Lets Drink To The Dead Read Online Free Page A

loud.
    “Alan?” He starts, scared, but it’s only a normal voice, a girl’s; Vera’s. The door opens. The landing light spills into the room. “Alan, are you OK?”
    “Nightmare,” he says. He’s lying to her, but perhaps he can lie to himself as well, convince himself that what just happened didn’t.
    “Oh, sweetheart.” She comes to his bedside and sits on the edge, squeezing his hand. “Today was the last time, baby. They’ll never be able to do it to you again. I swear to god that they won’t. D’you believe me?”
    At last Alan nods, but he can’t stop crying. Can’t stop. For Johnny and Mark and Sam. For him. Even for Yolly who was once a boy like him. He will not become like Yolly, he won’t.
    “Sweetheart.” Vera bites her lip, takes a deep breath. “Alan, do you want me to...?”
    Will it help? It can’t hurt. It’s made the hurt go away before, just for a little while; much of what little tenderness, pleasure and joy his young life has known has come from it. And it proves, too. Proves he’s not like Yolly, not into boys. He likes girls, girls, girls. And so he nods.
    Vera nods back. She’s wearing a nightie with nothing on underneath. She peels it off over her head, drops it on the floor and slides under the covers with him.
    As she unbuttons his pyjamas, she knows it’s wrong; she’s known that for a while now, maybe has done ever since she first offered this comfort to him. But it was all she had, as he is all she has. And in places like this, you take whatever comfort you can find.
     
     
    “M R F ITTON ?”
    A pause filled with hoarse breath. “Yes.”
    “It’s Vera Latimer, Mr Fitton.” She always kept her dad’s name; even when Mum took Walsh’s she wouldn’t. Outside it’s raining; it’s the hour before dawn and two nights have passed since Walsh died. “Have you got it?”
    “Yes. Have you got what I want?”
    “Yes.” She glances over at Alan, sat pale and shadow-eyed in the corner. Their three suitcases beside him. Ready to go.
    “So?”
    “Meet me at the station. Half an hour. Come alone.”
    “If–”
    “Alone, Mr Fitton.”
    Click. She breathes out. Her hands are shaking.
     
     
    E VEN IN THE early morning, there’s comings and goings at Kempforth Station. Vera’s been there with Alan for ten minutes before Fitton heifers in through the doors. His black eyes flick to Alan, who flinches back. “Little shit,” says Fitton.
    “Leave him,” says Vera.
    “Well?”
    “Money first.”
    Fitton glances round, then palms an envelope. “Show me,” says Vera. She keeps a hand on the knife.
    Fitton opens the envelope, flicks through a sheaf of fivers inside. It’s enough for train fare to Manchester and for food and lodgings, for a while at least. And after that? She’ll think of something; sell herself, if she has to. But Alan won’t. She’ll see to that. She’ll starve first. She gave him her word and she’ll keep it.
    “Alright. Give me.” She takes the envelope, stuffs it in her pocket.
    “Well?” Fitton demands again.
    She holds up the front door key; she’ll not need it again. “Back at our house. My room. In the wardrobe.”
    Fitton breathes through his nose.
    “Come on, Alan. Our train’s due.”
    They move fast, and she keeps her hand on her pocket, but Fitton doesn’t follow. The train pulls onto the platform as they reach it. Alan runs for it with a sudden burst of a younger boy’s energy and speed. Vera smiles.
    Everything, she tells herself, will be alright.
     
     
    A S THE TRAIN pulls away from Kempforth, Alan looks at the platform and knows that he and he alone sees the three small boys stood naked in the rain watching them go. Because he has the Sight.
    One day they will call him home and he’ll pay what he owes. In the meantime, like they said, he can make a living. There’s always someone wants to talk to their dead mother, father, husband, wife. Son, daughter, dog. Vera doesn’t know it yet, but he’s going to make