West

By Ian Munday

Sammy has been sick with a virus that has all but destroyed society as we know it. He awakes one morning to discover he is an orphan. His only living relative, his grandfather, lives two hundred miles away in Wales. With no trains, buses or cars running how is he to get there?

He packs essentials and, in a highly traumatised state, sets out on his bicycle, having to sleep in woods and fields and eat whatever food nature is able to provide.

But soon that journey has to be made on foot. Meeting various characters on the way, he discovers that other people, far from offering him help, need help themselves. Young or old, everyone has their own needs and agendas which they try to embroil him in.

Every chapter of the journey presents him with a hurdle he must overcome. Will one of those hurdles prove just too much? Will he reach his grandfather in Wales or will he fail?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Jun 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9781984595218

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Copyright © 2020 by Ian Munday.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 06/04/2020

Xlibris

800-056-3182

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1 Ends And Beginnings

Chapter 2 Tony

Chapter 3 Going It Alone Again

Chapter 4 Ellie

Chapter 5 Christians

Chapter 6 The Old Woman

Chapter 7 Hurdles

CHAPTER 1

ENDS AND BEGINNINGS

THEE IT BEHOVES TO TAKE ANOTHER ROAD

Dante, Purgatorio

T he year after Sammy turned twelve was the year when everything finally fell apart. He became aware that things around him were changing; and changing beyond all recognition from the time when he was little. And it wasn’t just because he was growing up. Things were changing for everyone, grown-ups too.

He heard on the television, during the news, about the economic crisis. When he asked his Dad what an economic crisis was his Dad said that it was all to do with money, and that bankers and politicians had made a terrible mess of things.

Then there was the day when the banks didn’t open anymore. He heard his Mum and Dad talking in the kitchen, saying they couldn’t get their money out. It was then Dad rang Gramps in Wales, and came back from the phone saying that Sammy’s grandfather could no longer get his pension.

‘What’s he going to do?’ Mum asked, looking very worried.

His Dad laughed. ‘Oh, he’ll be growing his vegetables, bottling his fruit, and filling up his shed with wood. And with his solar panels and the wind turbine, he’s got his own electricity supply, hasn’t he? And it’s quite likely he’s got a horde of old Welsh gold under his bed as well. No, Gramps’ll survive, don’t you worry.’

(Sammy, all attention, made a mental note to look under Gramps’s bed next time they visited.)

‘He always said this would happen,’ Sammy’s Mum added, shaking her head. ‘But say the troubles reached there, he’s so vulnerable, I mean he’s not so fit now, not with his hip. And God knows when he’ll get a replacement, if ever.’

Gramps had always walked funny ever since Sammy could remember. Mum said he needed a new hip, and he was supposed to go into hospital for it, but then hospitals had stopped all operations, other than really life and death ones, and now it seemed there was no money for those either.

‘Perhaps we should go there?’ Mum suggested.

Sammy thought this an excellent suggestion and was all ears. He would love that, if they could go to Gramps’s house. It was really big, with four bedrooms plus the one in the converted loft, and it had two bathrooms; there was a huge garden with a river running through, and a bridge to the meadow on the other side. Sammy had his own room there, with his personal collection of books, toys and games that he kept in the country.

‘What, you mean move in with him?’ Dad queried.

‘Yes … get the hell out of London.’

Sammy’s Dad exhaled through his teeth. ‘But how are we going to get there? There’s been no petrol for months now and we’d never get a permit to go on the train. At least I’m getting a bit of money at the moment, and we are surviving.’

Sammy’s Dad was a doctor and because he had a special job, it meant the government still paid him. But even so his salary was only a fraction of what he used to get and anyway, much of the time now, even if they did have money, the shops were empty. There had been that awful day when they got robbed on the way back from the supermarket. It had been really scary. Some men had pushed his Mum right over and grabbed her bags, she had screamed out and cried, and Sammy had kicked and lashed out at them, but then one had turned on Sammy with a knife and Sammy for a moment thought that he was going to get stabbed and killed. He had been terrified. So he backed away and the men ran off with all their food: the beans and the rice and the potatoes. Sammy and his Mum had walked home, both of them crying, holding each other’s hands, and there had been blood trickling down his mother’s leg from the graze on her knee. It had been really awful and scary.

