‘Shev!’ Annie drew back the curtains. Chevy rolled away from his mother, pulling his quilt around him. ‘I’ll fetch you some water,’ said Annie.
‘Milk,’ said Chevy.
‘That’s not how you ask,’ said Annie.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Warmed up.’
‘You can have it cold,’ said Annie, heading for the door. ‘It’ll help wake you.’ Chevy heard her go down the stairs. Rain blew at the window. He put his head under the quilt, breathing the heat of his pubescent body.
~
'There was glass on your floor.' This was later, in the kitchen. Annie, still in a T-shirt and knickers, packed Chevy's lunchbox. Chevy ate cereal with his back to her. 'Last night,' said Annie, 'when I came in.'
'I threw it at the wall,' said Chevy.
'And what was that about?' said Annie. Chevy kept his eyes on his cereal, heard her go to the fridge.
'You promised,' said Chevy. 'You were going to be home nights.'
'That's not an answer,' said Annie. 'What happened here?' He finished his cereal. 'You think I'm liking it Chevy, working all hours that place? I could throw stuff anytime and it wouldn't be at a wall.' Annie slammed the lunchbox shut. Chevy knew she was watching him, heard her open the box again. ‘Let’s give you a treat.’ She went to a cupboard, he turned to her now. 'Cream eggs? I got them for Easter, I know how you love them.’ Annie dropped two into the lunchbox. 'I'm doing my best love, can you keep your head down here? Not wind him up?' She took the lunchbox to the hall, where Chevy's rucksack would be hanging on the bannister. He heard his father come quickly down the stairs.
'I need the keys,’ said Mike.
‘You are not having the car,’ said Annie.
‘I've got to,’‘ said Mike.
'And I get Shev to school, how exactly?
‘The bus?’ said Mike.
‘No time!'
'Sodding kid,' said Mike, coming into the kitchen then seeing his son. 'Yes, you. Anyone normal your age could be trusted.'
'If you'd told me,' said Annie, following Mike in.
'I'm taking the car,' said Mike. ‘'That or I won't be working.'
'Can you drive?' said Annie.
'What are you on about?'
''Whisky,' said Annie. 'Last night, I don't know how I got in bed with you. Maybe I won't any more.'
'I'm alright.'
'I hope so,' said Annie. 'You want the car, you get Shev to school.’
‘Fuck it Annie,’ said Mike.
‘No!’ said Annie. 'You fuck it.' Chevy had left them in the kitchen, was climbing the stairs, still hearing them. 'No school, no car.' He went to the bathroom, closed the door behind him.
~
The rain had stopped, though ragged cloud still moved fast across the sky. Chevy sat in the front of a BMW much older than himself. Mike got in and started the car. Annie had followed them, stood barefoot on the wet pavement, holding a coat around herself. Suddenly she was rapping on Chevy's window. He wound it down. ‘Where's your bag?’ Mike revved the engine fast, impatiently till Annie ran back with the rucksack. She opened Chevy's door, yelling above the noise. 'Mike, you swear you'll take him in.'
'I said so didn't I?'
'Right to his class,' said Annie. 'Not just dump him outside.'
‘I'll do it! Shut the fucking door!’
Annie threw the bag onto Chevy's lap and slammed the door. Mike let the clutch up with a
bang, swerving out from the kerb, wheels spinning. Chevy looked back, saw Annie watching after them in a swirl of white smoke.
It was a tall, Victorian school behind railings topped with chain-link. Mike stopped by a side entrance. They were late, the strip of asphalt between the railings and the school building was deserted. Chevy undid his belt and got out, reached back inside and saw that Mike remained buckled, one hand on the wheel. The engine still ran.
‘You coming in?’
‘Get to your class,’ said Mike.
‘Mum said...’
Mike interrupted him. ‘I know what she said. She wants my money an’ all and i've got a boss waiting.’ Chevy didn't slam the door. He went in through the gate, slinging his rucksack over one shoulder. ‘Shev!’ Chevy turned. Mike was out of the car, jabbing a finger. ‘No messing and not a word to your mother.’ The finger dropped. ‘Deal mate?’
~
Chevy leaned against a part-tiled wall just inside the building, shielded from within by a rack of lockers. He listened, through the sounds of a morning routine, for Mike to drive away. A younger boy came out of a classroom opposite the lockers, carrying a register. He spotted Chevy, who winked. The boy nodded conspiracy and went on his way. Chevy went back to the entrance and peered through a wired glass panel in the door. Mike had gone. Chevy slipped outside. The sky was clearing. Another boy, about his age, crunched out of litter behind a row of tall bins. Without a word they went quickly to the street.
~
‘He hates her,’ said Chevy. They had gone to a park. Sunlight, still low in the sky, shone under what cloud remained, sparkling the wet, leaf-strewn grass. Bryn was smoking, setting a fast pace. Chevy looked across to a playground, where just one woman pushed a wrapped-up toddler on a swing. Annie had told Chevy how when he was small, on a swing he had flung his head back, knocked out two of her teeth. His own first teeth she kept in a sandwich bag with a lock of baby hair. Chevy had found them once, exploring her things while he was alone in the house. Sometimes he still did that.
