The Boy Who Could See Demons (32 page)

I stopped moving and sat still as a stone on the floor.

‘Good,’ he said, smiling. I held my breath because I wanted to pant and my heart was pounding. I hated that Ruen looked so like me just then because he was so mean and I didn’t even know why.

‘I’m going to show you something,’ he said, looking down at me. I felt scared but not of Ruen. I felt scared because the dark shadow that connected my jumper to Ruen was thicker than normal and moving the way a snake moves.

‘OK,’ I said to Ruen. ‘Then can you go away, please.’

He bent down and his face looked like he was sorry for me.

‘I want you to know that what I show you now is not a projection of your mind,’ he said, and his voice was different, like a man’s. ‘You are not having a psychotic episode, Alex. All of this is very real, so pay attention.’

I nodded and looked away from the shadow beside me, then folded my arms across my body and pinched the undersides of my arms so I knew that I was still there and that everything was happening, because lately I haven’t been so sure. I feel so dizzy when I take the tablets, especially on an empty stomach, that sometimes it feels like I’m on a ship and then sometimes I actually convince myself that I
am
on a ship and that we’re floating out to sea, that my bedroom curtains are icebergs and the fields outside are the polar icecaps and the sky is really the Arctic ocean.

‘Close your eyes, Alex,’ Ruen whispered.

I shook my head. I was afraid of the shadow.

‘Don’t you trust me?’ he said.

‘Not any more,’ I said without thinking, and our faces fell at exactly the same time because we both realised it was true. Ruen frowned at me.

‘Do you want your mum to live?’ he said in a cruel voice.

I gasped and shut my eyes tight.

‘Look,’ I heard Ruen say, and immediately there was this big cinema screen in my head filled with an image of Mum. It was clearer than a Wakeful Dream or a memory. It was even clearer than a film at the cinema because it was like I was right there in front of her. I could see her sitting in the communal room in a red chair at the adult unit and she was watching TV. She was wearing a long white T-shirt and her hair was tied back and her face looked blank. She kept changing position in her chair as if she couldn’t get comfortable.

‘Is this real?’ I asked Ruen, opening my eyes.

‘Of course it is,’ he said, and I closed my eyes again and kept watching.

Mum turned to the lady in the chair next to her and said,
Do you have any smokes
? The lady looked at her as if she was stupid and shook her head. Mum said
thanks
in a voice that sounded annoyed and she left the room.

Then the image changed to Mum walking into her bedroom at the hospital. She looked upset and her hands were flapping and she walked up and down, talking to herself. She was saying things like,
Said I was no good; he was right
, and then she lay down on the bed. At first I thought she was going to sleep, and then I noticed she was reaching under her mattress for something.

I opened my eyes. ‘What’s she doing?’ I asked Ruen.

‘You’ll see,’ he said.

Part of me wanted to run out of here all the way to Mum and the other part needed to stay and see what happened.

But I already knew what was going to happen.

Mum reached her hand underneath the mattress and slowly pulled out a fat book. When she opened it I could see she had ripped out holes in the pages and hid round white pills inside, lots of them. She sat with the book on her lap for a moment and she looked at the door which was open and then back at the book, and I shouted,
‘Mum, don’t!’
because I knew what she was thinking. I opened my eyes but the image was gone and all I could see was the orange toilet door with black scribbles on it and a rusting handle. So I closed my eyes and immediately I saw Mum again, but this time there were no round white pills in the book and she was drinking a glass of water and crying. She rubbed her face and gave a big sigh.

I love you, Alex. You’ll be so much happier without me
.

I yelled and yelled and then I opened my eyes and scrambled to my feet and I felt my fingers fumble with the lock on the toilet door and then I raced out into the corridor, though I couldn’t move fast enough. I needed to get to her, I needed to get to her. Every time I’d been able to stop her, but this time might be too late. I started to run but it felt like my legs wouldn’t move fast enough, like they were made of Lego bricks and I had to drag them after me.

I was outside the toilets now and in the long white corridor with the long white lights in the ceiling like lightsabers. There was nobody around, not a single person.

‘Help!’ I shouted, but my voice sounded so small. I looked from one end of the corridor to the other.

