The Identical Boy (2 page)

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it had been an all-boys’ school, but for the last fifteen years girls had been allowed to attend. This didn't sit right with many of the longer serving male teachers, who wondered what on Earth it was a ten year old girl could want to know.

Sam entered through the giant gates, the dark green paint peeling in ribbons from the metal. The playground noise was like a ghost as you approached, turning to a fist as you stepped through the gate. All confusion and shouts and energy and potential trouble.

In one corner, Sam could see two boys bent over, one with his neck being squeezed by the other’s forearm and bicep. The boy struggled but the other one, the bigger one, held tight and laughed as others crowed along and clapped. Mark, the bully.

Sam kept his head down and stuck to the edges, making his way around the fence until he reached the school building itself, with its large bricks slick with recent rain and mottled with a rash.

He found his way to the entrance and hopped through, shaking off the outside like a dog would pond water.

'Morning, Simon,' said Mrs Tithe, the head of year.

'Sam,' he replied.

'Yes, yes, that's right,' she said smiling, blouse straining as she turned and squeaked off down the corridor. At least she'd managed to remember the first letter of his actual name this time.

The bell rang and the doors exploded open as a flood of messy hair, torn shirts, and knee socks surged into the building and then away down the different tributaries at hand.

Sam held onto his bag as thought it were a floating log and navigated his way through the choppy waters towards his classroom.

***

All day Sam trudged from class to class He never sat at the front and he wouldn't be welcome at the back, so he sat to the side, lost in the mix of faces and voices.

And this was Sam's school life, forever trying to avoid attention.

Drift

  Drift

Drifting.

'Sam, will you please listen for once in your life!'

Sam blinked and looked up from the shapes he was doodling in his textbook, to see every face in the room turned towards him and smirking, and Mr Taylor up front, with his beard you could lose a pencil in, hands on hips, shaking his head.

'Sorry, Sir,' said Sam.

The children giggled, then turned their backs on him.

***

Sam hadn’t always been alone; he'd had friends of his own at one point. Lots of friends.

Well.

Some friends.

'Hi Miss, do you have any books about dreams and stuff?' Sam asked the squashed looking librarian, who was all hair and heavy, frayed cardigan.

'Not sure about 'stuff', but there's a book about dreams in aisle K somewhere. I think.'

‘Thanks,’ said Sam.

'As much as I applaud your thirst for knowledge, young man, you really should go and play football and run around shouting with the others boys once in a while.'

'Yes Miss,' he replied. Sam set off in search of the book. The library was where Sam spent his break times, amongst the rows and rows of books. He ran a finger along a shelf of spines as he wandered along the aisle. Books didn't ignore you, or send a heavy leather football hurtling towards your skull when you weren't paying attention. Books held secrets, and knowledge, and laughs, and entire new worlds.

A group of boys shoved the library door open and made loud farting noises before running away, laughing and shrieking. Sam saw him amongst them, at the centre of the whirlwind: John Finney. He'd been Sam's friend for a while, ever since they were at nursery together. Two peas in a pod, or so said Finney's Mum, a tall, fire-haired woman who spoke with a thick Dublin accent. Not that she'd lived there since she was seven years old, but she'd held onto the brogue. Pure dumb stubbornness, according to Sam's Dad: 'A country takes your family in and treats you right, least you can do to pay respects is talk like you're from here.' Sam had nodded at his Dad, but even then, at the age of five, had known his Dad was wrong and probably a bit stupid.

Sam pulled out a book at random:
The Secrets of Ancient Egypt
. It was one of his's favourites. He briefly paused in his quest for the dream book, and flicked through the full colour images of mighty pyramids, bird-headed Gods, and the riddle-spinning Sphinx. He slid the book back between its neighbours and carried on.

He wasn't quite sure when he and Finney had stopped being friends. Sometime over the last year or so they'd just spent less and less time together, Finney hanging out with a new gaggle of boys. Boys like Mark, the bully. Boys who enjoyed gobbing fat wads of spit out of the top floor window onto unlucky passersby below. Boys who were all noise and dirt, flashing fists and fear. Oh, and loud farting noises, apparently. These boys were not at all taken with Sam. Without Finney standing in their ranks, he assumed he would be one of the lucky few to receive their daily attention. No doubt they’d get around to him. In time.

