Golden Boy (50 page)

‘Oh my fuck, how romantic. OK, I would love you even if you were covered in hair.’

‘I would love you even if . . .’ I smile, kissing her neck. ‘You were some kind of goth-y, biker-chick freak who wrote poetry.’

She nods, grabbing my cheeks. ‘That’s so sweet! I would love you even if you were half-and-half.’

I grin and laugh. ‘I would love you even if you had oral herpes.’

‘That’s disgusting. I would love you even if you had gonorrhea in your eye.’

‘That’s highly unlikely.’

‘You’re highly unlikely,’ Sylvie says, and kisses me, stroking her hands down my back and grabbing my bum. I giggle and she slips her hands around to the front of my pants.

‘Not yet,’ I murmur.

‘Not yet? As in, not right this second? How about this second?’

‘Oh my god, stop.’

‘How about now?’

‘Stop!’ I yell, tickling her.

We get entangled on the bed and kiss more, when suddenly I hear a voice shouting my name. I sit up.

‘Wait, Sylvie, listen.’

‘Ignore it,’ she says, biting my jaw. I almost fall back onto the bed, but then I hear it again.

‘MAX!’

‘Sylves, I think it’s my mum.’

‘Shit, really?’

‘Yeah. Come on.’

I take her hand and we go out onto the balcony of the landing, but she’s not in the hall downstairs. I can hear shouting in the kitchen, so we run down the stairs.

When I push open the door, I see Dad stood by the kettle. Mum is stood at the other end of the table, shouting at Dad.

Everyone goes quiet when we come through the door. I feel a soft object bump my back and Sylvie puts her hand in my palm.

‘What’s happening?’ I ask.

Mum turns to me. ‘I . . . I . . .’ she stammers. ‘I just wanted to see you and your dad wouldn’t let me.’

‘Well.’ I shrug uncomfortably. ‘That’s because I don’t want to see you.’

‘I thought we said you wouldn’t come over for the next few weeks,’ Dad says to Mum quietly.

‘I have to talk to him!’ Mum shrieks, looking at me. She’s been crying. Her make-up is dark and pooled under her eyes.

‘Come on, Karen, you can’t just burst in and yell things at him. He’s very unsettled right now,’ Dad says. ‘He needs to rest and take things easy.’

I go and sit at the table just in front of Dad, pulling Sylvie after me. He moves so he’s just behind me and puts his hands on my shoulders. I don’t want to leave Dad alone to have a screaming match again. It was horrible enough the first time.

‘Come on, Karen, we said you wouldn’t come here.’

‘He’s my son!’ Mum says, and I suddenly feel really sorry for her. I look down at the table and pick at the wood. She puts her hands up to her face and covers a little gasp of pain. ‘Maxy?’ she says to me. ‘Why won’t you tell me anything anymore?’

I shrug and mumble, ‘You know why.’

‘No, even before that,’ Mum moans. ‘You didn’t want to tell me, but you could have. I’m so sorry if I made it hard for you, but you could have told me.’ She sobs and covers her face again.

I frown and look up at Dad. ‘Could have told you what?’

She looks up at me and whispers, ‘How the baby came about.’

‘But I did,’ I protest.

‘Please, Max,’ she begs. ‘I want us to talk. I want you to tell me who . . .’ She brushes away tears from her face and her voice gets ragged and breathy.

‘I want you to tell me who, and I will lock them away . . .’

And I realise.

‘No!’ I shout loudly. I stand up, throwing my chair backwards. I don’t want to hear it. Every cell in my body is trying to throw off what she is saying, stop time, change the course of present momentum. ‘Shut up!’

Dad has to jump out of the way of my chair as I stand. ‘Max! Be careful!’

‘Tell me who it was, Max,’ Mum says, like a lawyer this time, with both her palms flat on the table. ‘Tell me who he was and I will make sure he never harms you or anyone else ever again.’

She looks as if she would kill him. Dad is staring at her like she’s crazy. But then I watch it dawn on his face too, feeling the panic rise in my body until it feels like the blood is drumming in my ears, a cacophony of embarrassment, shame and, weirdly, guilt. I do not want Mum and Dad to know. I don’t want it to be another problem. I don’t want them to think of me that way.

No no no no no no no
, I think.
No!

‘Karen?’ Dad murmurs. She looks at him with tears in her eyes and confirms with a small nod. Both of them turn to me.

‘Max, tell me,’ Mum says.

I can’t say anything.

‘Max, you have to tell us,’ says Dad. ‘It’s OK, Max. You can do it.’

‘Be brave, honey,’ encourages Mum.

There’s a silence. Mum is waiting for me, Dad is waiting for me, Sylvie is gripping my hand so hard, and I look at her hopelessly. She looks back at me and it’s like we converse with our eyes.

I can’t
, I say.

You have to
, she says.

No
. I shake my head.
I don’t
.

And I realise I can’t say anything. My mouth won’t move, my voice won’t speak. I’m paralysed again. I can’t say anything.

I look down at the table.

‘Hunter.’

Mum and Dad’s heads both snap to Sylvie.

She says it again, softly. ‘It was Hunter.’

M
um and Max end up hugging in the living room for a long time, and then a police officer comes round and I’m not supposed to know anything but I listened from the stairs so apparently Hunter is being arrested. Everybody was crying for a while, but they’re all alright now and everyone’s happier now Mum is home. Dad says she isn’t staying overnight though, she’s just looking after us until Dad and the policeman have gone and dealt with Hunter and come back. But Sylvie is staying overnight. I don’t know what happened exactly. It’s hard to hear from the stairs. They had the door closed.

