Autumn: The Human Condition (7 page)

Culthorpe had to take a chance. She grabbed Jenkins' flailing legs and laid him out flat on the sofa. He arched his back in pain, his willowy frame beginning to shake and convulse furiously. Pressing down on his bare chest with one hand she tried to hold his thrashing head still with the other and clear his airway. Suddenly motionless for the briefest of moments, the odious addict then let out a tearing, agonising cough of pain and suffocation which splattered the police officer with blood and spittle. Shocked and repulsed she staggered back and wiped her face clean.

`Shit,' she cursed. `Glover, where are you?'

Still no response from her partner. Jenkins began to convulse again and she forced herself to move back closer towards him. It was her duty to try and save his life, much as she knew it wasn't worth saving. She crouched down next to him. By the time she'd decided what she needed to do he'd already lost consciousness. He wasn't moving.

`Glover!' she yelled again. Now that Jenkins was still she could hear more noises all over the dark, dank and squalid house. Her heart thumping in her chest, she stood up and walked cautiously towards the door. From the kitchen came a sudden crashing noise as plates, dishes and glasses fell to the ground and smashed. Culthorpe ran into the room and found Glover, Faye Smith and one of her three children sprawled motionless on the cold, sticky linoleum, surrounded by the remains of the food and crockery which had been knocked off a now upturned table. They were all dead. Smith, Glover and the child at her feet were dead, as was Jenkins when she returned to him. She ran upstairs. The two children up there were dead too. One was in the bathroom, the corpse wedged between the base of the sink and the toilet pan. She found his brother lying on the carpet next to his bed. Both of the children were white-faced but with crimson, almost black blood dribbling from their silent mouths.

With clumsy, nervous hands Culthorpe reached for her radio again and called for assistance. The familiar sound of hissing static cut through the silence, reassuring her momentarily.

She yelled desperately into the radio for help. No-one answered.

PETER GUEST

I keep going over the conversation in my head again and again and again, and every time I see Joe's face it hurts me more. I've been close before but I know I've really done it this time. I've made a huge mistake.

What happened at home this morning has been brewing for weeks, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do about it. Sometimes I feel like I'm trapped and that I don't have any control. I'm trying to do my best for everyone but no-one can see it, and at the same time everyone blames me whenever anything goes wrong. I'm starting to think that whichever way I turn and whatever I do I'll end up pissing someone off and paying one hell of a price. I can't stop looking at the clock. It's almost eight. Jenny will have Joe ready for school now. He'll be in the playground with his friends before long and everything that happened last night and this morning will be forgotten until he gets home. He kept telling me it didn't matter but I could see that it did. He kept telling me it was all right and that there'd be another time but there's no escaping the fact that I've let my son down again. The trouble is, how can I justify sitting in a school hall watching my child's first class assembly when I should be at the office, closing a deal that's taken days and weeks of effort to bring to the table? I know that in financial terms there's no competition and the office has to take precedence, but I also know that on just about every other level I should be putting work at the very bottom of the pile. It's hard to do that. The pressure they're putting me under is immense. And worst of all, I have this gnawing, nagging emptiness in the pit of my stomach which is telling me this morning that I might have just paid a price that can't be measured in pounds and pence.

It wouldn't matter so much if this were the first time. It wouldn't even be that bad if it was only the second or third time either. Truth is because of work I seemed to have missed just about every notable landmark event in Joe's short life so far. I missed his first day at playgroup because of an off-site meeting and I missed his first morning at nursery because I was in Hong Kong on a business trip. I missed his first day at school. I missed his first nativity play and his first proper birthday party with his friends. And why did I miss all of those things? If I'm honest, I truly believed that I was doing it all for Jenny and Joe. I just want us to have a good standard of living and not to want for anything. If that means I have to work long hours and be dedicated to my job then so be it, that's what I'm prepared to do.

Jenny doesn't see things that way. She used to, but she doesn't anymore.

She really laid into me last night when I took the call and told her I was going to be at the office early. She started hurling all kinds of threats and accusations in my direction, telling me that we were getting close to the point where I was going to have to make a choice between my career and my family. She's said things like that before, but last night it felt different. I could tell that she meant every last word she said. I tried again to tell her that I was only doing it for her and Joe but she wasn't listening. She asked me if I could imagine a time when I didn't work for the company and I said that I could. It might still be a long way off, but I know the day will eventually come when I don't work for them any longer. Then she asked me if I could imagine being without her and Joe. I said that I couldn't and that I didn't even want to think about it. She said that was the choice I had to make. If they were more important to me than work, why did I keep choosing work over them?

Bloody hell, I know she's right and I know I should be stronger, but the company has got me by the balls.

Traffic's bad this morning. God, that'd be bloody ironic, wouldn't it, if the traffic makes me late for the meeting after all the grief I've had over this. I'm over halfway there now and it's been pretty much bumper to bumper since I left home. This isn't unusual. This is the main route into town and I know that a lot of commuters will be turning off and heading for the motorway soon, leaving the last mile or so to the office relatively clear.

Last major set of traffic lights coming up. I might be sitting here for the next ten minutes or so but, once I'm through, I should be at the office pretty quickly. I'll get this meeting done and I'll see if I can't get away a little earlier tonight. I'll find a way of making it up to Joe and Jen. If we get the deal closed this morning we all stand to get a decent payout next month. I'll take them out for dinner tonight and put it on the credit card. I'll take them for a pizza or a burger, Joe will love that. Maybe we could go to the cinema if he's not too tired after school. I can't keep him out too late. Perhaps I'll take them at the weekend. Maybe I'll just get them both something from town at lunchtime. But I don't want it to seem like I'm just trying to pay for...

