The Stuff of Nightmares (31 page)

The day after my birthday I stopped looking.

When Dad died, Steve’s mum and dad let me stay with them. I would’ve been happy to stay with them for good but Mum came home three days later. I hated her for that. If Dad meant nothing to her alive, why should his death bring her running back?

But I understood a lot more now.

‘Mum?’ I called out again, louder than before.

I checked through the whole house. She wasn’t there. The house was empty.

I stood still and listened, just to make sure. No pipes gurgling, no tumble dryer vibrating, no dishwasher running – nothing. It was so quiet. A sudden thought occurred to me. I turned to the hall clock. The second hand moved with silent deliberation. I know this will sound silly but it was kind of a relief to see it. Time was moving as normal. I was back home and out of harm’s way, out of Death’s way. She’d just been messing with my head, that’s all. Patting my jacket pocket to make sure I had my front-door keys, I headed out of the house. The neighbours’ cars sat outside their houses. The road, like the air, was still. There wasn’t even a breeze.

Suddenly ravenous, I decided to take a trip up to the local deli rather than search through our fridge for something to cook. The day was warm and bright. I strolled to the top of my road, enjoying the peace. I walked past the roundabout, along the street, then
over
the usually busy junction to the high street. I say ‘usually busy’ because today it wasn’t. In fact, I didn’t even have to push the button and wait for the lights to change before I could cross. There were no cars on the street. Not one.

There were no people around either.

By the time I made it to the deli, which was the first in the local parade of shops, I was getting twitchy. Surely this couldn’t be right? There was absolutely no one around. Frowning, I entered the deli. The smells of assorted cheeses and sausages and fried onions hit me immediately, making me hungrier. I looked around. The place was empty. Why on earth would the owners leave the shop empty without locking the door? I was getting distinctly nervous about being by myself in an empty shop. I didn’t want the owners coming back and wondering if I’d nicked something. Crisps and snacks from the newsagent’s would have to do. Three shops later I was more than twitchy. I was freaking out. Where was everyone? The newsagent’s was open, but there was no one in there either. What had happened to drive everyone out of their shops? If something had happened, like a suspected gas leak or something, that still didn’t explain where everyone had gone.

I headed out of the newsagent’s and went into every shop along the street. They were all open for business. They were all empty. And the street was deserted. No cars. No dogs. No birds or planes in the sky. No people. What the hell …?

Thoughts can creep up on you, or they can hit harder than a wrecking ball.

Dad didn’t win after all …

I walked faster, away from my house, away from the local shops. Picking up my pace, I started to trot. Before long I was at a full-out run. My feet seemed to know where to go before my head did. Forty minutes later, bathed in sweat, I was at the shopping centre. Our local shopping centre was vast, with stores which were known nationwide. They were all open, even the jewellers, with light pouring from every display window and out of every open door. Muzak chimed relentlessly around me.

But no people. Not one.

‘
Hello …
’ I shouted at the top of my lungs. ‘
Hello. Is anyone here?
’

Was it my imagination or did the muzak get fractionally louder? Or maybe it was my heartbeat. I went into every shop and shouted, desperate for someone, anyone, to hear me. There was no doubt about it. The realization crept through me as well as hitting me all at once. The shopping centre was completely empty.

But hang on … That tinny, pipey music had to be coming from somewhere. I wandered from shop to shop and from floor to floor. I even tried the doors marked
PRIVATE
and
STAFF ONLY
. I found the security room, with its bank of monitors showing CCTV footage from all over the centre and even the two huge car parks outside. I scanned the monitors, eagerly
searching
each one for a face. Just one face would do. But there was no movement of any kind.

