was a shaded lamp, and he could feel the soothing coolness of the washcloth
Cal
was pressing against his forehead. He sat up with a start.

"It's Dad! What happened to Dad?" he cried, and looked around wildly, unsure of where he was.

"You're all right,"
Cal
said. "You were dreaming."

Will slumped back against the pillows, realizing he was lying in bed in a narrow room.

"I saw him. It was all so clear and real," Will said, his voice breaking. He couldn't stem the flood of tears that suddenly filled his eyes. "It was Dad. He was in trouble."

"It was just a nightmare."
Cal
spoke softly, averting his eyes from his brother, who was now sobbing silently.

"We're at Auntie Jean's, aren't we?" Will said, pulling himself together as he saw the floral wallpaper.

"Yes, we've been here for nearly three days."

"Huh?" Will tried to sit up again, but it was too much for him; he rested his head back against the pillow once more. "I feel so weak."

"Don't worry, everything's fine. Your aunt's been great. Taken quite a shine to Bart, too."

* * * * *

Over the ensuing days,
Cal
nursed Will back to health with bowls of soup or baked beans on toast and seemingly endless cups of
oversugared
tea. Auntie Jean's sole contribution to his convalescence was to perch at the foot of his bed and burble on incessantly about the "old days", though Will was so exhausted he fell asleep before she could bore him senseless.

When Will finally felt strong enough to stand, he tested his legs by trying to walk up and down the length of the small bedroom. As he hobbled around with some difficulty, he noticed something lying discarded behind a box of old magazines.

He stooped down and picked up two objects. Shards of broken glass dropped to the floor. He recognized the pair of buckled silver frames right away. They were the ones Rebecca had kept on her bedside table. Looking at the photograph of his parents, and then the one of himself, he slumped back onto the bed, breathing heavily. He was distraught. He felt as though someone had stuck a knife into him and was very slowly twisting it. But what did he expect from her? Rebecca wasn't his sister, and never had been. He remained on the bed for some time, staring blankly at the wall.

A little later he got to his feet again and staggered down the hall into the kitchen. Dirty plates sat in the sink, and the garbage bin was overflowing with empty cans and torn microwave-ready food boxes. It was a scene of such carnage that he barely registered the plastic tops of the faucet, melted and brown, and the flame-blackened tiles behind them. He grimaced and turned back into the hall, where he heard Auntie Jean's gruff voice. Its tones were vaguely comforting, reminding him of the holidays when she would come to visit, chatting to his mother for hours on end.

He stood outside the door and listened as Auntie Jean's knitting needles rattled away furiously while she spoke.