Suddenly the lights flickered off and it became very dark. It was raining outside but the rain against the glass sounded like a hiss and I felt so, so scared. There was no one to help me.

I closed my eyes and I saw Mum asleep in her chair. I started to cry.

When I opened my eyes again I saw a dark shadow at the very end of the corridor. It started off like a big black balloon hanging in the air, and then it grew and grew until it sank and splatted like a puddle of black oil that spread across the floor. I felt like I couldn’t move. I was just standing there frozen to the spot. Even if the building had exploded I probably would have just stood there. All I could think about was Mum. I watched the puddle as it spread to both sides of the wall and then it started to creep up the wall and I knew what it was.

The black liquid crept up both sides and then each floated into mid-air and joined and spread down to the floor to form a person. It was Ruen as Monster. He was almost as tall as the ceiling and as wide as the corridor and his eyes were tiny and yellow and his skin was a cross between black and purple. He had no ears or nose or hair and his mouth was big and full of sharp yellow teeth.

Then I heard his voice in my head, and it was soft and kind and gentle.

‘Alex,’ he said. ‘Your mother is very, very ill. What will you do to help her?’

I turned and tried to run away towards the other end of the hall, but my legs still felt like they wouldn’t work. I made it about four doors along, but Ruen was there again, right in front of me. This time he was the Old Man, and his arms were tucked behind his back and I could see the black thread hanging from his jacket and snaking up from the floor.

‘Alex,’ he said, ‘your mother is going to die.’ He said it like I was making it happen, like it was my fault.

I started to cry. ‘Help me, someone!’ I shouted.

Ruen reached out to me.
‘I’m
here,
I’m
helping you,’ he said, but I just wanted to run. I felt trapped. I turned to run again but this time I tripped and fell down with my hands outstretched and I hit my forehead on the floor. I wanted to get up but I didn’t have the strength. I put my cheek on the ground and it was cold and I was numb.

Then I felt Ruen stand over me.

‘There is still time, Alex, but you must act quickly. Get up, get up.’

I rolled over on to my back and looked up at him. I felt like it was all over, like I had nothing else in me, like I was empty. ‘You’re a demon,’ I told him. ‘Demons really do hurt people, not help people.’

Ruen grinned. ‘It appears I’m the only one helping you right now, isn’t that so?’

I looked at the ceiling. I could see the light flickering, trying to work. I wondered if there were angels out there. Or a God.

‘Help me,’ I whispered.

‘I
am
helping you,’ Ruen said, walking around me with his arms behind his back. ‘Your mother will live. You just need to do one thing, Alex. Do you think you can do just one thing?’

I felt tears sliding down the sides of my face into my ears. I pressed both hands on my chest and felt myself taking breaths, in and out, and I wished I could give these breaths to my mum. There was nothing else, nothing nothing nothing that I wanted more than to stop her from dying.

Ruen bent down then, right beside me, so close I could smell him. It usually made me gag but it didn’t then. He pressed something cold and sharp into my hand.

‘Do you remember swapping cards with the other boys in the old school, Alex?’

I heard myself say yes.

‘This is like swapping cards. For your mother to live, you need to send someone else in her place.’

I closed my eyes. I knew what he wanted. It was what Ruen had always wanted and even though he hadn’t said so I knew it because I knew Ruen.

‘You want me to kill someone.’

Ruen stopped walking. ‘Don’t you want your mother to live, Alex?’

I rolled up slowly to a sitting position and looked down at what he had put into my hand. At first it looked like a knife made out of glass. I brought it close to my face and saw that it was a broken handle of a glass water jug. The end of it was so sharp that when I tapped it lightly with my finger a small red line of blood appeared above my nail a few seconds later. Ruen looked at me as I held the weapon and gave a big smile.

‘I can’t do it,’ I whispered, but then a new image of Mum flashed in my head, even though I had my eyes open. I saw her hand on the side of the chair, and even though she was asleep I saw her hand fall and I knew she was dying.

I looked up at Ruen. My mouth and eyes were sore and I felt like I was falling. I thought of my dad, my
real
dad, and what he said to Ruen:
My son will pay my debt
. And I thought of Mum, swinging beside me, going higher and higher and higher. She was laughing. When she laughed I felt like my heart would take off. I wanted to hear her laugh again.