'Why don't you go out and play with that nice John Finney lad anymore?’ Sam's Mum would ask every few weeks. 'You'd always be out and about, instead of moping around my house all the time, nose in a book. It's not natural, Sam. Boys need to be outside. You'll turn quite odd reading on your own all day.'

‘
Turn
quite odd?’ Sam’s Dad interjected. ‘I think the turnings already been done, love. He’s done a complete 360 and he’s on his way back round again!’ Dad had laughed, wiping mirthful tears from his red eyes.

Sam found the book:
What Dreams Mean
, by Dr. Sandra Gubba. Sam pulled it down and took it over to the nearest table. The front cover was an illustration of a head with the top prized open like a pedal bin to reveal the brain, a multitude of symbols and sparks firing out from within.

Chapter 1: What Are Dreams?

Chapter 2: Common Dream Types.

Chapter 3: What Dreams Really Mean.

He'd heard a voice.

He wasn't sure quite when he'd first heard it, but he knew that he had. Thought he had. No matter what his Dad said. But it was all so vague, so difficult to pin down to an exactness. He thought it was probably a boy’s voice; that seemed to stick. Any more attempts at clarity slid off and aside, like he was attempting to push two magnets of the same pole together.

Dreams often represent a person’s unconscious fears—their desires, worries, and wants.

Sam turned the page.

He supposed he must be dreaming the voice. There was no such thing as ghosts, or monsters. And even if there were, he'd checked and triple-checked his room, his parent’s room (when they were out), the tiny stone enclosure that had once housed an outside toilet; every nook and cranny that might house something of the night. He'd even ventured into the attic with a torch in case anything had bedded down there for the winter. Not so much as a mouse had scurried from the light as he’d prodded and poked around.

No ghosts.

No monsters.

Unless it was an invisible monster. Sam hadn't considered that. Could monsters make themselves invisible? He wouldn't put it past one.

No. No such thing as monsters, of course there wasn't, that stuff was just for babies.

The library doors burst open for a second time to allow in the fanfare of rectal mimicry. Miss Travers gave chase at full squash-waddle, the boys whooped and shrieked in delight, then fled.

All
y
Chambers. She was 17, her hair cut into a sharp bob and dyed (for this week at least) a fierce, vibrant blue. The paint on her nails was always peeling, and her feet never seemed to wear anything but heavy Dr. Marten boots. To Sam, she seemed like just about the coolest person alive. She even smoked; he'd seen her as she stomped around the streets, music clattering from her earphones. He knew smoking was very bad for you. Perhaps that was why she looked so cool doing it. She was wearing her dark red leather jacket today, and under that a t-shirt that said 'Folk The Police' (Sam was pretty sure this was really clever and funny). Her bottom half sported a pair of orange jeans torn to such a severity that most people would've given them up for dead long ago.

Cool.

'We shouldn't be more than a few hours,' said Mum. 'Help yourself to crisps and that. Have a sandwich if the fancy strikes.'

'Cool, ta, yeah.'

'I don't mind if you nab a cheeky can from the fridge, all right darling?' said Dad, winking.

'Cool, ta, yeah.'

Sam's parents left. Ally flopped on the couch, legs dangling over the arm, and began to flip through the channels. Talk-show. Infomercial. Hitler. Finally she settled on one of the music channels.

'Your Dad's a real creep, you know that?' said Ally.

'Yeah,' said Sam.

'All right darling?'
Who's he think he's winking at? Creepy. Pure creepy.'

Sam laughed and nodded.

'I mean, I don't mind him fancying me, he can’t help that, but keep it to yourself, you're ancient. Creepy. Gross.'

Sam sat cross-legged on the rug, watching three men with guitars jump in unison to their polished, thin-sounding pop-punk.

'I don’t really need a babysitter, you know. Not anymore.’

‘Oh, is that right, is it? Why’s that then, Sammy boy?’

‘Well, I’m not a little kid. I'm almost twelve!' said Sam, trying to sound sophisticated.

‘Wow, pretty ancient.’

‘Exactly.’

'Yeah, well, don't let on to your parents; I need the extra cash, know what I mean?'

Sam nodded. He didn’t want Ally to think of him as a baby, but he also didn’t want her to stop coming round.

'You don't mind me slagging off your Dad then?' she asked.

'No,' Sam replied. 'I don't mind.' He hated to think that anyone he liked would actually think anything other than bad thoughts about his fungus of a Dad.

