Edge (6 page)

    "You actually believe in carbon derivatives and all that shit?" asked Vikram.

    "No, but the grads in my group do."

    "Silly buggers. How did the team building go?"

    "They were supposed to plan an outdoor corporate bash for fictitious foreign customers, VIPs. Themed event, venue hire, catering, the lot. You know what their risk analysis listed as the one thing that might go wrong? It might rain."

    "Poor little sods. Too much time in classrooms." Vikram tugged at his sweat-patched shirt. "It's hot. You reckon the others already hit Bar Aleph?"

    "Probably."

    "So this'll be a good time for you to get shit-faced, right?"

    "Don't touch the stuff, you know that."

    "Sometimes you need to let rip. That's what I say."

    Josh stared up at the airship.

    
Letting rip is what I'm afraid of.

    "I'll get my head back together in time for week three."

    The first two weeks were a wandering role, mentoring, and helping out, because the groups were large enough to need more than the lead instructor, at least in the bank's opinion, and they were paying the bills. The third week was when he would come into his own, teaching the stuff he knew best.

    "Can you afford to take time off?" asked Vikram. "Money-wise, I mean."

    As with all freelancers, no work meant no money.

    "Probably not. And I need to keep busy."

    "Well, that makes sense. Or we could just get normal jobs like normal people. So what would you do?"

    "God knows."

    "How about running a pig farm? Or a brothel? Hey, you could combine the two."

    "Say what?"

    "You know, like the two Welsh farmers talking. One says, 'How do you find a sheep in long grass?' The other says, 'Irresistible, boyo.' You could do a piggy version. All those plump porky arses with their cute curly tails."

    "Vikram Vivekananda, I am seriously concerned for your mental health."

    "Then you can turn 'em into rashers when they're all used up. Might taste kinda salty."

    "You're sick, man. Very, very sick."

    Tony and the other trainers were approaching.

    "What are you two chuckling about?"

    "Believe me, mate," said Josh. "You so don't want to know."

    As a group, seven of them, they headed into Bar Aleph and took seats among the old-fashioned chrome fittings, surrounded by colourful liquid crystal lighting, the air bouncing with the kind of rap Josh heard as a little kid.

    "I've got to teach a bit of crypto to my lot," said Vikram. "Just an intro. I was gonna start with Alice and Bob sending signals to each other."

    "Like every other example since World War II." Tony raised his dark beer. "Cheers, everyone."

    "Cheers."

    "Yeah." Vikram sipped from a fluorescent blue cocktail. "That's my theme, like. You know, how Alice has been sending signals for fucking ever, and Bob ain't taking the hint. Either the relationship evolves or she's got to find someone else, you know? Maybe Charlie."

    "No, that's not it." Sheena, with the bronze earrings like ninja weapons, gave a jangling shake of her head. "Bob and Charlie are gay, you see. What you need to say is–"

    "Or Bob's the father of her love child." This was Alan, getting into the act. "And her encrypted signal reads: Little Davey keeps asking where Daddy is. Or should that be little Tony?"

    Josh's phone vibrated.

    "No offence, everyone, but thank God I've got a call."

    He went outside, though he could have used the noise-cancelling earbeads tucked in his pocket. The caller was Kath Gleason, and she was Sophie's teacher, or had been. Everything about Sophie was inching into past tense, detail by detail.

    "Mr Cumberland, I'm sorry to call you in the evening, but I thought you might be working."

    "I was, yes. There's no change in Sophie."

    "Mostly I was wondering if I can help. The hospital staff don't tell us everything, but Eileen" – she meant Eileen O'Donoghue, the headmistress – "has been keeping in touch. How are you and Mrs Cumberland doing?"

    "You've talked to Maria?"

    "No, I tried you first."

    "Look, Ms Gleason–"

    "Kath, please."

    "All right, thanks, but I don't think talking about it helps."

    For a second he thought the call had ended, then:

    "I'm going to see the Brezhinski boy on Saturday. Would it help if you came along?"

    "Brezhinski?"

    "The boy the other two set upon."

    "Shit. How is he?"

    "At home, still months away from returning to school. His parents asked me to pass on their regrets, say how sorry they were about Sophie. I think they'd like to tell you in person."

    "I'm in London at the moment."

    "Oh. Yes – I think I knew that you travel a lot."

    Too much. So many hours spent in airports and railway stations, driving on motorways and highways. And that was after the years of active service, months at a time anywhere on the bloody planet. Maybe if he'd taken a more sensible path, they might have moved house to suit a settled career, put Sophie in a different school, and she'd still be all right instead of–

    "Perhaps I shouldn't have called."

    "No, it's all right."

    "Call me, please, if you decide to come. And I'm so sorry, Mr Cumberland."

    "Josh."

    "All right. Bye-bye."

    "Bye."

    Thumbing his phone display, he scrolled through the contacts list until he reached
those
entries:
Sophie
, the mobile he would never ring again; and
Sophie2
, which he chose now. It took a second to contact the URI and form the connection, so that her image brightened in the phone. She's so small. The picture was realtime video but might almost have been a photo: white sheets, stacked monitors, child-sized mask like some toy biowarfare kit, and her small chest scarcely moving in response to the machines, for they performed the breathing.

    All unchanging, until the day when she would leave that place; and while they had not begun to discuss the matter yet, he expected the coffin would be white.

    
My baby girl.

    She'd say to that: "Dad, I'm ten and a half, you know."

    Ten and a half forever.

High above the plaza, lightning flashed, white and purple; and then the rain came down. At the pointed apex of the tower, the trizep airship was bucking in the wind. Everyone else at ground level stopped to look up as a
crump
sounded. The airship had struck the building and bounced off.

