Chapter Two Zig
The train glided to a halt at the final station.
Bristol Temple Meads. Zig heaved his rucksack onto his shoulder and stepped off the train, not looking back.
He strolled confidently down the platform into the main part of the station, then ducked behind a convenient brick pillar.
He’d made sure to leave the train by the front carriage, so everyone who got off here had to file past him.
He bounced on the toes of his Converse as he watched them, but there was no one he recognised. No one who sent alarm bells ringing in his mind. Good. He probably needed to work on this paranoia he’d developed. Then again, better he jumped at shadows than got jumped himself.
Zig let out a long breath that steamed in the chill air, then headed towards the main station entrance.
It was gone five, and dark had fallen while he’d been on the train.
He’d meant to get away earlier, but he’d slept badly and got up late.
Most of his housemates had been out at work, but Lena, who worked evenings like him, had slouched into the kitchen while he’d been raiding the cupboards for breakfast and portable snacks.
On the plus side, it’d saved him sticking a note on the fridge to say he’d moved out and wouldn’t be back.
On the minus side, he’d had to endure an earful of abuse for leaving the rest of them in the lurch with the rent.
The fact he’d already paid up for the month, and wouldn’t be getting his deposit back either, hadn’t seemed to register with her.
Well. He was here now. And he hadn’t told Lena where he was going, so she couldn’t grass him up to anyone who might come calling.
There was a line of black cabs outside the station—funny, he’d thought they only had those in London—but he walked past them. Too expensive, and cab drivers remembered people. Google, don’t fail me now, he prayed, as he searched for a bus going to Glastonbury.
Bloody hell. Sixty-three stops? At that rate, he might as well have got the National Express from London, instead of forking out for the train. For a moment, Zig seriously considered staying in Bristol.
Right. Where there’s no one with any reason to help you.
At least there was a bus leaving within a quarter of an hour. Zig shifted his rucksack on his shoulder, and made his way to the stop.
The bus ride was boring as hell. There was probably all kinds of scenery going on out there, but with it being black as pitch, all Zig could see was the reflection of his own face. He was getting sick of the sight of it.
For a bit of variety, he glanced around the bus. Big mistake. An old bloke across the aisle with a long, grey ponytail met his gaze and immediately leaned over towards him. “Cold night, tonight,” he said, his accent a lot like Zig remembered Si’s being.
“Yeah,” Zig said shortly, too on edge to think of anything else to say. If they ever finally got to Glastonbury, which Zig was beginning to doubt, would Si be happy to see him?
“You look troubled,” the old man persisted. “Something on your mind?”
Zig dredged up a smile. “Nah, I’m good, ta.”
The man glanced at Zig’s backpack. “Not sure of your reception?”
Ouch. That was so on the nose it physically hurt. “Maybe.” Zig sighed. “It’s someone I ain’t seen for a while, that’s all.”
“Parted on bad terms?” The tone was sympathetic.
“No— Ah, I dunno. Difference of opinion, maybe? Nothing that couldn’t have been smoothed over.”
Si hadn’t even known the whole of it. Zig rubbed his hands on his jeans legs cos yeah, he felt pretty guilty about that. But that was all in the past, back when Zig had been a total fucking moron who’d believed all the shit his dad spouted.
“But it never was?”
Again, he sounded sympathetic, and understanding, and somehow it all came spilling out. “I thought we were gonna be okay, you know? Then out of the blue, I get ‘Sorry, mate, being a brickie ain’t working out for me,’ and he gives me a kiss and buggers off back to Somerset.”
The old bloke didn’t seem fazed by Zig outing himself. “That must have hurt.”
“I was fine,” Zig protested automatically.
Okay, so maybe fine wasn’t the word. Maybe it’d been like a knife twisting in his gut, but that was cos Zig had had the wrong idea about him and Si.
Same as he’d had the wrong idea about a shedload of things back then.
See: total fucking moron. Si, on the other hand, wasn’t stupid.
He’d sussed out that Zig wasn’t the sort to get mushy feelings about.
That was why he’d found it so easy to leave him.
The old man was nodding. “And that was a while ago, now?”
“Half a decade ago.” Zig laughed bitterly. “Just hope he still remembers who I am.”
“You don’t seem the sort that anyone forgets. Not with those eyes, and that hair. Very striking.”
Zig was starting to wonder if the bloke was hitting on him. “The hair was different back then. Bright red.” He’d dyed it black with blue ends last night. Maybe that had been a mistake?
