stop you calling.’
‘He stopped me living here.’
‘Don’t start.’
‘I wasn’t taking up much space, was I?’
‘Harry, it was like having a fucking black hole in the living room. You sat around all day looking depressed.’
‘I needed something to do.’
‘Yeah and you got it.’
The stacking job at the Co-op. Long days under neon. Christ, it was bone. But it got him out of the flat, out of Bekah’s hair. Till he decked a punter who startled him with a question about broccoli.
‘I’ll get myself sorted.’
‘How?’ Bekah stares at him. ‘What’s different, what’s changed since you were stoned on that sofa playing Xbox and watching …?’
She can’t say it: filth. ‘You don’t think I can hack it.’
‘Course I do.’
‘No you don’t. You think I’m fucked for life, some wreck with a Rupert in his head telling him he’s shit.’
‘What are you talking about?’ His little niece begins to whine. Bekah picks her up and Annie pats her mother’s face, almost slapping it. Bekah carries her into the bedroom and he can hear the quack and jingle of some kids’ cartoon. She comes back at him. ‘What are you talking about, a voice in your head?’
‘Forget it.’
‘That’s not good, Harry.’
‘Don’t call me Harry.’
‘Why not?’
‘I don’t like it.’
She stares at him. He looks for somewhere safe to bury his eyes. ‘Don’t you think you should see someone?’
‘Christ, if I’d known it was gonna be like this I’d have stayed in bed.’
‘Why’d you come and see me then?’
He looks at her feet that are swelling over the edge of her grey pumps. Her ankles look grey, elderly. ‘I thought I could stay for lunch. Take Annie to the playpark. I don’t mean on my own – obviously you’d be there.’
In the bedroom his niece laughs and shouts ‘dog, dog’.
‘I’m only doing spaghetti hoops,’ says Bekah.
‘That’s OK.’
‘Then I have to put her down for her nap.’
‘I won’t stop you.’
‘I’ll just go and check on her.’
Even now he can’t talk to his sister. Like on tour, when he got his twenty-minute phone call. Standing there hearing the kids in the background and Bekah asking how he was, what it was like, and him thinking, I saw three men get vaporised in a drone strike, we held a memorial service in the cookhouse for a teenager from Crawley, I’m scared I’ll bottle it next time there’s a contact. None of this would have made sense back home, so he told her it was hot and Gobby sent his love and how were the kiddies, how was work?
The front door opens and he’s off the sofa before Stu has put his toolkit down. It’s as if he can smell Aitch, coming straight into the living room with his long snarky face. ‘Wasn’t expecting to find you here,’ Stu says.
‘All right, mate.’
‘Where’s Bekah?’
‘With Annie.’
Stu is lean, a greyhound of a man, but he fills the room. ‘How’s things with the trendy vicar?’
‘All right.’
He looks at Aitch down his long nose. ‘She’s relaxed with your mess, is she?’
‘She’s not up my arse like some RSM, if that’s what you mean.’
‘She let you up her arse yet?’
‘Fuck off, Stu.’
‘Single woman, strapping young bloke under her roof. Sounds like something you’d watch on telly. Mind you, a lady vicar – she’s probably a lezzer.’
‘If all blokes were like you, who could blame her?’
Stu wets his lips, grins. ‘Good to see you, mate. Staying long?’
‘Just came to see Bekah.’
‘Yeah, well you seen her now, ain’t ya.’
His sister returns with Annie on her hip. ‘Dada,’ Annie cries and casts off from her mother into Stu’s arms. He makes a big show of kissing her cheeks and the tip of her nose.
‘I wasn’t expecting you back,’ Bekah tells Stu, and the lack of warmth in her voice cheers Aitch up.
‘You know me, efficient worker. I see we got the pleasure of a guest for lunch.’
‘Na,’ Aitch says, ‘it’s fine.’
‘You’re welcome, mate.’
‘I got things to do.’
Bekah protests, or feels the need to pretend to. Even so he can tell she wants him gone.
‘You give my best to Barry, yeah? See you, Annie. Stu. Bex …’
3
First come our boy Malk.
He hold the guidin stick, it bein his turn.
He hold Abans knife. The knife they take off Feo in the bad time.
Feo they slaver beat Malk so black Aban so blue one night they bled him like a porker.
Runnin ever since with the blade that done it.
Malk reckon a knife done red work cut a way for us. Stedders smell blood keep out its way an the way its people. Cant say for hoofers but they go sly an void the roads cos they gods say so.
Aban talk bout the roads. The Thirsty with its robbers. The Empty where stedders have they tolls. So many dangers on our way to West Cunny. West Cunny where the rains still fall. Where Malk Aban Efia Nathin Becca Rona Lan headin. The pastures there. Tight bellies plus an end to roamin.
Fastest ways the road, say Malk.
Walk on till wind spew up sand an grit. Becca Lan pull they hoods tight. Nathin spit. Efia look at the spit, how Momma swallow it like she swallow everythin.
On the road, say Aban, trollers see for miles.
Yeah an we see em too.
Trumpet finches bust up from the dunes. Aban put a hand on Malks arm, feel the muscles there. His bro, his mate from wayback.
Safer ways off road.
Aint nuthin but scrub an sand. What if we lose us?
Follow the sun. Least we stay hid.
I got the guidin stick.
Whats it tellin?
Malk look like he dont know.
Efia touch Malks neck. Trollers mean slavers, she say. You got pricey heads.
Malk feel Aban Efia Nathin Becca Rona Lan press eyes on him. He turn the guidin stick in his hand, feel the right