The last lump of ice cream was popped in his mouth and swallowed, its soothing cold a temporary balm as sweat beaded his sun scorched face, beetroot red like an over inflated balloon dangerously close to bursting. Irritably, Patrick probed a finger between the collar of his shirt and the folds of fat around his neck, unfastening the top button beneath his tie. Balls to what Askew might say; he wasn’t going back to the bank after lunch feeling like he was about to be choked. He loosened his tie and let it hang an inch or so from the top of his collar. A relief of sorts came at once. Perhaps he should buy a larger size next time, Patrick reflected; with a sigh he heaved himself up from the bench and gazed across the busy road that separated the Promenade of St. Auban from the bustling streets further back where most of the town’s businesses lay, deceptively cool between the high stone walls of its buildings: gift shops, supermarkets, the town’s two cinemas, a live theatre all too obviously on its last legs (as it had been for the past ten years, strangely enough), chemists, amusement arcades, their cacophonous interiors a cheap if attractive pandemonium of flashing lights and electronic noises, and the banks and building societies that rose more soberly behind their classical facades, like Greek temples gone curiously wrong.
Patrick glanced at his Swatch watch, scandalously yellow beneath the pinstripe sleeve of his business suit (Askew had already made snide comments about that since Patrick bought it a week ago). It was time he was on his way back. Another three hours before the bank shut its doors for the day. And another half hour after that before they would leave, hopefully having balanced for the night. Three and a half hours of working in this stifling heat! Patrick was certain he’d faint or be ill before the end. He’d felt sick this morning, though the pints of beer he drank in the Dolphin last night—known locally as the Fish—probably accounted for that. And at least his stomach felt better after a Cornish pasty, two sausage rolls and the ice cream he’d bought on the spur of the moment, though he’d felt a bit odd queuing up behind half a dozen kids, none of them older than twelve, their bright T-shirts and swimming costumes contrasting with his suit, not to mention the litheness of their sun tanned bodies emphasizing the grossness of his own. Patrick had rarely felt more overweight in his life as he stood behind the jostling children, hating every one of them.
He walked a short way down the Promenade to a Pelican crossing where he pressed the button and waited for the cars to halt. He had five minutes to spare. Even if he was late that was better than rushing and getting himself run over. He pushed back the heavy frames of his sunglasses as they slid down the snub of his nose; his chin jutted out like a plump Mussolini waiting for applause as he watched the cars with growing impatience despite his determination not to rush. He jabbed his finger again at the button.
‘It’s no use hurrying,’ an old lady told him; she clutched a supermarket carrier bag to her stomach. ‘They’ll change in their own good time whatever you do.’
Recognizing her as one of the customers at the bank, Patrick stifled the snort to which he would have otherwise given vent and shrugged his shoulders instead.
He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand as he watched the cars.
‘Hot today,’ the old lady, Mrs. Maggs he remembered her name, went on. ‘It’s going to be a scorcher, mark my words.’
Patrick checked himself from asking what the hell she thought it was now if it wasn’t a ‘scorcher’ already. Instead, he waited with as much patience as he could muster for the lights to change. He’d be late, he knew it. Patrick clenched his fists then released them at once as the traffic slowed to a halt and the green man appeared on the sign opposite.
‘We can go now,’ Mrs. Maggs told him as if he were a child as she headed out across the road at a pace that carried her, without so much as a backwards glance, to the other side before Patrick was even halfway there. With a sullen, deep seated feeling of grievance Patrick wondered if old people like her liked to show off how fit they were, built like sticks, with leathery muscles. The leaden feel of his legs made each step an effort as sweat trickled from beneath his arms. His feet felt sore and he wished, with a fervency that was almost unbearable, it was five thirty now and he could go home for a good long soak in the bath.
Fortunately, Askew, a short, bullet headed man with the jowls of a bulldog, was too preoccupied in checking an application for a personal loan to say anything to him when he arrived back; he barely glanced at Patrick when he hurried into the bank five minutes late. Relieved, Patrick slipped onto the counter and opened his till.
A hundred pound shortage by one of the girls, not found till nearly quarter to six in a transfer error, held everyone back from leaving the bank till six. Hot, exhausted, his feet throbbing after hours at the counter, Patrick left, wishing vaguely he could join the unemployed—except that his mother and father (and especially his father)—would never forgive him for signing on. That kind of thing just wasn’t done on Merlin Close, where working for a bank was a step down from what was expected. It had taken a considerable stand on Patrick’s part when he refused to go to university after Sixth Form College (not that he had the brains, in any case, as his parents were forced to concede) and, more significantly, refused to enter his father’s business.
‘Go on, have your God damned independence, if that’s what you bloody well want,’ his father had stormed at the end of their argument. ‘But you’ll still want my roof over your head, won’t you?’
