RUNNERS Read online

  Elijah took the pot and sniffed it. ‘What is it?’

  The black girl laughed disdainfully. ‘Tea, of course!’

  Elijah peered into the pot. Tea was fantastically expensive and hard to come by. He found himself thinking back to history lessons; people drank tea all over the place in the old days – and coffee. There was even a saying: ‘As British as a cup of tea’. But to find it here?

  ‘Tea?’ he repeated dumbly. ‘What – like nettle tea?’ As soon as he had said it he felt foolish. He glanced quickly at the girl.

  ‘You still haven’t told us who you are.’ The tallest and oldest looking boy in the room handed Elijah a cup, speaking with an expectation of compliance that Elijah immediately resented. Elijah took the cup and stared challengingly into a face that was dominated by dark, heavy-lidded eyes and an already manly, square jaw, though he couldn’t have been much older than Elijah himself.

  Jimmy spoke up, sensing trouble. ‘He was going to tell us earlier, weren’t you?’ he said soothingly, ‘But you fell asleep – remember?’

  Elijah nodded sullenly, passed the scalding pot carefully to Jimmy, and sipped his tea before replying. The tea tasted earthy and bitter. Trying not to pull his face in disgust, he decided to tell them his name.

  Sky and Jimmy both smiled encouragingly, the new girl looked beautifully bored. The older boy nodded curtly in acknowledgement and a younger, cherubic looking, blonde boy regarded Elijah with bright interest, expectantly waiting for more information. When none came, the blonde boy took the lead.

  ‘I’m Rowan. This,’ he nodded toward the older boy, ‘is Xavier.’ He motioned to the others, ‘Rosa… and you already know Sky and Jimmy.’

  ‘Xavier…’ Elijah stared at him as he repeated the name, rusty gears clicking in his memory. He spoke slowly, as if he was discovering something for the first time. ‘You wanted to leave me…’

  Xavier didn’t flinch. ‘Yes,’ he said simply.

  Five faces seemed to scrutinise him and Elijah, despite the warmth and the food and the companionship, suddenly felt the vulnerability of his situation. He gathered his knees to his chest and studied the fire. He dreaded the question he knew would come. He would have to tell them how he came to be there and, in doing so, would have to face it fully himself. Not tonight. He was too weak, too afraid. To say it out loud would make it real.

  Less than twenty-four hours had passed since he found his father’s body and, at first, he had only thought to run. Now, loneliness claimed him like the waves claimed the land – irresistible and inescapable. He felt guilty that he hadn’t stayed to watch the authorities take his father away. He felt like a bad son that he hadn’t gone to the incineration. But, in the end, even as he loathed himself for being so weak, self-preservation was all that mattered. As he gazed at the sparsely furnished room in which he now found himself, Elijah reflected bitterly on the irony that, in a world with precious little fuel, his father, whose veins in life pulsed with black market alcohol, would probably have burnt for an unnaturally long period of time.

  ‘Look,’ he addressed them in a low voice with his eyes still on the fire. ‘Thanks for everything. If it’s all the same to you, I’ll stay here tonight, and then I’ll be out of your hair tomorrow.’ He looked around for a response, not sure what he wanted to hear. Nobody said anything, but waited for Xavier to voice their collective opinion. He merely nodded. Elijah lay down on the mattress again and turned his face from them, fingernails dug in his palms.

  Elijah woke in the early hours of the next morning. He lay quietly, listening to the sounds of regular breathing and the occasional shuffle or cough of his companions as they continued to sleep. He couldn’t tell what time it was and remembered bitterly that he no longer had his dad’s old watch. A shaft of dazzling sunlight blazed across the ceiling from a gap in the boarding at the window, so he guessed it was after dawn. He also mused, staring lazily at that bright streak, that if it was too hot, he may not be able to get away after all – at least – not right away. Looking across at Rosa, who was curled in a sleeping bag with a hand tucked under her chin, her hair spread gloriously across the pillow, he didn’t feel entirely sorry about that. The others were all in sleeping bags too, making him the only one with a mattress. He wondered idly who usually took the mattress when he wasn’t there.

