STONE
DREAMS
by Stephen Walker
Rubber on
concrete, echo on walls, Billy Morten chases his footsteps up an
alleyway. Always chasing, always running. Things have to be hidden,
things have to be found - everyone knows.
This afternoon, he knows it more than
most.
Catching up his footsteps then
overtaking them, the twelve year old kicks shut behind him a battered
door. And he stands alone.
But is he
alone?
He checks the lower floor of the
abandoned house he's found himself in, one of a row of terraces on
the outskirts of town. He finds only cobwebs, silent memories and
gouges where wiring's been torn out and plumbing stripped out by
gangs. All the residents have gone to new developments on new estates
with new names and old problems. Now this is a place shielded from
the eyes of kids who'd want what he's found, without appreciating
what it is he's found.
He crosses to the
stairs and glances up.
At the top is a
darkness too brooding for investigation. If someone is up there, more
fool them; he won't be joining them.
So, he assumes
he's alone and, content with that assumption, claims a seat on the
bottom step.
Here he can check a precious bundle
found in the unlikeliest of places.
But the most precious of things are
always in the unlikeliest of places, or they'd have been found long
ago and they'd no longer be precious.
Eager fingers start to peel back a
muddy blanket wrapped to shield the object from unwelcome gazes.
Then they stop.
From the stair top, behind him, a
scuffling of something on floorboards.
Footsteps.
And a voice that says, 'What you got
there, Billy? Found yourself a miracle?'
*
Billy Morten scrambles to his feet
and, clutching his prize to his chest, he backs away from the stairs.
A wall halts his slow retreat.
Not that he's scared of her.
Not really.
She's just a girl, no more than
sixteen.
But there's something wrong about her.
She's too confident. To cocky. She doesn't move like a girl. In her
manner is a hint of the straggling weeds that surround this building
and clutch it with their tendrils as though trying to hold it
captive.
She calmly descends the stairs.
Her feet are bare.
She arrives at the middle step, claims
a seat, then, not looking at him, lights a cigarette. The tip glows
red before dying down. A shake extinguishes the match. A flick
discards it. It hits the floor and dulls to a shrivel. She says, 'How
you doing, Billy?' The cigarette flaps between her lips as she
speaks.
'How do you know my name?' He eyes
her, suspiciously.
'Seen you around, in the park, the
school, the old rec. Seen you in the woods, the ones with the den you
think no one else knows about though half the kids in town use it. I
see plenty. You'd be amazed. That bundle you're hugging, I've not
seen you with that before. Know what it is?'
He hugs it closer, hands checking that
it's completely wrapped, with nothing showing. 'It doesn't belong to
anyone. I found it in a skip.'
'Never said it did belong to anyone.
You found it, it's yours; fundamental law of life. And, trust me, I
know more about those than most. But that's not what I asked. I
asked, do you know what it is?'
He glances down at it, clueless.
Her gaze climbs the wall nearest her
then settles on a point on the ceiling.
And, following a suitable pause, she
says, 'I could tell you what it is.'
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