The old guy laughed. “I suppose you change your eye colour any time you feel like it too.”
“These? They’re real, not contacts.” He wasn’t the first person to assume that, but Zig’s mismatched pair—one blue, one brown—were what he’d been born with.
Cobbled together out of old parts they found on the scrap heap, weren’t you? his dad’s voice sneered in his head.
Fuck off, Dad, Zig thought tiredly.
Maybe he ought to actually get some contacts? It’d been years since he’d last tried them, back before he’d been away, and they had to have got better. There was a chance they wouldn’t scratch his eyeballs raw now.
“Ah well. I’m sure your young man will be happy to see you. And you’ll fit right in, here in Glastonbury.”
Zig shrugged, a little more jerkily than he’d intended.
“We’ll see.” At least he could be fairly confident on the second part.
He’d watched some YouTube vids last night while he was failing to get to sleep, and Glastonbury was full of people who dressed weird, looked weird, and fuck him if some of them didn’t act pretty weird too.
Mismatched eyes probably didn’t rate a mention.
“Good luck,” the man said, and pulled himself to his feet as the bus lurched to a stop. Glastonbury Town Hall. Huh. They were there. Zig grabbed his rucksack and followed the trickle of passengers off the bus.
Jesus, the wind was cold. Zig hunched his shoulders as he tapped at his phone, wishing for a moment that he’d chosen his jacket for warmth and not for how cool he looked in it. Si had always liked him in leather, though.
Fuck, this was crazy. Despite what the old guy had said.
Why the hell would Si help him out after so many years?
Because he’s a decent bloke, that’s why.
Zig couldn’t imagine Si had changed much.
Maybe he’d got himself a significant other and settled down, though?
Shit. That’d be a right spanner in the works.
No S.O. was likely to be happy with Si’s ex turning up unannounced and wanting to stay.
Could Zig lean on Adam if Si let him down? He ought to be easy enough to find. How many tattoo studios could there be in this town? Then again, like that beardy bloke down the pub said, Adam never really liked you, did he? Zig shivered, shoved his hands into his pockets, and picked up his pace.
Si. He was the one who’d always taken Zig’s part, despite . . . Anyway, he’d help, even if it was only for old times’ sake. Even if he was all loved-up these days with some West Country lad with an accent as thick as Si’s. Si would see him right.
Right?
Got to get to him first, though, haven’t you?
Zig peered at the map Google was showing him, and tried to work out which way was which.
Okay. Si’s parents’ house was that way. And seriously, only twenty minutes’ walk away?
Result. Zig hadn’t taken on board how bloody small Glastonbury was.
Like, seriously small. He should have twigged when he found out it didn’t have its own railway station, but for fuck’s sake, they held the UK’s biggest music festival here every year.
How was he to know that probably increased the population by a factor of, like, a million?
He set off briskly down the road.
Si’s parents’ house was at one end of a red-brick terrace. There was a small front garden with a tiny lawn and a tree strung round haphazardly with fairy lights, but no off-road parking. A security light flashed on when he approached the front door, nearly blinding him.
Zig rapped on the door and got his face ready to smile.
The bloke who answered was middle-aged and a lot shorter than Zig was expecting. Si was, like, six foot and then some, but this guy was shorter than Zig’s five ten (Five nine if you’re lucky, Sunshine, his dad’s sneering voice told him).
The bloke was frowning. “Evening?” He sounded doubtful.
“You’d be Mr. Greczik, right?” Zig said cheerily. “Si’s dad?”
A blink. “Yeah, that’s right. Have we met?”
“Nah, I’m just up from London. Me and Si was mates when he was working there, a few years back? I was hoping to look him up while I’m in the area.”
Mr. Greczik’s face cleared. “Right! Come on in, then, no need to stand out in the cold. Di, love?” he yelled over his shoulder. “It’s one of Simon’s old friends. Put the kettle on.”
Thank God. Zig eyed the line of shoes in the hall and kicked off his Converse, then followed Si’s dad into a small living room.
There were photos everywhere of a little girl— Shit, that must be Si’s sister.
Zig hadn’t seen a photo of her before, but he’d never forgotten Si, a few pints in, crying as he told him how she’d died when he was small.
There were no pictures of Si himself that Zig recognised.
“He still lives round here, right?” he asked.
“Oh, no.” Something must’ve shown in Zig’s face, as Mr. Greczik’s eyes went wide. “I mean, not here, here. He’s got a flat in town. Wanted his independence, but that’s young lads for you.”