  He felt at his head; the swelling had subsided and it didn’t ache so much now. Pushing himself up, he unlaced his boot and felt inside. Satisfied, he began to re-tie it when the morning peace was shattered by a piercing squeal. Sky bolted up, golden hair flying behind her and eyes wild. She stared at Elijah, panting heavily. Rosa groaned and half opened her eyes, and Elijah saw a tattered cushion fly from Xavier’s direction at Sky’s head. It missed and bounced across the floor. He mumbled, ‘not again’ before flipping over and closing his eyes. Oblivious, Sky continued to stare at Elijah with a terrified look, until he felt compelled to speak.

  ‘Are you ok?’

  At this, she seemed to snap out of her trance. She nodded weakly, and then lay down again to stare at the same dazzling bolt of sunlight that Elijah had been watching all morning.

  ‘Looks hot today.’

  ‘Mmmm.’

  ‘Still thinking of going?’

  ‘I should really.’

  ‘Why?’ She sat up and looked at him squarely. He shrugged. Then, without the least sense of absurdity or irony, Sky said: ‘I had a premonition.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just now.’

  ‘A premonition? Are you joking?’ Elijah could tell by the earnest look on her face that she wasn’t.

  ‘It was about you. You were floating face down in a river and we pulled you out.’

  ‘Cheers. Don’t tell me any more, eh? What makes you say it was a premonition? Couldn’t it be a dream? You were asleep… it could have been a dream…’ Elijah wasn’t sure he liked the way this conversation was going. He had been there five minutes and already this weird girl was having visions of his imminent demise. As if he didn’t have enough to worry about.

  Sky shrugged. ‘I just know. I have them all the time.’

  ‘Don’t listen to her,’ mumbled Xavier, half asleep from across the room, ‘she’s mental.’

  Two: Market Day

  A quick discussion about what to do for breakfast resulted in the idea that someone should try and get some eggs. The phrase: get some eggs left Elijah feeling distinctly uncomfortable. They surely weren’t contemplating food theft? And he had another reason for feeling uncomfortable but, right now, he wasn’t prepared to share it with them.

  Xavier ventured out, accompanied by Rosa, who, before she left, coldly informed Elijah that he stank to high heaven and could he please do something about it. Seeing his wounded expression, Jimmy laughed.

  ‘Don’t mind Rosa. Says what she thinks. It’s not your fault, mate. Only she would lie with concussion for a day and night on an old mattress and still smell like roses, the rest of us would be humming, just the same as you.’

  Jimmy directed Elijah to a small, high-walled yard at the back of what Elijah now saw was a tiny one-storey stone house, rather like a gamekeeper’s cottage. The house, like so many others, had clearly seen better days. The outside walls badly needed pointing and waist high nettles scaled them. Here and there, slates were missing from the roof. Thick ivy diffused over the gable wall, snaking into every fissure, and holding the chimneystack in a choking embrace. It seemed to Elijah that the ivy might be the only thing holding the building together. Crying gulls wheeled overhead. The yard was deep in shade and, though it was early morning, the heat was still terrific, even now. Elijah wondered how far Xavier and Rosa were going for breakfast; they wouldn’t last long in this.

  In the yard, he found an old water butt, three quarters full from the previous rains. He stripped down to his underwear, keeping his boots hidden carefully under his pile of grubby clothes. There was no soap, but the tepid water made him feel fresher. As he got dressed, he took in his surroundings and
endless questions raced through his head, concerning where he was, where he was going and who these kids were. And he found himself reluctantly hoping they would ask him to stay.

  As he was going back inside, he met Rowan on his way to wash.

  ‘You finished out here?’ Rowan asked, stripping his t-shirt off without waiting for a reply. Without his top on he looked tiny, even younger than Elijah had previously thought. His smooth cheeks still bore the pink chubbiness of childhood; Elijah guessed he couldn’t be more than eleven or twelve.

  ‘Yeah. Actually….’ Elijah followed him back outside, this seemed like the ideal opportunity to clear a few of those questions that were nagging him. ‘Where is this place?’

  ‘Some old guy lived here. Xavier found it. He was snooping around for days, after whatever we could get our hands on, when he realised that it didn’t look lived in. So we broke in and had a look. There was someone in here alright.’ Rowan smiled sadly, revealing experience far greater than his years.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Elijah asked.

  ‘Found an old guy. He’d been dead in bed for a few days, we guessed.’

