Robert Swindells: Daz 4 Zoe

i hope.

So I didn’t get kicked out of school but that doesn’t mean everything was okay. Far from it. There’s a name they call people who fraternise with Chippies – those who get too pally with the hired help or fix coffee for the guys on the garbage truck or something. Chippy-lover. That’s what they call ’em. Now you might think the more love there is around the better, but Chippy-lover’s a deadly insult. Folks start calling you that, you’re liable to lose friends because the friend of a Chippy-lover is a Chippy-lover, if you see what I mean. And that’s what some of the kids called me that day, right after I did my Galileo riff with old Moncrieff. I guess they thought I was sticking up for Chippy rights over the vote thing, and they were right. What they didn’t know was why. Not that it’d have made things any better for me if they had. If they’d known little Zoe was totally gone on some flaky guy with long hair and a leather jacket, little Zoe would probably have had to quit school right then and there for her own safety. As it was, it must’ve looked to them like I’d gone soft on Chippies just to be different or something, and some of them called after me in the yard and then along the street.

I tried to act like it didn’t bother me, but it did. I had so few friends I couldn’t afford enemies. I hurried off up the street, trying not to look like someone in a hurry and wondering what would happen later when I called for Tabby. Wednesday nights Tabby and me go to youth club, and I pictured myself walking up to her door as usual and ringing the bell, only this time Mrs Wentworth answers it and when she sees it’s me she looks down her nose and says, I’m sorry dear, Tabitha won’t be joining you this evening, and I can tell from the way she says it that Tabitha won’t be joining me any other time either from now on, because she’s a Wentworth and Wentworths don’t associate with Chippy-lovers.

What I did was, I went a long way round to shake off my tormentors, walking rapidly through drifts of fallen leaves, towards the waste ground just inside the boundary fence where nobody ever goes except cats and little kids, and I never did find out what would have happened at Tabby’s place that night, because something happened out there. Something staggering.

if you fink i’m wadin frou Subby muck you rong. This tunnel old rite? It was here before Silverdale and no 1 use it no more. Most old tunnels blockt of but sum 1 forgot this 1.

So. No Subby muck. Just rat muck plus rats. i hear em and i seen ther littel eyes. Thay dont bower me, the rats. Thay reel, like me. Not like that miner tour and Clint goast and moving shadders. Not like the ekco neever. Give me the rats ennitime.

Aniway i’m up this tunnel and evryfing going slow exept my hart, witch its going pretty fast. i’m shining the flashlite on the flor and sides and top, mostly flor, and letting out the twine. Wite stuff hanging down evriwear gets in my hair i dunno wot it is. Miner tour fur, mebbe. its cold like ice down here, but i’m getting use 2 the stink – dont notis it no more. i make so much noise walking and breeving it sownds like thers sum 1 follering but only drippy ekco wen i stop. i’m going on like this, stopping and starting, scairt, but saying easy-peasy, not long now, wen suddenly thers 2 tunnels.

i stop, but my hart speeds up sum more. Dont panic, i sez. Fink. i stand ther wiv these 2 black hoals in front ov me, finking, but it dont do no good. no marks aniwear. no way 2 tel witch way Silverdale. Boaf ways mebbe. Or non. So its a tossup only i got nuffing to toss so i try rite. i remember wot Clint sez abowt gerrin lost down here til i die, and a few steps in i stop 2 check my twine, its okay.

This tunnel difrent thogh. hoals both sides leeding of, and pretty soon it splits again and i after chooz. i fink, if i go rite again i’m gonna sail rite past Silverdale. i go left and i check my twine again. You in a stinky black maze, you check yor twine an all i bet.

Aniway by this time i’m starting 2 wonder does this tunnel reely go 2 Silverdale or was that Clint winding me up. Mebbe this tunnel goes nowear. Mebbe it goes 2 the sea. i seen the sea 1 time. its big. And wile i’m wondering this i see somfing on the flor in frunt ov me. somfing wite and its not hanging down neever. i moov tord it slow, shining the flashlite on it and wen i see wot it is i yell out and my yell ekco and ekco and i neerly turn and run.

its a skelington.

this skelington mouf open like it larfing only noffing much to larf abowt rite? Bits of old doodies on it and legboans stuck in dockmartins. i shine my flashlite over it and then i seen somfing make me glad. i know wot you finking, you finking cant be noffing make me glad near a skelington but you rong. Ded rong. (ha ha geddit?) this skelington on its armboan got this band. plastic armband wiv D on it and this is not D for ded this is D for Dred. this wots left ov 1 Dred and i fink, he been 2 Silverdale i bet. got hit not kilt rite away. tryd 2 get hoam but died here. So. i’m going the rite way rite?

littel voyce in my head sez mebbe not. Mebbe this guy lost like you. Shut yor mouf i sez. Wot you wanta go scair me for eh? i stept over the rags and boans and went on kwick.

i’m scairt alrite but noffing else happened plus no more splits in the tunnel. My ball ov twine getting littel thogh, and just wen i fink mebbe it run owt i see lite ahead.

i head 4 the lite, mooving reel slow, finking, Silverdale owt ther boy. You get cort now, you ded. i creep up 2 the end and luck owt. its been longer than i fought gerrin here. Daylite nearly gon but i see why this tunnel aint blockt of. it coms owt a little hilside. Piles ov muck all rownd. Erf and stoans and smasht up brix and long grass over it like sumplace in the city. i never new they had places like this in Veezaville. 1 pile ov muck rite in frunt ov the tunnel plus fireweed and littel trees. hundreds peeple pass by, no 1 see this hoal.

i go back in, strip off my doodies, get into coveralls and cap. now I’m a Chippy wiv graft in Silverdale. i put my doodies in the sac and hide it in the tunnel. i put the littel ball ov twine on the flor wiv a stoan on top. Then i walk out the hoal and frou the piles ov muck like i done it evry day. Gotta luck cool or sum bouncer ast 4 my seeit and i aint got 1. i’m just finking wear the big kid school wen somfing umbeleevabel happens. i luck rownd and ther she is – the girl i come 4.

troof is stronger than friction, rite?

It was like Grandma when Gordon Payne walked in that music shop. My heart kicked and I forgot how to breathe and my legs practically gave way under me. Only thing that went on working was my mind, and that must’ve gone into overdrive because in the second between me seeing him and him seeing me it processed about fifty thousand thoughts.

First I thought, it’s not him. It’s some guy who looks like him. It was almost dark, see? Then, when there was no doubt it was him I thought, he’s not here because of me. He’s got work in Silverdale. When he sees me he’ll drop his eyes and walk on by like he never saw me before, ‘cause that’s what Chippies do.

There were a lot more thoughts I’ve forgotten. It was my mind trying to shield me, I guess – to protect me from disappointment by refusing to believe or even to hope. If I’d let myself think he was looking for me and it turned out he wasn’t I couldn’t have stood it. I’d have fallen apart.

Anyway, the second passed and he saw me and I knew the miracle had happened. He was here for me, all right – I could see it in his face. He stopped, and I knew exactly how he was feeling – weak knees, aching chest and a mind racing towards burnout.

It was just like an old, old movie. We stood looking at each other and then we both moved at once, and before we knew it we were clinging together in the middle of all that squalor and nothing mattered except to hold on and never, ever, ever let go.