Out of Towners (17 page)

The road is still climbing, but the slope is much gentler now, flattening out as we get nearer to the cliffs. It's a strange, spooky landscape, illuminated by a moon that seems to have got even bigger as the night has gone on. The trees are further away, bent into hunched black silhouettes by a lifetime of pummelling by the wind off the sea. We've not seen another vehicle since we left Whitbourne. We're right out in the middle of nowhere, but there are signs of civilisation up ahead. The visitors' centre and the pub, shut down and silent.

Further on, the road arcs round to the right, running parallel to the cliff face, separated from the chalk precipice by a couple of hundred metres of downland. Moving through the gears again, Steph finds a place where the kerb isn't too high. She bumps the car across the pavement, onto the grass and up to the brow of the hill, finally stopping about twenty foot before the land drops away.

The engine cuts out and everything goes silent. The silence stretches on for what seems like ages. And then the laughing starts. It's wild, out-of-control laughing that keeps going and going, as we bundle out of the doors and roll onto the cool ground.

And we're not only laughing any more. We're screaming and yelling and whooping. We're buzzing. I don't know what might have happened back in Whitbourne if Kirkie's gang had got hold of us. But it feels like we've cheated death.

I push myself up and take Steph's hand. We walk to the cliff edge. When we're close, we lie on our stomachs. The grass is short and bristly, flat as a putting green, dotted with tiny plants. We inch forward, commando-style, until we're looking down into the void.

It's an awesome sight. The moon is shining like an immense torch, shimmering across the surface of the sea. Thousands of pinpricks of light are dancing off the waves and bouncing against the perfect white of the chalkface as it extends to the beach below. We're at the absolute top point of the whole ridge. A hundred and twenty-five metres above sea level, I remember Robbie said. Down near the bottom there's the remains of what looks like a flight of chalk steps leading up the cliff, coming to a sudden halt where years of wind and rain have washed them away. Over to the left, Whitbourne is a glittering grid of tiny lights. The pier is just visible as the bay curves round. A gentle breeze ruffles my hair. I find a stone to throw and watch it disappear into nothingness.

I look at Steph. She rolls her eyes. No words needed.

We both look back down to the beach. It's not sandy, and it doesn't have shingle like the stretch of coast near the bandstand. It's white chalk, smoothed by the pounding of the sea, pitted with potholes and strewn with green seaweed, like streamers from a big party long since finished. In the far distance I can see the lights of a ferry cutting across the sea on its way to France.

I clear my throat.

“Steph,” I say, trying to put my thoughts in order.

“Back there in town, you know, you…you probably saved someone's life.”

Steph gives me an awkward smile. She tucks her hair behind her ear.

“Maybe. But we've got problems haven't we? I've twocced another motor, and our fingerprints are going to be all over it.”

I nod. She's right. It's a problem. But to every problem there's a solution. And the solution is lying a hundred and twenty-five metres down the cliff. I don't know much about forensics, but I reckon if the car was in the sea for a couple of days any fingerprints would be well and truly washed out of existence.

Steph's read my mind. We both stand and run back across to where the others are still lying. There's no time to hang around.

“Come on,” I shout. “We've got to dump the car.”

While people are standing up and getting themselves ready, Steph pulls open the door of the BMW. She leans across the driver's seat and releases the handbrake. She slams the door again then runs round to the back to join the rest of us and we begin to push the big vehicle towards the cliff edge.

It's slow going at first, but as the last stretch of grassy clifftop slopes downwards, the car starts to pick up speed. The front wheels roll out into thin air and the BMW stops with a jolt. Its underside scrapes slowly forwards, pulled by the weight of the engine, and the back wheels lift up. For a second I think it's going to stay like that, balanced like a huge seesaw, but then it steadily pitches forward until the rear end is pointing skywards. It stays there for a brief instant, then plunges out of sight.

