Danny had been offered a place at university and come September he’d be moving to Cambridge. It wasn’t that far from Ely, but Jen felt like he was going to the other side of the world.
Before he left home, he was going to walk the Cleveland Way as part of his gold Duke of Edinburgh Award. The night before he left, they went for a walk down by the river. It had been a nice day and there were still tourists about, stopping on the bridge to look at the boatyard, sauntering past weeping willows where a grassy patch of park met the riverbank. Behind them were the cathedral gardens and the building itself, turning the rest of the town to Lego. Danny and Jen sat on the steps in front of a waterfront bar. A couple walked in front of them. The man had his wallet in the back pocket of his jeans.
“I could steal that,” said Danny.
“He’d notice.”
“I bet he wouldn’t.”
“What will you bet?”
“My leather jacket.”
Jen had tried Danny’s jacket on before, posed in front of the bedroom mirror. It was a biker jacket, way too big for her, and black, a colour she never wore. But when she’d looked at herself, hidden inside the leather like a child dressing up in adult’s clothes, she hugged herself, breathed in deeply. The jacket smelled of patchouli and of Danny. He’d bought it second hand in a shop in Cambridge when he went for his interview.
“So, if he notices you’ll give me your jacket.”
“Scout’s honour.”
“What if he calls the police?”
“He won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because he won’t notice me take it.” The couple stopped to watch some ducks on the river. “Come on.”
They went down the steps, veering left behind the couple. Jen found she was holding her breath, but nothing happened. There was no sudden shout, and Danny was swinging his arms by his sides. When they reached the bridge, Jen breathed out and laughed. “Chicken,” she said.
Danny held out his palm and on it was the man’s wallet, fat and brown and stuffed with cash.
“How the hell did you do that?”
“Told you,” said Danny.
“I don’t believe it.”
The couple had started walking again and were nearly abreast of Jen and Danny. The woman was talking and the man was smiling. They didn’t seem to notice the two of them leaning against the wall as they walked past.
“Danny!” Jen said under her breath.
“Excuse me.” The couple turned as Danny caught up with them. “I think you dropped this.”
The man took the wallet with a look of astonishment. “Oh, thank you.”
“I told you,” said the woman. “It’s not safe in your pocket.”
The man was looking at the wallet. “I don’t know what to say. You’ve saved me a lot of trouble. Can I give you a reward?”
Danny shook his head.
“You must,” said the woman. “It would have ruined our trip.”
“No, I just saw it fall. I didn’t do anything.”
The man had taken out a twenty-pound note and tried to put it into Danny’s hand, but he wouldn’t take it.
“Please. It would make me feel better. Take your girlfriend for a drink with it.”
Jen was trying not to laugh. The words, “He’s my brother!” burst out of her.
“Well, take this and make sure he gets something nice with it,” said the man, and he shoved the note into Jen’s palm. “Young men like you,” he said to Danny, “restore my faith in humanity. Thank you.”
“You have a wonderful brother,” said the woman. They turned and walked away. The woman took the wallet from the man and zipped it inside her shoulder bag. Danny looked appalled.
“We can’t keep it,” he said.
“My brother the thief,” Jen grinned.
Danny snatched the money from her and chased after the couple. They turned and Jen saw him gesticulating, then them reluctantly accepting the money. They walked on out of sight and Danny returned.
“What did you say?” asked Jen.
“I asked them to give it to charity.”
“Cool.”
“I get to keep my jacket though.”
“You could have a career doing that,” Jen said. “Will you teach me?”
Wolf stopped the bike outside the cottage. “Get what you need and be quick.”
The girls ran inside. Jen grabbed her books from her bed, stuffed them into her backpack along with some clothes that were lying about. Her dead mobile was already in the bag with her wallet. She didn’t have anything else.
Ethie had rolled up her nun’s clothes and was trying to fit them into her basket.
“How are you going to carry that on a bike?”
Ethie frowned. Ever since she lost the medallion she’d seemed confused and scared, and for the first time Jen felt like she was in charge.
“Put them in here,” she said, holding out her backpack. “If we stuff everything down, we’ll get it in.” Then they were back on the bike, roaring off into the night, Jen at the back clinging to Ethie for dear life.