Patrick drove home in his three year old Escort, arriving back just before seven. His father’s Daimler was stood in the drive, its paintwork gleaming in the sunlight.
‘You’re late,’ his mother whispered as he walked through the hallway, shedding his jacket and tie with relief over the banister rail and heading up the stairs.
‘There was a shortage. One of the girls made a cock up of her figures,’ he called, too intent on a bath to go into details—not that his mother would want them, not like his father, who had a ferocious interest in stuff like that which made talking to him feel like being subjected to an interrogation.
A few minutes later he was in luxury. The buoyancy of his body floating beneath a soothing layer of suds even allowed him to forget his weight as he lay back, staring at the sunlit walls with a sense of timelessness, the aches and pains that had accumulated in his overburdened joints easing away, at least for the moment.
It was only for a moment, though. His father’s familiar fists were pounding on the door a few minutes later as he called out, asking how long he was going to be. Their evening meal was ready but was being held up, waiting for him to finish. ‘I have an important meeting tonight and I’ll be damned if I’m going to be late for it because you want to wallow in the bath.’
Wallow! That was typical of the old man. Couldn’t he say anything to him without making a sarcastic reference to his weight?
‘I’ve only been in a few minutes,’ Patrick protested.
‘A few minutes, my eye! Stop dawdling and get yourself downstairs a-s-a-p.’
Listening to his father’s footfalls as he stormed along the passageway, Patrick grimaced, wishing he had the guts to tell his father to go to Hell. But he knew that he hadn’t. Not now.
By the time he had dressed, his clothes were already sodden with sweat and he felt no better than when he arrived home. Worse still, he was now seething with anger over his father making him rush just so he could go to yet another of his bloody meetings. Nearly every night he had one somewhere; Patrick suspected they were just an excuse for his father to see his cronies, any of whom seemed more important to him than his own family.
Dinner was a desultory affair, eaten in silence. Patrick could feel his father’s impatience to be done with it, so intense Patrick wondered why he waited for his son to be ready to eat with him. No sooner had his father finished than he rose, said nothing, then left the room, eager to be on his way. Patrick’s mother barely lifted her head as she finished her food at her own pace.
Treats us like trash, Patrick thought, glowering at his emptied plate.
After his father drove away, Patrick told his mother he was going for a couple of pints, ignoring her plea not to get drunk.
It was hot and close, with barely a breeze, when he left the house. Even so, by the time he walked to the pub he was sweating profusely.
‘Looks like you’re ready for a cold one,’ Berenice, serving behind the bar, said to him as soon as he stepped inside. The landlord’s daughter, she looked after the pub in the early evening while it was quiet. Patrick would have loved to have had the courage to ask her out, but he knew, deep down, with her long blond hair, slim figure and pretty face she was out of his league—if he was even in a league. Maybe the Losers’ League, he thought morosely as he thanked her for his pint and took it out into the beer garden at the back, hoping that what breeze there was would help cool him down.
He slumped into an empty seat and drank his lager. Robbie Bowen swaggered towards him; his ridiculously flamboyant Hawaiian shirt unbuttoned to expose a well-tanned stomach. Friends since school, there was a casual comradery between them which transcended everything, especially as Robbie often defended him from bullies when they were kids.
‘How’s it going?’ Robbie sat next to him and stretched his legs. He reached into the pocket of his shorts. ‘Fancy something new?’
Unemployed since school, Robbie had drifted into selling drugs. Unknown to his father, Patrick was a regular customer.
His small eyes narrowed as he stared at the yellow tablets on Robbie’s palm.
‘What are they?’
‘They’re new. They’re not even illegal yet, though I suppose they will be soon enough.’ Robbie grinned. ‘I’ve been told they’re called Yellow Kings. No idea why, other than they’re yellow.’ His grin broadened. ‘Interested?’
‘What are they? Uppers? Downers? Hallucinogenic?’
‘I haven’t tried them yet, mate, but they’re definitely the latter. If you want to get off your head, they’re the thing.’
He dropped a couple into Patrick’s hand.
‘Wait till you get home, then try ‘em. If you like what they do I’ve more.’
‘Cheers.’ Patrick pocketed the tablets. ‘After today I could do with something.’ He reached for his wallet.
It was dark by the time he arrived home. His father’s Daimler was still absent, for which he was relieved. He could do without another lecture, especially as the old man would have drunk even more than him by now, albeit whiskey rather than beer. As a leading Mason he not only got away with driving over the limit, he’d even been given a police escort when he couldn’t drive in a straight line, just to make sure he got home safe.
Calling out a perfunctory Good Night to his mother, who was watching TV, Patrick hurried upstairs, barely able to wait to try one of the pills Robbie had sold him.
