Even Ose cracks a slight, reluctant smile.
“What about you?” Jonah asks Farah, like we’re playing a party game.
“A headache,” Farah says. “I guess I passed out in Casualty.”
Jonah looks intrigued. “So you might be with us a little while?” He gives Farah a Cheshire-cat grin. “A lot of people here are just passing through, some of them don’t even know they’re here. But you three are different, aren’t you?” He turns to me. A piercing, shrewd look. “And you, Kyle, what’s your story?”
“I don’t remember,” I say shortly.
“Come on, Kyle,” Jonah cajoles me, an edge in his voice. “We’re sharing here, right?”
“I have epilepsy,” I say. “I pass out a lot.”
I expect him to be irritated by my non-answer but he seems oddly satisfied. “That you do,” he muses. “That you do.”
“Tongue?” Tongue says, questioningly.
“Leave it,” Jonah warns. He smiles, falsely. “Let’s have another drink, shall we?”
It seems to go on for an age, Jonah filling the room with his one-sided banter, a kind of strained, scripted act. What does he want? I wonder. Where is this leading? He fetches the bottle and refills his glass.
“Want some?” he asks, holding up the glass for me. “Or Coke, or whatever. There’s no rules in this world, that’s the wonderful thing about it.”
Jonah tells us that he came off his motorbike. He doesn’t know what’s left of his body in the ordinary world, what fragment of wrecked brain matter is keeping him tethered to this world, but he’s been here for decades. Ose was hit by a car and Levi was a maintenance worker for the railways. Their brains in the ordinary world are still dying or wrecked beyond repair and clinging on to life. They have no way of knowing for sure but, somehow, they’ve reached the same conclusion as Chiu. In the ordinary world their brains are igniting in gamma activity, catapulting them here, keeping them here. Hours, days, years… It’s irrelevant, the time in one world is unaffected by the time in the other.
They tell us this in passing, as if the nature of this place was never in question.
“I woke up on the tracks in this world,” Levi says. “Not that I knew it was this world. I couldn’t figure out why the lads had left me. I was still walking the length of the tracks, going nowhere in particular, when Jonah found me and explained it all.”
“How long have you been here?” Farah says.
Levi shrugs. “More years than I can count.”
“There’s a machine that can help us,” Chiu says suddenly. “We read about a machine that can—” He stops when he catches a look from Farah.
Jonah’s eyes are vigilant and cunning. “A machine?”
“It’s nothing,” Farah says. “Just kid stuff.”
Chiu looks furious but he doesn’t say anything.
“Is that where you’re going then?” Jonah asks. “To find a machine?”
“We’re going to find my family,” Farah says. “In Islington.”
Jonah nods slowly. He doesn’t believe her.
He throws his head back and drains his glass, then slaps his hands on to his knees and stands with sudden decisiveness. “Well, no rest for the wicked,” he says. He catches my eye, as if we’re sharing a secret. A warning, I think, not to tell them about what nearly happened upstairs. “Levi, Tongue, you’re with me. Ose, stick around and keep our new friends company, will you?”
He gives Tongue and Levi a nod and they follow him out, leaving us alone with Ose. Ose watches them, his face inscrutable.
“Where are they going?” Farah asks.
“They’re searching,” Ose says.
“Searching for what?”
Ose shrugs lazily. “Anything we can make use of. Anyone passing through.”
Farah stands slowly. She flashes me a play-along look. “Well,” she says. “We’d better be leaving as well, I guess. I was visiting my friends when I passed out. We have a long way to go to get to my family’s house.”
“Why are you going to your family’s house?” Ose says. “They are not in this world.”
“No, I…” Farah falters. “I want to see the place, that’s all. It’s home.”
Farah glances at me and Chiu and we stand. Ose holds his ground, blocking the way between us and the door. There’s a deep, deep sadness in him, a ponderous despondency.
“It’s better that you stay here,” he says.
“I don’t think so,” Farah replies, her voice hardening.
“Better to stay,” Ose insists.
Farah looks at me. For a moment I’m scared she’s going to rush him. She doesn’t know what happened with Jonah, she doesn’t know how dangerous these people are. I give a slight shake of my head and we share a moment of silent debate. She glances at Ose, sizing him up. He looks like a marathon runner who chops down trees for a hobby. Her mouth pinches in frustration and she sits.
We wait in tense silence. Ose doesn’t want to chat in the way Jonah did and that, at least, is a relief. But the air is thick and melancholy, the grey sky and manicured lawns beyond the window wait pensively. When Ose wanders over to the bookcase on the far side of the room and starts perusing the small collection of antique-looking books there, Farah shifts over quickly and sits next to me. Chiu leans forward to join in.
“We need to get out of here,” Farah hisses.
