Chris Ryan - Osama

Joe had been dry for six months. There was plenty of hooch knocking around Bagram, of course, and it would have to be a fucking stupid officer who didn’t let his men relax after several days of repeated contact. But for the Regiment lads it had been a no-no, and that was nothing to do with the ruperts. When your fitness and a clear head are all that’s between you and an enemy round, you do everything you can to take care of them.

Now Joe drank like he was watering the desert. Pints of strong, cold lager – Kronenberg – he wasn’t even counting how many, though he had the impression that the Aussie barmaid, with her nose stud, low-cut top and the edge of a tattoo peeking above her cleavage, was. The winos came and went; it grew dark outside. Joe maintained his position at the bar, carefully avoiding eye contact with anyone, doing everything he could to drink himself into forgetfulness. It didn’t seem to be working. When the TV screen showed what he immediately recognized as the compound in Abbottabad, swarming with journalists, he turned and looked the other way before downing what was left of his pint and ordering another.

He only left because the barmaid told him three times that she was closing up. He certainly had no idea what time it was, or how long he’d been in there; it was only as he staggered to the door, finally drunk, that he realized he was the last punter. Out on the pavement he swayed as he looked up and down the street, trying to get his bearings. A line of people snaked out of the door of a kebab shop on the other side of the road. The yellow and red signs became momentarily blurred, tracing neon lines in the air as he moved his head from left to right; the headlights of cars travelling in either direction, one every three or four seconds, did the same. Ten metres to his left he saw a little mob of six townies starting the opening salvoes of what would clearly end up as a fist fight; he saw a couple snogging in the bus stop opposite; he saw people walking up and down both sides of this busy Hereford street, even though it was late.

He saw a kid with dark skin and yellow teeth leaning against the window of the kebab shop, a bottle of Coke in his right hand.

The alcohol in his system made everything spin. He staggered back against the door of the Three Barrels, his head suddenly filled with the shouts of the little mob. He tried to shake off a wave of nausea.

Then he looked up again. The kid with the Coke bottle was gone.

The mob’s disagreement had shifted to the area of the pavement bang in front of Joe. He burst through them – they fell silent for a couple of seconds – then strode into the road. He heard the screeching of brakes and saw the line of people outside the kebab shop turn to look at him. He stepped among them, moving along the line, checking their faces, grabbing those who had their backs to him by the shoulders and yanking them round. Angry mutters quickly became more forceful. A squat guy with balding scalp and a rugby player’s physique pushed Joe in the chest. ‘Get out of it, sunshine. You’re fucking steaming…’ Joe fell backwards, regained his balance and scanned the line once more. No, the kid with the Coke wasn’t there, and as he looked beyond the queue and over his shoulder, there was no sign of him.

Maybe he’d been seeing things. A pint or two of Kronenberg too many.

Sixty seconds later he was away from the main road, walking on autopilot through the network of streets that formed the route from the Three Barrels back home. The names were familiar: Ashbourne Crescent, Meadow Way, School Close. In the corner of his mind he thought it should be comforting that he was here, and not patrolling some shithole of an Afghan village. Somehow, though, it wasn’t. The street lamps dazzled him and he couldn’t walk in a straight line. He saw two young women cross the road to avoid passing him. One of them wore a T-shirt with ‘Arctic Monkeys’ emblazoned over her breasts, the other was holding a rat-like chihuahua on a lead.

Antrobus Road. Fielding Avenue. Grosvenor Place.

And finally, Lancing Way. No parked vehicles. No pedestrians. The no-parking barriers edging the pavement glowing fluorescent orange in the lamplight. Joe weaved drunkenly across the pavement and clattered noisily into one of them.

He swore, then looked up and saw a car in the road.

It was forty metres away, about ten beyond his own front door. Its headlights were on full beam, but it wasn’t moving. He squinted. It was a 4 x 4 – a Range Rover maybe? He could make out rails on the front…

Joe stopped. He didn’t know why. He found himself estimating how quickly he could get to his house. Ten seconds, at a sprint.

Palpitations. Something was making him nervous. A sixth sense, finely honed after years on the front line.

Only this wasn’t the front line. This was Lancing Way. Home.

This was paranoia. He remembered the doctor’s questions.

‘Fucking bullshit,’ he muttered under his breath. He needed to get back to the house. Sleep off the booze. Start his whole fucking disastrous homecoming all over again.

He looked down the road. The car was moving towards him. Slowly, he thought, though it was difficult to judge speed in the darkness. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket and upped his pace. It was with a kind of defiance that he ignored the approaching car. So what if it was moving slowly? Probably just some John kerb-crawling for a hooker. He was in the wrong street…

Or maybe it wasn’t. He could hear the revs of the car’s engine as it increased in speed. Suddenly. Violently.

The car was twenty metres away when, still accelerating, it veered across the road towards Joe. It was ten metres away when it mounted the kerb. There was a massive clattering sound as it ploughed into the barriers, slicing through them with two wheels on the pavement and two on the road.

The headlights blinded him. Everything started to spin again. He dived to the side of the pavement, where his face scraped against a rough brick front-garden wall and his left shoulder thumped down heavily on the pavement. The stench of burning rubber hit his senses, and he was aware that the car had come to a halt just three metres forward of where he had fallen. Joe pushed himself up to his feet as it started reversing away from him, back the way it had come. Still blinded by the headlights, he sprinted towards the car. The distance between them closed to two metres. One.

The car stopped abruptly. Joe was alongside the driver’s door now, and the lights were no longer shining in his eyes. Although he was still dazzled, he managed to feel his way to the door handle and yank it.

Locked.

More revs from the engine. Joe raised one leather-clad elbow and smashed it hard against the driver’s window. The glass splintered, cobweb-like, but didn’t shatter. It needed another blow, but the car was moving forward. His vision was clearing now, and he could see through the rear passenger window.

A face was looking out at him. He recognized it, even though he didn’t notice the yellow tinge of the teeth.

And then the car was back on the road, accelerating away, the engine screaming. Five metres. Ten. Joe sprinted into the middle of the road and squinted after it, trying to make out the plates. But his vision was blurred and he couldn’t read them.

The car turned right into Grosvenor Place, out of sight; the noise of its engine disappeared.

Silence.

Joe felt his left cheek. It was wet with blood. His shoulder throbbed. On the other side of Lancing Way, the door to number 17 opened. A fat man Joe half recognized appeared, wearing a dressing gown and lit up by the hallway light behind him. ‘What the bloody hell’s going on?’ he shouted. ‘It’s half past bloody twelve at night! What you doing standing in the middle of the road? I’m calling the bloody police…’