The cameraman checks the last piece of footage on his phone and gives Jak a thumbs up. That’s a wrap. He turns off the bright light, rolls away the blue backdrop and packs up his kit.
Two police officers open the door and beckon Jak to follow them. They walk in formation, one in front of her, one behind her, down a drab office corridor, past a noticeboard and a water dispenser. The overhead lights hum and emit a yellow glow.
Jak rummages in her jeans pocket, pulls out a letter for Carly, the one Sticks didn’t take, stuffs it back in. And then pulls out the reminder note to herself. She holds it out in front and tries to read it as she walks.
‘Love you Tabs. Weird stuff about, what does that say, oh, maybe her uncle. And Pride. It was alright but I felt a bit like a tourist. Saw Donny. Maybe not say that. And the cat, she’ll like the cat.
‘Oh God, Jak! Just say something like I love you Tabs.’
Her hand is trembling so much that the words are just a jumble of lines.
She puts her hands in her jean pockets then takes them out again to fold her arms. She stumbles over a ruck in the thin carpet, putting an arm out to stop from falling. It catches the arse of the police officer in front, her elbow brushing his belt, but he doesn’t flinch or break his stride.
They turn a corner. Wall-mounted cameras cover every angle. The first police officer taps at a shielded code box and stares at a green pin point of light. A door opens to another corridor.
There is no carpet, noticeboards or anything else here. Their steps echo off the walls. The corridor slopes down. Jak feels sick. She shivers.
‘Breathe Jak. Slowly in, slowly out. Must be nearly there.’
“Here you go,” the first police officer stands to one side of a door while the second takes a bunch of keys from a bag on his belt, selects one, and turns it in the lock.
Carly is sat hunched over a low table. On seeing Jak, she gets to her feet and walks awkwardly, baggy blue trousers and a loose blue shirt making her seem like a child wearing too-large hand-me-downs, and limps across the room to greet her. Carly stretches out both arms towards Jak and they clasp hands. The door closes.
Jak tries to hug Carly but she flinches in pain, pushes her away slightly. So she leans in and kisses her face. Is she thinner, her skin paler? Maybe not so much paler but greyer, the colour drained away. Her eyes glow but she looks tired.
“Oh Jax, I’m so glad you’re here. I’ve not been having much fun, to be honest, on this little state-provided holiday,” Carly smiles weakly and continues, “but it’s so good to see you. And your kind face.”
Jak struggles to speak, “how are you?”
Carly shrugs, kisses Jak on the forehead and limps back to her seat before asking, “how’s your dad?”
“In a coma.”
“Poor him, poor you. I hope he recovers.”
“Are you injured?” worries Jak.
“Back pain. They don’t prioritise comfort round here. The regular coppers are okay I suppose, just dull. But the yanks, well, they’ve claimed more than their pound of flesh and,” she holds her arms out so her shirt hangs limply from her body, “defo a one star, would give it no stars if I could, review for the quality of catering.”
Jak suddenly realises she is still standing up, looking down at Carly, and self-consciously looks around for a chair.
It’s a small room. Bare, salmon pink plaster on the walls. No windows, except for a narrow strip by the door. Various LED lights – red and blue, some intermittently flashing – are embedded in the panelled ceiling.
And there’s a chair in one corner. She drags it over to the table, and sits facing Carly.
“So Jax, my love,” Carly smiles wistfully, “how’s it been on the outside?”
Jak fiddles with her hands, unsure why she’s still so nervous, “oh, same old you know. Did you get my letters?”
“A few. My uncle gave me one but stopped coming. Too risky, I guess. The yanks were interested in him. A cop gave me a few… you saw a swallow.”
“A house martin,” corrects Jak, “they’re like swallows.”
“Oh right, whatever, birds anyway. Copper said a woman had dropped it off. I didn’t know if you’d come to the station with it or if it was just one of my uncle’s contacts. I thought about that for ages. Had you been here? Well for a day or two I guess, but every day feels like ages here. But I liked the thought of you being just, you know, nearby.”
Jak hangs her head, “I was in the station once, applying to see you. But I didn’t drop off any letters. I passed them to your uncle. Except one. I got it here but it’s kinda old and out of date.”
She pulls the letter from her jeans pocket, uncrumpling it as best she can. Reaching across the table, their fingertips brush and Jak tries to hold hands. But Carly grips the letter and her fingers close in on themselves, like petals sensing rain.
“Sorry, not used to human touch being a nice thing anymore,” Carly extends her other hand out and they interlock their fingers to form an arch over the table.
They sit there, looking at each other, and try to smile. But instead tears leak from Carly’s eyes, dribbling along her cheekbones and down the sides of her nose. She sniffs and pulls her hand back to get a tissue from her shirt pocket.
And wipes her eyes, “so, they’ve built their wall then?”
Jak stares at a coffee ring on the table and mumbles, “it’s not really finished. I’m really sorry about, I should’ve said something about…”
“You still working on it?”
