The Concrete Grove

Lana knew the man they were talking about — it was the drug addict they’d seen trying to rip his own face off in the street. God, she thought. Right now, that seems like it happened a lifetime ago.

She returned her attention to Tom.

He was looking up at the dirty ceiling, as if inspecting it for cracks. Without moving, he began to speak. “Last night my wife physically turned into something else. I meant it literally when I told you that.” He lowered his head and looked at his hands, which he laid out flat on the table. He looked like one of those old-time circus sideshow performers, just before they start to slam a knife into the table top through the gaps between their fingers. “She turned into a creature and attacked me. If it wasn’t so scary it would be funny,” he dipped his head, exposing a tiny bald spot at the centre of his scalp that she’d not noticed before. She wanted to reach out and touch it, to penetrate his armour.

“I think we’ve both moved way beyond the normal now,” she said. “The decisions we make here, the way we act, will define how this all ends. If we ignore the obvious — that there’s something, well, supernatural, happening, then we’re fucked.” Talking about these things made her feel that she was actually doing something to fight against the situation. In all the books she’d ever read and all the horror films she’d seen, the main characters only ever admitted far too late that the supernatural had invaded their lives. That was the thing that usually got them killed: a refusal to accept the obvious, no matter how insane it might seem.

Lana was not willing to make the same mistake.

“There’s some sort of power in the Concrete Grove and, for whatever reason, it’s noticed us. Killing Monty Bright won’t send it away, but it will get rid of an immediate threat and give us a chance to think about what we do next.”

Tom rubbed a hand through his hair. He winced as he did this, causing his injuries to flare up in fresh pain. “After what happened to me last night, I’m willing to believe that anything is possible.”

The radio broadcast changed to a music chart show. The woman behind the counter turned up the volume and began to hum along to the tune. Her feet shuffled dryly across the dusty, crumb-littered floor.

Accompanied by the soundtrack of the latest number one record, playing from a tinny little radio on a shelf in a cheap riverside cafe, the deal was sealed, the pact was made. Such were the circumstances under which two ordinary people became murderers.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

TOM’S CAR WAS parked on the Gateshead side of the river. They left the cafe and headed up the hill, away from the water, to the small parking area behind a row of terraced houses that had been converted into shops and offices: a solicitors, a print shop, a DVD rental outlet.

They sat in the car and stared through the windscreen, across the short cobbled lane at the tall wall guarding the yards at the rear of the buildings. The wall was topped with razor wire and there were No Parking notices painted across the garage doors.

“I’ll drop you back at your place,” said Tom.

Lana gripped his hand on the steering wheel. “Thank you.”

He nodded. Started the car.

They drove back across the bridge and along the bypass, heading towards the Cramlington exit. The traffic was heavy but it moved freely.

“How about driving past your street on the way? I want to see where you live.”

Tom glanced at her, and then returned his gaze to the road. “Why? It’s just a normal house on a boring street outside boring old Far Grove.”

“Because it’s a part of your life I know nothing about. I’ve only seen one side of you — the side that comes to visit me and takes us on day trips.”

“And agrees to help you kill people.” He said it without a trace of sarcasm. He wasn’t making a joke.

“Yes. That part, too. The part of you that wants to help me, no matter what the cost.”

They both fell silent for a while, and only when they saw the first road sign for Far Grove did Tom break that silence: “Okay. We’ll swing by my place first, just so you can see how dull and tragic my life really is.” This time he smiled, but it seemed slightly forced, as if he was trying just a little bit too hard to act normal.

Lana watched the streets go by. The houses were mostly suburban new-builds, residential boxes made by development companies to house people who didn’t care about period detail and a sense of history. Red bricks, plastic window frames, double glazing. A small plot of garden, a garage and a concrete drive. It was all so strained that Lana felt as if the image might crack, like something painted onto a sheet of glass.

“This is mine. Ours.” Tom drove slowly along his own street, not even looking at the houses. “Number Sixteen.”

“I didn’t really have you down as a new-build man. I thought you might live somewhere a little more… well, interesting.”

“It was Helen. Her dream. She always wanted to live in a nice middle class area, with a new kitchen and a driveway. Flowers in all the borders and a fucking rotary washing line on the back lawn.” His voice was filled with bitterness. Lana could hear it, like a whining sound behind the words. “Her cosy little fantasy.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked you to bring me here.”

“No.” Tom stopped the car and then turned it around in the road to face the way they’d come, performing a neat three-point turn. “It’s good that you see all the sides of me.” He still hadn’t looked at his house. The curtains were closed. None of the windows were open even a crack. “There are things in that house that I never want to go back to, but I know I will. I can never leave for good.”

She knew that he meant the memories, and the elements of the life he and his wife had stored there behind the closed doors and windows, but somehow she got the feeling that there was another layer to what he was telling her, a subtext that she couldn’t quite grasp. It was puzzling, and slightly disturbing. He seemed to have changed from the last time she’d seen him. Nothing major, just subtle details about his character that she couldn’t even attempt to isolate without feeling that she was simply reading too much into his reactions.

But something about him was different. She could feel rather than see those changes, but nonetheless they were there.

“I’ll take you home,” he said, as the car approached the end of the road. “We can talk more there, away from this mess that I’ve made.”

From one mess to another, thought Lana. But at least this one’s of your own making.

She felt guilty for pulling Tom into her problems, yet at the same time she was grateful that there was at least someone she could turn to for help. Other than Tom, she had no one. Her life had emptied of real friends as soon as Timothy had taken it upon himself to use murder and suicide as a solution to his problems.

But wasn’t that now what she was about to do? Wasn’t it exactly the same as Timothy had done?

No, she thought. It’s different. But in what way it was different she couldn’t tell. Was she more justified in murdering a rapist loan- shark than he had been in killing people-trafficking gangsters? Could you even define crimes in this way, deciding which was worse and calculating what would represent a right and just punishment? Wasn’t it all just vigilante justice, like some absurd Death Wish film? If that were the case, then she suspected she made a shitty Charles Bronson substitute.

“What’s so funny?” Tom’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realise I was smiling.”

“You laughed. I was wondering what the joke was. I could use a joke right now.”

“I think we both could.” They were entering the Grove now. A group of teenagers dressed in gaudy tracksuits and hooded sweatshirts were standing on the corner of Far Grove Way, staring down the passing traffic. Tom glanced at them. He smiled.

“Jesus, there’s always kids hanging about.” Lana turned away.