A few minutes later, lying on his bed still fully clothed, he swallowed one of them, though all he felt at first was a mild feeling of disorientation, as if he’d drunk more lager than he had. Only gradually did he begin to feel a sense of weightlessness creep over him, after which he had the pleasant illusion he was floating upwards off his bed. No sooner was he experiencing this than he realised he was sliding towards the window. Startled he might crash through its panes; he opened his eyes to see the ceiling only inches from his face. The illusion was alarmingly real.
At the same time he realised his senses had become so acute he could hear the TV downstairs in the living room as if it was only a few feet away, even though there was the landing, the stairs and two closed doors in between. He could even hear the tyres of his father’s Daimler as it crunched over the gravel on the opposite side of the house as he arrived home. A few seconds later Patrick heard his father climb out, slam the car door shut behind him before panting from the effort of weaving his way towards the house.
It was then Patrick realised his feet were rolling towards the floor as he floated along the landing, hands stretched out in front of him for the banister rail—hands that were weirdly transparent like dirty glass!
Shocked at being able to see through his hands Patrick panicked, gasping for breath an instant later when he found himself lying on his bed again, any feeling of weightlessness gone as if nothing had happened and everything was back to normal, including his sense of hearing. But the experience had been so amazingly real he wished he could capture it again, especially the illusion of floating through the air. With all his normal aches and pains that alone was worth what he paid for the pill.
Patrick knew he still had one of them left and wondered whether the experience would be the same. If it was, he knew he would be better prepared next time and not panic if something weird like being able to see through his hands happened again. Patrick grinned. Forewarned was forearmed. That was the ticket, his father would have said. Knowing what might happen would stop him from being scared next time.
But not tonight. It was already late, and he had work tomorrow and the certainty of a hangover when he woke up.
Throughout the next day memory of the experience haunted him, especially after a handful of aspirin soothed away the aftereffects of last night’s beers. The memories of the hallucinations helped get him through being bollocked by Askew again and the other humiliations he had to put up with at the bank. God help him, he would be relieved if he did get the sack, he hated it so much, except he knew he would hate the repercussions even more. They would be unbearable.
His father would make sure of that.
By the time he arrived home he was tired and fed up. Annoyingly, his father was staying in tonight, which meant Patrick would have to go upstairs to his room after they had eaten or face an evening of snide remarks while they watched TV. After having endured Askew’s bile all day this was something he desperately needed to avoid. Thankfully, his father took no notice when he slipped away after tea, though there was a time the old man would have insisted on him staying downstairs to watch TV ‘as a family’—which had always struck him as the height of hypocrisy considering how many nights he went out. Not that Patrick would have dared use this argument against him.
On the plus side, there was the pill, that Yellow King as Robbie called it. If it was as good as the first at least there was something to look forward to later. He hoped it would be. Never the optimist, Patrick was now wary at trying it out. One more disappointment after the day he had had and he would be ringing the Samaritans, tempted to end it once and for all, though he knew he was being melodramatic; he was far too cowardly for suicide.
As soon as he was in his room he closed the door and reached for the folded envelope within which he had saved the pill.
Dry swallowing it, he lay back on his bed and waited.
It did not take long.
The blissful feeling of weightlessness returned so vividly he could really believe he was floating free. Remembering what happened last night he raised his hands in front of him. This time he was not alarmed when he was able to see through them, though they weren’t transparent, he realised, so much as translucent. Reassured there was nothing to fear, he attempted to steer himself across his room towards the door, where he reached for the handle, only half surprised when his fingers slid through it before moving through the door itself.
Before he left his room he glanced at his bed to see his motionless body lying on top. In truth he had expected this. How else could he explain what was happening? It was implausible that his overweight body could really float. The only possible explanation was that his spirit self, whatever he chose to call it, his ka, his soul, had somehow been able to detach itself from his physical body.
Whatever the explanation, Patrick enjoyed the experience as he moved onto the landing where his hypersensitized hearing could clearly make out the television in the living room, his father grumbling over something he was watching. Though spoken sotto voce it was audible to him despite the distance and all the doors in between. Patrick grinned. If his father knew how easy it was to eavesdrop every word he said he would be furious!
Feeling bolder, Patrick quickened his pace, floating down the stairs then through the front door onto the drive. It had begun to rain, though this didn’t bother him. Rain passed through him as if he didn’t exist as he gazed downhill into town. How long the effects of the pill would last he wasn’t sure, but he hoped it would be long enough to drop in on some of his friends in the Dolphin without being seen.
With a bit of concentration, he found he could increase his speed so easily it took only a fraction of the time it would have taken him walking, and with hardly any effort at all. Whether it was real or an hallucination he couldn’t tell, but if it was an hallucination it was fantastically realistic. He could count every lamppost along the road. Even the registration plates of the cars passing by were incredibly clear, as were the faces of their occupants. When he reached the town centre he passed through groups of people out for the night without them knowing he was there. It was exhilarating, surreal, far too realistic to be a dream.
Patrick loved it.
