‘OY! LADY A!’ A VOICE yelled from above as Ava and Fizz rounded the corner of Dowry House.
She squinted to see Nathaniel Marlowe waving from the top floor gallery of the apartment block. ‘Come on! I want to meet your new friend.’
Ava frowned upwards. ‘Come down then!’ she yelled back.
Nathaniel tut-tutted. ‘I’ve got to be up here for a bit. Could you bring the packet of fags from the trailer, please?’
Good manners were Ava’s weakness. War Horse was leaning against the foyer wall, and she noticed it had been further modified with a motor. Ava retrieved the packet of Benson & Hedges from the trailer.
She’d never been in any other block of flats except her own and, although the layout was the same, it was unfamiliar. With Fizz’s panting loud in the quiet of the building, she pressed the button for the elevator.
The lift doors opened to reveal Nathaniel crouched on his haunches. Fizz bounded over and sniffed every detail of him. Nathaniel’s face was impossible to read, and it had a fresh bruise marring his cheek but Ava sensed he was in a good mood. She handed him the cigarettes.
‘War Horse has an engine,’ she said.
Nathaniel grinned, puzzled. ‘War Horse?’
Ava shrugged. ‘It’s what I call your bike.’
He nodded in approval. ‘War Horse it is.’ He stood and smiled down at Fizz who sat and looked up at the boy. ‘He’s a chunky young fella.’
‘His name’s Fizz and he usually hates all men,’ said Ava out of habit.
‘Who doesn’t?’ said Nathaniel.
‘He was treated badly by men,’ said Ava, also out of habit.
‘Who isn’t?’ Nathaniel’s hands caressed the bustling canine, then reached into his pocket and gave the terrier a biscuit. As Fizz munched, Nathaniel looked to Ava, his odd eyes startling in the amaranth light. ‘I’ve got the coolest den to show you,’ Nathaniel said. ‘The Sky Den.’
Ava nodded. There was an interlacing of familiarity, no shyness, no awkwardness.
‘But before we go, we must do this,’ said Nathaniel. He rolled the sleeves of his shirt to his elbows and Ava noticed the bandages wrapped tight around his forearms. He snapped the lead from the dog’s harness, circled the lead around Ava’s waist, threaded the clip end through the handle then re-attached it to the harness. Suddenly she was hands-free. Nathaniel moved with efficient speed, and he hadn’t touched her once. Often boys – especially older boys – snatched any opportunity to touch a girl in places they shouldn’t, as a ‘game’, even if the girl was younger.
He pulled out a key from behind a section of loose concrete in the wall then unlocked the door to reveal stairs that led up to the roof.
‘We’ll get into trouble,’ whispered Ava.
‘We won’t,’ he said.
Ava and Fizz walked past maintenance cupboards then up the short flight of steps. The turret door opened to the roar of the wind which snatched their breath away.
They were on the roof! Gusts pushed Ava this way and that, but with the lead wrapped around her waist both she and Fizz were secure with each other’s weight. She’d never imagined being on the roof of these apartment blocks in her life.
Nathaniel laughed as he leaned against the wind, which was so strong it held him upright.
She walked slowly, distrusting of the wind, not wanting to be scooped aloft and thrown to the ground below. They pushed on to the furthest corner of the right wing of the building until she saw it – a perfect den. Ava grinned. Perhaps seeing her response as his cue, Nathaniel smiled too. The den was tucked into the corner, out of the wind, about as big as an Austin Mini, raised on wooden pallets for the floor, and constructed of breeze blocks, wood fencing and, on one side, a window made entirely of Corona pop bottles, their thick bottoms facing out. Its roof was corrugated iron draped in a black tarpaulin. A length of thick tarp material covering the entrance flapped in the wind.
Nathaniel pulled back the tarp and Ava bent to look inside. Fizz, jumping in, began sniffing everything: a sleeping bag, camping kettle and stove, and a tin mug. Milky light filtered in through the bottle window.
