B: Summer Chapter Two &; Three

2

Vodka doesn't even make me feel drunk anymore. I was already into my
second bottle and was praying for slurred speech and double vision.
Cigarette number eight had burnt down to the tip although I can't even
remember smoking any of it. It just sat there in the ashtray
dissolving. Crumpled cigarette butts, tainted filters, mounds of ash. I
think I was half-asleep because the rustled knock on my apartment door
didn't register immediately. The sound waves avoided recognition.
Clouds of smoke drowned the room. The ceiling disappeared hours ago and
the walls had become pastel abstractions. The only light in the room
coming from the hypnotic flickering of the TV. Some pointless game show
on mute. The innocent choking expressions of laughter on the
contestants' faces. Impotent happiness.
There are fifteen flats on each floor of my apartment block. That makes
300 flats to house an average of 3.2 people a flat. There are another
nine apartment blocks in my zone. All of them built to accommodate the
ever-spiralling population. If you want to feel like a number, a
statistic, you live here. All I need is a barcode. I only have this
home because I'm apparently low maintenance. Timid. Unconfrontational.
Boring.
After Flin's fleeting 'visit', I returned dejected to my five-roomed
cage of disease. While I was unlocking the front door Sal, my neighbour
from flat 124 decided to chat to me. This Sal is only eighteen, she
still lives with her parents, and I'm almost certain that she has a
crush on me.
'Jake. Hi, I passed!' she proclaimed, almost screaming out an orgasm as
she darted out of her apartment.
'Sorry?'
'My exams. I passed. A few friends and me are gonna go out tonight to
celebrate. Fancy coming?'
Eighteen, long blonde hair, fresh faced with smooth delicate
cheeks.
'Congratulations.'
I shut the door behind me. It's better for her she doesn't get too
close. She's too young. Too much potential. I'll let some other bastard
fuck her head up.
That night was where it all started. The gun shots. The blood. The
chase. The escape. Life for me, and maybe for everyone, will never be
the same. Stare long enough and the rest of the world will fade
away.
And it all began at 8.30pm.
As I sat on my sofa, killing my brain-cells, the tapping got louder,
thumping like a heart beat in my ears. Maybe I was more drunk than I
realised because as I tried to rise to my feet, my legs were
unresponsive moulds of jelly. I collapsed back on the sofa but after a
couple of attempts I managed to take control.
Through the fish eye spy hole on my door, I could see nothing but the
opposite wall and door 122. Was it a prank? My imagination? Was it just
a knock on a door down the hall? Just as I was about to return to my
drinking binge, there was yet another knock, even more eager than
before. The door vibrated under the tremors. My heart pounded in my
throat and quickly spread up to my eardrums. Droplets of sweat gathered
on my forehead and palms. Had they found me I wondered? Fuck no, of
course not, they wouldn't knock would they, don't be stupid, you'd be
dead by now.
After latching on the security chain, I carefully squeezed the freezing
cold door handle. It almost hurt to touch it. As I opened the door, a
gust of air bellowed through the inch gap, like I was opening up a
vacuum. I peered out into the hallway, half hiding behind the door as I
sought protection from whatever demonic forces had chosen to brush
their fists upon my apartment entrance.
In front of me was a little girl. No more than five years old. She was
crying, eyes puffy and red sore like she was allergic to her tears. Her
fragile fingers were curled up into nervous balls; her wavy long dark
hair tied back. She seemed familiar somehow. Distant.
'I think you got the wrong door.'
She looked up at me, her eyes deep and wide.
'You lost?'
She shook her head and sniffed her nose. Her mouth opened and tried to
utter something but it came out in a whimper.
'Are you my daddy?' she eventually spat out.
The little girl sat timidly on my sofa. I saw her discretely looking at
the alcohol bottles of my coffee table, then the ones that litter the
room.
'D'ya want some?' I offered, as a joke of course, kids have a sense of
humour right?
She shook her head but I'm sure she thought about it for a split
second. Until that is, she saw what it had done to me. A few minutes of
silence passed until she reached out her hand for me to shake.
'Amber,' she said. 'Hello.'
She sniffed again - her nose curled up.
'Hello,' I shook her smooth clammy hand. 'What are you doing
here?'
She looked away, to a picture frame placed on the coffee table in front
of her. In it was an old picture of Holly and me together, shortly
before or after our wedding. I couldn't remember.
'Mummy? You loved her.'
'More than anything.' I began to feel uneasy. She seemed to have her
own agenda, her own mission. Surely she's too smart for a
five-year-old.
'Why did you leave me?' She asked while looking me in the eye.
'I&;#8230;I didn't.'
'It wasn't my fault,' she stuttered as she tried to hold back her
tears.
'What are you doing here?' I asked again, trying to sound serious. 'Do
your Grandparents know you're here? You live with them right?'
She nodded her head reluctantly.
'I'll take you home.'
'No.'
'Why?'
Silence again.
'Why are you here Amber. How did you get here? It's too late for a
little girl like you to be out alone. It's dangerous out there,' tears
gathered on her cheeks. 'What do you want?'
She rubbed her eyes.
'A daddy.'
KO'd in the first round.
I don't need this. I have problems of my own. I hate you. I hate
you.
She looked down at her feet, the way her laces were knotted loosely,
her legs swaying in the air, too short to reach the floor. All I did
was stare at her. I hoped she could feel my eyes, my evil stare burning
at her pretty face. I hoped she felt guilty for being such a Goddamn
burden.
'I'll take you home.'
The strip lighting was flickering; creating a half-strobe effect as the
subway train hurtled to its destination. Amber didn't speak a word or
even make a sound except for a slight sniff now and then. The
monotonous thumping and drilling of the speeding train almost sent me
asleep. The carriage was bare except for a young woman with dark hair
sat opposite us, reading a magazine. I'm sure she kept peering at me,
eyeing me up with kiss me now eyes.
'It's for the best,' I tried to reassure Amber.
I don't know why I did what I did next. Maybe it was a rush of blood?
The full moon? A mere muscle spasm? But I held Amber's delicate hand.
Her fingers were frozen ice-lollies, like they would snap if I held
them too hard.
'It's for the best,' I repeated, almost trying to convince myself as
well as Amber.
'I'm scared,' she whispered
'Scared? Why?'
'Bad things. Bad things will happen.'
'What bad things?'
She scurried back into her shell and stayed there until we reached her
grandparents.
I couldn't sleep that night.
I could never sleep.
My electric clock ticked over to 12.45am. I pulled up my blanket
against the cold that caged my bedroom but I couldn't escape it.
Somehow tonight was different from other sleepless nights. Sounds
amplified. Echoes threatening. My room was alive in shadow. The
darkness was having a party and I wasn't invited. I just had to watch
from the outside, through the front window, nose pressed against the
glass.
I could hear Sal arriving home from her night out. Alone. I could sense
her almost crying. Tears building up in her eyes.
My bedroom light shade was dancing on the ceiling. The curtains
waltzing with each other. My clock flickering to the beat of a song
that it was humming to itself. I glanced over towards my open bedroom
door, almost by chance and I saw a silhouette standing there in the
opening. I knew who it was immediately. She just stood there silent,
motionless.
'Amber?'
She took a step back and disappeared out of the room. I got out of bed,
the wave of frosty air hitting me instantly, and headed after
her.
'Are you ok? Why'd you come back? I thought I said&;#8230;'
I entered the living room and she was stood by my front door. She was
looking at me although I couldn't see her face. I could just she her
pupils reflecting in the muted light of the room. She opened the front
door and slipped away into the outside.
'Amber&;#8230;' I was trying not to sound annoyed as I headed after
her into the corridor outside.
'Where are you going Am-'
I stepped outside, placed my bare foot on the cold concrete.
Frozen in head lights.
300bpm.
Adrenalin rush.
A shotgun pointed at my head. A balaclava framing two killing eyes
locked on me. Words beginning with 'f' were flooding my mind. Thirty
seconds went by, maybe more. Still no gun shot. No blood. I was still
alive. Still there breathing.
200bpm.
No movement. He doesn't even blink. I look down the corridor. More and
more men. Twenty? Thirty? Even more coming? All loaded with automatic
weapons, dressed in swat team gear. Bullet proof vests. Everybody
static. Cardboard cut-outs. Amber stood further down the hall, still in
the same clothes she was wearing earlier. The only colour in the
bleakness. The only movement in the hall. She seemed happy and anxious
at the same time.
I woke up sweating, still in my bed. It was only 11.45pm. I could hear
Sal arriving home from her night out. Alone.
Again.
I could sense her almost crying.
Again.
'What the fu-'
An intense sensation of dread flooded over me. I had to get out. To the
hallway. To the elevator. To the streets outside. No money no
clothes.
Like a lunatic I ran. Traffic lights stop go green red. Belting rain
drops like searing daggers. Heart beat sweat. Damp hair strands on
forehead. Gradually the world began to slow down as I ran over pavement
after pavement. The deep ache festering in my muscles began to ease.
The escalating pain subsiding in my limbs. I could see each droplet of
rain as they fell to the ground. A million reflections at once. A
million other worlds. A million other Jacobs. I hadn't even
contemplated where I was going, I didn't even care, but I still kept
sprinting on autopilot. Shut my eyes and the rest of the world will
fade away.
I opened my left eye and was greeted by tarmac. I couldn't open my
right. I couldn't feel my face, or my right arm, or my right leg. I
only hoped that they were still there intact, still part of that
infrastructure known as a skeleton rather than hanging loose by layers
of blooded and torn skin fabric. Nevertheless, the rain lashed
unsympathetically down on my twisted body as I lay in the middle of
somewhere that felt like a damp and squalid road.
My cheek was grazed and raw.
I tasted blood and an inflamed tongue.
Bullets shot by overhead, the echoes of gunfire, the screeching of
tyres, the torments of rain. A man climbed from his car, the headlights
beaming and searching, illuminating every drop of water that fell from
the darkness above as it shone in my aching eyes. I blacked out.

