Chapter 62
LIKE THE FLAMES WERE HIS WINGS
“I found you in the early hours of this morning,” said Roy Hanbury. “You were lying outside the front door without a stitch on—naked as the day you were born. You had your eyes wide open, looking up towards the sky—but you didn’t seem to be seeing anything. You just had this blank look on your face.”
Charlie Faultless stared at Christ above Hanbury’s mantelpiece. The figure seemed serene in its suffering. But Faultless knew there was no tranquility in anguish. Only dread and terror. Only loneliness and hopelessness.
He looked at his shoulder and ran a finger from his collar bone down to the middle of his chest. He felt a burning pain as his finger traced a line down to his solar plexus.
But his skin was unmarked. No seared flesh. No charred bone. It was as if he’d been healed.
“I remember where I saw the old man,” he said.
“You what?”
He told Hanbury what he was talking about.
“That fellow. Must’ve been a stranger. Told you, Charlie. He didn’t ring no bells with me, and I know pretty much every—”
“I saw him in my dream,” Faultless interrupted.
“Your dream? Not you as well. Does everyone have dreams and visions except for me? Do you believe all of this?”
Faultless stared at Christ.
“There’s not a shred of evidence to back up claims made by psychics and mediums, and dream interpretation is bollocks,” he said. “But I saw this guy when I arrived, and I’ve seen him before, Roy—in my past.”
Hanbury shook his head. “I’m getting my snake.” He went to the vivarium and opened the lid. He reached inside and gently lifted out the python, draping the serpent over his shoulders. The moment the animal rested on him, Hanbury appeared to relax.
“Did you see anyone?” asked Charlie.
“Told you—I opened the door, and there you were.”
Faultless touched his chest again, where Buckley had blowtorched him.
Hanbury said, “Are you sure you’re not high on something, and you dreamt—”
Faultless glared at Hanbury. “I didn’t dream the pain, Roy. They picked me up, two of them in a black BMW. I woke up in a fucking cellar. Graveney was there. His son. And this Buckley arsehole with his blowtorch. I remember the pain.”
“Well, if they scarred you, it cleared up pretty well. Perhaps God healed you, son. Though I don’t know why. You ain’t repented yet. Tell me again what you saw.”
Faultless blew air out of his cheeks. “Graveney was coming towards me, and all of a sudden, this shape just appears behind the bastard. And it was him, Roy. The old fella. The one with the tuft on his chin. Leather waistcoat. Weird tattoos. He was there, and he was surrounded by fire. Like the flames were his wings. I felt the heat. The fire just swallowed Graveney up, and when it cleared, he weren’t there no more. I just passed out, I guess. But I got this recollection of being wrapped up warm. It was all soft. Like feathers, you know? But real silky feathers. And there was blood on them, and the smell of meat too.”
Hanbury shook his head and stroked his python.
“You don’t believe me?” said Faultless.
“I don’t know what to believe any more.”
“You believe in God, mate.”
“He’s sound ‘cause he’s the Lord Jesus Christ, while you’re an untrustworthy little shit.”
“Cheers, Roy.”
“Well, you’re better than you were. Get on with your jackanory.”
“I was being carried, like I say. Wrapped in these . . . feathers. Carried around by this old fella. His little beard. His eyes . . . black and cold, but they felt safe, you know. I shut my eyes, then I went to sleep. Next thing, I’m getting cold. I wake up, and the old fella’s putting me down on cold, hard concrete. He’s taking my feathers away, mate. And he’s gone. Gone into the darkness. And I’m left there, hazy. I must’ve lost consciousness again. Next thing I remember is just now, waking up in there.”
Faultless thought about things.
Then he asked, “Do you know who my dad was?”
Hanbury stared at him. “How the fuck should I know? I’m not Jeremy fucking Kyle with my DNA test, you know.”
“You knew everything.”
“Bollocks.”
“Was it Tony Graveney?”
“What makes you think that?”
“He was messing about with my mum.”
“Don’t mean nothing. That was years after you was born, son.”
“He wasn’t coming back for more, then?”
Hanbury shook his head.
“Was it you, Roy?”
Hanbury’s face darkened.
“I’m only asking.”
“Don’t ask fuckwit questions like that, Charlie.”
“I want to know.”
“Some things we’re not meant to know, son.”
“Not meant to know? Why aren’t we meant to know them?”
“Cause maybe they can kill us.”
“What d’you mean?”
“I mean I’m not your bloody dad, and maybe you’ll never find who it is, that’s what I mean.”
Faultless was quiet for a few seconds, thinking. Then he said, “Was Pat Faultless my mum?”
“You what?”
“You heard.”
“Jesus, I don’t know.”
“I dreamt I was being laid at someone’s door.”
“You were—at mine, last night.”
“But it’s happened before. I know it has.”
“How can you know, Charlie?”
Faultless gestured at Christ over the mantelpiece. “You know he’s your savior. And that’s irrational.”
“It fucking ain’t.”
“It fucking is. You can’t prove it. You ain’t got evidence.”
“I got personal experience.”
“Yeah, and every nut in the worlds got personal experience of something Roy. Fucking alien abduction. UFOs. Ghosts. Everything’s a personal experience.”
“So what?”
“If yours is valid, way ain’t theirs? Why ain’t mine?”
The snake slithered down Hanbury’s leg.