In fact life was pretty horrible now all the time. There were problems getting to school; the bus used to take him every day, then it only ran for only three days a week, and then it stopped altogether, so now to get to school he had to walk two miles there and back. Then some of the other children at school started getting ill and not coming at all. Those that did come sometimes cried because they were hungry, as there were no school dinners anymore. And often Sammy would have to share his biscuits and sandwiches with his friends, which sometimes left him hungry as well.

And then the big sickness came. Some said it was started by the water, that it wasn’t clean anymore and had to be boiled. But often you couldn’t boil it or cook anything due to the cooker or the kettle not working because of the power cuts.

When the sickness reached Sammy’s home, he got it first. One day he woke up and the whole of his throat hurt; and he couldn’t swallow, not even to take little sips of water. His head hurt and throbbed when he moved and he couldn’t bear to open his eyes. And he got very hot and his Mum had to change the bedclothes. But he couldn’t remember much of it, just a vague memory of wild, terrifying dreams of sun-scorched deserts, dangerous cowboy-like men and savage animals.

Then one morning he awoke and he felt all right; thirsty and a bit weak but basically fine. His bedroom was still very dark where his Mum had drawn the curtains across. But as he listened he began to realise that everything was quiet, much too quiet, in fact there seemed to be no noise at all. No sound in the flat, and no sounds from the rest of the building or from the street outside either.

Sammy slipped out from under the duvet and pulled open the bedroom door. The hallway was in darkness. All was still. He reached the living room. Looking across at the window he could see it was light, daylight; but it was that white, blank light that happened early in the morning. The branches of the plane tree outside the window gently swayed in a light breeze. Sammy carried on to the kitchen. The kitchen window was open and he could hear the rustling of the plane tree’s leaves, and the song of a bird floated in, but nothing else. He crossed to the window and looked down to the street below. The road was empty except for parked cars that were now dusty and dirty through lack of use and, apart from an old sheet of newspaper blowing across the tarmac in the breeze, nothing moved.

Sammy suddenly realised he was very, very hungry. He looked at the fridge. Its door wasn’t shut; Mum didn’t close it completely now because there was no regular electricity supply and things would often go mouldy inside. He pulled the door wide open. Inside were two bananas, speckled and blackening. He took hold of one but then wondered if it would be all right to eat it. He put it back and decided to ask.

He walked through to the hall again.

‘Mum!’ he called out.

After a moment’s pause a muted voice whispered ‘Sammy….’ This came from his parents’ half-opened bedroom door.

‘Sammy….’ The voice repeated.

Sammy went to the door and pushed.

His mother was in bed, in her nightie. She looked very pale, but there was not much light in here either as the curtains were still drawn across. She was lying on her side with one arm flopping to the floor.

As she heard his approach, she slightly raised her head, lifted her arm and beckoned him over.

‘Sammy, listen to me….’ Her voice was hoarse.

Sammy felt a great lump of fear rising up inside him.

‘Mum, what’s the matter?’

‘Shush, Sammy, listen … listen … you’ve got to get away; you’ve got to get to Gramps’s….’

What did she mean he’d have to get to Gramps’s? Sammy was aware of his father lying behind his Mum, under a mound of duvet, but he didn’t move.

‘Are we going to Gramps? Shall I pack?’

‘No … you don’t understand, you’ve got to go on your own….’

‘But I can’t go without you and Dad!’ The fear inside Sammy was growing and he felt he was going to cry.

‘Daddy and I can’t come … Sammy, you have to do this on your own. I want you to go into the other room and ring Gramps; he’ll tell you what to do.’

‘But Dad….’ Sammy was really frightened now; he could feel tears stinging his eyes.

‘No … Sammy … you have to do this alone … Daddy can’t help you anymore.’ She swallowed hard. ‘Go and ring Gramps.’

‘But Dad…,’ Sammy insisted and began to move towards the bottom of the bed.

‘No Sammy … don’t!’

But Sammy had to see his Dad.

‘No Sammy…,’ his mother pleaded again weakly.

