Keeping it Real (13 page)

“Can’t,” Brice explained grimly. “Hellhounds are practically blind.” He yelled out, “Yo, Fido! Over here!”

“Are you
crazy
!” I shrieked.

“Trust me,” he insisted. “This is the best way!”

Don’t ever tell me the worst way then
, I thought.

The almost-blind hell beast suddenly lowered its head, and suspiciously swivelled in our direction. Its eyes were huge, like lamps, and filled with pain. Who knows what the hellhound saw when it looked at us? Maybe just a gold-white blur of angel fire? But that seemed like enough.

The hellhound gave a growl so low and menacing that another three hounds seemed to be speaking through its throat. Slippery threads of drool were suddenly dripping off its muzzle.

One minute Brice was beside me, the next he was standing on a half-toppled tombstone, inches from the hell dog. With a single ruthless lunge he shoved the blazing torch into its face.

The hound cringed away, more in loathing than fear, baring hideous outsized canines, and snarling with fury.

“Gotta message for you, hell-pooch!” Brice said. “You ever come near that little girl and I’ll insert TWO of these exactly where the sun don’t shine.”

Incredibly it seemed like Brice had actually scared it off. The hellhound slowly backed away, making a frustrated, high-pitched whine that set my teeth buzzing. It backed so far that it was literally backing through a pristine new marble headstone.

Jade immediately ran to my mum. “Mum, mum! There was a monster but Mel and a big boy scared it away with their angel kung fu.”

I felt sick just knowing that something so evil could simply erupt into her innocent little world.

Brice sat down on a tombstone, looking shattered.

I watched my parents walk away slowly, arm in arm, like they were having to hold each other up. Jade was skipping beside them, chatting excitedly about monsters.

I can’t tell you how much I longed to cross back through that invisible barrier and go back to my human world of Sunday parks and Friday night cafes. Unfortunately I was trapped on the inhuman side, the same as Brice.

“Thanks,” I said with difficulty. “That was great what you just did.”

“Nah, just insurance,” he said. “It was never going to hurt Jade.”

I didn’t need my life to be any more confusing than it already was, so I just snapped, “It was never going to hurt her? Oh,
really
? Wow, so suddenly you talk hell dog now?”

“No. I just happen to know who it’s actually following.” Brice stood up, looking exhausted suddenly and pointed across rows of identical modern headstones, to the wall that divided the cemetery from the three-lane highway outside. “See that kid? A while back, he won a hellhound for life.”

I was barely in time to see a youth in a hooded top vault over the wall. He plodded beside the traffic until he reached a subway entrance then disappeared from view.

My mission had taken yet another bizarre cosmic twist.

Chapter Fifteen

R
eturning to his tombstone, Brice sat down as if his legs had abruptly given way. I sat down beside him, feeling absolutely unreal.

“That thing is seriously after that boy?” I asked bewildered.

“It’s a
hound
, darling. Give a hound a whiffy trail to follow and off it goes. Only with hellhounds it’s not smells, it’s vibes.”

“That dog was sniffing for vibes?”

“If your soul is giving off a certain damaged kind of vibe, hell dogs can’t help themselves -they’ll follow you around till they’re half dead sometimes.”

Just occasionally, Brice lets something drop that made you wonder about all the other darker things which he has never told anyone, even Lola.

I remembered the beast slobbering obsessively along the paths, how frustrated it seemed when two fire-wielding angels interrupted its icky activities. I glanced at Brice who looked like he had gone off into his own gloomy thoughts.

“So are you planning to keep me in suspense forever, angel boy, or could you tell me who that hell pooch is really after?”

His face brightened. “Want to meet him? I mean, don’t feel you have to, but you can if you want.” He grabbed my wrist to check my watch. “Actually, if we wait a few minutes, I can almost guarantee where he’ll be.”

I gave a deep sigh. “So where do damaged souls go at ten past three on Sunday afternoons?”

Brice gave me a tired grin. “The Cosmic Cafe. If business is slow.”

When we eventually beamed on to the pavement outside the cafe, business was about as slow as it could be. There were exactly two customers, sitting with their backs to each other - an old guy reading a paper and a boy in a hooded top, sitting with his back hunched to the window. Nikos came through the swing doors and carefully set down a plate of steaming sausages and mash in front of the boy.

“See how he’s looking after that kid?” I told Brice. “He treats everyone like that.”

“Even more amazing when you know Shay’s getting a free lunch,” Brice commented.

The boy whipped round as if he’d heard his name. I was startled to see a familiar face with slanting, suspicious brows. I started to say, “But that’s Jordie!” But all at once I couldn’t breathe. I
knew
this boy, not from this morning - it was like I knew him from
forever
.

He’d turned back to his meal. I couldn’t believe he wasn’t as shaken up as I was.

“I’m guessing Shay is Jordie’s twin?” I said and I heard my voice tremble slightly, though I have to say it didn’t sound anything like as trembly as I felt.

Brice was watching me closely. “Did you guys ever meet? You looked almost like you knew him?”

I shook my head. Kelsey’s brothers had never made it to school that often, plus they’d been in a different class. I just had a vague impression of two sets of black slanty eyebrows.

“I sort of knew their older brother,” I explained, then I started telling Brice how Kelsey and his younger brothers had camped in an abandoned car rather than be taken into care, but he said carelessly, “Yeah, I read about that in the case notes.”

