Foxes (24 page)

“Micky, right?” she asks Micky with a grin.

“Yeah,” he says.

His fingers briefly touch mine and I nearly jump a foot in the air.
It’s probably accidental
, I tell my happily racing heart. Not that it’s listening.

Donna gestures us to follow her up the concrete stairwell. In this sickly, artificial light I’m shocked to see how pale Micky looks. Even his sky blue eyes are the washed out gray-blue of the estuary at the end of the Thames. I keep glancing at him to check he’s okay.

“I didn’t realize you and Vinny knew one another until the other night,” Donna says to him.

“How’s Jack?” Micky asks.

“He’s okay. He slept most of yesterday. I think he’s awake now, if you want to see him?”

Micky nods.

Beyond the purple front door, Donna’s flat is mostly all corridor as far as I can tell. The doorways are narrow and I can imagine the rooms being smaller than the hallway connecting them. I’ve never met her flatmates, but I know she shares with two other girls, and now Vinny seems to be staying here, and Jack.

Vinny is in the kitchen, cooking something in a small frying pan. Her honey-gold hair is piled up on her head, and she’s wearing a T-shirt I’ve seen Donna wear once or twice that barely comes down to cover her underwear. Other people’s nakedness makes me uncomfortable, as if I’m afraid my eyes won’t look where I’d like them to. Like at Vinny’s face.

I shift from foot to foot in the doorway, only noticing at the last second that Donna has led Micky somewhere different and they’ve disappeared into one of the other rooms.

“Hey, Loki,” Vinny says, twisting her head to look at me and tipping whatever is in the frying pan out onto a plate. It looks like a burned fried egg, but to be honest it really could be anything. “You’ve just missed breakfast,” she says apologetically. “We’ve run out of food now.”

“That’s okay.” I’m not hungry.

Vinny sits down on a stool right next to the door, the plate balanced carefully on her lap, and she starts to eat.

“Donna’s been really worried about you, you know? She said you were with Micky. I didn’t realize it was the Micky I knew until she said he was with Jack when he lost it.”

I glance behind me, wondering where he and Donna are, which room.

“Is Micky here with you?”

I nod. “I think Donna’s taken him to see Jack.”

“Ah, well, we’ll see how that goes. If they make it through five minutes together, then they’ll be okay. It’s a bit of a fucked-up relationship they’ve got.” She pauses, forkful of burned egg halfway to her mouth. “You like him, don’t you?”

I don’t respond. I more than like him.

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I’d start nursing your broken heart right now.”

I frown. Her words make me feel bad even though I’m not sure what she means by them.

A door opens down the corridor, and Donna slips out.

“I’ve left them to sort a few things out,” she says quietly.

“Did you bring any earplugs?” Vinny asks.

The look Donna gives her makes me smile, until Vinny says, “When they start fucking, you’re going to wish you had something.”

For a second the world tilts and I feel myself falling sideways. The doorframe is solid at my side. I let it take my weight, trying not to grip it too tightly.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, feelings. It’s not as though I didn’t know this would happen, that my carefully Sellotaped heart would be so easily ripped open.

We were only pretending, after all. It could only ever be pretending. What the fuck was I expecting?

“Danny? You okay?” Donna puts her hand on my arm.

I nod, fixing my gaze on the light coming in through the kitchen window.

“I’ve got to go now,” I mumble, stepping back into the corridor, focusing on the purple front door. My limbs are stiff. I’m made of fallen tree branches and old timber. Dead wood.

Donna calls after me, but I can’t be here any longer.

THE SOHO
basement where I fix phones sometimes is at least a little dodgy. The two Chinese guys buy broken phones off eBay, fix them up, and sell them on. They don’t always have work for me, but today, before I even make it down the stairs, I can see from the boxes of parts on every step that they’re inundated.

They’re pleased to see me, and I’m pleased to do anything that will consume me and take my mind off the past few hours.

AFTERWARD I
buy a few supplies from the guy who sells stuff in the underpass—some tins of food, toilet paper, soap, and painkillers—then walk slowly back to my shell. My shoulder aches even though I’ve taken more painkillers. This afternoon it’s worse. Stress makes pain worse.

