Tamsyn Murray-My So-Called Haunting (10 page)

‘Keep it down,’ Dontay muttered, glancing around to see if any of the footballers had heard. When he saw no one was listening, he went on. ‘It’s Shank, not Skank.
He’s the main man in the London Fields Posse and he’s like a god in Hackney. If anyone hears you so much as breathing wrong around him, you’ll end up like me.’

‘That’s your gang, right?’ I said tentatively, recalling our first ever conversation outside the Dearly D.’

The same strange look as last time crossed his face; half proud, half disdainful. ‘Sort of. I wasn’t really a proper member, just sort of hung around with them. The Marsh Street
Massive is a rival gang, not as big but twice as vicious.’ He focused on his brother stretching some distance away, and his voice tightened with anger. ‘I warned Nelson not to get
involved with any of them. He’s destined for better things than petty fights over stupid crap.’

In a flash, I knew why Dontay was still here. His brother was getting sucked into gang culture and it was his job to stop it happening. From the look on his face, he knew it too. The question
was, what could I do to help? I blew on my chilled fingers ruefully. More importantly, how many Saturday morning lie-ins would it cost me to do it?

My ankle was much better by Monday, but that didn’t stop me accepting Jeremy’s offer of a lift to school. His car might have less street-cred than Noddy’s,
but it did have a wicked sound system and I amused myself on the journey by channel hopping between radio stations in search of a thumping bass-line.

Jeremy frowned in disapproval. ‘Pick a station and stick with it,’ he said, watching me stab one little button after another. ‘What’s wrong with Radio Two?’

‘Nothing, if you’re eighty,’ I responded, pausing to listen to a few bars of music before pressing the buttons once more. ‘Why do you have such an awesome sound system if
all you listen to is Radio Oldster?’

‘Just because it plays the classics instead of head-banging mash-downs doesn’t make it worthless,’ Jeremy argued. ‘Have you even heard of Pink Floyd?’

I had a vague idea he was a celebrity chef, but at that moment I found a tune I’d been longing to hear and sat back to enjoy it, my eyes shut so I couldn’t see the look of pained
incomprehension on Jeremy’s face. So I didn’t notice we’d reached Hornsey Lane Bridge until Jeremy slammed on the brakes. My eyes flew open as I jerked forwards in my seat.

‘What is it?’ I gasped, expecting to see a startled pedestrian in the road ahead of us. Instead, I saw the receding bumper of the car in front.

Jeremy’s face was white. ‘I saw a woman on the bridge.’

My gaze skittered towards the pavement. There were plenty of people crossing the bridge and some of them were women. It didn’t explain why Jeremy had stopped. Then I realised what he meant
and my eyes narrowed. ‘On the bridge? Or jumping off it?’

He passed a shaking hand over his features. ‘She jumped, just like you said.’

We stared at the parapet of the bridge; there was no sign that anything out of the ordinary had happened. The sudden blare of a car horn made us both jump. Jeremy shook himself and turned to
face the front. Fumbling with the gear stick, he eased the car forwards. Neither of us spoke for a minute, then I said, ‘What just happened? You don’t see ghosts.’

Jeremy looked as confused as I felt. ‘Apart from Lucy, you mean? That definitely wasn’t her.’

I battled not to roll my eyes. Lucy had passed across; she wasn’t going to be throwing herself off a bridge in North London, unless the astral plane really sucked.

‘You’re sure the woman jumped?’ I asked, but even as the words left my mouth I knew it was a stupid question. Jeremy was part psychic, and what were the chances of making a
mistake like that in the exact same spot I’d seen someone jump the week before?

He peered in the rear-view mirror at the bridge behind us. ‘I think so. One minute she was there, balancing on the edge, and the next minute she’d disappeared. Where else could she
have gone?’

Questions jostled for my attention. How psychic was Jeremy? And why could he see this ghost, but not Mary? I thought back over what he’d told me about Lucy. ‘Maybe you only see
suicides.’

Jeremy shook his head. ‘Lucy was murdered. Her friend, Hep, killed herself and I never saw her.’

