Kaden found it impossible to keep his mind blank. Joe might not want to hurt him, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t happen. He was still thinking about eggs, incubating eggs, babies eating him alive from the inside out, or maybe the outside… That movie with John Hurt where…
For fuck’s sake, I can’t lay eggs!
“You swore!”
Because you do. I can’t be much different to you until I leave you or until I meet other people.
Kaden took a deep breath. “This morning, I have to go to see a client I’m ghostwriting for.”
Okay.
Kaden’s head was spinning. Bad enough that Joe was hitchhiking inside him but him being able to listen in to every thought was somehow worse, even if he said he’d try not to. The only way Kaden was going to be able to cope was pretending he wasn’t there.
That resolve lasted until Kaden walked outside.
Oh. Ooh. Ooooh! So much colour. The sky… The buildings… The ground. So pretty.
“Not like this on your planet?”
Everything is white or black and a thousand shades in between. It’s stark and cold, not warm like this.
It was April, and not that warm. Maybe that wasn’t what Joe meant.
It wasn’t.
Kaden used the tunnel under the road to get to the Tube and saw three familiar guys coming towards him. He’d had a run-inwith them before. They’d taken his wallet a month ago, stripped it of thirty quid in cash and thrown it back at him. He’d not gone to the police because he knew that wouldn’t have ended well for him. His heart rate increased. He tightened his hold on the straps of his backpack that held his precious laptop and kept walking, deliberately not meeting the gaze of any of them.
When they passed and nothing happened, Kaden felt a surge of relief until the hard kick at the back of his knee sent him sprawling. He was shocked when he pushed straight back to his feet, amazed there was no pain.Joe?
He heard the three laughing and had no intention of turning round to face them, but he did. Joe’s doing again? A moment later—less than a moment—too short a time for Kaden to have actually done anything, all three of them had bloody noses and Kaden’s hand hurt. Then it didn’t hurt.Oh God. What did you do?The three looked at him in shock, then bolted in the opposite direction.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Kaden said.
I wasn’t going to let them hurt you.
Kaden sighed. Now they werereallygoing to hurt him.
No, they’re not.
Despite everything, inside Kaden, a little flicker of hope began to grow. Maybe this would be okay. It felt as though his shoulders were being massaged and the sensation was nice.
See! I can make you feel good.
By the time Kaden rang the bell at Alistair Bridger’s house, a smart Georgian terrace in Notting Hill, he felt exhausted. Joe’s questions had been endless. Why? How? When? Who? What? Kaden had tried to answer and mostly could. Joe admired everything, wanted to see everything. Kaden had thought they’d never get here.
The white-haired, sixty-three-year-old answered the door with a smile. “Good morning, Kaden.”
“Morning, Alistair.”
“Come on in. Coffee is brewing.”
Kaden followed him through to the kitchen where they worked. The work on the book was almost done and Kaden was going to miss seeing Alistair who’d had a fascinating life. In 1973, well before Kaden was born, Alistair had left his home and gone off to explore the world with two travel companions he’d found via an advertisement in theTimesnewspaper. The three men travelled through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, various countries in the Far East, then Australia, Tasmania and finally, New Zealand. His companions had stayed on in New Zealand and Alistair had come back to the UK.
Elsie, Alistair’s golden retriever didn’t come over to Kaden for a stroke as she usually did. She wagged her tail but stayed in her bed. Because she sensed Joe? Kaden was unsure whether to go over to her or not, but since she was wagging her tail, he bent down and gave her a tickle.
“Morning, Elsie.”
“She’s tired this morning,” Alistair said.
