Copyright © 2012 Dominic Eagle
All rights reserved
CHAPTER 3 - DEALS WITH THE DEVIL (Part 1 of 3)
Thud, thud, thud, thud.
The rhythmic beating of my heavy heart stirred me from the terrible dreams of which only a man with the most deeply rooted guilt can conceive. My heart ached and fluttered. I tried to inhale air, but my throat seemed to have narrowed, as if God would not allow me any right to the oxygen he had blessed this forsaken planet with. I had sinned far too much for one good deed of saving Laura Hills to redeem me.
My blurred brown eyes tried to capture the time on my bedside clock, and I was sure the digital figures read 4:24am. It was the Saturday morning following the horrendous fire. I stumbled out of bed, with my hair undoubtedly in a tangled mess, and shuffled to my bedroom window. I gazed across the street at Laura’s house. She was so close, yet so far.
About two hours earlier a car had pulled up into their driveway, and Jennifer Hills - along with her now oddly haughtily-walking husband - had helped their injured daughter into the house. Presumably her injuries hadn’t been too substantial; she’d probably just inhaled too many dangerous fumes. The married couple seemed to have remained awake since then, however, and judging from the fact their raised voices were projecting obliviously across the small estate, I could only presume that they weren’t heatedly discussing their daughter’s accident.
I only caught a glimpse of the scene that was unfolding from a faint silhouette cast through the top left window, reflected against disgusting beige-coloured curtains. A male and female-shaped shadow faced one another, and the shadowy hands of the male repeatedly wavered all over the place, in the flustered manner that I very quickly attached to Herbert Hills’ personality.
Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, Herbert’s shadowy hand swung across the bedroom, making contact with Jennifer. The crack it made as it hit her cheek was worryingly loud, but her muffled sobs following the assault were almost inaudible.
“…. That’s what you get… Disrespecting me… Bitch… Who is this man...?”
Those stuttered segments of sentences were all I could make out from the raised voice of Mr Hills, but it was quite obvious that he knew his wife had been unfaithful. How did he find out about me though? Unless, of course, he’d discovered a different affair his wife was having. It seemed plausible, judged solely on the basis Mrs Hills seemed to have had a rushed desire for sexual relations with a student she’d only just met. She must have truly resented this man she called her husband to cheat on him several times; and rightly so. I’d presumed, at first, it was because he appeared to be a grumpy, boring, weak little man, but it was quite the opposite. Mr Hills was violent and abusive.
“James… Are you okay now? Did the doctors fix you up?”
I snapped away from my window and turned to the open doorway where my nine year old brother was stood, clutching his stuffed giraffe toy tightly to his chest, and wearing a ridiculous set of pyjamas with elephants and clowns littering every square inch. The kids at school would’ve laughed at the sight of him, but I preferred it to the nuisance child who’d sworn at me earlier and caused me to lose my keys.
“I didn’t need any fixing up pal, just got a little burnt on the cheek. Nothing serious. You shouldn’t be up at this time anyway.”
“I couldn’t sleep ‘cause of those new neighbours.”
“You and me both, Tom. You and me both. Go back to bed.”
Unfortunately, the Hills family were giving me a restless night for quite another reason than young, naïve Thomas. My thoughts were much less innocent and good-willed. You see, I only felt shame, guilt and fear.
Tom left the room, quietly closing the door behind him, and I returned to my window to glance across the street. Mr and Mrs Hills had stopped fighting now, and the light was turned off, submerging their little house back into the dark docility of every other box of bricks on that street. The world was so indefinitely silent for the first time since I could remember, and I was worried that I might be able to finally hear my own awful thoughts, so I went back to bed.
*****
“I made you breakfast, poppet,” My mother smiled, as I tottered feebly to the kitchen table in the late morning. She seemed in a much more genial mood than usual, and I wasn’t in the mood for being spiteful.
“Thanks mum.”
“You’re feeling well, aren’t you? No bad injuries? If you need anything throughout the day-”
“- Mum, honestly, I’m fine.”
