2
“So he just took your laptop?” said Alice. “Just like that? That so sucks. You’d think you’d at least get a computer out of all this, wouldn’t you?”
Luke stared at her, eyebrows raised, and slowly shook his head. Oh so sensitive Alice.
They were sitting on a fallen tree on the common out behind her home, their bikes dumped at the bottom of the slope nearby. Alice was in faded jeans and a sleeveless top, making the most of the spring sun. Her blonde hair was tied back with a blue and white chequered ribbon, and she had him fixed with her cartoon-big eyes.
“Do you know any more about what happened?” she asked. “The news blogs are still saying it was the Nats.”
Luke shrugged. “Not that I’ve heard, but then no-one ever exactly tells me anything.” The English Nationalists had claimed responsibility within minutes of the bombing, the latest in a wave of atrocities they had been responsible for. Since that first awful evening, when a newsflash on TV seemed to electrify Luke’s mother into a series of telephone calls and then floods of tears – Luke hadn’t even known his father was at that dinner – he and his mother had barely discussed what had happened. It was just a big dark thing, looming over them all, but which nobody would ever comment on.
Alice had no such reservations. “You’d think they would really, wouldn’t you?” she said. “Tell you something, I mean. Even if it’s only to say they still don’t know anything.”
At that moment, Alfie appeared, scrambling up the slope to their fallen tree. He was taller than Luke, his hair darker, but... it was not so much the looks, but something in his manner that made Luke turn away, look down, swallow hard.
Seeing someone who looked and acted just like their father was so difficult.
Now Luke felt something, and he wished he didn’t. He wanted to return to that numbness of not feeling anything at all.
“Hey, bro. Alice,” Alfie said, sitting down between them. “Not interrupting anything, am I?”
Luke glanced at Alice. She was a year younger than him, two years younger than Alfie. She went to the private Lady Maudesley’s Girls’ School in town, and was the only daughter of the Seatons, an old, landed family that could trace its roots to the court of Elizabeth I and beyond. She was a straight A student, president of the school debating society, county-level athlete They had known each other since forever; she was the closest thing he had to a sister.
“You were,” said Alice. “You broke the moment entirely, didn’t he, Luke?”
“Yeah, sure,” said Alfie. “So what’s been happening?”
Luke told him about the visit from Mr Mahmood, and how he had taken their father’s laptop and several box-files full of papers.
“No sweat, bro,” said Alfie. “You can still use mine, can’t you? If you can find it in my room, of course...”
“Alice was saying they still think it was the Nats,” said Luke. He didn’t have to explain what he meant by “it”.
Alfie tore a lump of bark off the tree and tossed it down the muddy slope. “Bound to, aren’t they? They always blame the Nats. Easy target.”
“Well,” said Alice. “That and the fact that the Nats claimed responsibility.”
“Says the press,” said Alfie. “Just like any outspoken minority, the Nats are targeted. If you go online and talk to members of the movement you hear a very different story. That’s all I’m saying.”
“So you’re a Nat?” said Alice. “Well I never would have thought... You: a Nat. How disappointing. I thought you had more brain cells than that.”
“Good to see you showing off your debating skills to their best again,” said Alfie. He flicked another piece of bark at her, lost balance and almost fell off the tree.
All of a sudden, Luke had heard enough. He pushed himself to his feet and stumbled down the slope, trying not to lose balance and slide down on his backside.
“Luke?” Alice called after him.
He raised a hand, but didn’t look back. He didn’t try speaking either, for fear that his voice would crack.
He really didn’t want to feel anything now. Didn’t want to feel anything at all.
He picked up his bike, climbed on, and rode off along the main track across the common.
Later that afternoon, Luke sat with his mother and Alfie at their chunky old kitchen table, each of them cradling a mug of tea.
“Have you cleared his clothes yet?” asked Alfie. His tone was easy, conversational, no hint at all that he was talking about something as weighty as clearing out his dead father’s belongings only a few days after his death.
She looked down into her mug. Today she’d tied her dark hair into a practical but unflattering pony-tail.
“It needs to be done,” pressed Alfie.
“We could do it together,” said Luke. If Mr Mahmood doesn’t get there first, he thought.
A short time later the three of them were in Luke’s parents’ bedroom. They paused, looking at each other. Light streamed in angled beams through the windows, bleaching colour from everything it struck.