It was the most exhilarating experience he had ever had, especially the feeling of weightlessness for someone who would be puffing with breathlessness by the time he walked twenty yards.
He couldn’t wait to see Robbie to tell him about it and buy more pills. He wished he could do it tonight, but if he saw his friend while he was in this state would he even be able to talk to him? It was all so new he didn’t even know what he could or could not do—though in truth, he didn’t even know if it was real. He might be laid on his bed experiencing a spectacularly vivid dream.
What he needed was proof. He had to see or hear something he would have to have been there to know.
Ahead of him was the Dolphin, with its usual gaggle of smokers outside, tapping ash on the pavement. For once Patrick passed between them without having to hold his breath to avoid the stink of nicotine. Inside, he sped through the drinkers at the bar, glancing along it in the hope of seeing Robbie so he could earwig what he was talking about, then surprise him with what he heard the next time they met, but his friend wasn’t here.
There were a few familiar faces though.
He sidled up to a girl called Nan. She had attended the same school as him, but all he could remember about her was she had always been a pain in the arse. Patrick listened as she talked to two other girls, intrigued how frank they were to each other about the men they were dating. If they had known he was as near as he was they would never have talked as openly as this. Which added spice to his invisibility, though several minutes of mindless jabber from people he neither liked nor found all that interesting soon began to pall, and he drifted along the bar once more, his inability to interact with anyone or buy a drink frustrating him. It was all very well this voyeurism, but it quickly became boring. He needed some stimulus.
Which was when he saw someone watching him.
Perhaps because he had quickly become used to being invisible, for someone to see him came as a shock that almost sent him hurtling back to his body. As it was he was only just able to control himself, and for a moment returned the man’s stare. Hovering several feet above ground at the far end of the pub, he was in his late thirties or early forties, with short cropped hair and a trim beard, and was as translucent as Patrick, which he automatically assumed meant he had to be another of Robbie’s customers trying out those amazing pills. Patrick grimaced. He wished it had been someone who didn’t look so annoyed. At any time, there was something about the man that would have made Patrick keep his distance. Not that it would have bothered Robbie. Patrick didn’t suppose his friend was particular about any of the people to whom he sold drugs so long as they weren’t the police.
A few seconds later the stranger moved towards him, floating over tables and chairs and customers. It would take just a few seconds before he reached Patrick. Which was something he instinctively knew he needed to avoid. He did not know why the man frightened him as much as he did, but there was something about him, his face, the posture of his body, the movements of his arms and fists. Instinctively, Patrick rushed towards the doors, passing through them so fast the next instant he was floating in the middle of the road as a bus hurtled through him. Body after body of seated passengers whizzed past his eyes in a dizzying kaleidoscope of images, throwing Patrick into confusion. As soon as it passed he turned around, feeling horribly sick.
At the same instant the stranger emerged from the pub; the expression on his face made Patrick yelp in terror.
And was instantly back on his bed at home, his face covered in sweat.
As soon as he realised he was home he gripped the duvet to feel its reality, relieved the hallucination had ended, even if his heart was pumping so hard at any other time he would have been worried he was having a heart attack. God damn it, if this was what those pills could do, he was never going to buy them again. He must have been lucky the first time hallucination ended as quickly as it did. Jesus Christ, he thought, Robbie, what the hell did you sell me?
Patrick rolled out of bed and reached into the drawer of his dresser where he kept an emergency bottle of Jack Daniels, poured a tumblerful and drank it quickly, hands shaking. He could not forget the stranger’s face as he stared at him. Before he could sleep he drank more whiskey till the experience had been blurred by alcohol.
The next day he was back at the bank, with all its frustrations, but for once he welcomed them and didn’t even resent Askew’s snipes. Anything to take his mind off what happened last night, anything to be back to normality!
Despite his fears about bumping into the stranger again, he called in the Dolphin on his way home for a pint of lager. Robbie sidled up to him as he waited for Berenice to fill his glass.
‘How ya doin’?’
Patrick shrugged. ‘Recovering.’
Robbie cast him a quizzical look. ‘From what?’
‘Those pills.’ Patrick tried to keep his voice calm, but he heard it crack with emotion.
‘Bloody hell, that must have been one powerful trip.’ Robbie smiled roguishly, though the expression faded when he saw Patrick’s face. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
‘Serious? I was never more terrified in my life.’
‘Bad trips happen.’
‘I don’t even think it was just a trip.’
‘What d’you mean you don’t even think it was just a trip? What else could it have been? Real?’ Robbie laughed.
‘I don’t know if it was real or not. It felt real.’
‘That’s the point, mate. It’s meant to seem real. But fantastical too.’
‘And scary?’
Robbie laughed again. ‘Depends how easily you’re scared. Me, it would take quite a lot. You?’ He shrugged. ‘You’re not exactly Mr Action Man, are you, Pat? Let’s be honest, it wouldn’t take much to put the shits up you.’
