So Rose is after me. I’m sure of it. I only caught a brief glimpse of somebody watching as I left Bolt’s shop, but I could swear it was her. It’s too much of a coincidence, and I’ve never really believed in those. Why is she shadowing me? Did Julian put her up to it? Or is she following me on somebody else’s orders?
It’s time I set a trap of my own.
I wander back towards Brick Lane. I shouldn’t go far. If Rose is following me, there’s no point setting a trap if I lose her.
I size up a hotel and go in. It’s nothing fancy; a chain that probably looks the same no matter which part of the country you’re in. The walls are sunshine yellow. A smiley celebrity probably paid a fortune for her face grins from every leaflet. A fake potted plant sits on the desk. The man behind it is just as genuine, grimacing through fake tan at my bedraggled clothes and hair. I’m surprised he doesn’t shoo me away. Turns out beggars can be choosers.
‘Will that be a twin or single room?’ he asks.
I really want to say ‘twin’ and feed his sordid imagination, but I’m too tired and, honestly, he’s easy prey.
‘Single,’ I say, pulling out the bank notes.
‘Fill this out.’ He nudges a form across the desk. I use the standard bullshit details I’ve perfected over years of filling out forms – my fake name, Cherry Gently, is too good to retire now – then pay him from my dwindling stock of cash. He hands me a key card. I ride the lift to the fifth floor and wander down a corridor that stinks of cigarettes and cleaning chemicals, then use the key to get into my room.
The bed looks so fluffy I almost collapse into it at once, but I resist with all my willpower. At the window, I peer through the net curtains. The street seems a long way down, cars honking as they line up. The building across the street is typical London – a fried chicken shop on the ground floor, and everything above it is flats. There’s a flat roof the chicken shop guys probably use to smoke weed. It’s perfect for what I’ve got planned.
I glance at the digital clock by the bed.
14:30.
How long will it take? I’m not sure. If Rose followed me to Bolt’s it stands to reason she’s followed me here, too. I wonder if she saw me check in. Maybe she’s standing outside the door with a gun in her hand. Killing me won’t achieve anything, though. If I’m a scapegoat, she needs me alive.
I go to the door and press an eye to the peephole.
The corridor’s clear.
My feet take me back to the bed, but that would be the end of me. Maybe it’s the exhaustion but for a moment I wonder if an end – ending it all – would be a good thing. I’m a deadly contagion. Spend too much time with me and I’m in your bloodstream, spreading sickness, setting you up for a messy fall.
On the bureau sits a pot of shiny cutlery. The knife looks blunt, but if I grit my teeth, I should be able to get the job done. That’d rob Rose and Julian and whoever else of the victory. I’d claim it for myself.
My fingers reach for the knife.
No. That wouldn’t be a victory. It’d be giving in for good. I imagine the look on my mother’s face, a kind of snarling disappointment, and I reach past the knife, grab the kettle. I fill it with water from the bathroom and make myself a strong cup of instant coffee. It tastes like dirt but I cram biscuits into my mouth, too, and I begin to feel better. Not as cold. My fingers tingle.
Turning the radio on, I clamber onto the bed and jump up and down on it, stuffing more biscuits into my mouth. I’m fizzing with nervous energy and I can’t stay still.
Let’s not make it easy for them. Whoever’s setting me up obviously wants me floating in dirty water the way my mother was. Imagine how surprised they’ll be when they discover my backbone’s adamantium like Wolverine’s. All the people I’ve killed, all the guilt and hatred and confusion, it hardens a person. I know what Bolt meant when he said I’d changed.
I’m not going down without a fight.
When I look at the clock again, it’s 15:50. The world’s darkening and I should probably get moving before it’s too dark to see properly. The bed looks suitably messy and I leave the bathroom light on, the shower running. If somebody listens at the door, they’ll think I’m in here.
There’s an umbrella in the wardrobe. I grab it.
Checking through the peephole, I see the corridor’s clear and crack open the door. Peer out. Still nobody. The door clicks behind me and I hurry for the fire exit, shoving it open, relieved it’s not alarmed. I peer down the metal staircase, checking nobody’s lying in wait, then hurry down it, the stairs clanging in the enclosed space no matter how quietly I step.
I shove the emergency exit open and hurry into the cold autumn air. At the end of the alley, I glimpse the street and move swiftly towards it, scanning the alley for movement. I’m the only one here.
