The bottom step of the staircase halted its progress and when it landed on its side, both wheels spinning madly, the father ran over and lifted the baby out, his face ashen.
‘I’m so sorry,’ began Warty Ada, as the man and baby fled from the house.
I picked up the pram again and, marvelling with a white-hot surprise at how strong I’d become, threw it against the wall. All the light bulbs above us seemed to explode at the same time and then the hallway filled with a loud droning noise, like a hoover had been switched on.
Scanlon sobbed. ‘Dad, when is enough going to be enough?’
The world around me whirled and spun, and I felt something pulling and tugging at me, sucking and squishing me through a narrow tube, before I landed with a thump in what felt like a cramped metal box.
One which smelt suspiciously like tuna.
‘What’s happening?’ I shouted. ‘Scanlon? Are you there? Help!’
After a few moments, I heard the muffled sound of an engine starting, and a low continual throb as if from a vehicle.
Later – I lost track of when – there was a rusty squeak, the sound of a door opening then slamming, and Scanlon was asking, in a strange, flat voice, ‘Where should I put this one?’
‘Usual place,’ said Crawler. ‘Usual place.’
I WAS SWUNG upwards through the air. There was a clanging sound of metal meeting metal. Another door; the sound of it shutting. Then everything went still, as if time had stopped, as if the planet had grown tired of turning.
‘Scanlon?’ I said, my voice weak in the dark.
I stretched my arms out in the gloom as far as they could go. My hands met cold, ridged walls. I pressed my fingers against them, mystified.
Where was I?
One minute I’d been screaming at Scanlon and throwing that baby – I felt a flush of shame at the memory – and the next – whoosh! – I’d been jerked through the air like a trout on a line. And now I was trapped in a snug tin box. With no windows. Which would have been great if I’d been dead dead and looking for a coffin, but was not so great because I was dead-ish and liked being able to see and move.
How had any of this happened?
Had my rage somehow taken me into another dimension of the afterlife? Was death essentially a series of containers getting increasingly smaller, like Russian dolls? And if so, what next? A matchbox?
Or was something else going on?
Uneasily, I remembered the bizarre computer-hoover Crawler had been fiddling with during my hallway meltdown. Almost immediately after Crawler had pressed a couple of buttons on its display panel, my whole world had gone dark. I couldn’t have been – had I been? – forced up inside the pipes and into the cans? Had those pipes slurped me in? Was I somehow inside his computer-hoover? More specifically, inside one of those cans that had dangled off the end?
I shook my head at myself. I’d seen a few odd things since dying, admittedly, like buses full of dead children and reluctant death guardians, clothes made of mushrooms, holograms, and people drinking crushed-up and insect skeletons, but that would be taking it way, way too far. Of course Crawler hadn’t sucked me up like a dustball and squished me into a tuna can. Adults could be weird, but not that weird.
What I needed to do, clearly, was find someone who could tell me what was really going on.
‘Scanlon?’
My ears strained for a response. There were muffled sounds of life – music blaring out of a radio, a noise like the pop of a cork exploding from a bottle – yet Scanlon did not reply. The only person I heard was Crawler, whooping and cheering as if he was having a party. You’d think he’d just won the lottery or something. And he was saying the same puzzling phrase over and over: ‘Caught a whopper! Caught a whopper!’
In the few seconds of silence before he said it again, I became aware of another, much softer sound, coming from beneath me.
Someone was crying.
‘Scanlon?’ I shouted.
For a brief moment the crying stopped.
‘Scanlon?’
No reply. I’d had enough of his ignoring me. I smacked my hands ineffectually on the metal around me. This gave me a brilliant idea.
I went back over the day, starting with the moment Scanlon told me he was saying goodbye. I deliberately focused on all the things that had gone wrong, and spoke them aloud to make them more effective.
‘Not sticking around … glad he’d never see me again … trapped in a … no one telling me where I am … how DARE … I deserve better …’
As the fury kindled, my arms and legs grew warmer and agile. I pushed against the walls around me once more, and this time my container wobbled slightly.
Yes!
I pushed harder, muttering to myself, ‘Reeks of tuna … worse than cat sick … absolute joke …’
A second later, like a beer barrel flung into a cellar, I flew through the air and landed on something hard with a clatter. There was a sharp intake of breath. After a moment, I felt a lifting motion, as if I was being picked up softly by hand.
Then everything went quiet again.
‘Scanlon, I know you’re there,’ I said. ‘Please can you get me out of this thing?’ I tried to keep my voice steady – the darkness was beginning to get to me.
‘I can’t,’ he said finally.
‘What do you mean you can’t?’
‘Crawler put you in there, and only Crawler is allowed to get you out.’
‘What are you talking about, Scanlon?’
A low but audible moan came from outside my box. Scanlon was crying again. I listened to it for a while, helpless, not knowing what to say.
‘Look, things can’t be that bad, Scanlon,’ I said as gently as I could. ‘Now, how about you help me get
