Phoebe climbs in next to me. ‘It smells funny in here,’ she says.
‘Well, it was fine before you came in.’
‘It’s not my fault that you don’t wash.’
‘Nah,’ I say. ‘D’you want me to kick you out or wot?’
Phoebe goes quiet and, even tho she doesn’t say anything, I can tell that she’s thinking.
‘Nate,’ she says. ‘Where do we go when we die?’
I shrug. ‘Heaven,’ I say.
‘I know that . . . but how do you get there? Do you just wake up and you’re there? Or does an angel come and take you away? Or do you just die and then . . .’
She pauses, and I think of Al for a minute. Drifting upwards, so awkward and lanky that, if you do float up to heaven, he’d probably get caught on summat on the way up. Tangled round an electricity wire like the old socks or school shoes that people throw up there. The thought makes me smile for a minute, numbing all those bits inside me, but it soon stops.
‘Do you think it hurts?’ Phoebe says. ‘Dying . . . Do you think it hurt Al?’ She pauses. ‘Was he in pain?’
I look up at the plastic glow-in-the-dark stars on my ceiling. Al got them from one of those crappy pound shops the day Dad left. He’d stuck them down, taking ages to get them in the right places. He’d said that when he didn’t understand life, or if things didn’t make sense, he’d just look up and, somehow, everything would just feel different. It would feel okay.
Then he started telling me that there was no point in having stars on the ceiling if they didn’t look like the real thing, and he kept going on about all these names. Saying how there was some star named after this guy called Ryan, and how everything was shaped like his belt.
And, when he’d finished, he just had this one thing left. A comet that he ended up sticking in the corner, at the far side of my room. He said that he didn’t know what to do with it, but that he could tell that it didn’t wanna be with the rest of the stars.
I think of how Al looked when I’d found him. The blueish tint to his face. The green-and-black school tie knotted round his neck. His silver prefect badge glinting in the light, and the stupid faded school motto on his blazer: In Caritate Christi Fundati. I could hear kids playing in the street outside: someone kicking a ball against a fence; the wheels of a bike skidding round a corner; the slapping of a skipping rope on the pavement; the thud, thud, thud of music from a car in the distance. The chanting of, ‘Who are ya? Who are ya? Who are ya? Touch me again and you’re dead.’
I think of how me and Al had had a row that morning. How he’d called me after school and I’d cut him off. Ignored his call, then turned my phone to silent. All cause I wanted him to stop bothering me and piss off. All cause I was having too much fun, drinking and smoking in the park. All cause I wanted to stay with Kyle and these two fit girls we were with.
Al had always been there for me, but, when he needed me the most, I’d cut him off.
I feel Phoebe tug at the sleeve of my T-shirt and my eyes begin to sting.
‘Nate, do you think it hurts?’ she asks again.
I stare up at the comet, separate from all those other stars.
‘Nah,’ I lie. ‘I don’t think it hurts at all.’
*
I listen to the sound of Phoebe’s breathing till she falls asleep, her head resting on my arm. I close my eyes and try not to think of Al, or how I’d let him down.
Afterwards, these two police officers had come round to get me to give a statement to explain what happened. ‘Routine,’ they’d said. ‘To establish that Al’s death was an accident.’
An accident.
I didn’t tell them about the phone call. Or that before they’d pulled up, with their loud sirens and flashing lights, before they’d got out their car, or written down his time of death, or zipped him up in one of those white bags, I’d noticed summat.
I’d seen it on the floor when I’d found Al. It was resting beside the leg of his wooden desk chair. I didn’t know if he’d left it there on purpose, or if it was a mistake, but I picked it up anyway. A drawing. Al had drawn himself sitting in the corner. The face was all scribbled out, but I knew it was him cause of the Afro, and he was wearing his favourite navy hoodie. He was hunched over, his hands pressed over his ears, and there were all these people surrounding him. Towering over him. He’d scribbled out their faces, too, but there were loads of them covering most of the page. Then, towards the bottom, beside the tip of Al’s shoe, were two words. Help me.
I pull the covers back and get outta bed, trying my hardest not to wake Phoebe. I open the drawer of my bedside table. I move stuff around – my iPhone, a lighter, some old headphones – till my fingers brush over Al’s drawing. I pull it out and make my way to the bedroom window, pushing the curtain aside to let the light from the street lamp shine in. I unfold the crumpled piece of paper.
I must’ve looked at it a thousand times – probably more – each time hoping to find summat different. I dunno wot. Maybe an answer or a clue. Summat to tell me why Al did it, or how to stop it from hurting, or wot I’m supposed to do now. How I’m supposed to just carry on . . . even tho Al’s torn this hole right through me. And I’ll never be the same.
None of us will.
I hold the drawing up against the window so the paper goes this weird off-white colour, and I stare at the picture of Al, scared and hunched over. I move my finger over the words. Help me. Help me. Wot if Al had been in trouble and I hadn’t even known?
The screeching sound of car tyres coming down the road makes me jump. I hear the low beat of some rap music, and I watch as a dark blue Corsa pulls up outside our house. The car door opens and Saul stumbles out, the music getting louder. I see some of his mates, all crammed into the tiny car. Saul slams the door, pulling the collar of his leather jacket up. The driver presses down on the horn, beeping it in time with the song, shouting and jeering.
‘Shut up, you bellend,’ Saul says. ‘You’ll wake me mum up and that.’
There’s more noise from the car, and one of his other mates sticks his head out the window, chucking a cig stub into the night.
‘Oooh,’ he says. ‘Don’t wanna wake Mummy up. When are ya moving out?’
The others laugh. I recognize most of them from our estate.
‘Piss off,’ Saul says. ‘Your mum asked me to move in, but I ain’t sure you wanna new stepdad just yet.’
There’s more laughter from the car and Saul walks towards the house.
‘In a bit!’ one of them shouts. ‘I’ll come check for you tomorrow, yeah?’
Saul waves, and they rev the engine, turning the music up even louder and beeping the horn as they go. The car disappears down the other end of the road, and I see Saul shake his head. He must feel me watching cause he looks up at my bedroom window. He stares at me for a minute, scrunching up his face, and then he flicks me the V sign. I don’t do it back.
Saul’s key turns in the front door, and I hear the sound of his footsteps moving towards the kitchen. There’s the noise of pots and pans banging, the microwave going. And I can’t help but feel all this anger inside me. It’s like Saul can just forget about wot happened and move on. Pretend that Al never existed. Our brother’s only been dead for three days and Saul’s acting like he doesn’t even care. When our dad left, Saul just said, ‘Shit happens,’ and we needed to get used to it. Well, maybe having your dad walk out is normal, but it’s not normal for your brother to kill himself. Is it? Not when he’s seventeen . . . when he had all this stuff he wanted to do. Not when it’s Al.