With a great lump of dread rising in him Sammy passed round the bottom of the bed. In the gloom he could see his Dad’s face above the duvet. It was grey, strange and lifeless, it was all flattened on one side; and his mouth was open. Sammy slowly reached out to touch his face. He stretched out a single finger; Dad’s bristly cheek was cold, icy cold. This wasn’t his Dad, this was….

He squealed in terror and ran screaming from the room. His mother called, ‘Sammy Sammy….’

But Sammy ignored her. Terrified he ran into the sitting room and sat down on the sofa. Hot, salty tears were now pouring down his cheeks. He tried to shut his crying inside him by sticking a fist in his mouth but he couldn’t, the sound squeezed out in high squeaky noises. His small-framed body rocked back and forward.

‘Daddy – Daddy!’ Fresh sobs shook his body. His Daddy was dead. No, this just couldn’t be. Sammy cried and cried … but nobody came.

After a while, perhaps ten minutes, or half an hour, or half a day, Sammy seemed to come to. He was lying on his side. Had he been asleep? It was now full daylight. Outside the window he could see blue sky with white cotton-wool clouds drifting slowly across it. Turning his head he looked back across at the door to the hall. Behind it the hall was dark and silent. Behind it his Dad was dead … and his Mum…?

Not wanting to, feeling terrified, yet needing to, he crept over to the doorway. He listened. There was no noise, no sound. He pushed the door wide open and listened.

‘Mum…?’ he called gently into the hallway. No reply.

‘Mum…?’

Oh God…. He slowly edged forward until he got to the bedroom door. His mother was lying in the same position that he had left her. But her eyes were now closed and her arm hung lifelessly to the floor.

He gingerly inched forward. ‘Mum?’ He desperately wanted her to open her eyes.

He reached out. ‘Mum,’ he whispered.

His mother’s arm was still warm when he touched it. He pulled it to him. But she said nothing and Sammy, still holding her arm, sat down on the carpet next to the bed.

‘Mummy wake up please … please.’ He sobbed and hugged his mother’s arm to his face so that tears trickled down between his cheek and her arm. But his mother didn’t wake up, she didn’t stir. She was dead, he knew that, and gradually her arm was growing colder and colder until … it wasn’t hers anymore.

Sammy let go. He stood up and backed out of the bedroom, then turned and walked back into the sitting room. He could hear a sound, a sound like an animal crying out, and then he realised that it was his own voice wailing from somewhere deep inside him, the sound of a great pain rising up out his deepest, inner self. His Mummy and Daddy were dead. He just couldn’t bear it. What was he going to do? Yet through all the pain and anguish he felt, he knew what he had to do. His mother had told him: he had to ring Gramps.

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Sammy went through to the kitchen. His mother’s bag was on the table. He opened it. It smelt of her, a dry sweet powdery smell, that of the perfume she wore. Inside was a soft hanky and under that he felt the hardness of the phone.

He picked it up and scrolled down through the numbers, which he could barely see through his tears, until Gramps’s name and number came up.

He pressed call and listened to the ringing tone.

‘Hullo,’ the familiar voice of his grandfather answered at the other end of the phone.

‘Gramps….’ Sammy tried to control the shuddering and shaking was overwhelming him but hearing Gramps’s voice made him feel worse, just made him feel completely vulnerable and alone.

‘Sammy … Sammy! What’s the matter old chappy? Where’s Mummy?’

‘It’s Mummy and Daddy….’ Sammy gasped for air, and then, finally, spitting it out: ‘They’re dead.’ He opened his mouth and wailed into the phone.

‘Dear God … how? Why? What’s happened?’ Gramps’s voice, coming out of the small mobile phone, sounded shaky and wobbly.

‘We all got sick….’ Sammy struggled to get his breath. ‘But … but, I got better … but they didn’t and now they’re dead.’ This admission brought fresh waves of misery and sobbing.

‘So….’ There was a long pause. ‘So, it’s all true then?’ the old man muttered, more to himself. ‘Now Sammy? Sammy!’ Gramps’s voice had changed gear. ‘Is there anyone else there to help you?’

‘No.’ Sammy’s voice and breath seemed to come out in shudders. ‘I’m all on my own … there doesn’t seem to be anyone, anywhere.’

‘Now Sammy … Sammy! You’ve got to listen to me, now try and stop crying,