Chapter Seven
The culprits for these cowardly acts are still at large. All Londoners should remain at home and await further instructions. Do not attempt to flee the city. Do not attempt travel of any kind. Further attacks are expected. The prime minister will be giving a live statement on all TV and radio channels at 7:00 p.m.
They lowered the clematis back across the window and ate the food they had brought. The church was still a beautiful place, but the air was marred by the knowledge of what lay beyond. Once they left here, Jack suspected they would be leaving that beauty behind.
The robin returned to watch them eat. Sparky threw a bread crust its way, but it hopped back and ignored the offered food. Jenna crumbled the crust from a jam tart and sprinkled it across the undergrowth. The bird watched her, head jerking this way and that as though expecting ambush at any minute.
Emily crawled forward with the crusts from her own sandwich. She broke them into many pieces, then held out her hand as far as she could stretch.
“Not a chance,” Lucy-Anne said, but she grew still as they watched the little bird. It hopped from the wisteria and came close, eyeing them all suspiciously, but was apparently unconcerned at Emily's presence.
Jack saw that she held the camera in her other hand, the lens trained on her hand offering the crumbs.
The bird hopped closer, hesitated, then jumped into Emily's palm.
Jack heard her intake of breath. He wished he could see her face.
Eventually the bird hopped away, and their small group was taken with a flutter of excitement. They finished their food and passed a water bottle around, all of them aware that every mouthful and swallow brought them closer to leaving this place.
“I never liked London,” Sparky said. “Shit-hole. Bloody place made my brother what he was.” He toyed with a long leafy plant stem, winding it around his finger. “What he is.”
Jack was surprised. Sparky rarely talked about Stephen, and certainly not to an audience. Sometimes, after a few ciders, the two of them would discuss him for a while, but it always ended up with Sparky getting angry, his voice turning hard and exuding violence. Jack had always thought that talking, really talking, was just what he needed.
“How?” Jenna asked, and Jack could have kissed her.
“Went there to join a band,” Sparky said. “Mum and Dad didn't want him to go, said he should stay on in school and go to university. More they said that, the more determined he became.” He laughed. “Band was called Deep Shit. Steve liked that, said that when they made it big he could always answer people asking what he did by saying, ‘I'm in Deep Shit.’ Well, he soon was.” He drifted off, concentrating far too hard on the plant stem. Jack noticed his friend's face flushing.
“What sort of band was it?” Jenna asked.
“Punk. Real punk, not the pop sort that was popular a few years back. Music with bollocks. But the singer, Charlie, was a waster. He wasn't really there for the music, not like Steve. He thought they'd make it big, make loads of money, do what they want. Thing is, he spent it before they made it. Booze and drugs, and girls attracted by the glamour of it all.” Sparky shook his head, as though amazed for the first time at what had happened to his brother.
“It's strange what some people see as glamorous,” Rosemary said. Sparky glanced up, and for a moment Jack thought he was going to shout her down. But then he nodded.
“Yeah. Steve never did, not really. But being aware of how crap all that stuff was…it didn't help him. Mum and Dad blame him completely, but I blame them. Never let him do anything he wanted. Kept him at home, trying to protect him they said, because they had this thing about how big and nasty the world was. They knew it was, ‘cos they saw it all on telly, read it in the papers. Huh.”
They waited quietly, letting Sparky take his time. Even Emily was silent, leaning against Jack as if for protection from where this story was going.
“So he rebelled,” Sparky continued. “What a bloody cliche, eh? He took the drugs to get back at Mum and Dad. Least, that's what I think. They just blamed him, disowned him, never took his calls. And he stayed there in London when the band fell apart before it had really begun, and…” He started crying.
“I think we all know the story from there,” Rosemary said after a while, and Jack winced and closed his eyes, because now surely Sparky's fury would fly.
But sometimes grief can overcome fury, and smother it. “That's just it,” Sparky said, his voice sad and lost. “None of us knows, not really. We know what happened to London. But something like that…it's not one story, it's a million. That's why I want to find him. Need to find him. To hear his side of the story.” He lowered his head again and wiped at his eyes, unashamed in his sadness.
After a minute or two Jenna stood and went to him. She sat by his side, not touching him, silent, but Jack could see that her simply being there meant the world.
Jack and Emily went first. The churchyard was even more overgrown than the ruined building itself, and it was impossible to hurry without risking a fall. There were still gravestones showing their humped grey shoulders above the undergrowth, and hidden beneath would be tomb slabs and other promises of broken bones. But the lushness also provided good cover, and they crawled their way towards the church's boundary.
Over the road, into the ditch, right, and then left. It sounded so easy. But Rosemary's directions could not convey distance, nor the fact that there were great swathes of vicious stinging nettles all across the churchyard.
They moved slowly, carefully, doing their best to avoid the nettles and always listening for noises that may warn of danger. In the distance Jack could hear motors, so faint that there was no way of telling whether or not they were approaching. Closer, there was only the singing of birds, and the soft, secret whispers of plants moving in a warm summer breeze.
When they reached the edge of the churchyard, they followed the boundary wall until they found a grilled gate. The hinges looked rusted, but there was no lock or chain, and Rosemary had told him that she'd come this way.
“Ready?” Jack asked.
Emily nodded, rubbing at a rash of stings across one forearm. “Need some dock leaves.”
Jack smiled. “Mum always told us that, didn't she?” Emily tried to smile back.
Jack leaned against the gate and looked back along the road. Nothing. Then he turned and looked toward the Exclusion Zone. He could see where the road finished in a pile of rubble, the tarmac crushed and cracked by whatever heavy vehicle had been used to demolish so many buildings. Again, nothing. They seemed to be completely alone.
The Exclusion Zone spooked him. So many people had lived there, and now they were gone, along with all trace of their existence. A place that had once been so full of life was now barren and sterile. The breeze lifted drifts of dust-clouds across the broken landscape, and he could imagine they were something else.
“I'll go first,” Jack whispered. “If you hear or see anything wrong, go straight back to the church.”
“And leave you?” Emily's eyes went wide, the mere thought of being parted from her brother patently terrifying.
Jack touched her shoulder and squeezed. “Don't worry,” he said. He could think of nothing else to say. “I'll go first.” This was so dangerous that if he was seen, there would be no easy way out for any of them.