Panic, bitter as vomit, began to churn and rise within me, but I fought it back down. This was silly. There had to be a perfectly logical explanation for all this. I sat in front of the monitors for one hour … two … three. Nothing changed. Each time I tried to leave the room, every time I turned my back on the monitors, I whipped round to watch them again. It was like a game of Grandma’s footsteps. Part of me was convinced that whenever I turned away, everyone in the shopping centre was standing in front of the CCTV cameras dancing and having a party, and whenever I turned back, they ducked out of sight. And no matter how many times I told myself off for being stupid, I still found it hard to tear myself away from the monitors. But after three hours I had to face facts. There was no one in the shopping centre, no one in the car parks.

No one.

I went down to the electrical discount store on the first floor. It was one of those shops where TVs blasted your retinas with bright lights and fast-moving images. The huge TV at the front of the store was showing a well-known and very funny CGI film, but every other screen in the place was filled with white dancing lines of static.

I set off for home. At that moment I needed to be at home very, very badly.

Still no cars. No traffic. No noise. I rang the
doorbells
and knocked on the doors of every house – and I mean every house – within ten streets of my home. In some the lights were on; in most they were off. But no one answered the door.

This was all wrong. I couldn’t be the only one … How could that be? It didn’t make any sense. Was I the last one, the only one …? What had happened? Something terrible must’ve happened. But then, why not to me …?

‘Get a grip, Kyle,’ I ordered myself.

I mean, not only was that just plain daft, it was also impossible. There was no way in the world that I could be the only one left in my neighbourhood.

Please, God, don’t let me be the only one left. I don’t want to be by myself …

I finally set foot inside my own house.

‘
Mum?
’ I called, my voice croaky and hoarse from all the shouting I’d done that day.

No reply. Not that I’d been expecting one. But that didn’t stop me shouting for her. After searching through the entire house again, I switched on my TV, hoping to see someone, anyone. Hell! I’d even settle for one of those boring house make-over programmes. There was nothing. The screen was dark. I checked to make sure it was working by grabbing the nearest DVD to hand and putting it in the DVD player. The film started without a hitch. I turned off the player and tried flicking from channel to channel. The screen was still dark. I gave up on that and tried the radio. Sounds like crisp packets being scrunched up filled the
airwaves
from every station. I gave up on that too. I ran upstairs and flung myself down on my bed, trainers and all. Had something happened to keep everyone indoors or had everyone gathered in one central location because of some threat? Pulling my mobile out of my pocket, I wondered who I could phone for information. Even though I’d probably get a rollicking, I decided to phone the emergency services. I’d forgotten my phone was dead so I went into mum’s room to use the land line extension. The number rang and rang and no one picked up. What could’ve happened to stop the emergency services from answering the phone? And if there were some huge emergency, surely there would still be people on the street – the police or even the army? Where was everyone? Why had everyone disappeared? Where had everyone disappeared to? What the hell was going on? And where was my mum? I tried the emergency number on and off for the next hour but still no one replied. All my questions sprinted round my mind until, exhausted, mentally as well as physically, I fell asleep.

The next day found me back at the shopping centre, as did the day after that and the day after that. I spent my days eagerly scanning the banks of monitors, searching each one for a face. Just one face would do. But there was no movement of any kind. I sat in front of the monitors for hours. Nothing changed – not even the muzak, which was on a continuous two-hour loop. If I could’ve found that muzak CD, I would’ve
smashed
it to smithereens. Where was my mum? My friends? The rest of the country?

After three whole days of solitude, I decided it was time to move on. The silence around me was driving me out of the house and out of the neighbourhood and out of my mind. There was no way I was the only one left in the area. (The country? The planet?) That would’ve been too ridiculous. But I’d have to move further out to find others who were isolated like me, who maybe even thought that they were all alone too. I packed up a large rucksack with some clean clothes, plenty of water, fruit and crisps and headed out. I wasn’t particularly worried about finding food – every supermarket and grocery shop I passed was open and well stocked.

‘Strange to close my front door, knowing this is the last time I’m going to be here for a while.

‘Bye, house. Bye, Mum … wherever you are.’

I’d taken to voicing most of my thoughts out loud, just to hear the sound of my own voice; to hear something apart from my own breathing and my heart thumping. I set off down the road, turning back once or twice just in case I was walking away from other people instead of towards them.