I glanced out of the window. Murder and suicide were tragic in any circumstances, but when the victims were around my age I found them even harder to contemplate. ‘I don’t know,
then. Celestine might be able to explain.’

He cast a weak smile my way. ‘Let’s hope so.’

I didn’t have the heart to insist he dropped me off where no one could see. As he pulled up outside the school gates, I
reached across and gave him an awkward hug. ‘Thanks for the lift. Sorry about the, um, scenery.’

Nodding, he said, ‘You’re welcome.’

Opening the door, I started to get out.

‘Skye?’ Jeremy said, as I slammed the door.

I ducked my head through the open window, expecting to be told to treat the car with more respect. ‘Yeah?’

‘We don’t see many friends of yours, apart from Dontay.’ He hesitated, then carried on. ‘Make sure you spend some time with the living ones too. Dontay might not be
around forever.’

I nodded. ‘OK.’

Standing back, I watched him drive away and then walked thoughtfully into school. I spotted Dr Bailey in the middle of the hordes of students, bellowing ineffectually, and I ducked behind a
group of hulking Year Elevens. I wasn’t about to bring any of my schoolmates home. As I’d learned the hard way on Friday afternoon, the living and the dead don’t mix.

I didn’t tell Megan I’d turned Nico down; she’d have only beaten me to a pulp with her statistics book, and it had at least three hundred pages. But by
Tuesday morning my reluctance to discuss him was making her suspicious.

‘You were touching all the way from the field to the nurse’s office. You must have talked about something,’
she insisted as we sat on the boulders by the rock garden.

‘Yeah, we did.’

‘And?’

I lifted my shoulders. ‘And then I saw the nurse.’

She swatted me with her open hand. ‘Didn’t he ask you out?’

‘No,’ I said, crossing my fingers in my blazer pocket. ‘I don’t think he’s interested.’

Squinting at me, she looked like she didn’t believe me. ‘Really?’

‘Yep. It’s fine. I don’t fancy him anyway.’

It was just as well I wasn’t related to Pinocchio or my nose would have been ten centimetres long. Megan sniffed. ‘So you won’t care that he’s coming over here right now,
then?’

My head jolted up. Sure enough, Nico was crossing the playground towards me.

Megan stood up. ‘Tell me everything,’ she whispered, before hurrying away.

Nico’s shadow fell over me. ‘Hi.’

I shaded my eyes with one hand. ‘Hello.’

‘Can I sit down?’

‘Yeah.’ I waved at the boulder beside me. ‘Although I warn you, they’re not the most comfortable seats in the world.’

Nico arranged himself on the rock next to me. I couldn’t help noticing how close his legs were to mine. Memories of Friday afternoon came flooding back, when he’d practically had his
arm around me. I concentrated very hard on a ladybird crawling along the floor and didn’t look at him.

‘How’s the ankle?’ he asked.

Flexing it gingerly, I said, ‘It’s OK. Unless Mrs Robertson is asking in which case I’m in agony.’

‘I get you.’ Nico smiled and my heart bumped against my ribs. ‘I didn’t mean to freak you out on Friday. Sorry if I came on a bit strong.’

He’d come on exactly the way I’d hoped he would and if Dontay hadn’t turned up, I’d have said yes. I lowered my ankle, wishing I could be honest with him. ‘You
didn’t.’

There was a pause, then he said, ‘So you don’t hate me, then?’

I looked up. He was grinning, but his eyes were studying me. I swallowed, feeling suddenly lightheaded; hate was the exact polar opposite of what I felt. ‘I definitely don’t hate
you.’

‘Maybe we could go for a drink or something, then?’

I hesitated. He was by far the coolest boy I’d ever met and this was the second time he’d asked me out. If I said no this time, I didn’t think he’d ask again. But how
could I risk anyone finding out the truth about me? I stared at Nico as he waited for me to answer, caught up in the dilemma. Then Jeremy’s words came back to me, reminding me I needed living
friends too, and I came to a sudden decision. I couldn’t let my psychic ability rule my life; it wouldn’t be easy, but I’d find a way to keep my secret safe.

Over Nico’s shoulder, I suddenly caught sight of Megan, hiding behind a bush and grinning like a chimpanzee. The moment she saw me looking, she began twisting her hand wildly between
thumbs up and thumbs down and looked so ridiculous that I couldn’t help smiling.