    "They'd better let it go. Unhitch it, or whatever." It was a young woman who spoke: twenty years old, short skirt, violet lipstick. "Gonna be a right smash-up otherwise."

    There was another thump, then something cracked, and the trizep's cable dropped away like a flying tree snake, making S-shaped curves as it fell.

    "A kite in the wind." She raised her eyebrows at Josh. "Wouldn't like to be on board that thing."

    "Er, yeah."

    "So you looking for some friendship?"

    "Is that what you call it?" But his blood was flowing downward, stirring. "Why not?"

    
Christ, I'm going with her.

    Just like that, she slipped her arm through his. He forced away the voice inside his head asking how many times a night she did this.

    "I have got a nice place we can go."

    "Good. Er… How much?"

    "Thirty all the way, dirty sex is fifty."

    He wondered what the difference was.

    "I, er, need to go via a cash machine."

    She tossed her head, tightening her hold on his arm.

    "This way, lover."

    As they walked, she took hold of his hand, and rubbed it across her buttock like a promise. Nothing beneath the thin skirt save warm flesh.

    
Bloody hell.

    "You're beautiful," he told her.

    The kind of beauty he could purchase by the hour. He could pay phone-to-phone but that would leave a traceable transaction. By the time they reached the lobby of ATMs, he felt shaky. His fingers trembled as he withdrew the fifty.

    
Don't do this.

    He had the money, the opportunity, and no one to stop him.

    
Don't.

    He pushed out a breath and handed over twenty. "Sorry, I can't. But that's for you."

    Then he kissed her on the cheek.

    "What is wrong? We can do whatever you want. I like you very much."

    "That's nice, but no, thank you."

    She raised her hands, then let them flop as Josh walked away. Trembling, he decided to walk back to the flat, get changed, and go out for a run; otherwise he would eat first and end up running the streets at one in the morning, which would at least be quiet. But here, as he turned into an old residential street, the atmosphere was already muted, while at the corner, next to an abandoned mini-supermarket, three youths were leaning against the wall, watching everything, their jackets unzipped to allow access to sheathed blades.

    There was rain now, soft as a mother's tears.

    He crossed the empty road, continuing along the other side, checking behind him; but the youths had not moved. His nerves relaxed a fraction, then came sounds of scuffling. There was an alleyway behind the disused supermarket, and that was probably where the–

    A female yelp, followed by: "Back here, ya cunt."

    "Leave me alone!"

    The thud of bone against bone, fist on flesh. Josh broke into a run, but the three youths were closer, spilling into the alley ahead of him. By the time he reached them, two of the youths had hauled the woman clear, while the third, arm outstretched, was sighting along his blade as if aiming a lance, his target the attacker's vulnerable throat.

    "You want formal duel, motherfucker?"

    There was blood on the attacker's face. Two neat slices: the youth was fast.

    "N-no, mate. No trouble."

    "You go hitting women again, mate, there'll be plenty of trouble. Know what I mean?"

    "Yeah, sure. Sorry."

    Josh stood, hands loose, while the attacker backed away, then stumbled into a broken jog.

    "You need a hand?" One of the youths still held the woman's sleeve. "Or can you manage?"

    "I'm just there." She pointed to a front door. "Thank you. You're very brave."

    "Any time."

    They watched her go in. Then they shrugged, went back to the corner, and resumed their leaning against the wall.

    "Nice work, guys," called Josh.

    Nods all round, then he walked on.

    
You watching this, Dad?

    Police Sergeant Jeff Cumberland died at the boots of a teenage gang while a hundred shoppers watched and did not help. Times had changed in the decades since; not everything was worse.

    
Only the weather–

    Lightning, silver-white, lit up the streets.

 

Tuesday lunchtime, and Suzanne sat opposite Carol Klugmann in a coffee shop, the remains of lunch on the table between them. Carol was from Austin, Texas, weighing in at double Suzanne's body weight, and still she had success with clients – using behavioural repatterning and hypnosis – who needed to get thin.

    "If they look at me funny," she would tell her colleagues, "I say I'm fat cause I don't give a shit, and I don't mean constipation."

    Her clothes were expensive, her presence imposing, every word and gesture a masterclass in effectiveness.

    "You look terrific," Suzanne told her. "On the phone you said you needed cheering up."

    "I lied, sugar. Just wanted your company. Plus… you know I'm on the Council complaint committee, right?"

    "
Merde
."

    "Exactly. We had some lawyers asking us about complaint procedures. A big City firm with an outlying office in Guildford. Philip Broomhall's solicitors, or I'll eat my Stetson."

    "You don't have a Stetson. And you used to think solicitors were door-to-door salesfolk."

    "And that barristers worked in coffee shops, not law courts, cause I'm a simple cowgirl."

    Suzanne first saw her at a conference in York. Carol's voluminous pink sweatshirt had borne the slogan Keep Austin Weird. Surrounding her, a group of male therapists had been rocking with laughter. The next morning, the slimmest, best-looking of their number had shared a breakfast table with Carol, looking dazed.

    "I played the mother figure," she'd said. "For someone with naughty Freudian desires."

    Now, Suzanne squeezed the bridge of her nose. Tears were beginning to form, and there was no point in masking her expression, because Carol noticed everything.

    "Maybe I don't deserve to hold a licence. A fourteen year-old has run away."

    "You've not talked to Broomhall, the father?"

    "I listened to him shout at me, then ended the call. It didn't help anyone, and I didn't handle it well."

    "What do you know that he doesn't?"

    "I don't understand."

    "Come on, Suzanne. You spend a few minutes with anyone, you find out things they've kept to themselves for life. So what did you learn about young Richard?"

    "Nothing besides…"

    "Uh-huh?"

    "Bullying at school. There was something specific there. We had four sessions booked, you see. I thought I could address it later."