Page 7 of Star Struck

‘You’re not a fan then.’ Another stream of smoke billowed out like a speech bubble.

‘Oh, no, I am! A huge fan, I mean, I’ve got all the DVDs and the books and I’m a member of the forum and everything. I even—’ half-embarrassed I looked down at my feet kicking little piles of stones into order — ‘I’m teaching myself to speak B’Ha.’

‘Good for you.’ Whether or not he meant to be condescending I couldn’t tell, his face refused to reveal anything. But at least he’d stopped frowning. ‘What was all that, yesterday? Not being able to walk?’

‘Oh, nothing. Just — stupid. Valium. I . . . I have these weird panic attacks sometimes. When I’m stressed.’ I felt myself blushing, as though I was admitting to something perverted. ‘Felix thought . . . I don’t take it much any more,’ and even I heard the words as justification. ‘Stupid,’ I repeated.

He turned those dark eyes my way. ‘Hey.’ The glowing cigarette tip described a series of tiny circles as his gaze flickered from me to it and back again. ‘We all have our crutches.’

‘I’m not an addict,’ I found myself forced to add. ‘It was just to help with the travelling and being in strange places and everything.’

‘Okay.’

‘How about you?’ I was getting no sense that he was enjoying our staccato conversation but I wanted to keep it going, for some reason which escaped me. Perhaps I just wanted him to distract me from the fact that I was thousands of miles from home. His long Yorkshire vowels could have come from next-door. ‘Are you with the show?’

Now he wasn’t looking at me any more, his eyes had found the distant horizon beyond the car park and were scanning up and down the pencil-lines of the mountains as though he was waiting for some kind of sign. ‘Me? Oh, yeah, I’m “with the show”.’ A deep sigh that made the smoke trail stutter. ‘But, hey, it pays the bills.’ Then his gaze came back, scanning my face. I watched his eyes trace the line that vanished up under my, necessarily over-long, fringe. ‘What happened?’

‘What do you mean?’ My mouth had gone dry. I should have been used to it by now, but nowadays fewer people mentioned it and I’d managed to kid myself that it wasn’t as noticeable.

‘The scar. On your face.’

My hand came up and I slid a fingertip along the raised weal which ran from the top of my cheekbone, around my eye, through the brow to hide beneath my hair. It was an unconscious movement; I was only aware I was doing it when I saw him make a twisted-mouth face again. ‘I was in a car smash.’

His eyes darkened. ‘How long ago?’

‘Eighteen months. Well, nearly two years now.’ I dropped my hand. Watched him reach out, almost as though he was going to touch my face, but instead he wove his hand through his own hair, hooking swathes of it back.

‘Anyone hurt?’

I raised an eyebrow. ‘Uh, yes. Me.’ I pointed again at my forehead.

A half-smile around the cigarette. ‘I meant, anyone else.’

I closed my eyes. Felt the ghosts. ‘My best friend. And my fiancé. They died.’

I kept my eyes shut, waiting for the platitudes, but none came. The man said nothing. From the sounds of it he was lighting another cigarette. When I finally pushed the most overwhelming of the emotions back underground and opened my eyes again, he was staring at the dust. The still-glowing tip of his previous smoke lay beside his bare feet, but he didn’t seem to be looking at that, instead his eyes flickered as though he was reading his own thoughts. After a few seconds he shook his head, glanced at me quickly, and rolled up the sleeve of his shirt. Held out his forearm to me. It was criss-crossed with pin-prick scars regularly spaced around the elbow, as though his arm was attached with flesh nails.

‘Snap,’ he said.

Chapter Six

Wow. He sat suddenly on the edge of the unmade bed, the nicotine still swimming through his bloodstream. Something which might have been pity swam along with it, but he pushed it away with long-practised ease. That was weird. Strange kid. Wonder how she gets by with that scar? Maybe she’s used to people staring, maybe that’s why she didn’t once look me in the face. Well she ain’t gonna see sympathy here. The momentary need to bolster the cigarettes with a glass of something tickled his spine and he jumped up, began firing up the laptop. Early morning was best for writing, the sun hadn’t yet reached full baking potential; even in October it could still burn through metal at midday, but just now the air still held the silver edge of last night’s chill and he could pretend that he was at home. Sitting in the little office in the farmhouse, fire blazing to keep the long shadows at bay; watching the scenery stretching back into the centuries where nothing changed except the positions of the sheep that dotted the moorland like clouds that had shed all their rain.

The Fallen Skies logo pinged up onto the screen and he stared at it for a moment, trying to remember. Before all this. When space and time were new, when I wasn’t carrying this weight of guilt and regret. How far back would I have to go to lose it all? How far? A deep breath shook his shoulders, another attempt at emotion made it nearly as far as his heart before he stopped it, ruthlessly reaching inside himself and dragging it out half-born, killing it with his neglect.

Yeah. Too far back. But you don’t go back, do you? Back is defeat, despair; all those things you swore you’d never feel again. Course, you won’t feel anything else either, but that’s the price you pay for being the Iceman.

But it’s funny how one little thing can force you to remember. Today it was a voice, an accent. A couple of words and a girl with a scarred face and it was like I was sixteen again, back in Leeds, skinny little runt dragging the tail-end of his adolescence for fear of growing up. Back then, scars were badges of courage, like tattoos but with a better back-story.

Before everything went evil. Before everything I am was ruined.

He closed his eyes and let images fill his mind. Huge ships ponderously crossing galaxies, planets of water and fire, shadows which hid in plain sight. A fight for freedom. And then he started to write.

Chapter Seven

Felix was irritably awake when I got back to our room, squatting against the small bedside cupboard, doing tricep dips.

‘Bloody jet lag,’ he puffed. ‘It’s the middle of the night as far as my brain is concerned. Been anywhere exciting?’