Childhood Friends

And suddenly I’m on the floor, and the ripping metal screeches and shrieks as the train veers off the tracks, mingling in the air with screams, the smell of rust, the smell of blood, sweat, and dust. Lisa’s jolting sobs next to me, the grabbing, bloodied hands gripping at my sleeves and burning skin, and the splitting, searing pain in my side are all just more pieces in the puzzle of what’s going on.

I have no idea what’s going on. 

From within this chorus of confusion, a single rhythm leaps out at me, and I latch onto it. That pounding, those footsteps marching a drumbeat toward me—this sound is the only thing that makes sense. 

Then I see who it is. 

I recognise Alex first by his boots. Their scuffed leather exterior and the missing chrome eyelet on the right side are the same as they always were. My eyes find his face, and he looks pained and guilty, an expression far too old for his young face. 

All he asks is, “Why couldn’t you help me?”

* * *

I was sick the first time I met Alex. Tissues, both dirty and clean, filled my pockets; my eyes were swollen, my nose was red, and my arms were laden with books, which made sense because we were in the library. The room was almost silent.

I was sitting in a wooden chair in the corner, sorting through the novels I had found, picking at the peeling red plastic of the chair’s cushion cover under my thighs when my thoughts were disturbed by the arrival of a teenager. His flippy brown hair poked at his ears, which stuck out; his glasses were round and thick-rimmed around his slightly goggling eyes. He was too tall for his jeans, which ended three clear inches above his dinosaur-patterned socks, and he seemed to possess altogether too many limbs, which was handy as he was carrying at least four bags.

The teenager walked over to where I sat in a slow, easygoing stride and sat down heavily in the seat right next to mine, even though the room was filled with empty chairs. He leaned too close to read the title of the book I was reading, and when he recognized it, he smirked and snorted. At that point, I was more than just a little irritated by this intrusion on my quiet afternoon, and so, when I asked him what exactly his problem was, my voice was terse and my expression exasperated. 

“I don’t have a problem," Alex replied, "that book's awful. The protagonist dies in the end.” 

* * *

Alex and I became friends. It was hard not to because, after that day at the library, I began to bump into him everywhere: at the corner shop, at the park, on the train, everywhere. We weren’t friends in the way that two people who go to the same school were friends, or how my mum was friends with all the families who lived on the street, but in a strange, grudging way. We knew pretty much everything about each other, and even though we wouldn’t exchange presents on Christmas or pleasantries when we talked, and even though he was different from everyone else I’d ever called my friend, my friend he remained. 

We went for a walk one night. The night was young when we left. Milky-white stars were scattered across the glossy night sky, clear as far as the eye could see. The slightly decrepit streets were empty of any other nocturnal roamers, and the air was silent apart from the lilting melodies of a nightingale in the lofty oak tree that strangled the pavement with its roots. 

We walked down the road, wandering aimlessly. We passed the small church, with its crooked steeple grasping at the sky. We passed the duck pond, with its familiar pattern of litter strewn across the water's surface.

Finally, we found the small grocery store.

The front shutter, which usually covers it at night, was only halfway down. Alex and I caught each other’s eyes, and with a shared slight smirk and a small nod, we ducked under the shutter and pushed open the unlocked door. I headed straight to the freezer, and he beelined for the bakery. A few minutes later, we emerged from our respective aisles, arms full of cake and ice cream. Alex grinned and used his elbow to push open the door before he left the shop and didn’t look back. 

About to follow him, I paused. With a small sigh, I pulled out my wallet and left enough notes by the cash register to cover the cost of our small stockpile. 

Conscientious or cowardly, I didn’t have it in me to shoplift.

We walked past the train station at least three times before I suspected we might have gotten lost, but then I saw the familiar alley beside the tracks that led to my house. Neon-coloured graffiti peered out between the evergreen vines that snaked around the walls, and tangled weeds pushed through the bricks on the wall.

Halfway through, in the darkness of the passage, I saw two figures, a man and a woman, with a pram. Their voices rose and fell as they argued mutedly, their arms waving in the air in the unmistakable gestures of an argument. Their figures, less and less distant from us, seemed more and more animated as their voices grew louder and louder, and suddenly they were shouting, and their baby’s voice added to the din as it began to bawl and scream. 

Then I saw it.

In his hand, waving from side to side, with its blade glinting slightly where it caught the moonlight, was a knife. 

I didn’t think; I ran, and at my side, Alex ran too and outstripped me. He tackled the man to the floor, and I pushed the woman out of the way and the air was suddenly full of their yells and the hollow sound of fists meeting flesh and… blood. It soaked through Alex’s shirt and pooled on the ground by the man’s head; it dyed my vision blotchy and red with confusion and covered his fingers that wrapped around the knife in his abdomen. His eyes turned glassy, and he lay still.

Alex stumbled back and looked at what he had done, eyes wild with confusion and apprehension, and I am still just standing there, staring.

* * *

They blamed him. I tried to tell them. I gave a witness statement and a testimony and talked to the newspapers, the police, my teachers, my neighbours, my mum, my dad, my friends, and myself; none of it did anything, and he got four years for involuntary manslaughter.

I visited once a month, and I called and wrote letters as well. But life progressed despite my unwillingness to let it do so. I made new friends, Lisa and John, at university. 

Two days before I graduate, while I’m packing up my boxes in the dorm room, he appears. 

He was taller and quieter. He looked older as well, as though he had aged fifteen years in the four that passed. 

I took him out for coffee, and we went to the small café just off campus to talk. We covered me first: school, my parents, and the town. He told me about him, how he got his degree inside prison and how he was flat-sharing with his brother while he looked for a job, but his optimism did not convince me. I could see his worry in the lines in his eyes. His fear showed in his upright posture. The tension in him made his fingers drum the table, making my glass ripple. I grew more and more restless and impatient talking about resumes and childhood memories while the weight of the unspoken between us pushed us down, pressing us into the ground until I couldn’t keep quiet anymore.

“What happened? What’s wrong?” The questions burst from my mouth as if of their own volition. 

“I need money,” he said quietly, “five thousand pounds. I’ll pay you back as soon as I can, but I need it now. I didn’t know who else to go to.”

“Why?”

“I’m in trouble with some people from prison. I never borrowed anything from them, but they say I owe them because I didn’t help them when I was meant to. I don’t really understand it either, but they said that if I don’t pay them, they’re going to make me do something."

“‘Do something?’ I don’t understand."

“I think they’re going to get me to plant a bomb somewhere, or kill someone, or something else equally horrible, and I don’t know, I don’t know what to do, I don’t have any money of my own, I’ve just come out of prison, so I need your help.” His eyes pleaded with me as he asked, and my heart sank, but I could do nothing.

I spoke the apology softly, "I don't have that amount. I’ve just begun paying off student loans, and I’m looking for an apartment; I just don’t think I can."

I couldn't see the disappointment in his eyes. I wished I could help him, but I couldn't. When he walked away, he didn't look back.