Blotting Megan out, I focused on Nico. ‘Actually, I’m free on Saturday if you’ve still got the ticket?’

He threw me a pleased but surprised look. ‘Really? You’re up for the gig?’

‘Yeah, I – uh – thought I was busy but I’m not,’ I said, trying to sound as casual as I could. ‘I love The Droids.’

He nodded, looking pleased. ‘I’ll check what time it starts and we can arrange where we’re going to meet. Or I can pick you up if you like?’

I gulped. Er – how about no? I might be ready to take a few risks, but Celestine’s house was a minefield of potential weirdness; there was no way I was letting him see how freakish I
really was. Coming across as a little bit kooky was one thing; having him think I was certifiably insane was quite another.

‘Let’s meet somewhere,’ I said and then I realised how far away Saturday actually was. Could I really wait that long? ‘But we could go for a drink before then, if you
wanted? There’s a new juice bar in Highgate Village.’

His face split into a grin. ‘Cool. We should swap mobile numbers, then.’

My heart abandoned its happy dance and went all out for a full-on trapeze act. I grinned back at him, then realised he had his phone out and was waiting for my number. Hurriedly, I reeled off
the numbers and he pressed the call button. Seconds later, my mobile vibrated in my blazer. I pulled it out and saved his number.

‘So I’ll meet you after school?’ I said, hoping he wasn’t the type to be put off by enthusiasm.

His face clouded. ‘I can’t do tonight. I kind of work for my dad sometimes and he’s got a job for me later. How about tomorrow?’

I could wait one more day. ‘Yeah, OK.’

When he was completely out of sight I punched the air in Megan’s direction. I had a date with the boy every girl in Heath Park wanted to get to know. I was starting to feel I’d done
the right thing by moving down from Scotland. It looked like things were finally on the up.

We’d arranged to meet on Saturday outside Chalk Farm tube station. I’d been quite restrained with the text messaging and had resisted the urge to drop him flirty
little texts asking what he was doing every half an hour. I hadn’t even been tempted by Megan’s suggestion to tap his mobile number into a website to track his location by GPS. I wanted
to be his girlfriend, not his stalker.

My stomach cartwheeled crazily when I spotted his dark head above the crowd. Even though we’d gone to the juice bar twice after school that week, I still felt nervous around him –
but in a good way, like I did when I was a kid waiting for Christmas Day. Trying to ignore the butterflies flapping up a storm inside me, I weaved towards him.

‘Hey,’ I said as I reached him. He was dressed from head to toe in black. I gulped at how good-looking he was. It was the first time I’d seen him out of school uniform. If I
didn’t know better, I’d have said he was playing the gig rather than being in the audience, and judging from the admiring glances he was getting, the rest of the female population
thought so too.

He broke into a smile. ‘You made it.’

I thought I caught a hint of relief around his eyes. Surely he hadn’t been worried I’d stand him up? ‘Yeah. Did you think I’d change my mind?’

A teasing expression crept over his face. ‘It wouldn’t have been the first time. How’s the ankle?’

‘It’s fine, as long as you don’t drag me into the mosh pit tonight.’

Mouth quirking, he said, ‘Moshing is the last thing on my mind, believe me. Want to head
in?’

I gave a distracted nod, glad he wouldn’t be leaping around like a lunatic but wondering what he did have on his mind. Was he imagining what it would be like to press his lips against
mine, the same as me? I shook the idea away as we followed the crowd along the road, in case I accidentally thought out loud. Once the Roundhouse came into view, I could see where it got its name.
Rising up against the orange glow of the city sky was a circular building, easily the most distinctive one around.

We joined the queue to get in. Noticing me craning my head backwards to look at it, Nico said, ‘It’s not the biggest venue around but it’s one of the best for atmosphere and
acoustics. Anyone who’s anyone has played here.’

The passion in his voice caught my attention and I realised I hardly knew anything about him. ‘Are you a musician?’

A wry grin tugged at his mouth. ‘Nah. I look the part, but the sad truth is that I’m tone deaf. You?’