They stuck to country lanes, zigzagging this way and that, and Jen had the feeling they were going south, but she couldn’t be sure. It seemed like they were travelling through the night forever, but when they stopped it was still dark. They were next to a bus stop in a village.
“We’ll leave the bike here,” Wolf said. “I’ll let Jerry know, he’ll get it back to the owner.”
“What are we going to do?” asked Jen.
“The first bus will be along soon,” said Wolf.
Light was coming into the sky. Ethie sat on a doorstep with her head on her knees. Anxiety or a hangover kicking in. Most probably both.
Wolf sat on the bus stop bench, his hands in his lap, his lips moving. Jen sat next to him and watched a pair of cats stalking their night-time territories.
“What are you saying?” she said after a while.
Wolf let his voice become audible. “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
“That’s the Jesus Prayer,” Jen said. “That’s the thing they say in Franny and Zooey.”
He smiled and nodded and kept saying the prayer, silently without ceasing.
By the time the bus came there were quite a few other people waiting, men and women in dark coats and overalls, heads down, still with the smell of sleep about them. They nodded to each other as they arrived and cast curious glances at the three strangers. Nobody spoke.
The bus was full. Jen, Ethie and Wolf went to the back and sat crammed on the seat either side of two surly men and a woman who had nodded back to sleep.
Although it had begun to get light, the yellow glow inside the bus threw the outside world back into darkness. Jen couldn’t see anything except when they passed through a village. More people got on and, by the time they reached the outskirts of a town, the aisle was crowded with people standing, holding onto the backs of seats and the overhead bar to keep themselves from stumbling as the bus turned sharp corners, raced round a roundabout.
Jen couldn’t see Wolf and Ethie on the other side of the passengers. Surrounded by strangers, hurtling through the failing dark, coats and hats reflected in bus windows, she felt the world falling away from her. I could be anyone, she thought None of these people know me.
The bus stopped outside a huge factory and all the other passengers got off, leaving the three of them alone at the back of the bus. I could follow them into their lives. No one would ever find me. Ethie had fallen asleep, her head dropped onto Wolf’s shoulder. His head was bowed but his eyes were open, and his lips were still moving. The bus rattled its way into town through the empty streets.
The bus turned sharp left and Jen saw a sign for Middlesbrough Bus Station. They pulled in beside a long glass and concrete shelter and the three of them got off, stumbling with tiredness.
Wolf steered them to a small café with Formica tables and ordered strong coffee and egg butties all round.
“We’ve got a head start,” he said, “but we need to keep moving. The moment Beau notices the medallion isn’t in his pocket, he’ll be after us. If we’re lucky he won’t notice for a while, but he could have spotted it straight away, so no rest I’m afraid.”
“Could I have a banana?” said Ethie.
Wolf glanced round. A bowl of oranges and bananas and apples was sitting on the counter. He gave Ethie some coins and she went up to the counter.
“Are you going to be OK?” Wolf asked Jen. “No more taking it easy.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“Sorry I took the medallion. I don’t know what came over me, I was just angry at the way he’d been with Ethie and did it without even thinking, and now I’ve got us into all this trouble.”
“Jen, you have no idea. We, Ethie and I, especially Ethie, are completely in your debt. OK, we’re running, but it would be a lot worse if Ethie had lost the medallion.”
“Why?”
“It’s a long story, but let’s just say there’s someone who would like to hurt Ethie, cause her harm, and that medallion is her protection.”
“Is it magic or something?”
“In a way. It’s symbolic. Its power is in what it represents.”
“Is it Egfrith?”
“Yes, that is his name.”
“And this Egfrith believes in the medallion, does he?”
“Oh yes. If she lost it and he got to hear about it, she’d be in a lot of trouble.”
Ethie sat back down with her banana. She held it in both hands then laid it down on the table and ran her finger along its length. She looked up at the other two and grinned.
“Bananas are amazing. I can never get over bananas.”
“Why do you say the Jesus Prayer?” asked Jen.
