Phoenix and the Bag Man

Chapter 15: Revolution

First, there was darkness, warmth and quiet. The quiet was split by an explosive, sharp, brittle sound. It cascaded away into nothingness, ever smaller chunks of it scattering across a wooden floor to scrape slowly to a stop. There was a scream and sobbing. Distress swelled within my stomach and chest like a huge expanding bubble, robbing me of breath. I understood crying. Standing, fearful, clinging to thin wooden bars that caged me, protected me, watching the door in a dim light. Wanting her to come. No one came. The sobbing stopped, a voice raised, shouting. The one that threw me into the air and frightened me, laughing. Scream after scream after scream and I screamed too. A bitter, choking smell. And a roaring like a gale in the trees and a blast of hot air and an orange light. Two arms outstretched towards me.

I woke suddenly. The lights were out in the room but the yard lamps outside spilled enough of their yellow light through the large many-paned metal windows ranged along the opposite wall to create a kind of artificial dusk, where everything seemed familiar and yet unfamiliar. It reminded me of Christmas Eve when the tree lights are left on at night - same room, same house, but when all the house lights go out there's a comfortable, safe other-worldliness about the place. Anyhow that's what I felt. It wasn't Christmas, it wasn't home, it wasn't comfortable and it wasn't safe. It was better than a muddy pool in a rising tide, though. The room was empty of people. Katyia had gone. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and sat up. I was starkers. Except for the memory stick on a cord around my neck. I glanced up at the door suddenly nervous that someone might come in. And then towards the bed where Aferdita was. Bora was there, sat beside the sick girl's bed. She muttered something in Albanian and smiled. I smiled nervously back, quickly pulling a blanket after me. I tried standing up. My head thumped. My thigh ached. I was stiff. Otherwise OK. My mind started to wake up. Find Katyia. No. Find clothes!

I was looking around for my things when I became aware of shouting outside. Several raised voices fought with each other. Plainly there was an argument going on. I moved across to the nearest window. It was only a few steps but enough to show me exactly how stiff my leg had become. Wincing, I looked out. A couple of metres away, a high chain-link fence ran parallel to the building and beyond that, past some scruffy wasteland full of junk and down in a dip, were the shadowy outlines of rows of caravans. Many had lights on. But I could not see round to the yard outside the hut, where I guessed all the noise was coming from, which I remembered lay beyond the windowless end wall which had the the door in it.

Clothes.

I snapped to and returned to my search and quickly found them on the floor on the other side of my bed in a soggy heap.

"Shit."

I picked them up but there was no way I could wrap their cold wetness around my skin. In the back of my mind, if I chose to listen, I could hear a steady mantra; Bullimore, Bag Man, Bullimore, Bag Man, Bullimore, Bag Man... I chose not to listen. I tried to focus. I was going to stay dry, I was going to keep warm and I was going to eat. I was famished.

There was clothing scattered all around the room on the bunks, there was even a makeshift washing line at the back of the room hung with other people's clothes - T-shirts, shirts, trousers, socks, fleece, socks. I didn't hesitate to take what I needed - except underpants ... no way.

The old woman watched me all the while, expressionless.

Wet feet I would have to put up with as the dry socks I had nicked soaked up the water from my trainers, but they quickly warmed up.

Now for food. I gently opened the door onto the yard and peered out. The rowing voices had moved away but there was shouting coming from beyond the barn I could see across the yard. In the dark I could see figures drifting in twos and threes towards the sound from the direction of the caravans. I was about to set out across the yard to join this procession when a door in the barn opened. It was Katyia. My first thought was that she might know where I could find food. She saw me but peered nervously around the door towards the figures half hidden in the dark scrunching along the track that passed along the ends of the barns and the courtyard. I could hardly make them out. The night was still. The outside lights reflected off the wet concrete of the yard but their light fell short of illuminating anything more than twenty feet away. It had grown foggy and the light merely bounced off the mist as though it were frosted glass creating an impenetrable barrier. Something in her manner caused me to keep quiet. She crossed the yard towards me. The strange stillness the fog brought with it was punctuated only by footsteps, random, disconnected shouts, dampened and intelligible, and now the sharp tap of Katyia's boots on concrete. I started towards her but she gestured for me to stay back. She kept her hand raised, discreetly at waist level, palm outwards, until she reached me. I kept completely still. She glanced sideways towards where the track ran. She stopped inches from me. Her upraised hand rested against my stomach. She tilted her face upwards and leant forward and touched her lips to mine. Before I could react in any way she gently, but firmly, pushed me back.