Trash by Andy Mulligan Read Free Book Online Page B

Gardo was gone.
    I was so frightened I felt sick and I couldn’t stop crying.
    We were bumping and rocking because the road is so rutted and the driver was going as fast as he could. There was still a crowd around me, and someone was banging on the roof – and then we were through the gates, and on the road. They put their siren on, and we whipped through. Red lights didn’t matter, the traffic police waved us on. For some reason it didn’t feel quite so bad when we were going past stores, and the roads were full of people, and everything was lit up. But when we turned off into smaller roads, there were no people, and soon there were no lights.
    I have never felt so lost and lonely, and I still could not stop crying. I said, ‘Where are we going?’
    One man said, ‘Where do you think we’re going?’
    I said, ‘I haven’t done anything, sir.’
    The man said, ‘Keep still, boy – we know that.’
    ‘I haven’t done anything, sir,’ I said again. I kept saying it through my sobs.
    I tried to keep still, like the man had told me to, but I couldn’t. I was rocking backwards and forwards. All you can think about is how alone you are, and how anything can happen now. A little while ago, things had felt safeand ordinary – my auntie, Gardo, the cousins, the fire – and people, all around me. Now! It is like falling through a trapdoor. In a second, every single thing had changed, and you are falling – your friends cannot get to you, nobody knows where you are, and you think,
So when do I stop falling?
You think,
What plan do they have for me that I can do nothing about?
    Rat had the envelope. Rat had the ID. I would not give either of them up because we knew more now. We knew about José Angelico, and there was a fight beginning.
    The streets and buildings were all grey-cement coloured, and we drove left, right, up, down, and came round fast into a car park, up close to a heavy-looking gate. A policeman with a dog opened it, and we drove through, and down a ramp. To be going down, underground, was more frightening still, and I started to cry harder. I called for my auntie as well, and that is when – I will be honest – I wet myself.
    We stopped in bright lights, and I was taken out of the car. I could hardly move by myself, and a policeman had to pull me – not because I was resisting, but because I was so frightened my legs wouldn’t work. He spoke quite softly and put his arm round me, half carrying me. We went down some steps and through metal doors. We came to a corridor, and there were cells on either side of it, all with numbers. A policeman opened one of the doors, and I was put inside. The door closed and I stood there, not knowing what to do, feeling so sick I thought I would fall overand die. Seconds later, the door opened again with lots of noise, and a policeman came in and told me to sit down.
    I sat on the floor, and I was sick. I hadn’t eaten much, but up it came and went all over my knees, and I started crying again, and I had never before heard the sounds that I was making – I had never cried like I was crying then.
    The policeman sat on the bench, and he didn’t close the door this time. I think he realized that I was too frightened to be left alone and that somebody should be with me. The policeman gave me a little towel, and I tried to clean myself, but my hands would not work.
    Time passed.
    There was nothing in the cell but the bench, which was concrete. The policeman said a few things to me, just casual questions about who I was. I found that I couldn’t speak, much as I tried to. After a while, a man in a light grey suit came in and looked at me. He asked me my name. I managed to say it, but my voice wasn’t my voice.
    ‘Six,’ he said. ‘We’ll use six.’
    He went out, and two policemen came and lifted me to my feet. They had to almost carry me. I was taken back along the corridor, and this time up some steps instead of down. We climbed high and then passed some offices,