Cry Myself to Sleep: He had to escape. They would never hurt him again.. Joe Peters

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СКАЧАТЬ used to deliver goods to the shops earlier in the day. Everyone was calling out to one another, competing to see who could find the best box. I wasn’t as quick as the others and didn’t really know what I was looking for, so by the time I realized that what I needed was something I could sleep in for the night, I only had something tiny.

      Once everyone had what they needed, we wended our way back down to the park, which was now finally empty of other people and filling up with an eerie, makeshift city of cardboard as everyone set about constructing themselves some sort of shelter for the night, covering them with plastic to protect them from the damp that was bound to descend before morning.

      Everyone was huddled in the small groups that they had been in all evening, avoiding encroaching on the territory of anyone else who might be angrier, more violent and more drunk than they were, and staking a claim to a patch of land that was going to be theirs for the night. As everyone got settled, the odd fistfights would break out when one group felt that another had crossed over their boundary, and there were a few squabbles for the best, most sheltered sites.

      Gradually, as exhaustion and alcohol took their toll, people began to fall asleep, pulling blankets and sleeping bags up over their heads and disappearing from the world for a few hours. As we all crawled into our shelters, the sounds of shouting and fighting become more intermittent as more people surrendered to sleep. Every so often a policeman or two would wander past the park, but they didn’t seem to be too bothered about anything that was going on. I guess it was easier for them to have all the homeless people corralled behind railings in one area than to have them curled up in shop doorways and back alleys all over the place, causing complaints from local residents and shopkeepers when they came to open up in the morning.

      I managed to get my box together and put some plastic over it as the others showed me, but when I came to lie down it was impossible to curl all six foot of me into it, so I had to leave my legs sticking out, using my bag as a pillow with the handles looped round my wrist to make sure no one nicked it in the night.

      Jake arrived back from wherever he had been with the man in the Mercedes and didn’t have any trouble finding us. He had picked up some cardboard for himself on the way.

      ‘What you doing with that box?’ he said, laughing, when he saw my legs sticking out. ‘You don’t fit in it.’

      ‘The others got the best ones.’

      ‘You’ve got to be faster than that, mate.’

      ‘Where have you fucking been, Jake?’ Jock growled from near by in the dark.

      ‘I had to do something for Max,’ Jake said, obviously not wanting to talk about it.

      ‘That fucking bastard! Why do you do whatever he tells you?’

      I didn’t understand why Jock felt so strongly about this Max guy, but I was too tired to ask any more questions. Now that I was no longer moving about to keep warm, I was regretting not picking up one of the blankets at the centre. The others had put up another plastic sheet and tied our boxes together so that when it started to rain most of the water could be kept off us, but I was still feeling cold and damp. I would organize things better the next day, I told myself as I dozed off, now that I knew what was needed. Things would get steadily better from here on–I was confident of it. I could still hear the odd raised voice in the distance but it didn’t bother me any more; I felt safe enough to sleep. Here and there muffled giggles came from other boxes, and the sounds of couples having sex.

      It must have been just after midnight when I was woken by the sound of voices.

      ‘Hello? Hello? Come on. We’re here. Hello? Does anyone want blankets?’

      That was exactly what I needed, so I wriggled out of my box to see what was going on. A middle-aged woman was standing outside with her arms full of old-looking blankets, passing them out to anyone who asked.

      ‘Do you want something to eat?’ she asked as I went over to her. ‘The van’s just over there.’

      I looked over to where she was pointing and saw a van parked outside the Tube station, with a table set up beside it doling out soup and rolls to warm us up.

      ‘Come on,’ she said, putting a blanket round my shoulders. ‘It’s a cold night. Wrap up well. We need to look after you. You’re a new face. My name’s Sarah. What’s yours?’

      ‘Joe.’

      ‘Come on then, Joe.’

      She took me over to the van with the blanket round my shoulders and gave me some soup. Jock came ambling over and she obviously knew him well.

      ‘You’ve been drinking again, Nigel,’ she said, wagging her finger at him. ‘Haven’t you?’

      I looked up in surprise, startled to find out this hard man’s real name. Jock did not look like a ‘Nigel’ to me.

      ‘I wouldn’t do that, Sarah,’ he said, grinning like a little boy being told off by a popular teacher.

      ‘Don’t you tell me any of your fibs, Nigel. How old are you then, Joe?’ she asked.

      ‘I’m sixteen,’ I said, more aggressively than I probably should have done, but I was fed up with people thinking I was younger.

      ‘Are you sure?’

      ‘’Course I am, you mad woman.’

      ‘Oh, now,’ she clucked. ‘I don’t want to upset you, lovey. How long have you been here?’

      I was getting tired of all the questions and said nothing. I just wanted to get some soup inside me and go back to my cardboard box for more sleep.

      ‘Is anybody looking after you?’ she asked, looking across at Jock as she spoke.

      ‘Yes,’ Jock sighed. ‘I’m looking out for him.’

      ‘You make sure you do, Nigel. He looks very young to be down here. Who else have you met?’ she asked me.

      ‘Jake.’

      ‘Oh,’ she said, pursing her lips. ‘The less said about him the better.’

      Just at that moment Jake came stumbling over for his soup and I could see she was trying to pack him off back to the boxes again as quickly as possible so that she could get back to talking to Jock and me.

      ‘Keep Joe away from him, Jock,’ she said once Jake was out of earshot. ‘That boy is confused. And that Max! You stay away from him, Joe, or he’ll get you into a lot of trouble.’

      ‘I fucking told him today, Sarah,’ Jock assured her.

      ‘You keep him in your sight all the time, Nigel. And don’t let Jake anywhere near him.’

      I felt comforted by this kindly woman’s obvious concern for my safety, but at the same time her words of warning worried me. I had met enough violent and dangerous men during my childhood to know that I didn’t want to meet any more. Standing in the middle of a strange city in the dark and cold made me feel suddenly vulnerable, and anxious to hurry back to my box so that I could curl up under my blanket to hide from the world until morning. I moved off but found Sarah was coming with me.

      ‘Is that СКАЧАТЬ