  ‘In bed?’ Elijah went cold as an awful idea occurred to him. ‘When you say in bed, it wasn’t… it wasn’t that mattress I’ve been…?’

  ‘As if!’ Rowan looked equally horrified. ‘We don’t know what he died of; we had to burn the bed. No, Xavier found that mattress somewhere else. D’you know…’ he continued with obvious awe, ‘Xavier can find anything.’

  ‘When you say Xavier can get stuff, how exactly…’

  ‘Oh he doesn’t steal it, if that’s what you mean. At least, I don’t think so. Him and Rosa are always off out finding stuff, catching food, getting soap and everything. I don’t know how, but he says he doesn’t steal it. Anyway, food theft – he’d be mental wouldn’t he?’ Rowan plunged his head into the water butt and then shook his hair out like a dog after a swim.

  ‘What did you do with the old man?’

  ‘He’s buried – in that field behind us. We couldn’t tell anyone, obviously. And we’ve been here ever since. We had to be careful at first, we didn’t know whether he’d get family coming looking for him, or whatever, but he must have been a bit of a hermit, ‘cause no one has been. We boarded up the windows, y’know, and made the place look shut up. And he’d got food tokens hidden under the floorboards. Lasted us a good while.’

  ‘Is that how Xavier’s going to get eggs?’

  ‘Dunno. Maybe. He likes to get food without using tokens if he can.’ Rowan looked thoughtfully at Elijah as he rubbed at his hair with a threadbare towel. ‘Shame about your things. Did you have much?’

  ‘Not really. Some tokens… a bit of sentimental stuff.’ Elijah felt the need to change the subject. ‘How old is Rosa?’

  Rowan smiled. ‘Don’t even go there, mate. Strictly off limits.’ He looked Elijah up and down meaningfully. ‘I don’t think you’re her type, anyway.’

  ‘What is?’ Elijah asked with a barely disguised scowl.

  Rowan’s smile became a broad grin. ‘Xavier.’

  The promised eggs did arrive. Elijah wondered, for a brief time, where they had come from. In the end, he was too hungry to let it worry him. There was also another kettle of tea and, although he hadn’t enjoyed the last cup, there was no way he was going to miss out. Rested, clean and fed, he felt more able to enjoy company a little. He pushed uncertainties about his situation to the back of his mind, after insistence from Sky, Jimmy and, surprisingly, Rosa (which had raised his spirits more than anything), that he couldn’t leave them that day. Xavier and Rosa had come back with reports of inferno temperatures, which would be unbearable and possibly dangerous. The only thing to do was to lie around in the stifling heat until it cooled. They lounged, idly chatting and making plans, Elijah mostly listening. He didn’t say much; still unable to face the idea of telling them his story, though he knew that if he stayed the time would come. Every so often, the conversation would lull, and he would find the silence filled with sadness as his own thoughts absorbed him once again.

  The day turned into two, then into a week, and then two weeks, and still the heat-wave showed no signs of coming to an end. The best they could do was to slip out for short periods, early or late in the day, for supplies. Water became a problem, especially for washing, and they had all started to smell a little ripe, even the delectable Rosa. A good part of every day was spent languishing indoors, immobilised by heat fatigue and staving off dehydration. Black clouds of flies hung in the air around the cottage like ominous shadows of disease, squeezing into the house wherever there was a gap. There was never a moment when there wasn’t at least five or six whining lazily around the ceiling in the main room, and somebody wasn’t swatting at one in annoyance. Maggot check was a frequent duty. When they did find any in their food supplies, Jimmy would laughingly advise them on the added nutritional value, as if it was a joke he had never made before. To compound the misery, massive colonies of ants marched through the place, as if storming it in a well-planned military manoeuvre. Everybody found their extremities itching with angry red bites, wondering which species of bug they had come from.

  Even so, the group were united in one main goal, which was to avoid being taken into care at all costs. They often discussed what the consequences of this might be. No one was entirely sure of the truth; rumours and conjecture were enough for them to know that it probably wasn’t good.

  ‘I heard they send the older kids to war if they haven’t got a family,’ offered Jimmy one stifling afternoon as the topic was being discussed, once again.

  Over the last hundred years a great war had raged across every continent. It began in the East and crept across the globe, a black shadow smothering humanity in conflict. Nobody had remained untouched. It wasn’t the first time Jimmy’s theory had been aired and Rosa, once again, dismissed it.