Running to the edge of the cliff, we watch the BMW hit a ledge and spiral wildly to the beach. A sound like distant thunder rises up. I can actually feel the rumbling in my body. There's no explosion, and the car looks intact. It's even the right way up, like someone's parked it there, a few metres from the giant wall of chalk. We stand for a while, mesmerised, then we walk back and flop onto the grass.

My body is coming down off red alert. My knees hurt and my hands hurt. There's a lump on the top of my head where I got punched in McDonald's and another one on the side from where I hit the tarmac. But it's no big deal. We're alive. That's what matters. We're all alive.

Steph touches my arm.

“I've got an admission to make,” she says.

I tilt my head on one side.

“What's that?”

Steph sighs.

“I've lost Cartman.”

I laugh.

“No worries. I'll win you another one tomorrow.”

I lie back and stare up at the stars. Relaxation is spreading through me.

There's movement to my left. Gemma's standing up.

“Where's George?” she asks.

I'm not really paying attention.

“Where's George?” Gemma asks again, more urgently this time.

Nobody's answering her. I sit up. I scan from left to right. Steph's here. Nikita's here and Gemma's here. Robbie's here and so is Dylan. But there's no George. I feel the first little flicker of unease in the pit of my stomach.

I get up and look around. Perhaps George has gone off to take a piss behind one of the gnarled bushes down by the road.

But there's no sign of him.

The flicker in my guts is growing now. Like the fire last night, it's gradually catching light and the flames of unease are rising, moving from my stomach and working their way up my throat to the back of my mouth.

George isn't here.

I try to keep my tone steady, unemotional.

“Has anyone seen him? I mean, since we've been up here, has anyone seen George?”

There's no response.

My whole body feels like it's ablaze now. A terrible certainty is dawning on me. I know where George is. Five of us would never have got in the back seat of the BMW. So George would have made his own arrangements. He'd have done what he did last Friday, when we went into Letchford in Dylan's brothers' Escort. Squashed himself into a ball in the boot. And no-one's seen him since we got to the cliffs. So he's still in the boot.

This just can't be happening. I stand up and walk to the cliff edge, looking for the place where the BMW disappeared. The fresh scars on the grass help me find the exact point. Peering over into emptiness, I'm getting a strange feeling that the car might not be there. That this whole thing is a dream. And that in a minute I'm going to wake up in a puddle of my own piss and puke. It gives me a moment of hope. But I'm not dreaming. I can see the car. Water is starting to creep over the smooth chalk of the beach and lap gently around it.

I turn away. No-one needs to ask me what I'm thinking. We've all come to the same conclusion. The colour has drained from everyone's faces. In the pale light of the moon, we look like ghosts.

Gemma's still on her feet. She takes a couple of steps, sags down and starts to sob quietly. Steph and Nikita are rigid with shock. Robbie and Dylan have got their heads in their hands.

I walk across to where everyone's sitting and sink to my knees. Again, the same thought. This just can't be happening.

Dylan lifts his eyes to look out to the horizon.

“Instant Karma,” he says. “That's what this is. Like George said. We all lied to our parents, and look what the result is. It's Instant Karma.”

I shake my head. I can't let myself believe that. This weekend was supposed to be a laugh. A harmless laugh and a piss-up. We earned it. I know it's bad we did it behind our parents' backs, but it's not the crime of the century. We're not bad lads. George definitely isn't a bad lad. So why are we getting punished like this?

Gemma's sobbing is getting louder. Steph goes across to try to comfort her.

Dylan's eyes are still focused on the horizon.

“George didn't even want to leave Wonderland tonight. He said there would be trouble. The Family Entertainment Centre might have been shit, but if we'd stayed there then at least, you know…” his words trail away.

“Yeah,” Robbie says. “And we bullied him. Ganged up on him. This is our fault. Not just that we pushed the car off. It's all our fault.”

I shake my head again. It's true, but I don't want to think about it. The thing is, it's impossible not to. People are always using words like
disaster
and
tragedy
to describe crappy, everyday stuff. Like Letchford Town getting relegated. But this really is a disaster. This really is a tragedy. We've just killed our mate.

