Outside

OUTSIDE

A post-apocalyptic novel

Shalini
Boland

~

Copyright © Shalini Boland 2011

~

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

~

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior permission of the author.

~

http://www.shaliniboland.co.uk

Prologue

*

The woman swung the huge
armoured
vehicle out through the iron gates and turned left onto the poor excuse for a dirt track that ran parallel to the Perimeter. She remembered when Britain was open and free with real roads, pavements even, before all the trouble started.

As she turned, the full glare of the dying evening sun blinded her and she flicked on the windscreen filter.
She heard a muffled thud, looked to her left and saw a dark figure lying by the side of the fence. She didn’t stop, but glanced in her wing mirror and made brief eye contact with him as he lifted his head.

‘A man,
’
she breathed out, realising she
’
d been holding her breath for quite a time. She sucked in another lungful of air and felt a lip-biting pang of concern, realising she must have hit him. But everybody knew you didn
’
t stop for anything outside the Perimeter.
I
’
m sure he
’
ll be okay
. She reasoned, convinced and then banished her conscience.

‘
Won
’
t be long now,
’
she said to herself, looking ahead at the vast tract of wilderness.

Chapter One

Riley

*

Pa is a black marketeer. Nobody and everybody knows this. Pa pays people not to rock the boat. He pays the guards, he pays the neighbours and he even pays his friends. He pays off just about everyone – a litre of whisky here and a bag of sugar there, and in return we live a life of ease and comfort. Pa believes in the carrot approach just as much as the punishing stick. As long as he doesn’t draw too much attention to himself from the wrong quarters, we’re safe and free.

Pa can get his hands on just about anything from before. If you’ve got a craving for a pot noodle he can probably magic one up from somewhere. But it’ll cost you all you’ve got and more besides. He isn
’
t swayed by threats or tears. He
’
ll hold fast and stare you down and if you can
’
t pay you might get a bullet in your head, or worse.

This morning, my parents are standing together in the doorway of the sitting room. Behind me, the sun floods in through the windows and they edge closer to avoid squinting into the too-bright light.

Their faces are ghost white and Ma
’
s nose and eyes are pink and swollen. She shivers and her teeth chatter as though she’s chilled and it isn
’
t the warm July morning it appears to be.

‘
Riley, can you sit down?
’
Pa asks.

‘
Okay,
’
I say. They’re acting weird. It’s freaking me out. My legs are heavy wood and I’m not sure I can make the three feet required to reach the sofa.

‘
Okay,
’
I repeat. But I don
’
t move. I just keep looking from one to the other and they stare back almost as if they’re afraid of me.

‘
Riley, sit down,
’
Pa says.

I walk to the sofa and sit in one corner with my hands on my lap. The leather is cool against my legs in the warmth of the room. Fear has
travelled
up from my stomach to my throat and I can
’
t swallow. I feel sick.

‘
Riley,
’
he says, running his hands slowly through his hair.

‘
No!
’
Ma loses it. She sobs and stumbles towards me. Sits and buries her head in my chestnut curls, rocking me backwards and forwards, moaning and muttering. I can
’
t breathe she’s holding me so tight.

‘
Sweetheart, let go, you
’
re crushing her. Go and lie down upstairs if you want. I
’ll tell her.’
Pa
’
s voice is soft and broken. It doesn
’
t sound a bit like him.

She lets go of me, cups my face in her hands and kisses my face all over. ‘No, It
’
s alright, I
’
m alright,’ she says not taking her eyes from my face. ‘I'm not leaving my baby.’ She leans back, trembling. I press my hands back into my lap and she wraps her arms around herself, still shivering and rocking.

Our house has always been a light and happy place. I don’t understand what’s going on. My face and
pyjama
top are wet from Ma’s sticky tears. I let my mind wander for a minute, away from the awful strangeness of what’s going on and I hear the low background hum of the generators overlaid by the familiar whirr and thrum of a copter hovering overhead.

Has my father done something wrong? Are we in danger? Do we have to leave the Perimeter? All the most awful things I can think of crowd my brain. And then … Skye! Why isn
’
t she here? My little sister is usually up before me. I hesitate, not wanting to pose the question. Maybe she’s too young for this conversation and they’ve sent her out of earshot. She won't like that; she’ll kick up a real fuss. But then I would have heard them arguing and everything has been quiet this morning; abnormally quiet up until now.

An unwanted thought creeps into my head and I push it out quickly.

‘
Where
’
s Skye?
’
My voice sounds high pitched and distant, like my ears need to pop.

Pa comes close and crouches down in front of me. He takes both my hands in his and looks into my eyes.