'God, I hate this band. Soft as baby poop.' She flicked onto the next music channel, idly humming the song she'd just turned over from. 'Do you think your Dad fancies me, then?'

Sam shrugged.
Probably,
he thought.

'Yeah. I don't mind. Just don't be so gross and obvious about it. I mean your Mum was right there. Not cool, man.' She flicked back to the other song. 'What's that book, then?'

Sam was holding the dream book. He'd taken it out of the library to look into it more.

'Just this book,' said Sam.

'Well duh, yeah, all right. What's it about, though?'

'Dreams and that.'

'Really? Give it here, then.' Amy reached out for it; Sam passed it over.

Ally started flipping through the pages, back and forth, back and forth. 'I got a dream catcher over my bed. Know what that is?'

'Not really.'

'It's real mystical stuff. Hippy jazz, all right?'

Sam nodded as if that made everything clear.

'Why you reading this, then? Is it for school or something?'

'No, I….' Sam swallowed. 'It doesn't matter. Nothing.'

Ally clapped the book closed and sat up sharply. 'Oooh! Are you keeping secrets? You know, as your babysitter I am, like, your guardian and stuff. It's more or less illegal to keep secrets from me.'

Sam wasn't sure if that was true or not; it didn't sound true, but then half the things grownups had rules about confused him.

Plus, he really wanted to tell someone. Ally especially.

'Well, there's this voice. And a place, I think.'

Ally raised her eyebrows as Sam paused for that bit too long. 'Yeah, and? Elaborate, Sammy boy, elaborate.' Ally shimmied off the chair and joined him on the rug, her legs curved beneath her.

'I dunno. Just a voice. I've told Mum and Dad, but they say it's probably nothing. It's not a monster; I'm not a baby who believes in monsters, you know.'

'I'm not a baby and I believe in monsters,' Ally replied. 'Haven't you ever watched the news, or looked at the internet, or read a, you know, book or anything? Can't move for monsters. The whole world’s a monster, with teeth the size of trees. On you go.'

Trees.

That tickled at something in Sam’s brain. He shook it off.

‘Well, then?’ said Ally.

Sam hesitated. Was he really going to tell her all about this weird thing? What if she thought he was nuts, like his Dad? But no, Ally wasn’t like that, she was cool. She believed in stuff.  Maybe Ally would know what the voice was?

'It's hard to remember. I forget it all. Or most of it. The important stuff. I think I remember when I'm asleep, but it hides when I wake back up properly. But there's this voice. I know there's a voice talking to me. Might be a boy. And we're someplace else. Some other place. But the other place isn’t completely another place as it’s also still here, I think. Sort of. Which doesn't make any sense. Do you believe me?'

Ally eyed him with studied cool indifference. 'Maybe.'

'Well, I think it might be a real thing. Not just a dream. It feels like I'm trying to remember. Like I
should
remember. Like it's important somehow. Like it's really, really important'

Ally leaned back and regarded Sam. 'You've got quite the imagination, hey?' she said, with a wink.

Sam turned away, blood rushing to his face. He shouldn't have told her. She thought he was a baby. A liar. An idiot.

'Hey, man, what's with the cold shoulder? Imagination is good. D'you think your parents have any imagination? D'you think any parents at all have an imagination? Anyone over, like, thirty, even? They let all that cool stuff go when they start dreaming about weddings, and mortgages, and what kind of couch they could go buy to best suit their ugly curtains. Imagination is something to be proud of, something to fight for, 'cos it separates the likes of us from the likes of them.'

Ally reached out and ruffled his hair. 'Imagination can make the unreal real. Keep tight hold of it, little man.'

Sam smiled at Ally as she lurched back up and flopped onto the couch again.

'Now go get me one of those beers your dirty perv of a Dad said I could have.'

Sam hopped up and scurried off to the fridge.

***

Sam could still hear the music channel blaring downstairs as he closed his bedroom door and climbed into bed. Every now and then he could hear Ally singing along, slightly tipsy, to one of the songs.

He wondered if he'd ever be able to go to sleep, so full was his head of the voice, and of life, but before he knew it his eyelids dropped, his jaw slackened, and he left Awake behind.

And that was the last normal day that Sam would encounter.

Things would change.

Things would stay remembered.

And what could be remembered could be made alive.