Bryn hadn't responded to Chevy, had barely spoken since they met. His cigarette done, he stepped on the butt without altering his stride. The path they followed now skirted a lake. Ducks and Canada geese tracked them beyond a low iron fence, hoping for bread. In the centre of the lake a clutch of pedallos was tied together, anchored for the off-season. ‘Last night,' said Chevy, 'he was pissed.’ Chevy kept his eyes on the pedallos. They were painted red and yellow, each with a number. ‘He told me how she stitched him up. Reckons she messed with her cap to have me.' Still Bryn said nothing. Chevy went on, not knowing why he was doing this. 'Like he never wanted a kid?'
‘And you’re telling me?’ Chevy shrank at the inevitable rebuke. ‘Shit man, you want respect or what?’ Bryn spat on the ground. 'Shit!' He strode away from the lake and from Chevy, a trail of dark prints behind him in the gleaming grass.
~
An old man snoozed in a shelter. A rough sleeper, his dog tied to a trolley filled with his possessions. The sun was higher now, the sky quite clear. Chevy passed the shelter, then stopped and went back. He picked up a small stick and lobbed it, just hard enough, he thought, to wake the man who stirred, but didn't wake. Chevy found another stick.
‘Shev!’ It was Bryn, calling from a way off. Chevy ignored him, taking aim. Bryn called again: ‘This kid’s got a gun!’
‘You've had it open?’ said Chevy.
‘Course I have,’ said the boy, a couple of years older than Chevy and Bryn. He fiddled experimentally with the revolver.
‘He don't know how,’ said Bryn.
‘Give it here,’ said Chevy. The boy ignored him.
‘His uncle had guns,’ said Bryn, happy now to take Chevy's reflected status. ‘Give it him, he'll show you.’ Reluctant, but curious, the older boy passed the gun to Chevy who opened it with a flick and shook out the shells. Two spent, four live.
‘Where'd you find it?’
‘Fishing,’ said the boy, still defensive.
‘In the water?’ said Chevy, looking through the barrel.
‘No, up your mum's cunt.’
‘Can't have been there long,’ said Chevy. He blew through the barrel and checked it once more, then replaced the live shells and snapped the revolver shut. Felt the weight of it.
'Spose he taught you how to shoot' said the boy, challenging. Chevy nodded.
'Then I shot him.' As he spoke, Chevy brought the gun up sharply to the boy's face, holding it two-handed. The boy froze. When Chevy cocked the gun he backed away, turned and fled. Chevy watched him over the gunsights, saw also a jogger who must have passed close by, saw her look back at him as she ran.
Chevy swung the gun towards Bryn. ‘Fuck off,’ said Bryn, without flinching. Chevy held the revolver on Bryn till he saw a flicker of doubt, then tucked it beneath his anorak. He walked away alone.
~
Chevy sat, near the lake again now, his rucksack on the grass beside him. He had taken out his lunchbox, then across the park had seen a police car enter through wide gates and stop, lights still flashing. A figure who had to be the jogger now leaned at the window. Was it two or three more sirens Chevy could hear? He put the lunch back and took out his phone. It rang for longer than usual.
'Shev?' said Annie.
'Mum...' said Chevy.
'How are you calling me?' said Annie. 'You're not in your lesson?'
And then, a voice in the background. 'Annie!' Chevy heard it. A man's voice, not Mike's.
'Who's that?' said Chevy.
'Who?' said Annie.
'Calling you,' said Chevy. 'I heard him, he called you Annie.'
'No love, there's no-one here.' Chevy didn't speak. 'Shev, what is the matter?' He cut the call. Annie rang back. He turned the phone off and dropped it onto the grass. Sat a while, blind now to the police and the jogger. Took his rucksack and walked without sight or purpose, the bag swinging in one hand at his side. He stumbled into the fence by the lake. Birds swam towards him. Chevy swung the bag deliberately now. Higher, higher again then he flung it in the air, out over the water. It smacked down hard, scattered birds, set the pedallos bobbing. He watched the lake settle. The rucksack floated heavily into view, just kissing the surface.
Chevy looked away and saw the police car moving over the grass, not quite towards him. Then another, much closer, coming the other way around the lake. Near by him was a parapet where an underground culvert connected with the lake. Chevy went to it. The water here was deep, the bottom invisible. Small fish swam in and out of view, caught briefly in sunlight beyond the shadow of the parapet. Chevy took out the gun and dangled it over the water, low, out of sight. Heard tyres on the grass behind him. Passing? Moving away? He turned, quickly, the gun in both hands again, aiming at one of the tyres. Fired until the gun was empty.
Chevy by Peter Francis-Mullins was read by Ben Farrow at the Liars' League Decline & Fall event on Tuesday 8 September 2009 at the Wheatsheaf in London
After some while not getting into screenwriting, Peter Francis-Mullins has switched to prose. He teaches in South London, where he lives with his partner and gap-year children. He never caught them bunking school.
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