I did an amazed double take. “The Agency assigned Shay to you! You might have told me you were on a mission, you big creep!”

I’d been privately wondering why Brice, of all people, had rocked up in Park Hall, but I could see that a screwed-up boy with a hellhound problem would be just up his street.

Brice shook his head, looking glum. “It’s more that Shay assigned
himself
, if you get my meaning?”

I finally caught on. “
Omigosh
- you got the call!”

‘The call’ is when a troubled human sends a personal request for you to be their guardian angel: a silent, totally desperate SOS from their soul to yours. It’s a v. mystical event, also a v. steep learning curve for the angel who is being called. Now I understood why my friend’s boyfriend had been acting so super-stressed.

Brice jammed his hands in his pockets. “To be honest, I’m feeling like I’m in way over my head,” he said in a tight voice.

I nodded sympathetically. “I bet. Still it’s early days yet, right?”

I was secretly dying to ask him all kinds of nosy questions. Like, could you get rid of a persistent hellhound once it became attached to your vibes, or did it have to follow you around until one of you eventually crumbled into dust? And how come Jordie’s brother’s soul got damaged in the first place?

If it had been me and Lola we’d have been up discussing Shay all night. But it seemed like Brice had said all he wanted to say.

Tell the truth, Mel
. I actually got a really strong feeling that Brice wanted to talk to me about his case, but something was making him hold back.

Maybe if I expressed a kind of general interest, Brice would feel like he could open up?

“So what’s Jordie’s brother like?” I asked in a casual voice. “Does he rap like Jordie?”

Brice glanced at the boy silently shovelling down everything Nikos had put in front of him. “I’ve never even heard that boy talk,” he said softly.

Chapter Sixteen

A
police helicopter was hovering over the hospital, churning up the night with its blades. After emergency sirens and that constant, pavement-shaking bass line, police helicopters form the third most common ingredient in Park Hall’s edgy urban soundtrack.

Jools and I barely even glanced up at it as we came out into the freezing wind and rain. After the stuffy atmosphere of the children’s ward, the subzero temperatures were a shock.

“That little cutie just laps up angel kisses, doesn’t he!” Jools enthused through chattering teeth. “Did you see that smile?”

“Yeah, and that clueless nurse said it was wind!”

Four days had gone by since the hellhound incident and my new life as an honorary EA was turning out to be seriously hectic. Up early for dawn vibes, (I know!), plus twice daily rehearsals, and obviously I tried to help out the EAs as much as I could.

After tonight’s rehearsal Jools and I had popped in to check on her shocked newborn: the baby who was having problems adjusting to his home planet. I waited, shivering, while Jools checked her phone for messages then remembered I hadn’t actually checked mine for ages.

Most of my messages were from a deeply jealous Lola!

“You guys actually
rescued
your sister from a real live hellhound! AND you’re giving angel lessons! Well, take it easy, OK? We don’t want any humans unexpectedly sprouting wings, do we? Oh, yeah, tell that creep Brice he has to call me. Miss you!” BEEP

Jools was talking on her phone now, so I ducked into the wheelchair bay out of the wind and rang Lola. Her phone was switched off, again, so I left yet another rambly message, keeping her up to speed with events in Park Hall.

“They’re calling the show PURE VIBES, isn’t that cool! This production’s even got Mrs Threlfall buzzing and trust me, she is
not
a naturally buzzy lady! She’s so thrilled the kids are doing something positive, she’s letting them off lessons so they can rehearse! Oh, yeah, remember Miss Rowntree? The teacher who called me an ‘airhead with attitude’? She totally can’t do enough to help! I know! And obviously it’s early days, but working on the show seems to be bringing Karms and Jax even closer.”

I felt a pang then because I didn’t have anything good to say about Sky.

“Lollie, listen,” I remembered. “Brice is having a super-stressful time with his guardian angel module. Send good vibes, yeah?”

When I rang off, I was v. spooked to find a new message from the bad boy himself.

“Got some news that’s going to blow you away, but I can’t tell you, because you won’t get off the stupid
phone
! Oh, yeah, I’m at KISMET, that little Turkish cafe next to the tattoo parlour!” BEEP.

When Jools and I finally rocked up at KISMET, crackly Arabic music was playing on an ancient cassette player. Brice was watching a group of taxi drivers play dominoes: a game which involved violent slamming on tables, a barrage of friendly insults in at least six different languages, and howls of laughter.

We joined him at his table. “And you’re here in this atmospheric cafe because?” Jools hinted.

Brice reluctantly tore himself away. “Oh, yeah, they needed a washer-up.” He saw our expressions and rolled his eyes. “Not me. Shay’s got a few hours work.”

“You’re waiting to walk him back,” I said astonished.

“It’s just common sense,” he said gruffly. “If our four-legged fiend knows Shay’s got angelic security, he’ll keep his distance, plus it gives us a chance to talk, man-to-man, or cosmic-misfit-to-lost-boy or whatever.”

This guardian angel module was bringing out a side to Brice I’d never seen.

“Brice, not to be hardhearted, but what can it actually do to him? Obviously being followed by a hellhound isn’t ideal, but it’s just a nightmare pretending to be a dog, right?”

“Do you guys want to know about this - it’s kind of disturbing?”

Brice glanced uneasily at Jools.

“No, we do,” I insisted.

He took a breath. “Ok, to put it crudely, a hellhound will only adopt you if you’re already in extremely deep poo.”