Bloody hell, what was that? As I pulled away from the lights just then I'm sure I saw a car going out of control on its way down the bypass. There's no way I can turn back. There are plenty of other people about and there's probably nothing I could do anyway. The police watch all these roads on CCTV and they'll be on the scene before... Jesus Christ! I'm just heading down into the Heapford tunnel and I've seen another crash at the top of the slip road I've just pulled off. I went by so fast I didn't really see what happened. There was a blue-grey estate and it smacked into the back of another car. They both went spinning across the carriageway. Thank God I missed it. I hope everyone involved is all right and I don't want to sound completely uncaring, but I can't afford to be delayed today. A minute or so later and I would have been stuck in the tailback and chaos that rush-hour crashes always leave behind.

Down into the relative darkness of the tunnel. The light quickly fades and I listen to how the sounds change around me � the signal on the radio disappears and the noise of the city is muffled and snuffed out by the sounds of car engines echoing around the inside of the tunnel. The road ahead bends away to the left. I can see the bright red glow of brake lights up ahead. Drivers are always having to brake sharply at the end of this tunnel. They just don't anticipate the filter system. Everyone drives too fast down here and... and there are quite a few cars backed up now. Bloody hell, I hope it is just the filter and nothing more serious. I'm cutting it fine now. To be stuck this close to the office would be just unbelievable.

The noises around me are changing again. Now I can hear brakes and horns and engines roaring and other sounds. The radio is still quiet. It sounds like there's been another... Hang on, the traffic is stopping. There must have been another accident. Christ, three in one morning, and all in less than a mile. What are the chances of that...? Shit, what the hell is happening...? Jesus, this is a bloody pileup. It looks like a load of cars have smashed and been wedged together and... and I've got to stop before I hit them. I slam on my brakes but I'm going too fast to stop in time. The car behind me is doing the same, and the one to my right too. I'm going to hit something or something's going to hit me. I try to keep hold of the steering wheel and take my feet of the pedals so that I don't damage my legs and I'm just trying to...

Seven minutes later Peter Guest woke up. Dazed and disorientated, he gently pushed himself upright and gagged and coughed as warm, semi-coagulated blood trickled sickeningly into his open mouth and down the back of this throat from his broken nose. The fact that he might miss his vital meeting was the first irrational thought that crossed his concussed mind. He immediately struggled to unbuckle his seat belt and disentangle himself from the remains of the now deflated airbag which had prevented his face from smashing into the steering wheel with any more force. He had to get out of here and get to the office. He had to let them know what had happened. They'd understand if they knew he'd been in an accident.

Guest slowly and painfully attempted to focus on his dull surroundings. The end of the tunnel around the bend allowed a degree of grey morning light to trickle and seep across the scene a hundred meters or so ahead. Nearer to him the yellow-orange strip lights suspended along the arched ceiling of the tunnel provided a little more illumination. His car was wedged tight between the tunnel wall on his left and a crashed black taxi cab to his right. He tried to open his door but could move it no more than a couple of inches. Needing to get out of his car and out of the tunnel he lifted his aching body up out of his seat, clambered over the dashboard and scrambled through the shattered remains of his windscreen before rolling over onto his back on the car's crumpled bonnet. The effort required to move just that short distance was immense. He lay still for a moment or two longer (just enough time to let a sudden debilitating wave of nausea subside) and then stood upright on his car, leaning breathlessly against the grubby tunnel wall for support.

For as far as Guest could see both ahead and behind him the tunnel was filled with a huge mass of tangled, crashed traffic. Most vehicles seemed simply to have collided with those in front and around them and had come to a sudden, shunted stop whilst others had been forced up into the air by violent impacts. A few cars behind where Guest was standing a once pristine bright red, two-seater sports car lay on its roof, straddled widthways across the remains of two other vehicles.

Apart from him, nothing was moving.

Guest cautiously began to edge forwards. The road was obscured by wreckage and he had no option but to clamber over the mass of cars, trucks and vans if he wanted any chance of getting out of the tunnel. He had to do it. He was in pain. He needed daylight and fresh air. He needed help.

After dragging himself over the boot, the roof and then the bonnet of another car, Guest was faced with a short jump onto the boot of another. Pausing to compose himself and bracing himself for impact, he jumped onto the second vehicle and lost his footing, slipping down onto a small triangular patch of road that had somehow remained clear in the midst of the carnage. He fell clumsily against another car door. Inside the car the sudden lurching movement caused by Guest's impact made the body of a passenger slump over to one side, its head smashing against the window with a heavy, sickening thump. Christ, he hadn't thought about the other drivers. Struggling with his own disorientation, pain and confusion he had only been concerned with his own safety and well-being and with trying to get himself out of the tunnel as quickly as possible. Now that he stopped to think about the others, however, they were suddenly all that he could see. He scrambled through the devastation to get to the nearest body but it was no use, the poor bastard was already dead. As was the next one he found, and the next, and the next. He was the only one left alive.

Everywhere Guest looked he saw bodies. Vast, countless numbers of them. Bloodied, battered faces smashed against windows and limp, shattered bodies hanging awkwardly out of half-open doors. And the longer he stared into the shadows, the more he saw. In the low gloom he saw splintered, broken bones, dripping pools of crimson-black blood, torn skin, gouged eyes, twisted limbs and smashed faces. Suddenly finding enough terrified energy to be able to rise above his own pain, he began to run, jump and dive like an adrenaline-charged athlete until he had cleared the tunnel and was finally out in the open air again.

But the carnage and devastation had not been limited to the inside of the tunnel. All around him now it continued, unabated and unstoppable. Endless, inexplicable and seemingly without reason or direction.

Guest dragged himself along silent streets to the office where, sitting amongst the lifeless bodies of the colleagues and business associates with whom he should now have been meeting and negotiating, he sat and tried to make sense of the incomprehensible nightmare which had reduced his world to ruin.