Patrick ignored him, taking a swig of lager.
‘Anyways, it’s probably just as well you’ve gone off those pills,’ Robbie said. ‘The supply’s dried up and it ain’t likely to undry anytime soon.’
‘Have they been made illegal?’
‘Naw, that wouldn’t dry supplies up. If anything, it’d egg the punters on. I’ve no idea what’s happened. I went to my usual source and that’s what they said. It’s dried up. I was told not to ask why, so I didn’t. You don’t get those kind of warnings twice. Get my meaning?’
Patrick didn’t, but he nodded anyway.
‘So, all’s well that ends well, as the Bard used to say. You don’t want no more and I’ve no more to sell.’
Which suited Patrick, who finished his drink and left for home.
After which he thought it could all be forgotten, but he was wrong.
Several days went by, during which his old resentments about his treatment at work resurfaced, especially towards Askew, who seemed hell bent on getting him to say or do something that would get him disciplined, or even the sack.
None of which made it easier for Patrick to bear. His only hope was eventually one of them would get transferred to another branch. That would happen eventually. That was how promotions usually happened, though the idea of him ever achieving any kind of promotion looked less than likely. As assistant manager, Askew’s assessments of him were dire. He’d be stuck on counter the rest of his career if that bastard had his way. How his father would crow in years to come!
It was a few days later when he returned home from another particularly gruelling day that Patrick suddenly felt lightheaded. He stepped into his bedroom to lie on his bed for a few minutes till the faintness passed.
Which was when he started to float again.
It was so unexpected he gasped for breath, clutching at his mattress to stop himself rising, but his fingers passed through it as he floated higher towards the ceiling, then through it into the pitch black darkness of the loft, emerging seconds later through the rooftiles. He leaned over and was startled to see the house dwindle beneath him to a tiny cube, which was when he panicked. The next instant he was back on his bed, covered in sweat and shaking with fear.
Never having bought more of Robbie’s pills, Patrick was bewildered why this had happened again. He was only relieved that in panicking when he soared into the sky he somehow brought the hallucination to an end. It was so frighteningly real! If it wasn’t for memories of the man in the pub he might have been excited at being able to experience it again without the help of any pills, but he still had nightmares about him. He was not someone he could easily forget. Nor someone he wanted to meet again.
He reached into his dresser for the Jack Daniels. A few glasses would help him relax. Without it he expected he would lie in bed worrying all night and get up in the morning feeling exhausted.
Despite the whiskey he still lay worrying most of the night and when his alarm went off at seven thirty he was nauseous and had a splitting headache—and was still worrying. He couldn’t help it.
Why had that hallucination returned? It shouldn’t have done. It was days since he used that drug and he had only taken two of them. How powerful were they that they could lie dormant inside him and sneak back when he least expected it?
‘Bloody hell, Walker, stop daydreaming!’ It was Askew. Patrick jerked to attention at his till, aware he had become self-absorbed in thinking about the hallucination again. The sense of soaring into the sky had been so intense. It was as if his spirit had been set free and was indifferent to the climate and solid objects like walls or roofs.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Askew,’ he muttered.
‘Perhaps a few nights off the booze would help keep your mind focussed on work.’ He stared at Patrick through his gold framed spectacles.
Had he smelt last night’s whiskey on his breath? Surreptitiously Patrick breathed into his hand to see if he could detect it. It was just old Askew putting two and two together. As usual the bastard was right, of course, though that didn’t make him feel any better.
By the time he left work he knew he would have to see Robbie in the Dolphin before going home. He needed to talk to him about those pills. He’d heard somewhere that LSD could stay in your system for years after using it. Were the pills Robbie sold him as bad as that? If so, what could he do about it?
But his friend wasn’t there. He asked Berenice if she had seen him, but she hadn’t either, not since yesterday afternoon. He’d been talking to some men. ‘I didn’t like the look of them. I don’t think Robbie did either. He seemed a bit worried, to be honest, Pat.’ She handed him his pint. ‘He left soon after.’
‘And you haven’t seen him since?’
She shook her head.
Patrick drank his beer, glanced around the pub once more but there was still no sign of Robbie, then left. He knew his friend had dealings with some dodgy people, so the fact he was getting some grief didn’t surprise him. No doubt he talked his way out of any problems he had. He always did. He was that kind of bloke. Ducking and diving, that’s how he described his business tactics to Patrick, who would have hated to live that sort of life. Working in a bank was stressful enough for him. At least even Askew could only shout at him, not drag him into an alleyway to beat three shades of shit out of him. He’d seen Robbie sporting a few bumps and bruises before now, which was no way to make a living in his view.
Hoping this was the worst that might have happened, Patrick got into his car and drove to Robbie’s flat. It wasn’t a part of town he normally visited. Robbie lived on the tenth floor of a multi storey tower block built in the sixties on an estate where it wasn’t safe to leave your car after dusk. At this time of day, it was probably safe—or almost, he amended, as he watched a gang of young lads kicking a football when he arrived. They eyed his car intently. Luckily, it was neither new nor flash.