“Not really, don’t think so…”
“Well anyway, it’s not important anymore,” Carly shrugs again, “it’s a job at least. How’s your mum?”
“She’s fine,” Jak, although still feeling nervous, forces herself to adopt a more positive posture, upright and to speak clearly, “one of the cops reckons you might be out soon.”
“Yeah, well,” Carly glances up at the LED lights in the ceiling, “they want me out. But there’s a price.”
“A price?”
“A deal.”
“To get you out?” hope rises in Jak and her voice becomes urgent, expectant, “so you can get out?”
“Everything changed yesterday,” explains Carly, “new guys came to talk to me. They were all, like, wanting to be friends. Said they weren’t interested in my uncle, the Americans kept asking about my uncle, but these guys said they didn’t care. And that they won’t let me be sent to America and Americans have no right telling Oxford folk what to do and they want me to be free.
“I mean these are young guys, same age as us, younger, one of them, I would swear it. But they talk like they know everything in the world. One of them said he’d been in some place in London, meeting with the Justice Secretary, you know from the UK government, friend of his dad’s or something. And here he was talking to me about this proposal of his.”
“Proposal?”
“Yeah. I tell them stuff and go on the record with how grateful I am and how scared I was of being sent to America and I say I trust the Authority now Mr Miles in charge, and they’ll let me off with a caution and even apologise to me on behalf of Messina. And the lawyer’s going, while they’re still in the room which he shouldn’t’ve done, ‘it’s a good offer but it’s your decision’ and I’m nearly saying ‘yes’ there and then. But…” Carly pauses, leaves her hesitation hanging in the air.
Jak half stands up, ready to hug Carly but with trepidation in her voice, “so did you say ‘yes’?”
“No.”
“What? Tabs? What?” she sits down again, “Why?”
“Jax,” Carly looks at the ceiling again, and this time keeps her eyes focussed on the lights, “they tortured me. That’s why I’m in pain and limping and all the rest of it. Big American beasts reeking of aftershave and bleach. Looked like they worked out every second of the day. And I was just part of their fitness regime, letting their inner psychopaths out to play.”
“Bastards!” Jak can feel tears tugging at her eyelids, but they don’t fall.
“Yeah. And some! So now they’re trying a different tactic. Like I said, posh English boys pretending to be nice to me. Using me,” Carly takes a deep breath, “and I won’t let them.”
Jak’s mind races. She has to persuade Tabs to change her mind. How can she do that?
“You want to change how things are in Oxford. So do I,” Jak gets to her feet and paces back and forth, from wall to wall, “so does everyone I know but you’re the one brave enough to do something about it. But Tabs, how is getting locked away going to change anything?”
Carly shrugs, “it won’t, Jax. But that’s kinda the point in a way. Things have gone too far to stop them. I can’t change Oxford. I realise that now.
“But worse than that, it’s trying to change me. I won’t let it, Jax. Not those American beasts hurting me. And I haven’t gone through all that just to cave to a bunch of sweet-talking posh cunts that’re cold as knives inside. Whoever they are, I don’t care. I’m not going to let them get to me.”
“But Tabs,” Jak stops pacing and crouches down next to Carly, stroking her hand, “surely if you tell them what they want to hear, you don’t have to mean it? Why not? You won’t like it but people have to do things they don’t like doing all the time, to earn a living or to help someone they love. Why can’t you do that?”
Carly stands up, undoes her shirt and pulls it up from the waist to reveal her back, criss-crossed by red lines and the puffy yellow swellings of skin trying to heal itself, “see these marks? They couldn’t beat the words out of me. I’m not going to let them seduce the words out of me with promises of their so-called freedom.”
“Tabs,” pleads Jak, “it’s awful what they did. But if someone throws you a line you need to take it.”
“Even if they tortured you?”
“Yes. It’s better than ending up in jail. And you said yourself, it’s new people now, not Americans.”
Tears flow down Carly’s cheeks, one lands on Jak’s upturned face, “oh Jax, my dear, sweet Jax. You’re such a kind hearted little thing.
“These people are torturers. Even if the tactics are different. They’re part of the same thing. They won’t just let me go and then that’s it. If I agree to their terms, that means they own me. Even if it seems like I’m free, I can never escape from them because I’ve let them change me.
“If I refuse then all they can do is lock me up. And I remain free inside, still me, still my own person with my own conscience.”
Jak lets Carly’s tears fall on her, wishing her own dry eyes would fill, wanting their tears to flow together, “what if they torture you again?”
“If they do, they do. But at least I won’t be torturing myself.”
Jak stands up, takes a deep breath and wipes the tears away with her sleeve. From her own face. And from Carly’s. She kisses her again and again. She kisses her all over her face. She kisses her painful shoulders and scabby back. And her hands, every millimetre of her hands.