‘Something’s happened.
’
He breaks off.
‘
We
’
re waiting for
…
We
’
re not sure ...
’

And then something really horrible happens. My powerful, strong, wonderful father starts crying. Proper messy crying where his face twists and his voice sounds broken. I’m appalled. He
never
cries.

‘
Pa …
’

I’m not a typical daddy
’
s girl. I love the bones of him, but I feel easiest around Ma. We always talk make-up, fashion, gossipy stuff and laugh a lot together. Skye belongs to Pa and Pa definitely belongs to Skye. They’re a team. I never feel excluded exactly, but I don
’
t have the same natural connection they do.

‘
Riley,’ he says.
‘I don't know how to say this.’ He looks over at Ma who’s staring at him in horror. ‘Skye
is … Skye is. Oh Riley, she … she
’
s dead.
’

I stare down at the patterns on the carpet. I
’
ve never noticed just how vivid the individual
colours
are.
The over-all effect is of a soft warmth, but I focus on a particular strand of red that seems almost luminous, as if it’s going to jump out of the weave and hit me in the face.

*

I wake up in my parents
’
bed. A moment of peace and then everything rushes towards me in a crash of disbelief and pain … Skye.

Ma lies next to me on top of the quilt, humming in a scary way while she strokes the hair off my face. I must have blacked out, fainted or something after they told me Skye was...

‘
Ma.
’
I speak gently, as if talking to a young child, but she carries on humming.
‘
Ma!
’
I pull away from her and wrench her hands from my hair.
‘
What happened to Skye? Where is she? She can’t be …
’

‘Sh
, sh baby,
’
she croons to me and kisses my forehead.

‘
You
’
re scaring me. Are you okay?
’ I hear the tremor in my voice.

‘
Everything will be alright
’
, she says in a strange new childish way.
‘Just
sleep and it will be okay.
’

I throw myself out of bed, run out of the bedroom and almost fall down the stairs to find my father. He’s standing in the lounge talking to some of the guards, including Roger Brennan, the Head of Perimeter Security.

Even though we don
’
t really speak to any of them, we know all the guards by name. They’ve guarded the Talbot Woods Perimeter for the past sixteen- and-a-half years since the fences first went up, just before I was born.

This spring a new guard started - Liam. This thrilled us as we rarely get to see new people. On his first day, his watch stopped and Skye and I sneaked him a new battery out of Pa’s supplies. Since then, we’ve been friends of a sort. We’ve never properly chatted, but he’s about nineteen or twenty and always has a wink and a flirty comment for us which makes us blush and think he’s wonderful.

The only other people we see are those who live in the Perimeter and of course the delivery drivers, trades people and the army. Occasionally we get a glimpse through the wire fence at a rare passer-by.

I wait downstairs in a blur of grief and anxiety until the guards finally excuse themselves and leave Pa sitting on the sofa. I desperately need to speak to him to make sense of what he told me. I stupidly start to hope there’s some sort of reasonable explanation and Skye will come running in to ask us what we’re making such a fuss about.

Pa stands up and holds his arms out to me. I stumble into them and breathe in his comforting smell of diesel oil and cologne. We sit next to each other on the sofa, his arm around me. He kisses my hair and strokes my cheek with his fist.

‘You alright?’ he asks gruffly.

‘No,’ I reply.

‘No,’ he echoes.

‘What happened?’ I ask in a quiet voice. ‘How can she be gone? It’s Skye. She’s my sister. She can’t not be here anymore.’

‘I don’t know. Luc found her this morning.’

‘Luc?’

My sister thinks … thought seventeen-year-old Luc Donovan was the cat’s pyjamas. This summer especially, he’s all she talked about.
Luc’s so good looking, Luc’s so amazing.
She adored him. I always pretend to be disinterested when he’s around and I’m sure he thinks I’m a stuck up cow. Pa interrupts my thoughts.

‘Luc found her next door, in their poolhouse. It was an accident. She … she fell through the glass door …’

‘What? That doesn’t sound right. How can you fall through a door?’

‘I don’t know, Riley. But I’m bloody well going to find out. The guards have got Luc in there. I’m going down to get some answers.’

‘Skye …’ I say. ‘It can’t be true.’

Pa stands up. ‘I’ll be back in a minute. I’m just going to check on your mother.’ He walks quickly from the room and I know he’s crying again. He doesn’t want me to see.

What Pa told me doesn’t make any sense. I have to speak to someone, to find out what happened. Nothing feels real. I haven’t even cried. I open our front door and walk down the block paved driveway. Liam, the new guard, is standing outside our house. I hesitate, wanting to know every terrible detail but at the same time I can
’
t bear to find out.

‘Liam!’ I call out.

He looks across at me with awkward pity and I can tell he’d rather be anywhere else than here with me, Skye’s sister.