He got out and walked towards them.
‘You seen Robbie—Robbie Hammett?’ he called.
‘What’s it to you?’ This from a suspicious ten year old in a torn t-shirt.
‘We went to school together. We’re old friends.’
‘Robbie went to school?’ There was derisive laughter from the boys, though their hostility visibly went down a few degrees. ‘What were you, the school swot?’
Patrick laughed with them, then gazed at the tower block, craning his neck.
‘I suppose I’d better go and see if he’s in.’ Which was what he intended to do all along and had played along with them just to make sure they knew he was friends with Robbie in the theory this would make it less likely they’d mess with his car.
Luckily, the lift was working, even if did stink of eau de urine. Patrick wrinkled his nose as he pressed for the tenth floor. When he arrived, he checked off the door numbers. Robbie’s was 10C. When he reached it, he was surprised to find the door was ajar, its lock broken as if it had been kicked. Apprehensive, Patrick was tempted to return to his car as fast as he could. But, against his better judgement, he felt he owed it to Robbie to make sure he was alright. A stupid thought. If Robbie were alright he wouldn’t have left his door like this.
Wary of leaving any prints—just in case—Patrick covered his fingers with a handkerchief and pushed the door open wider.
‘Robbie! You here?’
He felt foolish calling out like this, especially as his voice quavered with nervousness. Certain he was being stupid, he stepped in further. He had only visited Robbie a couple times, but remembered the place well enough. The living room had a big black chesterfield and an even bigger widescreen TV that filled most of the wall facing it. Below lay a flashy array of electronic devices, X-box, Nintendo, Blu-ray player, a sound box, etc., all brand new. Knock offs, of course. Patrick moved into the next room, the kitchen diner, which again was filled with cutting edge gadgets. Robbie had a thing about techie stuff. But it was all neat and tidy, no sign of trouble. It could have been a timeshare apartment for all its impersonal tidiness. Again, Patrick called to his friend, more confident now, knowing he wasn’t likely to get a reply. There was no one here, he was sure.
He looked into the bedroom with its king-size bed, the inevitable massive TV on the wall and the chic wardrobes, ram-jam full of designer clothes. Like the rest of the flat it was pristine. But no sign of Robbie.
Patrick wondered if he should phone the police, but even if he had been burgled would Robbie want them snooping around his flat? Who knows what they might find if they looked too hard? Which they probably would, Patrick thought. Robbie would hardly thank him for that!
Leaving more quickly than he entered, Patrick returned to his car, pleased to find it had been left alone, which proved he had done the right thing in talking to those kids. He doubted they would have ignored it if he hadn’t mentioned Robbie. Drug dealers were always respected in places like this. And feared.
Playing at the far end of the quadrangle, the boys shouted to him as he drove away, though he could hardly hear what they said. Something about you’ll not see?
Not see what?
Back home, joining his parents for supper, Patrick wondered if he’d experience any more trips tonight. He still couldn’t understand what triggered last night’s, except he had been in a bad mood after a more aggravating day than usual at the bank. Was that the reason? Did feeling depressed and angry, both or either, bring it on? If that was the explanation he should be alright tonight; whatever anger or depression he might have felt had been drained away worrying about Robbie.
Unless worry could bring it on too.
Patrick felt his appetite shrivel as he pushed away his plate, still half filled with food.
His father looked over and raised his bushy, untrimmed eyebrows. For a moment Patrick thought he was going to say something sarcastic, but for once the old man stayed silent, perhaps too surprised at his son’s behaviour.
Mumbling excuses, Patrick rushed upstairs, where he sat on the edge of his bed wondering whether to turn his TV on, at the same time worried if he would again feel weightless. The prospect scared him, still unsure if any of it was real, though he knew the idea it could be real was crazy. It had just been a trip, that was all. A hallucination. He had not become weightless or drifted away in some airy-fairy ethereal form to float into town. The man who scared him in the pub had not been real either. Just a dream. A nightmare. A drug induced hallucination.
Except it had seemed real at the time.
Patrick wished he never bought those pills. He only ever used what he regarded as safe stuff normally, the kind everyone took. Nothing heavy. Nothing strange. Nothing avant garde. Not like these. It was all because he trusted Robbie, who had let him down big time, even though he was still worried something bad might have happened to his friend.
Patrick was still trying to think about something else when he realised he was floating again. Crying out in alarm, he rolled over as his bedroom wall loomed towards him, before sliding through it onto the landing and floating towards the stairs. He managed to twist over to a standing position, though his feet were inches above the carpet, when he saw someone at the top of the stairs.
It was the man from the pub.