Ethie was peeling the fruit, looking at it, lifting it to her mouth, in a way which would have seemed suggestive in another person. She looked like a child with a treat. Jen remembered the night before in the club, the cocktail with the cherries and oranges.
“Remember Nadia? Who gave us a lift?” said Wolf. Jen nodded. “She and her sister, Berta, they live on islands, shut themselves away from the world in the hope that that way they will find God.”
Ethie pulled the last piece of the banana out of the skin and put it in her mouth. “Ascetics,” she said with her mouth full.
“They believe that if they control their surroundings, eat simple food, have few clothes or possessions, then they will be closer to the divine.”
“You don’t agree?”
“I believe we carry God within us. That we can live in the world and still have that connection.”
“And the Jesus Prayer?”
“Is a way of strengthening that connection. I hope. Like breathing brings oxygen to the body, praying without ceasing can make you one with God.”
“How long have you been saying it?”
“Not long enough.” He looked at Ethie who had finished her banana, then out at the bus station which was bathed in daylight. “We need to get going,” he said.
They caught another bus out of the city. Ethie was still wearing the jeans and white shirt from the night before, and in the morning light, with her short hair standing on end, she looked younger than ever. Jen sat next to her, and Wolf on the seat in front. Ethie was looking out of the window, pointing every now and then to things that caught her attention – a horse, a bad-tempered looking sheep, a pointed hill that Wolf said was named Roseberry Topping.
Jen thought about the marks she’d seen on her cousin’s thighs and stomach, about Egfrith whom they were running from, and Beau whom they’d cheated at poker, and she wanted to put her arm around Ethie. She’d never had a younger sibling. Lyddie and Grace were both younger than her, but they were different. They didn’t need her. Lyddie was blonde and confident, as good looking as her father, and Grace was a sculptor. She was sixteen and didn’t care what she looked like. She tramped around the island in wellies and an old fisherman’s jumper and produced work that had art colleges fighting over her. Jen was a bit scared of her. Ethie wasn’t like them.
Jen stretched out her arm and took Ethie’s hand. Her cousin turned and looked at her. After a while she looked back out of the window, but she didn’t remove her hand.
They got off the bus just before it reached Saltburn and walked into the edge of the town underneath a huge redbrick viaduct.
“Where are we going?” Jen asked.
“We’ll keep moving south,” said Wolf. “Stay out of towns. Walk in the mornings and the evenings. Beau and Eg, they’ll both be looking for us.”
“We can find sanctuary in Whitby,” said Ethie.
Jen had arrived back at university on Easter Monday. She hadn’t told anyone at home what had happened, or that she was leaving. She walked across campus and didn’t see a single person, only ducks, geese, swans.
She let herself into her room and lay down on the bed. She listened. Normally there was a constant hum of traffic from the main road, but this was a bank holiday. A crow called from the tree outside, and there was a flurry of quacking and splashes from an altercation at the lake. The sky was grey with low hanging clouds. Jen pressed into the mattress. She lay still, listening, until it got dark, and then she fell asleep.
When she woke, she was in the same position on the bed and the dark was fading. She hadn’t eaten since she left home yesterday morning. Her stomach hurt. In the communal kitchen she looked in the cupboards, the fridge. There wasn’t much food. She found hash browns in the freezer and put them under the grill. There were frozen peas and half a tub of Haagen Dazs, spaghetti, three tins of baked beans, some cream crackers, half a box of Coco Pops. She ate the hash browns with her fingers, sitting on the floor in front of the fridge.
Later, when it was dark, she went outside in her pyjamas and bare feet. She tiptoed across the bridge and between the buildings, past the handkerchief tree, and round the corner to where the Buddha sat. She sat down, facing him, her legs crossed.
They left Saltburn along a red sandy path which climbed up the edge of the cliff. The sea was shining in the morning sun. The path had a sign engraved with an acorn.
“What’s that for?” asked Ethie.
“It’s the sign for the national trails,” said Wolf. “This is the Cleveland Way. It goes right down the coast.”
“My brother went to walk the Cleveland Way,” said Jen.
“We know,” said Ethie.
“That’s why we’re going this way,” said Wolf.