“Well Herbert popped over this morning, whilst you were sound asleep…” My mother began. So that verified my theory that Herbert didn’t realise I had slept with his wife, or I probably would’ve awoken to Mr Hills beating my brains out. “He thanked you, as profusely as he was able to, for saving his daughter’s life. The local paper rang up bright and early as well, trying to muscle in on some information, but I told them they could stick their typewriters up their self-righteous arses.”
I snorted chunks of cornflake all over the table in laughter, and my mother grinned at me again.
“But it was a very brave thing to do James. I don’t think you know just how proud of you I am! I’m sorry we bicker sometimes, I love you… But if you think you’re going near fire ever again, you’ve got another think coming!”
She rustled my hair as we laughed together and then I disappeared out of the house for a while, to clear my head and stroll through the valley.
It was there I bumped into Melissa. Melissa Rose was her full name, actually. It’s a beautiful name, and she could blossom like a flower, as long as the sun was shining her way.
“James!” She screamed, lunging at me and clasping her slender arms around my lower back, squeezing me tightly. Her body radiated with warmth and tenderness, and her adorably wavy locks of hair brushed against my burnt cheek, soothing the pain slightly. “That burn looks painful. Do you want me to tend to it?”
I chuckled, keeping my arms around her waist. “A kiss would do me just fine, pal.”
She gave me a light peck on my burnt cheek, and I pretended to retract in pain, much to her horror, but a small snicker gave me away.
“You jerk!” She thumped me on the arm lightly, but her face burst into a page of light, as endearing dimples opened up near the corners of her smile.
“So what are you doing around here anyway?” I asked.
“I came to see you actually! I was just heading through the valley. Are you alright? You almost died saving that bitch, Laura! Did she even thank you?”
I opened my mouth, let out a faltering gasp, and then closed it again.
“Yeah, I thought as much,” Mel frowned, looking deeply into my eyes. I flicked a stray strand of hair from her own brilliantly green eyes, which served as beacons of hope for her to gaze through. “Don’t let her mess you around James. It’s girls like her that messed you up in the first place and made you fragile. Look at you now, in need of constant female attention.”
“It’s nothing to do with the girls.”
“Then what is it? Because I miss James… I miss the real James. I’ve tried my best to be the same as you, so you’ll at least keep me as a friend when you undoubtedly ditch the others.”
Melissa’s head dipped in that famous look of despair she wore so well and I felt a sharp pang of pain in my chest. Was that the impression I’d given my friends? I drew the adorable girl before me close to my chest.
“Ditch you? I’m not ditching anybody. I’m sorry Mel, I know I’m not myself, I just need time. I don’t know how to stop what’s happening to me.”
“It doesn’t matter, because I do.” She spoke cautiously, lifting her head up to lock her gaze back into mine. Her hands lifted and pressed lightly against both sides of my face, causing the faint hairs on my cheeks to prick up attentively. Then, inevitably, we began to kiss.
The warm familiarity of nostalgia flowed and danced along the inside of my mouth as I recalled times with Mel from long ago. Those days we’d spent in summer, lying amidst thick blades of grass in our school uniform, talking of how we’d leave everyone else behind, for we only needed one another. We’d always been brilliant friends, but that’s why romance could never last between us. Nonetheless, that flare always lingered in the back of our minds, and it was reborn into two lost hearts once more, on this particular summer’s day.
Today there was to be no guilt, it wasn’t the same as my shameful rendezvous with Jennifer a few days prior. If anything, I now spited Laura and her dismissive attitude towards me, so I didn’t care what she thought. I’d saved her life and she had the nerve to be angry at me? I might have done something bad to her, but I’d saved her life to make up for that! Besides, I didn’t see why she was so stale about her mother and I. Making love is just a biological process, after all.
My sense of morality vanished once more, replaced by indisputable anguish. So, perhaps as a form of revenge, in the middle of a sheep-ridden field, I made love to Melissa Rose. Though the scene would’ve looked quite comical judged solely by the setting (for sheep gathered around us inquisitively) all that was on my mind was the resentment I felt towards Adam, Laura and their false relationship with one another.
When all was done and we were bereft of life, Mel started to sense my unease. She realised dangerous loving in public wasn’t enough to heighten my sense of pleasure. After all, sex had been the cause of a spiralling sequence of tragic events in my life.
“Let’s go and have some fun,” She suggested, taking hold of my hand.