Patrick was unable to stop himself from shouting out in alarm. If he had hoped panicking would end the hallucination, he was wrong. Nothing changed except the man moved towards him.
Whirling his arms about his head as if he were trying to swim and couldn’t, Patrick lurched sideways, passing through the walls till he was hanging over the garden. Still early evening, the sky was a rich golden yellow, but the beauty of the scene, the lines of trees along the roadside and the radiant rooftops reflecting the sun where the land sloped towards the bay, could not diminish the paralysing fear that gripped hold of him as he found himself hurtling away from the house out of control.
Behind him he sensed his pursuer closing the gap. If he had been capable of hurting himself as he passed through objects in front of him, he would have been terrified at the speed he was moving, but what fear he had was reserved for the man. He glanced back and was shocked to see the stranger was only inches away, his arms outstretched in front of him as he reached out for Patrick’s ankles. Patrick squirmed sideways, corkscrewing away, only to find himself cascading through a line of shops. Though their walls couldn’t stop him, he felt himself slowing before the man grabbed hold of his foot with a grip like iron.
‘No! No! No! No! No!’
Too late.
The man heaved and Patrick felt himself being tugged backwards.
‘Stop, for God’s sake, stop, you idiot!’
It was the man’s voice, desperately furious. Or was it fury? There was desperation too, but for what? And why?
Patrick glanced back at him.
‘Please!’
Unable to escape the man’s grip, Patrick stopped resisting and found himself slowing to a standstill, both men hovering over the Promenade where crowds were strolling in the late sunshine, oblivious of the men high above their heads.
‘I thought you were angry,’ Patrick said.
The man nodded towards the buildings beneath them. ‘We’re too visible here.’ He let go of Patrick’s ankle and began to descend towards the resort’s funfair, heading towards the long, winding alley that ran behind it, overshadowed by hoardings on one side and the back of hotels on the other. It was not somewhere Patrick had ever gone in his normal form. Even now he felt reluctant. But there was something about the man that convinced him it would be better to do as he said, not out of fear but because it seemed there was something important he needed to tell him.
The alley was choked with weeds and wheelie bins. In his solid form Patrick was sure he would have found the smells unbreathable, especially with the clouds of flies buzzing through the air. He was spared this in his present form as he hovered above the cracked concrete, watching the man a few yards from him.
‘You know Robbie Bowen?’
Patrick nodded. ‘Since school.’
‘You buy drugs from him?’
Again, Patrick nodded, more reluctant this time.
‘Now and then. Not often.’
‘You bought some from him recently or you wouldn’t be here. We both know that.’
‘You know him?’
The stranger smiled. Wearily.
‘Do you know where he is?’
The man turned. ‘Follow me.’
He floated upwards. After a moment’s hesitation, Patrick put any qualms he still had left to one side and rose behind him, confident in his present form he was safe from danger, though he was unsure if everything that seemed to be happening to him wasn’t just another dream from which he would awaken to find himself on his bed.
They headed towards higher ground where grand hotels dominated the skyline. They moved past the best above the town centre, their size and condition diminishing as they moved towards the outskirts, some no more than abandoned monuments to better times. Finally, the stranger descended towards one at the edge of town where it bordered moorland. Surrounded by a garden filled with nettles, the building had been boarded up, with gaps in its roof through which rafter beams peered at the sky. The man passed through one of these gaps. Down and deeper into the building he moved; Patrick followed. It was soon so dingy Patrick was barely able to see a thing. Only a few beams of sunlight pierced the boards nailed to its windows, and those that did were too narrow to do more than emphasise the darkness elsewhere.
Despite his non-corporeal form, Patrick felt uneasy. Though an outspoken atheist to his parents, this was just bravado. In truth he was pitifully superstitious, especially in places like this, even if he seemed as if he was little more than a ghost himself.
Now more than ever he hoped it was a hallucination.
A dream.
As they descended Patrick saw a light below them where several lamps cast a sickly glow over an even more sickly scene. Patrick’s automatic reaction was to look away. His second was to wish he could make himself leave as quickly as he could—but he knew that he couldn’t.
He owed Robbie that much.
Because his friend was strapped to a chair and being beaten, perhaps tortured too. There were cuts and grazes all over the pitiful mess that remained of his swollen, misshapen face.
Patrick had never seen a dead body before, but he knew he was looking at one now, that Robbie had been murdered by whoever beat him.
Anxiously, he glanced at the man who had brought him here and was relieved to see he looked appalled as well.
‘I didn’t think they would beat him like this,’ the man said. ‘Honestly.’
Ever the cynic, Patrick remembered being told by his father whenever anyone used the word honest it was the last thing they were really being. Which was one of the few lectures his father had given him Patrick believed.
‘What did you expect?’ Patrick asked. He watched the man warily, his feelings of relief at the man’s reaction clouded with uncertainty. Was he being tricked? But why? And for what reason?
