No Way Home

‘OK.’

She steered the car across with the angle of the red and white cones, letting the men continue to push her a few yards beyond the temporary lights on their bright-yellow stand.

‘There you go,’ the man in leathers called and stood away.

She pressed down on the brake pedal.

‘Right. Ease it back down to the lights. They’re tall enough to be seen over it.’

She checked that the men were all standing clear, then used the far door mirror to guide herself slowly down the line of the kerb until the man raised his hand, calling, ‘That’ll do.’

She stood on the brake, pulled up the handbrake and put the car into first gear as extra insurance, then stepped out. ‘Thank you so much, all of you.’

‘No problem.’

‘S’all right.’

The others simply nodded and headed back to their cars.

‘You sure you’re all right now?’ the guy who had taken charge asked.

‘Yes, thank you. I’ve got my mobile. I’ll just try to sound helpless.’

He laughed. ‘OK. Take care.’

‘Thank you,’ Emma called again as he raised a hand and turned away.

She reached into the car for her phone, brought up the menu and dialled.

By the time the connection was made, the traffic was moving again, the rhythmic hum of passing engines acting as a background to the call.

A female operator answered after just two rings.

‘Hello, yes. I’ve broken down. The engine just died on me. I’m at the top end of the roadworks in Pennsylvania Road, Exeter.’

‘Is the car in a safe position?’ the woman asked.

‘Yes. Some men helped me move it.’

‘Are you on your own there?’

‘Yes, I am.’

‘OK. We’ll have someone there with you as soon as we can.’ She heard the tapping of a keyboard faintly over the line. ‘It’ll be about twenty minutes.’

‘Thank you.’

She slipped the phone back into her handbag and stood beside the car, on the far side from the passing traffic. She checked her watch. Six-seventeen. She watched the lights change. The downhill traffic started flowing through. The evening was warm, almost muggy, as if a storm could be brewing. She took off her jacket, folded it and put it on the passenger seat. After a few moments, she reached into the back of the car and moved her briefcase to the front passenger footwell so that everything she would want to take with her if he couldn’t get the car going again was in one place, ready.

*

Tommy was in the TV lounge with most of the other eighteen residents, watching the last few minutes of a documentary on the nature of New Zealand, when the single warder who was sitting with them got up and announced, ‘Back in a minute. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t, any of you.’

He stepped out of the room, closing the door behind him.

‘Yeah, more like ten minutes,’ said one of the other kids. ‘Must be them steroids, I reckon. Mess him up something terrible. Bloody bog stinks like hell after he’s been in there.’

Several of the others laughed and Tommy joined in as he filed the information away for future reference.

‘Should be plenty.’ The bully who had attacked Tommy earlier, who he had since learned was called Sam Lockhart, turned in his seat and grinned at him.

Tommy frowned…

Had barely had time to form the expression when his seat was tilted suddenly back. His arms and legs darted out reflexively, but there was no stopping it. His grasp slipped from the shoulders of the two boys either side of him and he landed on his back. The lanky blond kid from this morning grinned down at him as some of the others laughed. Tommy slammed a fist up into the lean face, felt his second knuckle impact directly on the tip of the boy’s nose. He yelled, darting back out of reach, as Tommy rolled sideways off the upended chair.

In the confined space, he hadn’t reached his feet when he was grabbed from behind and yanked backwards. His feet tangled with the chair, almost spilling him again. Then his right foot landed on the front edge of the chair and he pushed hard against it, driving himself backwards into his new attacker, who stumbled, letting go of the back of Tommy’s standard-issue polo shirt as he swore.

Tommy turned the opposite way to the other boy, landing on his side and shoulder across the back of two chairs, the occupants of which had sat forward and begun to turn to see what was going on. The padded chair backs dug into his ribs, but not as badly as they would have if they had been wooden. He grabbed them with his upper hand, turning further as he got his feet under him. Someone shoved him from behind, but he righted himself and saw that, as he’d suspected, it was Lockhart who had attacked him.

The bully was pushing himself up off the backs of the two lads he’d fallen against, struggling upright in the tight space between the rows of chairs and the feet of their occupants. Tommy only needed one foot and he didn’t care where he put it. He slammed his right foot down, the leg still slightly bent when his heel drove into the top of someone’s foot, and he launched himself forward in a dive as the person behind him howled in pain.

Tommy’s grasping hands both caught hold of something: the right got Lockhart’s belt while the left gripped his right forearm. They went down in a tangle of chairs and legs. Tommy’s head bounced off the edge of a chair seat, but he paid it no attention, using his arms and his grip on Lockhart to power himself forward, landing on top of the larger boy, who slammed his head forward in a butt that was aimed to smash Tommy’s nose.

His aim was way off. Tommy’s move had brought him further and higher than Lockhart had anticipated so that his forehead struck Tommy in the chest.

It was like being hit with a hammer. It stunned his ribcage into inactivity, but survival was Tommy’s only motivation now and inactivity would not allow that. As Lockhart’s head fell back, Tommy relaxed his arms, falling flat on top of him, at the same time ducking his head so that his teeth hit Lockhart in the face.

Quickly, Tommy opened his mouth. Snapped his jaws closed.

Lockhart howled as his nose was caught between Tommy’s sharp front teeth. Tommy squeezed down on the warm skin and cartilage, stretching his lips wide open.

‘I thought we had an understanding,’ he said through his tightly clamped teeth. ‘What did I say this morning about biting your ugly nose off?’

‘Get off me or I’ll fucking kill you, you little bastard.’

‘Promises, promises.’ Tommy adjusted the grip of his teeth on the larger boy’s nose. ‘And, talking of…’

‘No!’ Lockhart shouted.

Tommy bit down hard. He could feel the grease of the other kid’s nose. The give of his nostril walls against his tongue and the roof of his mouth as Lockhart howled in pain and terror. Then something wet and warm in his mouth. He hoped it wasn’t… No, he tasted the iron tang of blood. Kept on bearing down with his teeth as he shifted his right hand from under him to grasp the back of Lockhart’s neck, pulling him in so he couldn’t escape.

Other hands were grasping and pulling at him, trying to pull him off the other boy. Lockhart’s left fist was pounding on his back, but he barely felt it. His whole awareness was focused on what was between his teeth.

‘Get off me! Get off me!’ Lockhart bellowed. Then he jerked upwards under Tommy, forcing him backwards. Tommy went with him. Used the opportunity to slide his arm around behind Lockhart’s neck and lock his hand over his own shoulder, clamping them tightly together as his other hand let go of his arm and came up around his head to grasp his ear.

Tommy gripped the ear, pulling back on it hard. He felt warm blood trickling down his chin.

‘Tommy Gayle! Release him at once.’