I think about Micky—I hope Jack’s looking after him. As long as they’re with Donna and Vinny, I tell myself Micky will be okay. But then I remember what Micky said about not being able to deal with Jack’s emotions at all. I remember what happened last time, and I don’t know what to do.

Maybe I’ll call him later. We’re friends—that’s not changed.
Nothing’s changed.

The blue sky has given way to gray. No snow, though, it’s just cold. I turn down the dead-end road to the pool, thinking about Dollman and how I’m going to follow him more stealthily tonight. How I’m going to look for other sharks too.

My head is so full of sharks that I’m not concentrating on what’s in front of me, as usual, so when a familiar voice that’s not Milo’s says, “Hey, you,” I nearly drop my bag of shopping.

I look down and find Micky sitting hugging his knees on the ground next to the plywood door. As I step closer, I can see his nose looks sore, or possibly bruised, as though someone’s hit him.

Jack?

I drop the shopping, no longer caring. The cans roll across the frozen ground and away.

“What happened?” I crouch down. I want to reach out, touch him.

With a self-conscious smile, Micky touches his nose. “Fainted again. At Donna’s. Does it look broken? I kinda convinced myself it’s not. It does hurt, though.”

I don’t know if it’s broken. Painkillers will probably help. I pat the cold ground behind me, trying to find the bag.

“Here. These will help with the pain.”

“Thanks.” I watch his throat work as he swallows them, pleased that he didn’t ask me for some water, which I don’t have. “I didn’t hear you go, Danny.”

He gives me a lopsided smile, his eyes bright and sort of sad. He’s so pretty.

“I had to fix some phones.” I try not to stare at his nose, but my eyes are transfixed. Even though it looks sore, it’s still kind of perfect. If it was Jack that hurt him…. I close my eyes and shake my head. We’re not all sharks, I remind myself.

“Jack didn’t hit me or anything, if that’s what you’re thinking. I really did just keel over. Smacked my face on the bedside cabinet, apparently.”

Are my thoughts that obvious?

“You probably didn’t have any energy.” I have a feeling Micky will shut down if I say it more explicitly. “It’s a long walk. Things shut down if they don’t get enough power,” I say, thinking more about batteries and phones than human beings, but it’s the same principle, isn’t it?

Is this why he faints? Because he doesn’t eat enough? When does not eating
much
become not eating
enough
? I think about what Diana said this morning.
I know
he doesn’t eat.

As though he really is inside my mind, Micky picks up an apple core off the ground. “Milo’s been feeding me, don’t worry.”

But it’s just an apple.

“How long have you been waiting for me?”

“Since about lunchtime. I didn’t know where you’d gone, but I figured you’d come back here eventually.” His gaze sweeps down, his eyelashes fanning out blackly against his cheek. “Do you mind?” He tilts his head and won’t quite meet my eyes.

Just an apple. That’s all he’s had all day.

“I thought you were with Jack,” I say without really thinking. I’m thinking instead about going back to my shell and making some food for him.

“I only wanted to see if he was okay. And he is. That’s it. What you did the other night—”

“No. Don’t.” I push myself up off the ground. I told him before I don’t want his thanks, his gratitude. If he’s here out of guilt, it’s worse than pity. No more pretending.

Long fingers wrap around my wrist, pulling me back in place. I like that he’s strong, even though he doesn’t look it. I like feeling his strength, so real and alive. I don’t resist.

“Please, Danny, let me say this. What you did the other night for me, Jack would never have done for someone. What you did on the bridge for Dieter: I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t have thought of themselves first. People are selfish—”

“Stop.” I’m selfish. It’s all I am.
I want him. I want him so much.

I try to pull my arm away. Micky immediately lets go, and instead he reaches out and touches my cheek with the palm of his hand and presses a finger to my lips. His touch immobilizes me more completely than Dollman managed in his office. I think the whole world can probably hear the thunderous beating of my heart.

Where my skin is scarred, I can’t feel a thing. The nerves are dead, but the skin around the scars is supersensitive.

The whole world has narrowed down to the sensation of his hand on my face—a single blindingly brilliant focus.