On the second day I reached the motorway. There was nothing on it. Nothing. It was stupid, I know, but I walked in the central lane of the motorway as I headed south. I was so desperate to see someone else that I was prepared to risk getting run over to do it.

‘You’ll hear a car coming a mile away,’ I told myself.

And though I listened hard, I heard nothing but my own footsteps on the tarmac. After a couple of days of walking along the motorway, I got off and made my way via normal roads. The motorway was hard on my feet and harder on my sanity. It was eerily quiet walking along with nothing moving in either direction; it only served to emphasize my loneliness. At least on the ordinary roads I could hope to meet someone else around each new corner. Every so often I’d knock at a succession of doors, ring a few front doorbells, enter a shop or two and shout ‘
Hello?
’

But there was nothing.

I was nowhere.

Had I died in the train crash, after all? Was that it? Had I died and gone to Hell? If this was Hell, it’d been selected by someone who knew me better than I knew myself. Real Hell for me wouldn’t be a fiery pit inhabited by the Devil and his demons. What I was going through now, living through now, dying through now … this was Hell. Hell was spending the rest of eternity totally, completely, utterly alone. Loneliness was silence and solitude and isolation. But mostly silence.

Just under a fortnight later I was back at home. I’d travelled as far south as I could before realizing that it didn’t matter how far I went or how fast, I’d never meet up with anyone else. Death’s words kept haunting me.

‘
Let’s take a look at your worst nightmare …
’

Well, now we both knew. When I finally made it back home, I immediately went up to Mum and Dad’s
room
and sat on their bed. I couldn’t even smell Mum in the room any more. I went into the bathroom, stripped off and had the world’s longest shower. For all I knew, the world’s only shower. I listened intently to the sound of the water playing over my skin and running down the plughole. For the first time since I was a little child, I gave in to what I was feeling and let out the tears that had often threatened. Unfamiliar tears burned my eyes and spilled down my cheeks to get lost in the shower water running over my face. I tried to choke back the accompanying sobs, but my body wouldn’t let me. The next thing I knew, I was crying like a baby. Sobbing and heaving like someone who’d forgotten how to cry and was having to learn all over again. Furious with myself, I punched the shower wall, then again, and again, until I didn’t even have the energy to stand. I sat down on the shower floor, drawing up my legs as the water cascaded all over my body. Only when the water ran stone cold did I attempt to move. Slowly turning it off, I stepped out and grabbed the largest towel off the towel rail. Trying to scrub some warmth back into my icy skin, I became lost in my own thoughts.

I had plenty of food and drink so there was no danger of starving. But what I yearned for was something far more unexpected.

I wanted someone to touch me. Just touch me. To feel someone’s hand on my hand, my face, my arm, and have them tell me that everything would be OK, that I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t prepared to spend the rest of my
life
like this. There was only one thing left to do. I put on clean jeans and a gleaming white T-shirt. I was ready.

I walked out of my house and carefully shut the door behind me. Standing in the middle of the empty road, I stretched out my arms.

‘Where are you, Rachel?’ I called out. ‘I know you’re close. Are you watching me and having a good laugh? Well, come and get me then. I’m ready now.’

The words slipped away from me like ripples moving out from the centre of a pond. I spun round. The road was still empty.

‘
Come on! What’re you waiting for?
’

I knew she was near by. I could sense her, stalking me like a predator. She was watching, waiting to see what I’d do next. I sat down in the middle of the road, cross-legged. I wasn’t going anywhere. I had nowhere to go. So I’d sit for as long as was necessary and wait for Rachel. I closed my eyes – I didn’t need to watch her approach.

My thoughts took flight and flew off in all directions. I didn’t try to catch them, I just followed as best I could. Despair pecked away at me from the inside out. I thought of the train and my friends’ nightmares – and Dad. Where was he? He’d deserted me, just like everyone else. Like Mum and all my friends and … and …