I get my phone out of my pocket and slide it open. It's ten to two. I select
MENU
and open my file of photos, flicking through until I get to the one George BlueToothed to me in the Wonderland Supermarket. The one taken by the bloke in the orange reflective jacket at Whitbourne Bus Depot. It's us lot, at the start of our holiday. Me. Robbie. Dylan. George. So excited. So full of life.

Time seems to be standing still. Gemma keeps on sobbing.

I shut the phone and cram it back in my pocket. I look up at the sky, away from the glare of the moon and out towards the stars and the blackness. My mind is spooling into the future. I start to imagine the pain and disappointment on my mum and dad's faces when I see them. I think about how it's going to be, back on the streets of Letchford. The finger-pointing. The whispering. The strangers knowing who I am and what I've done.

In the space of a few seconds, my whole universe has changed. Nothing's going to be the way I hoped now. This is like a cloud over everything. And it's always going to be there. It seems amazingly, unbelievably unfair.

Tears are welling up in my eyes, but before they can break out I'm feeling disgusted. Ashamed of myself. What sort of bloke am I? Wallowing in self-pity. Whingeing about things not being fair. How fair is all of this for George? My future might not be what I wanted it to be. But George hasn't got a future.

I roll my head from side to side, trying to clear the clutter out of my brain, leave some space for logical thought. It's no good. George is the logical thinker. And he's not around.

“What are we going to do?” I ask.

I don't mean it as a question. But Nikita answers me anyway.

“Look. This is Bellevue Point, right?”

I nod.

“Well I read something in the paper a few months ago. A lad was messing around in a car on the top of these cliffs and he went over the edge. But he survived. He only had a few cuts and bruises. They said it was a one-in-a-million thing. What if it wasn't? What if it's happened again?”

We all look at one another. Maybe George has still got a chance.

“But even if he's alive, we can't get to him,” Dylan says, exasperated. “I mean what are we going to do?

Abseil?”

“No,” Robbie says. “No. We don't need to do that. The steps on the cliff face got swept into the sea years ago, but there's still a way to get down.”

Everyone's attention, even Gemma's, fixes on Robbie.

“We'd have to go back towards Whitbourne. There's a path that leads down to a place called Seaward Cove. It's an old smugglers' bay. Hardly anyone ever goes there because it's so difficult to get to, and because the sea comes all the way up to the bottom of the cliffs. When the tide's out though, you can double back along to Bellevue Point. Right underneath where we're sitting.”

“But the tide's coming in,” Dylan moans.

Gemma's right back with us now.

“We've got to call the Coastguard,” she says. “Or the Lifeboats or something. Just dial nine nine nine, get someone to help…”

I'm not listening. I'm on my feet. The burning sensation is leaving me now, being replaced by a coldness. It's like my veins are filling with ice. My body is preparing itself for one massive effort.

“Come on,” I say. “The Coastguard will take too long. It's up to us. We've still got time.”

We're sprinting as we head along the clifftops in the direction of Whitbourne. Robbie's up front, because he knows where we're going, and I'm on his shoulder. Dylan and Nikita aren't far behind. Steph and Gemma are right on their tail. Whatever happens, we're in this together.

We go even faster as the cliff edge sinks into a natural dip. We're flat-out. It's like being on a runaway train. One wrong step now and we'd go tumbling down through the town and out the other side. As we get to the bottom of the dip, Robbie points.

Just past a patch of mangy shrubs and tall grass, is a signpost. It's weathered and warped with an outline of an outstretched finger. The words on the sign have nearly been blasted out of existence by the salty wind but, as we pull level, they're easy enough to decipher.
Seaward Cove
.

I sag forwards with my hands on my knees and blood hammering in my ears. I'm fighting for breath, but I'm still thinking, plotting the next move.

The edge of the cliff is different here. It's not a sheer drop like other parts of the coast. It's more a ragged slope. If I'd ever listened properly in Geography, I could explain how it was formed. An ancient river running to the sea. The track of a glacier. Something like that.