“Listen, all I want to say is: what you’ve done for me means something to me. It really fucking means something. More than you’ll ever know. Okay? And you’re going to have to push me away really hard to get me to leave you alone. But if that’s what you want, please do it now, because I don’t think I’ll be able to take it if you do it later on.”

I nod, a little bit mesmerized by the way he’s looking at me. My bright blue sky.

“One more thing,” he whispers. “Do you trust me?”

DO I
trust him?

Micky is sitting in my nest, wrapped in blankets again, with a bowl of steaming-hot ravioli resting in his lap. It’s too hot to eat straightaway, but we made a deal, and he said he liked ravioli.

By the time I’ve finished my bowlful, he’s nibbled one single piece. I’m not going to push it; instead I move to sit next to him. Perhaps my body knows best, or perhaps it’s instinct or something, because a moment later Micky rests his head on my shoulder, and slowly he begins to eat.

Trust. It’s a funny thing.

I feel as though I’ve always trusted him, right from the start. Even with all the pretending. And right now I feel as though Micky is trusting me with
this
—this thing that he won’t talk about. He let me cook for him. I get the feeling that’s pretty big. And his trusting me makes me trust him more.

When the light gets too low to see, I lean across the floor and switch my little lantern on. The warm orange light fills my shell with big glowy shadows that are so much bigger than we are.

“I want to take you somewhere tomorrow night,” he murmurs, handing me his mostly empty bowl and then curling up on his side. “Will you come?”

“Where?”

I rest his bowl on top of mine next to the stove.

“It’s a surprise.” He’s speaking so quietly I have to lean down to hear him. His eyes are drifting shut as I watch. “Trust me. Please…? You’ll like it.”

“I have to go out,” I say gently. Shark hunting, looking for Dollman. Guilt eats away at me, and I know it will keep on eating away at me until I find whoever it was who killed my best friend.

“I know,” he whispers, “but tomorrow….”

I meant I have to go out tomorrow night as well as tonight, but… I want to do this for Micky too.

“Okay.” I’m not sure he hears me, though. In the space of a few seconds, he seems to have drifted off to sleep.

With shaky fingertips, I smooth his hair away from his closed eyes and wonder, not for the first time, if I’m imagining Micky being here with me like this.

TEARING A
page out of my notepad, I leave Micky a note that tells him how to open the window in case of an emergency or if he just needs to get out before I’m back. I only have one set of padlock keys, and it seems safer to lock the door behind me when I leave.

The night is freezing and empty. I search for Dollman. I even walk across the park and stand outside the warehouse flats, right in the road, no more hiding in the shadows, but he doesn’t appear. I want him to know I’m not afraid of him—even though I am
afraid
, but what I’m afraid of is so much bigger than some creepy guy who gets his kicks from scaring people and causing pain, some guy who might have killed my friend. It’s so easy to take life away, so much harder to live it, to make it big and bright and full of wonder.

I fill pages and pages of my notepad. Every guy I see chasing his own need has turned into a potential shark, every person having to sell themselves a victim. I don’t want Dollman’s words to have any truth in them, but maybe they do. Maybe the shark is there in all of us.

At half two I’m walking down toward the embankment, nursing my aching arm and trying to protect my hands and face from a cold so sharp it’s as though the air is full of tiny shards of glass. I don’t want to be out here—I want to be back in my shell, with Micky.

By the time I do return to my shell it must be nearly four and I wish I’d never left.

Micky is curled exactly as I left him. Without thinking too much, I take off my shoes and jumper and crawl into my nest beside him. When he shifts into my arms without waking, I am filled with so many feelings, so much tenderness, there doesn’t seem enough room for it inside me. I’ve no idea how to contain it, but I fall asleep so quickly that containing it doesn’t matter.

When I wake, I am alone. It takes a moment for me to realize why that is not what I expected.

The door is locked, meaning Micky must have stood on the sink and climbed out of the window.

When I sit up, I find a drawing propped up against my stove. A really simple sketch. A face, all sketchy lines and shadows. It takes a minute to realize it’s my face, that the shadows are my scars.