Mum and Dad had a fight, which is why Mum isn’t staying here at the moment, which I can understand, because sometimes they are both very irritating. But sometimes they are really nice. Like when Dad builds a fort in the back garden with me or Mum takes me for ice cream in Oxford at the posh tearooms. She says I’m a big boy now and I won’t misbehave. That’s right. I won’t. I’m grown up. I’m ten and two months and twenty-one days.

I hear a tap over my shoulder and when I turn around, Max is standing against the doorframe.

‘Hey buddy,’ Max says. He looks all red and jolly for the first time in ages, which is good because he wasn’t even jolly at Christmas. He was just faking it for me, and it was so obvious. He kept going up to his room for five minutes and then coming down again, and then in the evening he was getting upset in his room and Dad came and gave him a big bear hug for ages and they talked a bit quietly, and then Max came downstairs and him and Dad watched action movies after I slept. That’s what Max told me. He said they watched
Terminator
1 and 2, and then
True Lies
and ate chocolate-covered raisins.

‘Hi Max,’ I say. ‘Did Hunter hurt you?’

‘Huh?’

‘I heard he attacked you. I was listening.’

‘Yeah.’ Max nods, looking funnily relieved. ‘Yes, he did. But it’s all dealt with now.’

‘OK,’ I say. ‘Have you come to play Top Trumps?’

‘Yes,’ he says.

‘Cool. Do you want to play the two-player on
Zombieland 4
first, though, because I have to finish this level before I can play Top Trumps. It’s imperative.’

‘Oh, good word,’ Max says.

‘OK, hang on a minute,’ I say, and I kill four zombies and get the powerpack.

‘You’re doing better, aren’t you, Daniel?’ Max says.

‘What with?’

‘You know, with . . . everything with me.’

‘Oh, yes. I was worried when you tried to kill yourself, but then I found out you were different, and now I know you’ll be OK, because we all know and now you can talk about it. I guess it was hard for you because you’re not very different at all in other ways, but I’m sort of different to most of the kids in my class, so I know how to deal with being different. You can ask me anything you like and I’ll help you anytime. It’s OK. Plus, you weren’t lying to me before.’

‘Huh?’

‘About being special. Sometimes I thought maybe you didn’t know about being different but I guess you do, because you are, so you weren’t lying when you said I was special. We’re both special.’

‘That’s right,’ he says, leaning against my bunk bed and grinning. He got even taller over Christmas.

‘Like superheroes!’

‘Yeah, totally.’

‘Like genetic mutants.’

‘Don’t get carried away,’ Max says, and he laughs even though it’s not funny.

I
go with DI Travers over to Leah and Edward’s house to find Hunter. I shouldn’t have come but I had to. I’ve just resigned my post, but my job as Chief Crown Prosecutor was to make sure little bastards like Hunter are locked up, and I’ll fucking well make sure that happens tonight.

I called Paul Travers because he’s to the point, unemotional and respectful. He’ll keep the charges quiet. I’ll ask for the court records to be sealed as it’s rape of a minor, and Paul won’t be tempted to beat the shit out of Hunter like I am right now, in the passenger seat of the car. Gripping the car door handle, staring at the Fulsoms’ house, waiting for the moment when Hunter comes running out and I have to jump out the car and can legitimately tackle him to the ground and smash his face into the gravel.

This is a kid I watched grow up. This is a child we let sleep in the same bed as our child.

Karen was right. I can’t forgive her. Not because of the abortion, but because she didn’t listen to Max when he said something so important. If we don’t listen to him, if we take away his right to his own choices, his own body, then he stops being an autonomous being and becomes a thing. He stops making decisions for himself, he forgets how to stand up for himself, and things like this happen. People like Hunter will happen to him.

The house in front of me is quiet. I see the light of the living room dim in the hallway. Paul must be in there, telling them what he always tells the families. Paul’s good at this. I imagine for a minute Karen and I sat on our sofa, being told that Max had hurt someone like Hunter hurt him.

He’d just never do that. I know Max.

Suddenly, bright white light fills the car. I turn around. Two headlights swing into the drive, and the gravel crunches as Hunter’s car comes to a stop.

I go to open the door but the only urge inside me is to beat the living daylights out of him. I stay put and shrink down in my seat.

Hunter switches off his engine and looks quizzically at the police car. I’m in shadow. He’s parked to the right of me, closer to the house. I don’t think he can see me.

I watch Hunter stepping out of the car. He stubs a cigarette out on the interior of the car door and leaves it in there. He shuts the door with a thud.

He walks slowly towards the front door. The kid is tall, proud and cocky. He strolls slowly, predatorily, towards the house, then stops near the front door. He looks back over at the police car. His eyes are black in the dark. He’s wearing black trousers, a T-shirt and an open long-sleeved shirt. I won’t forget this for a long time.

The front door opens and he turns towards it.

‘Mum?’ he says. ‘Are you OK? What’s happened?’

He’s not even worried. He doesn’t even suspect we’re here for him
, I think. I open the car door and slip quietly out.

‘Baby,’ Leah cries. She runs forward and throws her arms around him.

‘Is Dad OK?’ he asks.

‘Hunter,’ she cries, her voice hoarse. ‘Why did you do it? Why would you do that?’

Hunter’s hands go to her waist. He sees Paul coming out his front door. His mouth opens. He knows what’s coming. Paul is walking towards him. Edward leans against the doorframe, bent over like an old man, his arms folded. He can barely look at Hunter.

‘Hunter Fulsom,’ Paul says softly but firmly. ‘You’re under arrest for rape of a minor.’

Hunter looks over at Edward.

‘Dad?’ he says. His voice is deep – deeper than Max’s. As I get closer, I see dark stubble all over his chin. He’s broader, taller, even more so than when I last saw him in September. Hunter grew up. He became different to Max. We should have noticed.