Dancing Jax

The gulls were floating above, shrieking mournfully and swooping down on any scraps that the chip-eaters flung their way. The sea was grey and featureless, except for the movement of the enormous container ships that sailed from the dock around the infamous headland. They were so immense they looked like drifting cubist islands. Conor checked his phone for messages, but there were none. He swivelled about on the wall and looked across the car roofs and bustling boot fair.

The tall, solid, round shape of the Martello tower dominated everything. It was one of many built during the Napoleonic Wars for an invasion that never happened and was now a Coastwatch Station. Others had been turned into eccentric homes, while the rest were crumbling. Suffolk was peppered with old defences along its sea-ravaged coast: pillboxes from the Second World War, or concrete bunkers from the First.

Conor’s grey eyes scanned the crowds. The boot fair was busier than usual. More people than ever were inspecting the unwanted junk arrayed behind the cars. He recognised several faces in there. He checked his phone again. Emma was late.

Cursing under his breath, he looked back at the sea. Yesterday had been a blank fog for him. No one at home knew what to say and the more they fussed the more he resented them. Now he felt like a can that had been violently shaken and was ready to explode at anyone who said the wrong thing. The sight of the sea was calming though; he could watch it for hours.

“I don’t have no money or nothing,” Emma said flatly. “So you can forget that right way.”

Conor looked around. The girl was standing beside the wall. He had been so wrapped up in himself he hadn’t heard her approach. She was chewing loudly.

“I’m not stopping long,” she told him, flicking her ponytail behind her with a toss of the head. “What do you want?”

“Money?” he repeated in confusion. “What are you on about?”

“You tell me, Goldilocks. Aren’t you after something to keep you quiet? That’s blackmail, you vile sicko. If it’s not money you’re after then it can only be the other and you have got to be kidding, you filthy perv.”

Conor held up his hands defensively. “Oi!” he cried. “I only wanted to talk about it, nothing else. You got it so wrong.”

Emma folded her arms and eyed him sharply. She couldn’t understand any motive that wasn’t selfish.

“So talk,” she said at length.

The boy wasn’t sure how to begin. He glanced down at the tracksuit bottoms she was wearing and guessed she was deliberately hiding her bandaged legs.

“How are they?” he asked.

Emma shrugged. “I’m not about to marry Paul McCartney,” she said.

Conor watched as three gulls fought over a generous piece of battered fish skin.

“It keeps going round and round in my head like a bit in Grand Theft Auto I can’t get past,” he said. “Nobody who wasn’t there can understand.”

“Are you confusing me for an agony aunt? I’m not Denise bleeding Robertson. You got problems with it? Go to a head doctor or chuck some Prozac down your neck.”

“Don’t you keep seeing it in here?” he asked, tapping his forehead. “Those faces – the screams and the panic…”

Emma turned away. “That’s my business,” she replied.

“But Ashleigh and Keeley…?”

“What do you want me to do, shave my hair off or something? They’re in the morgue, dead and blue, but I’m still here. There’s no amount of talk or blowing my nose going to bring them back or make it go away. No sense in banging on about stuff like that. It’ll do your brains in.”

Conor shook his head. “God, you’re hard,” he said. “They were your best mates.”

“I’m my best mate! Have you finished, pretty boy?”

“Not yet. I saw the papers today. No one knows why the car was out of control. What happened?”

Emma chewed and clicked the gum in her mouth. “Danny Marlow was driving, that’s what happened. He was a useless pillock. It was his fault – all of it.”

“Why don’t you tell someone? You should.”

“Who? The fuzz? Are you from Norfolk or what? I had a visit from them last night about that Sandra cowing Dixon. I’m not going to give them an excuse to come back and ask me a load more questions. I had nothing to do with that crash. I was just lucky to get out of it alive. The other poor pieces of toast didn’t.”

“Danny’s family would want to know. So would Kev’s and the others.”

“So what? Not my problem and it’s not yours neither.”

Conor couldn’t think what else to say. He should have known better than to try and speak to flint-hearted Emma Taylor about this. The fact that he had probably saved her life that night didn’t even occur to her, or if it did, she wasn’t going to acknowledge it, let alone thank him.

He changed the subject.

“I saw Sandra Dixon back there before,” he said, nodding towards the boot fair.

“She was lucky we thumped her,” Emma declared proudly. “She might be lying on a slab right now with the rest if we hadn’t. I told the police that last night. Not that they took any notice. She should be bloody grateful.”

“She isn’t the sort to go to a flash mob,” he answered.

“Don’t go sticking up for her! She’s so far up herself you don’t have to. And she deserved what we done. You know she said you was thick and couldn’t read a book without colouring it in. Snobby cow.”

Conor managed a grim smile. “She’s right there,” he agreed.

An elderly couple had been admiring the sea as they walked along the promenade. Drawing close, they paused when they saw the two young people and let out sympathetic groans.

“Oh, you poor lad,” the woman cried. “Your bruised face. Were you caught up in that terrible disaster?”

“Awful business,” the man added consolingly.

Conor didn’t know how to answer them, but Emma said, “Bog off, you nosy coffin-dodgers! Go find someone else to patronise or I’ll squeeze your colostomy bags so hard your false teeth will shoot out!”

The couple backed hastily away from the hostile, hard-bitten girl and walked off as quickly as they could. Conor exploded with shocked laughter. She really was relentlessly foul.

Emma watched them leave with a snarl on her lip. Then she reflected it might have been a mistake wearing tracksuit bottoms. Conor bore signs of battle; perhaps it was time she displayed her wounds too. She had a feeling she would need all the sympathy she could get, especially if that Sandra was going to make a stink. She had been looking forward to at least a week off school, but now she thought it would be smarter to make an appearance tomorrow, with her poor bandaged legs on show.

“Have we done here?” she asked the boy.

Conor didn’t think there was anything more to be said.

“So you’ll not tell anyone, yeah?”

He felt conflicted. “Not today,” was all he could promise.

“Just keep that gob buttoned,” she warned. With that, she strode away.

Conor chewed his bottom lip. He didn’t know what to do. A brazen seagull alighted on the wall and took a stalking step towards him, hoping for something to eat. Another landed beside it and came bullying forward.

“I haven’t got nothing!” the lad said, showing his empty hands. One of the gulls pecked greedily at his fingers and he pulled his hand back.