The streets of the blissfully-bare, broken, little city centre groaned and creaked as the rapid footsteps of Melissa and I pounded against the cobbled concrete, trying to withstand our weight as we sprinted across the town square.
At the time, my alter ego had formed a barrier between my sense of reasoning and my actual emotions, rendering me oblivious to the real reason I was suddenly attracted to Mel, just like the good old days. It was for a reason she’d mentioned herself. You see, she tried so hard to be like me and to be careless (so that I’d keep her as a friend) and that was the main thing which attracted me - I felt desired by somebody. That was all I’d ever truly wanted. Though, in theory, I was supposed to care for nothing.
“Let’s live how we used to!” Melissa suggested excitably, indicating for me to follow her over to the rotting corner shop, where the strange Indian man still worked - who seemed to be a huge fan of Lady Gaga, judging by his enthusiastic dance moves to the radio. But he straightened up and returned to the counter when he spotted us approaching from the window.
The little shop bell rang as Mel and I swung the door open. I grinned wickedly, feeling that forgotten rush of adrenaline I used to have as we’d walk into that corner shop to steal sweets in the good old days. It saddened me at the same time, however, as I was painfully aware of the fact that the past had faded away. For all of us in this life, our memories are just dusty video tapes stored in the narrow storage compartments of our overloaded minds.
“Do you remember how we used to do this, Smithy boy?” Melissa asked, with the old vitality and intensity she used to possess every time we did something dangerous.
“How we used to do what, Mel?” I enquired innocently, throwing the same naïve look at the shopkeeper.
“Hey, don’t I know you kids? Yes, I know you from some place. You stay where I see you, okay?” The shopkeeper stuttered in broken English. Apparently several years in this country had not improved his linguistic abilities. Then again, considering most of his customers were delinquent youths living on council estates in the surrounding area, it was a miracle he’d retained any understandable English.
“No, I don’t think you do know us,” I replied calmly, knowing full well that he must vaguely recognise us from the days in which we’d steal food from his shop, about three years earlier.
Melissa turned and gave me ‘the wink’, as she sauntered promiscuously over to the counter. I smiled, wondering how she was going to distract the shopkeeper this time. It used to be with crazy, unbelievable stories, such as:
“I just saw a pigeon nibbling at a woman’s face outside!”
“Eh, what? Pigeon attack woman? Let me get newspaper!”
The shopkeeper had eaten up the ridiculous story, before panicking and hobbling outside to hit the killer pigeon with a rolled up newspaper. Mel and I had been in hysterics, letting our pockets overflow with sweets, crisps, and even a stashed away bottle of cheap vodka.
“Hey! There is no pigeon out here! You kids, I get you one day!”
We ran away from the shop, still laughing, whilst the shopkeeper chased us - his beer belly protruding him and bouncing up and down comically.
“Oh, did I say pigeon? I’m sorry, I don’t think it was a pigeon. I think it was this!” Mel had crudely lifted her middle finger up at the shopkeeper.
The scene which unfolded that Saturday afternoon was of a similar nature, but Melissa seemed to have a new technique for distracting the shopkeeper, as she was now much older.
“Do you have any OK magazines?” Melissa fluttered her eyelashes seductively, before leaning over the counter with a look of playful innocence spread all over her deceitful face. The shopkeeper’s eyes bulged and strained in their weary sockets as he picked up on Mel’s very low-cut top.
“Ah, OK magazine, you say? Yes… Okay, you want OK… We have OK magazines, my dear,” The shopkeeper’s brow was working up an anxious sweat, and he wiped his greasy shirt sleeve across his forehead to mask this.
“Would you mind being a gentleman and fetching a copy for me?” Melissa asked kindly, as I began to stuff my pockets with Liquorice Allsorts and a packet of Maltesers, laughing at the triviality of the things we were stealing, but the overwhelming joy of reliving our past.
“Ah yes, I get you magazine!” The foreign shopkeeper exclaimed excitedly, before he hobbled off down one of the aisles and I proceeded to walk to the exit. I indicated to Melissa that it was time to go.