3

I used to be happy. I had a job. I was liked.
We were lying in bed on a Sunday morning, basking in the early morning
light peering coyly through the curtains. I could feel her smile as she
lay delicately in my arms, her breaths brushing against my chest.
'You love me don't you, hun?' Holly asked, breaking the blissful
silence.
'Of course,' I whispered, holding her soft body tighter.
From what I can remember Holly and I lived in a decent part of town. In
the middle on the social hierarchy. We would laugh together at how we
could judge the respectability of an area by the size of the houses'
driveways. Ours could fit one and a half.
'I'm sorry I've been working so much, Jay,' Holly said as she ran her
fingers across my ribs.
'It's ok.'
'It won't be for much longer. We're almost finished.'
Holly was a university science lecturer. When she first started she
would always come home enthusiastic and eager to share with me her days
events. But this excited openness disappeared after a year or two. Then
came the late hours. Then came weekend research working. But did I
doubt her? Never. Did I mistrust her? No. I could only have enough room
to miss her. Holly was beautiful. What was a gorgeous, intelligent
young woman doing with a loser like me? I never used to think about it
but now it never leaves my mind. She deserved so much better than me
during her short life.
'You'll always be with me won't you, Jay?'
'Of course.'
'Because I'm pregnant.'
I used to be happy. I had a job. I was liked.