She wants to kiss her forever. She kisses her to try and stop time, for it to hold its breath until she can think of the right words to convince Tabs to change her mind.
But eventually Carly has to sit down. She buttons up her shirt. The kisses are nice but they don’t take away the physical pain.
Jak sniffs. Her nose is snotty but still her eyes remain dry. There’s a knock on the door, “one minute warning, Miss Churchwell, one minute.”
“So what happens next?” Jak crouches down again, holding Carly’s hand.
“They’ll give me a final offer…”
“Take it Tabs, take it. Please Tabs, take it. Be good to yourself. Be good to me. I would take it to be with you. Please Tabs!”
Carly shakes her head, “unless they drop their conditions, I’m going to say ‘no’.”
Jak feels empty. Powerless. Hopeless. Her voice sinks to a monotone, “what’ll happen then?”
“They’ll call me a terrorist. And put me on trial. Judge only. No appeals.”
“But how? You haven’t hurt anyone? Or blown up anything?”
Carly laughs and coughs up phlegm, which she wipes from her mouth, “oh dear, sweet, honest Jax. Sometimes you are so naive. These people don’t care about truth. They care about power. They need us to be afraid and obedient so they make up stories about terrorists to scare us and use actual terror to keep us in line. And then demand that we’re grateful. If you’re not afraid and you’re not grateful, you’re a threat. Why do you think they shot your dad? He wasn’t afraid. And he gave them flowers even though they told him not to. So he wasn’t obedient either. So they shot him.”
“Dad was trying to give me the flowers…”
“Jax,” Carly lowers her head, so that all the surveillance cameras in the world cannot see the anguish in her face, and whispers, “they don’t care about you. They really don’t care.”
Jak looks away. She can’t think of anything else to say and, ashamed of her own lack of tears and courage, daren’t return her gaze. But she also can’t bear to take her eyes off Tabs a second sooner than she has to. So she stares at her shoes – her once shiny, now scuffed, red zip-up ankle boots.
—
Donny and Jazz unlock the Moonshine’s front door. They have left Alice and her husband, together with a rather twitchy Sam, to guard their tent.
They need supplies, especially water. But the mains is running dry for the whole neighbourhood. And they emptied their fridges of bottled water last night to distribute round the camp. Jazz tries a tap. Nothing comes out.
“Fuck it! Utter bastards!”
Donny scrolls and scrolls through his phone.
“Anyone?” asks Jazz, resignation creeping into his voice.
“Taps are on in Botley. And round Abingdon Road and Kennington,” Donny lists the place names calmly, focused on the task, “but out in Littlemore and Rose Hill, and as we know everywhere from there to Wood Farm, which has just gone. Headington’s okay, hasn’t been affected so far. And Barton. I’m guessing Marston and Northway as well but I don’t know anyone there…”
“Okay, okay,” Jazz is impatient, “how many volunteers? How much, how quick?”
Donny wrinkles his nose and adjusts his glasses as he continues scrolling, “five, maybe six. But if Headington goes as well, we’re screwed.”
Jazz’s phone beeps, he glances down at it, takes a breath and states calmly, “we’re screwed.”
—
Jak stares at her own boots, black and specially polished that morning, as she trudges back down St Aldates to Folly Bridge Gate. People walk past her, heading to lunchtime shifts in cafes and bars, and she feels like they can’t see her. They can avoid colliding with her on the pavement but they can’t see her. No one can, not at that moment.
She joins the short queue for the exit. A sign above the gate says, ‘Thank you for visiting Historic Oxford, hope to see you again soon.’ She shuffles along as each person in front goes through. And then scans her phone, waits a few seconds for an overhead camera to match her ID and trigger the barrier to swing open, and trudges on over Folly Bridge.
Jak turns left down some steps to join the Thames path. A swallow darts in front of her and across the river to the opposite bank. Her eyes follow its flight.
‘Was that our swallow? She’s still here at least. But she would be, wouldn’t she, it’s too early to go back to Africa. Might be another one, Jak. Probably is. This one is a bit closer to town.’
As she walks by the river, away from town, a second swallow flies across towards her before veering up and away to the sports pitches beyond.
A mile downstream from Folly Bridge, Jak turns off the path and up an embankment onto Donnington Bridge. She walks halfway across. And stops by a memorial display of withered flowers and an Oxford United football shirt that is propped up against a rusty safety barrier.
She is just able to look over and down at the river below. It is wide and, despite the drought, plenty deep enough to drown in. Jak reads back the note of things she wanted to say to Tabs. It’s as if a stranger had written them. Why the fuck would Tabs care about them getting a cat? She’s been tortured for fuck’s sake.
No tears come. This time she is glad.
She rips the note in two, then in two again, and again and again until the pieces start falling, drifting like withered petals onto the surface of the water below. And are swept away, down to Iffley Lock where they join a slick of flotsam at the base of the old stone footbridge.
Another swallow flies across the river and heads to the meadow to hunt.