At the street, I huddle against the wall, watching. I don’t see Rose. Or Reverend Mara. Or black-masked ninjas with guns. They could be anywhere. I’ll just have to risk it. Better to risk it than get caught in this alley. They could do whatever they liked to me then and nobody would notice.
The umbrella clicks open and I clutch it low enough to obscure my face. Taking a breath, I hurry across the road, my heart thrashing in my chest. Reaching the other side, I hop into another alley.
It’s almost identical to the one I just left. Filled with bins and tumbling newspaper rags. I feel beady eyes watching me from under the bins and hope it’s only rats.
A wooden fence runs along the side of the alley. Over it is the space behind the fried chicken shop and a rickety set of stairs is fixed to the back wall. Another fire escape, just where I’d hoped it would be.
I listen. Hear voices. But they’re coming through a window. Workers in the chicken shop’s kitchen. Tossing the umbrella aside, I grab the fence and heave myself up. Splinters skewer my palms and I grit my teeth, throwing a leg over the fence and rolling to the other side, only just getting my boots under me in time to land.
Shooting a glance at the back of the chicken shop, I’m relieved the kitchen windows are steamed up. Nobody can see me. If I move quickly, they’ll never know I was there.
Ignoring my stinging palms I rush for the fire escape, holding my breath the whole way up. I count five windows as I go. At the top, I clamber onto the grey square of roof, weak with relief.
It’s spitting rain. I stare out across the network of rooftops. Broccoli-like treetops sprout between the buildings and, in the distance, a twinkle of light comes from the skyscrapers in Canary Wharf.
I’m suddenly aware of how exposed I am. The wind whips my hair into my eyes. Quickly, I cross the roof and crouch by the waist-high ledge, shielded from the road below.
The hotel rests across the street. Peeking over the edge, I count the windows until I reach a room with a dim glow behind net curtains. The bathroom light I left on. The room’s still empty, as far as I can tell.
My pulse begins to slow and I slump against a chimney pot.
Now the waiting begins.
It’s pitch dark before I’m even aware of the fading light, and with the dark comes a nipping wind. I wrap my coat tighter and put my hood up, but it doesn’t help. The cold’s in my bones. An icy certainty that this is all going to end with me dead and nobody even caring enough to put me in the ground. Which is fine. What have I ever done for anybody?
I glance periodically over at my hotel room, sure that whoever’s set me up will break in at any moment. At least then I’ll know who I’m really up against. I’ll be pissed if it’s Julian. He’s provided the only income I’ve ever had. If he’s using me as a scapegoat, I can kiss goodbye to the flat. The mattress on the floor. The odds and ends I put in there to make it into a home.
I have no idea what the time is. The traffic becomes a rushing torrent of fumes and angry engines, then finally subsides. I watch the commuter army cram into the nearest Tube station, then the street quietens.
It has to be around 8pm.
Huddling against the chimney, my mind wanders back to Bolt’s place. He said I’d changed, but he was different, too. Calmer, when he wasn’t trying to crush my throat. Maybe he’s grown up. Unless he’s in on this, too. He’d nearly choked me when I turned up, which I’d half expected. Was it just an act? Had he been calm after that because he’d been waiting for me to turn up?
I tear my nails with my teeth. I’m so paranoid I almost don’t even trust myself.
Would you trust somebody who could kill you just by sitting next to you?
I catch movement out of the corner of my eye. A shadow passes through my hotel room. I tense against the roof ledge, craning as far forward as I dare, squinting at the hotel.
Somebody’s broken into my room. Somebody’s been following me.
Instead of feeling relief that I’m not completely paranoid, I chew the inside of my cheek. The shape in the hotel room moves stealthily behind the net curtain and I can’t tell who it is. Rose? Julian?
The shadow goes into the bathroom, then comes out again and approaches the bed. Something goes flying. Must be the duvet. The figure’s at the window. It looks out, searching. Then it stops moving. I crouch lower, but it’s too late. It’s seen me.
The figure draws the netting aside and I glimpse long, ghostly white hair. It frames a narrow, bony face. Dark eyes blaze across the space between us.
And I’ve gone mad.
I cease to exist. I’m blank and inside out and dead and alive all at once.
Because I know that face.
It belongs to my mother.