“Here you go!” The shopkeeper rushed back, much more quickly than I’d expected. His fingers were clinging on to the magazine for dear life, as if it was the passage to the young girl’s heart - and possibly less romantic motives. I also noticed he’d drawn blood on one of his knuckles in his rush to attain the item.
The strange little foreign man stopped in his tracks, noticing me near the doorway and suspiciously processing that I was leaving without the girl I’d entered with. The shock of this led me to accidentally stumble, and one of the packets of sweets tumbled from my pocket. The shopkeeper froze for a second, as if considering his next words.
“Oh… You know what?” Melissa began, starting to carefully step backwards, a malevolent grin on her face. “I’m suddenly not in the mood for a magazine anymore. Yeah, I think we’ll just take these lovely sweets, if that’s alright dearest? I don’t have any money, but I have this.”
Mel blew a kiss at the flustered shopkeeper and then she and I began to run away, just like the old days, as the man pursued us, maniacally.
“I get you kids one day! You hear me?! I knew I recognised you when you walk in, yes! I get you one day!”
We stopped about half a mile further down the street, after the shopkeeper had given up chase, and we leant forward, placing our palms on our knees. We were panting heavily and laughing our heads off every time we managed to inhale a new gust of fresh air.
“Feeling better now?” Melissa asked tentatively, as I handed over some of our stolen goods.
“Well, I feel distracted,” I laughed, thinking about rule number three of not caring.
She nodded, reading my mind. “The wonderful rules.”
“Don’t start Melissa, please. We’re having a good time.”
“But we have to talk about yesterday James-”
“- No we don’t,” I interrupted violently. “We don’t have to talk about anything.”
“Alright, so I guess you don’t care about the fire then? Or Laura?”
“I’ve only known her a day… In fact, never mind that, I saved her life and she hates me. So no, I don’t care.”
“Yeah yeah, so you keep saying…” She trailed off, clearly growing bored of my aggressive tendencies.
We sat in silence for a couple of minutes, eating sweets, chocolates and all the other things that had once tasted of adventure and life, but now tasted of stale nostalgia. It could’ve been unbearably awkward in the time following those few minutes if we hadn’t suddenly recognised two people across the road.
“Hey James, isn’t that your mum over there…?” Melissa enquired, pointing at little ol’ Wendy standing outside a café, with her trademark fizzled blonde hair.
I froze, glaring at my mother, as I realised she had an acquaintance with her. It could be an innocent rendezvous, I thought, except he has his arm around her back…
“Yeah, it is,” I muttered through clenched teeth. “And the man who’s all over her is Laura Hills’ father.”
Mel was stunned as I swung viciously off the park wall we’d been perched on, but she quickly grasped hold of my shoulder, tugging me back.
“Woah! Steady on there, cowboy. What was your plan exactly? March up to them and cause a commotion? It might be a perfectly innocent meeting.”
“Well what exactly do you propose?” I asked Mel, full of aggro and testosterone.
“Let’s just follow them and see where they go.”
Keeping a casual distance between ourselves, my mother and Herbert, we followed them through the winding narrow streets of Preston’s back alleys, away from the prying eyes of the public. The fact my mother and Herbert were avoiding unwanted attention didn’t exactly fill me with confidence about the nature of their meeting.
Surely enough, our trail very quickly came to a halt outside a dingy, decaying motel - whose sign was falling apart at the seams. The pair of them entered the disgusting building, and the cheap double doors swung shut behind them.
I was livid.
“Come on James, let’s go home,” Melissa tried to reason with me, understanding that there was no way to sway my line of thought now. She did give it one last valiant attempt, though, I must say. “It’s probably a business meeting or something.”
“My mother doesn’t work for any big-shot company like Herbert. She works at a supermarket.”
“I don’t know what to say James, but you can’t go storming in there.”
“I can do whatever I bloody well-”
“- James Smith, get back here this instant!” Melissa screeched at me as I started to march towards the building. My clenched fists loosened in surprise. “Good. Now you’re going to walk straight back over here, and we’re going to go home. Okay?”
I was too in shock to object Mel’s violent outburst, so I shrugged my shoulders and willingly obliged. My mother could make her own mistakes.
But whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding: he that doeth it destroyeth his own soul. Proverbs 6:32
*****