For a moment, Luke thought his mother was going to cry again, but then Alfie said, “Right. Let’s do it.” Alfie had always been the one to take control, cutting through any nonsense. Now, he flung open the nearest wardrobe’s doors, stepped forward, took an armful of clothes and hauled them out onto the bed. Then he started to stuff them one by one into a black bin bag.
“No!” cried Luke’s mother, rushing forward. “Like this. Fold them. They’ll go to charity.”
She showed Alfie how to fold shirts properly: face down, sleeves folded into the back, and then the tail folded up to the collar.
When Alfie tried the whole thing fell apart again and he stuffed the shirt into a bag as he had been doing. Soon, the three of them were shoving great bundles of clothes into the plastic sacks, pushing and giggling like little children.
After a few minutes Luke stopped, holding onto the end of the bed to catch his breath. He couldn’t remember the last time they had all laughed like this. It felt as if someone had lifted a weight from them all. He caught his mother’s eye, smiled, and then turned to the next drawer.
That was where he found the note. It was in an envelope, tucked under a chaotic jumble of mismatched socks. On the front of the envelope were the words “Just in case”.
Silently, Luke turned and held it out to his mother so that she could see the words.
She took the envelope from him and turned it over in her hands.
Alfie broke the limbo. “Well are you going to open it, then?” he said.
She did so.
Luke watched her reading the note, and then she turned the single sheet of paper so that he and Alfie could see.
Luke - be True to yourself
Alfie - be Strong, be Patient
Julie - try to Forgive, please
That was all.
Alfie turned away, shaking his head. His eyebrows were ridged in the middle, the way they went whenever Luke had really wound him up. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he said. “What’s the point in that?”
Luke wondered what the message meant too. What did his mother have to forgive? And what did he mean by telling Luke to be true to himself?
“He must have known he was at risk of some sort,” he said, softly.
His mother put a hand on his arm. “He worked in security at the Home Office, Luke. There was always risk.”
Luke thought of the routine of always parking the family car in a locked garage and checking underneath for signs of interference before you ever climbed in. You never knew where the Nats would strike next. They had all been aware of the risk. Any government official could be targeted these days.
“But... what’s the point?” said Alfie. “If you’re going to leave a message why leave something so meaningless and cryptic?”
Alfie spun, took a step towards the door, then paused. Looking back over his shoulder he added, “He might at least have told us something useful.” Then he walked out, leaving Luke staring at his mother, watching that tremble in her lip, that filling of the eyes, as she started to cry again.
Early evening and the sun still high in a blue sky, Luke paused to open the garage’s side door, four black bin bags of clothes at his feet. Just then he heard the rattle and crunching gravel of an approaching bicycle; he turned and saw Uncle Phil pulling up and dismounting in the drive.
Phil was a good ten years older than his sister, Luke’s mother, but his owl glasses and trimmed silver beard made him look even older.
“Luke,” he said. “Luke. How are you?”
Luke sighed. “Fine, Phil,” he said. “Thanks.” He refused to ask the same question in return. Phil had just lost his brother-in-law: either he was grieving or he wasn’t and so was feeling guilty that he didn’t feel more. Luke knew exactly how that worked.
“Been having a clear-out?” Phil propped his bike against the side wall of the garage. Then he added, “Ah, yes... of course. A clear-out. Sorry. Give you a hand?”
Between them, they only needed a couple of trips to bring all the bags down to the garage. There was a lot more still to do, but they had made a good start.
As they added the last bags to the heap, Phil paused and said, “You know, I had a strange chat with your dad last week. ‘Make sure you see Julie and the boys before the end of next week, will you?’ he said. Made me promise I would. Well, it’s Friday now. I’d been thinking of dropping by tomorrow, but I remembered what he’d said, so I thought I’d come and see, you know, how you all are. You doing okay? Or... as okay as, you know...”
Luke nodded. “Yes, we’re okay, thanks.” Or as okay as, you know, anyway.
Uncle Phil stayed for dinner. In fact he provided it, riding down into the main part of the village to the Bengal Spice for a takeaway, and returning with bags of food strung from his handlebars. The spring weather was so mild that they spread the cartons out on a wooden picnic table in the garden and sat eating ever more slowly until the sun had dropped behind the trees and the mozzies started to bite.
Then Phil climbed onto his bike, a little tipsy from Cobra beer, and headed for his home down in the village. It was only then that Luke really started to think about his uncle’s words earlier: the conversation with Luke’s father the week before, the importance of visiting before the end of the week. And that was when Luke started to think impossible thoughts...