Patrick floated towards Robbie and reached for his forehead in an attempt to rouse him, even though, being immaterial, his fingers passed through him. Perhaps if he could reach the immaterial part of Robbie he might achieve something.
That had to be somewhere, hadn’t it?
Which was when he felt himself being dragged backwards as if by a whirlpool. Alarmed, he cried out.
And awakened in bed.
Shivering in panic, Patrick wished he could stop the hallucinations. How long would they keep on taking him over like this? The effect of two pills should have been wearing off by now, not worsening. Surely?
Downstairs he heard the doorbell ring, going on and on as if whoever was there had jammed their finger on it to keep it going, which he knew would enrage his father.
Worriedly, Patrick climbed off his bed and was immediately panting. He had put on too much weight over the last few weeks, probably because he had been eating for comfort.
Though wasn’t that what he always did?
Patrick put on his shoes and went onto the landing to hear what was happening downstairs. The doorbell finally stopped ringing, and he heard voices. One was his father, demanding to know who the hell they thought they were ringing the doorbell like that. This was followed by a thud and a cry of pain that ended quickly.
His heart pounding, Patrick ran to the stairs, realising that his father was in trouble and needed help. Though far from brave, Patrick moved instinctively, unable to ignore what was happening, even if he was terrified at what he would find and had no idea what he would do. He had never been involved in any kind of physical violence since school, and even then he had always been on the receiving end.
He stopped when he saw several men stood by his father, lying on the floor groaning. The men looked up as Patrick stood halfway down the stairs, one hand gripping the banister rail. They wore ski masks that covered the whole of their faces. Their clothes were nondescript but dark. As anonymous as their masks.
There were five of them. Too many for Patrick to think of tackling, wondering instead if he could run upstairs to his room before they caught him, though he knew he would not get far before his lungs betrayed him and he collapsed, breathless.
Trapped, he said: ‘What do you want?’
One of the men stepped forward. Patrick glimpsed something bulky and yellow in one of his hands an instant before it crackled, when he realised it was a taser. He was hit by two small darts and his world was filled with excruciating pain, then blackness as he fell downstairs in a heap.
While unconscious, his spirit or ka or whatever it was that could roam about was suddenly free. This time he was not alone. The stranger was stood a few feet away.
‘You knew this would happen,’ Patrick blurted, still reeling from his terror at the sight of the taser and the pain the electrical charge had inflicted on him.
‘I followed them.’
‘From the derelict building?’
‘One of them was watching us there.’
‘In this spirit world—or whatever the hell it is?’
The man nodded. ‘They’re concerned about those pills.’
Patrick laughed. ‘If I had any left they could gladly have them. I wish I’d never seen the bloody things.’
‘It’s too late for that now. What you had was enough to open up your mind for good. There’s no going back.’ The man looked over his shoulder. ‘It’s time we went.’
He reached out and took Patrick by the hand, leading him through the wall till they were outside the house, where Patrick felt panicked and wanted to return, but the man tightened his grip on him.
‘Why?’ Patrick asked.
‘Those pills were stolen. It was an act of espionage, but it all went wrong. Most of the thieves were caught within hours of taking them from the facility.’
‘In England?’
‘The pills were part of an experiment. Now they have to be accounted for and returned and anyone connected with the theft has to be eliminated.’
‘Which is why they killed Robbie?’
‘The only surviving thief passed what pills he had left to him. Maybe to sow confusion. I don’t know.’
‘And the people Robbie sold the pills to?’
‘Have been accounted for.’
‘Like me?’
‘You’re the last.’
They were motionless, hovering outside the house.
‘You work for the government, don’t you?’ Patrick said.
‘I’m part of the experiment,’ the man said, avoiding a direct answer, and Patrick felt an overwhelming urge to return to his body, trembling with fear, but still the man gripped his arm.
‘You’re better staying here,’ he said, and Patrick was sure he was sorrowful about something. But what?
Which was when Patrick felt a change come over him. It was strange, yet natural. Perhaps a butterfly felt something like this when it emerged from its chrysalis and felt fresh air for the first time. Patrick looked at the man, whose hand passed through his arm as insubstantial as light. Then he knew he needed to see what was happening inside the house. But before he could move a pleasant coldness sifted through his body, calming him, and he no longer cared.
He no longer cared at all.
‘I didn’t want you to see it happen,’ the man called, but already Patrick found himself receding into the far distance as if drawn by a force he could not resist. The house, the man and everything around him, the Earth itself dwindled to an ever decreasing spot then blinked into nothingness.
The masked man withdrew the needle with care so the puncture would barely show on the young man’s skin. Satisfied, he returned the hypodermic to his bag.
‘Is he dead?’ his commander asked.
The man looked up and nodded.
The commander glanced at the other body on the floor, the younger man’s father. Already he was beginning to stir. ‘Time we left. He needs to find his son after we’ve gone.’