  ‘Nah. Why would they do that when there are grown men?’

  ‘It’s just what I heard. I don’t suppose anyone cares how many of us get killed. Nobody to miss us is there?’ Jimmy shrugged and messed up his fringe.

  Rosa shot Xavier a furtive glance, loaded with mutual understanding.

  ‘They send you to labour camp,’ Rowan chipped in.

  ‘I’ve heard that,’ Rosa agreed. She shuddered, then added meaningfully, ‘Some of those so called humanitarians enjoy power… if you know what I mean.’

  The others looked at her blankly. ‘Do I have to spell everything out to you lot?’

  ‘Yes,’ Rowan said, yawning.

  ‘They like to throw their weight around don’t they? A bit of a slap here, locked in a room there, starvation for that kid whose face they don’t like.’

  ‘One thing’s for sure,’ Elijah said quietly, ‘Abuse or not, I’m never getting caught.’

  Sky gave him a curious look but said nothing.

  There was now an unspoken agreement that Elijah should stay for good. Nobody had discussed it but, at the same time, nobody had discussed his leaving and he became more or less completely included. He felt more settled than he had done in a long time. Even Sky’s frequent predictions of his imminent doom, which had at first unnerved him, became less disturbing, even at times vaguely amusing. Mostly, they were repetitions of the first vision she had had, sometimes confused snapshots of other images that didn’t make any sense. Elijah decided to accept that what would be, would probably be, no matter how much he worried about it. There were still many moments when he felt vulnerable and lonely, but the overwhelming constancy of the feeling had lessened. And, no matter how guilty the thought made him, the burden that his father had become in recent years had been lifted.

  On the sultry afternoon that the weather finally broke, Xavier had spent longer in bed than usual. He seemed quiet and pale, but nobody really noticed how ill he was until he stood up quickly, swayed, then bent over double, retching. He vomited spectacularly, narrowly missing his sleeping bag and sending a crowd of the omnipresent flies zooming excitedly
to the spot where the puddle lay. Xavier, everyone agreed, despite his protestations, was in no state to go out foraging, but supplies were running low. Rosa, of course, was the natural choice to go as she usually accompanied Xavier anyway. Jimmy offered, but Elijah spied his chance to get some time alone with her and insisted that he go instead. Xavier looked at him murderously. Not for long, though, because he was soon throwing up again, leaving Elijah with an unsettling feeling of smugness.

  Elijah and Rosa strode side by side toward Lower Hunterbourne, roughly four miles away. They both knew it was only a matter of hours until the storm broke and the possibility of being stranded in it provoked a sense of urgency in every step. Elijah’s attempts at conversation were met with terse replies. Sweat began to form little rivulets down his face and back, staining his clothes. After half an hour of marching in the sauna- like heat with only Rosa’s taciturn company, his temper began to fray. He halted in the road, until Rosa noticed he was not at her side and turned back to face him with an impatient, questioning look.

  ‘Rosa… why do you hate me so much?’

  Rosa’s usually composed demeanour slipped, momentarily, and her mouth worked silently before she gave her reply. ‘You’re annoying.’

  ‘Annoying?’ Elijah’s mouth fell open. He had never been spoken to in this way before. He didn’t know whether he was offended, or whether he fancied her even more for it.

  ‘Look, much as I’d love to take part in a little counselling session, we don’t have time right now.’ She turned and began to walk again.

  Elijah followed; the rest of the journey completed in awkward silence.

  In town, Rosa seemed at ease, as if she had done this many times before. They crossed an ancient market square, where, during the rains there would be lush grass, but now the earth was baked hard as iron and the grass shrivelled away, making dust puff up under the feet of shoppers. Gathered around a raised and weathered stone cross were a few shabby, canvass roofed stalls, displaying sparse stocks of food and other supplies with an air of misplaced optimism. Amusingly, one stallholder had resorted to an ingenious arrangement of mirrors around his wares in a tragic, but laughable, attempt to make the stall look well stocked. It seemed to be working though; there was a bigger knot of people milling around this one than any other. There was much shoving and pushing; the imminence of the storm had filled everyone with the same sense of urgency and goods were being bought up at an alarming rate.