Nathaniel was watching her reaction.
‘It’s like Stig of the Dump,’ she said, delighted. ‘How’d you get away with it?’
Nathaniel pointed behind her. ‘Look at the view.’
Ava gingerly approached the edge then looked out, not down. It was like being on the prow of a galleon sailing through the skies, the rose clouds rolling past as if they were not the ones moving, but the building. Up here, they seemed to sweep forth on the crest of a wave of green hills and fields, and the houses of Frankley Estate. The wind snatched at her breath, her smile puncturing dimples in her cheeks.
‘I come here to think,’ said Nathaniel. ‘I’ve got dens all over, but this is my best one.’
‘Why show me?’ said Ava, because it had to be asked.
Nathaniel considered for a moment then said, ‘Because you’re all right, Lady A. You’re all right with me.’
Ava wasn’t sure what he meant by this. She supposed it was similar to how she felt around certain people who managed to slip through the chinks in her armour as if she never had any, people she felt safe with. It was strange but symbiotic alliances came in all shapes and sizes – like plover birds cleaning the mouths of crocodiles.
The scar on Nathaniel’s head was pale against his recent tan. Ava kept her face impassive as she wondered at the scar and the bruise on his cheek. Did he get into fights? Were his parents hurting him? It was difficult to imagine anyone hurting Nathaniel because he was tall and strong and he’d thrown Brett Arbello like he was thistledown.
Nathaniel sat on the edge of the building with his back to the drop, lit a cigarette, and crossed one leg over the other, his gaze inscrutable.
‘How’d you get that scar?’ Ava asked before she could stop herself.
‘Last September I had an accident at my dad’s junkyard.’ It was obviously a popular question, as he answered it with ease. Trevor had once taken them to the Marlowe junkyard, but children weren’t allowed inside so they had waited in the car. The yard had huge guard dogs. ‘The crane claw clipped my head as I ran around a corner. I don’t wear a hard hat, see, like I should. I ripped my head open and pushed bone into my brain. I was in a coma for a week, but I got better.’
‘Does it still hurt?’ she asked.
‘Nah. I get migraines now. They get so bad I can’t go to school or work but I get through them.’
This would explain his irregular but long absences from school. He was a prefect so she’d always noticed when he wasn’t at his usual post at the bottom of East Block stairway.
But Ava sympathised – her father had also suffered terrible migraines for most of his life.
‘You could’ve died though,’ she said.
Nathaniel stood, stomped on the cigarette stub, his face relaxed. He said nothing.
‘How’d you get that bruise?’ she asked, emboldened by his easy-going attitude though it was cheeky and none of her business.
For a fleeting moment, she saw anger ripple across his features, but she felt the anger was not aimed at her. Then he said with sardonic humour, ‘I fell on a desk again.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s nothing much. My dad and I have the same bad temper when we disagree and we’re blokes so sometimes . . . ’ He shrugged again. ‘We scuffle.’
Ava was angry for him because she suspected Nathaniel was being loyal to his abusive father, taking on some of the blame for his father’s violence. She no longer blamed herself for her own mother’s habitual cruelties, and she wondered if, like her, Nathaniel had a mother who wouldn’t protect him. She pointed at his bandages in a silent question.
‘You’re a bit nosey, aren’t you, Lady A?’ There was no bite in his tone just amusement.
Ava blushed. ‘Sorry.’
‘I play rough with my dogs, that’s all,’ said Nathaniel. ‘They forget sometimes who’s boss.’
‘Oh,’ said Ava. His explanation could be true – she’d seen the Marlowe dogs from behind a fence and they looked ferocious. Fizz whined, and looked up at her.
‘Come on, Lady A,’ Nathaniel said. ‘I’ll take you down.’
As Ava turned away, she caught Nathaniel hiding the key in a hole in the concrete above the door before replacing it. To anyone else but them, it would just look like a crack in the wall.