Eventually I whispered:

‘Who do you want me to kill?’

26

THE CALL

Anya

Trudy Messenger phones as I am at my flat, both arms filled with clothes and books that I didn’t quite know whether to put back into their boxes or into the cupboards I have recently bought. I hear my mobile ring and expect it to be Michael.

She sounds both angry and relieved at the same time.

‘Anya? I’ve been in touch with the secretaries at MacNeice House, they said you would be gone for some time …’

I take a breath, my heart still heavy. ‘What can I help you with, Trudy?’

Her voice softens. ‘It’s Alex Broccoli’s mother, Cindy. She’s in intensive care.’

‘Intensive care?’

A pause. ‘It’s so rare when this happens, usually security is so tight … Somehow she got hold of barbiturates and …’

It is as if the ground around me has just plummeted ten feet. I can hear her rattle off the words
suicide attempt
and
coma
and
brain damage
, then times and procedures in a slightly shrill voice, but all at a great distance, as if a plane is taking off close by. Eventually, there is silence on the end of the line, and a terrible image unravels in my head: Ursula knocking on Alex’s bedroom door with this news held in her mouth like a concealed weapon.

‘Has anyone told Alex?’

‘Not yet.’

I sink down on the bed, my mind racing with the necessary steps.

‘I’m going over to see him now. When can I bring him to see Cindy?’

‘That won’t be possible,’ Trudy says. ‘Not at the minute. They’re doing everything they can but I don’t know … Cindy’s sister’s here. She’s inconsolable. It would be really traumatic for Alex to be here right now. Let’s wait until things calm down and we have a better idea of Cindy’s condition.’

I nod at the phone, thinking hard about how I might get to see Alex without a confrontation with Ursula. Most likely, telling her about Cindy’s suicide attempt would increase her efforts to block me from seeing him. Right at the moment he needs me most.

Michael’s green Volvo pulls into the car park at MacNeice House a few seconds ahead of me. Ursula appears at the top of the steps, her arms folded. I get out of the car and walk quickly towards the entrance with Michael behind, feeling Ursula’s stare and thinking quickly how to evade her.

It is Michael who speaks first. ‘I think it’s in the boy’s interests that he speak to Anya, don’t you?’

I am at the bottom of the steps, looking up at her.

‘The boy is asking for you,’ she says, pursing her lips. ‘He’s very upset about his mother.’

I feel a deep thud in the pit of my gut. ‘You
told
him?’

She hesitates. ‘Somehow he already knew. He even told us where she’d stashed the tablets.’

I ignore her, taking the steps two at a time. Just as I think she is going to tell me to leave or be forced to leave, she moves aside, letting us through.

‘Don’t sign the register,’ she tells Michael and me as the three of us push through the front door. We follow quickly behind her as she sweeps up the corridor. Michael stops at the vending machine by the doors that lead to the staff offices, fills two plastic cups, one with water, another with espresso, and hands one to me.

‘This is for Alex,’ he says, nodding at the cup of water. ‘You look tired.’

We catch up with Ursula at the therapy room. She turns as she reaches the door.

‘I won’t note that this interview took place,’ she says candidly. ‘Looks bad to the Trust if a member of staff on sick leave appears out of the blue.’

I glance past her and spy Alex through the glass panels. He is sat in the armchair facing us in a white T-shirt with a Bart Simpson logo on the front and new denim jeans, and I notice he has had a haircut. He looks different in kids’ clothes. Normal. Then he lowers his head in his hands, his fingers crawling through his long hair as if he wants to pull his head off. He begins to rock. I nod at Ursula, then watch as she turns the key in the door and pushes it open. I gesture for Michael to go inside first.

‘No,’ Alex says when he looks up. ‘You.’ He points at me.

Michael and I share looks. I turn back to Alex. ‘You just want to speak to me, Alex?’

He nods. Michael shrugs and hands me the cup of water. ‘I’ll wait down the hall,’ he tells me, lifting a hand to my shoulder, then dropping it. I wait until he has walked past and out of sight before I close the door behind me and sit in the chair opposite Alex. He watches me, his face pale and flat.