In the Bag by Jim Carrington Page A

of Year Eight kids have sat on the back seat.
    ‘Shift,’ Ash says. He indicates with his thumb. ‘Down the front of the bus where you belong, little boys.’
    One of the young kids makes a face at Ash and sticks up his middle finger. Ash lifts his hand as though he’s gonna slap the kid round the face. The kid laughs and gets up from the seat and so do his mates. Ash uses his hand to ruffle the kid’s head and then breaks out into a grin.
    ‘Gotta admire that in a kid,’ he says. ‘Takes balls to stand up to your elders and betters.’ He looks at his hand. He sniffs it. ‘He could do with washing his hair, though!’
    He holds his hand out for me to smell. I turn away.
    The bus moves down Marshland Road, turns right at the end and then on to the main road. It trundles along the road, through the middle of the town, stopping at the lights. The bus slows as we get near the flats. Everyone moves over to the right-hand side of the bus and looks out of the window. The block of flats is still cordoned off and it’s surrounded by police and reporters and TV cameras. There are still police standing around; some in uniform and some in suits and ties. There are others in white boiler suits as well. They must be forensics or something.
    The bus moves past and everyone sits back down.
    As we drive along the road out of town, Ash’s phone beeps to say he has a message. He reads it right away and sighs.
    ‘What’s the matter?’
    He looks out of the window. ‘Nothing,’ he says.
    And neither of us says another word all the way to school.

Ash
    Rabbit is the first person I see when I get into the playground. And I feel uneasy as soon as I see him. He gives me a really angry look. And I start to dread what’s gonna happen. See, he sent me a text on the bus, saying, You better be able to explain this . And it can only mean one thing. It has to be about Saturday night and the money. Though why he’s angry about it, I don’t know.
    ‘Follow me,’ he says quietly, so no one else can hear.
    So we sneak away from everyone else, Rabbit leading and me following. And all the time I’m kind of hoping that this is about something else – about something I said the other night when he was round, or some girl he fancies. But I don’t ask what he wants. I just follow.
    We walk right past all the mobile classrooms and then go round the back of the last one – Mr Robert’s French room, where some of us go at break time to have a smoke. Rabbit doesn’t usually smoke though, only when he’s drunk. There’s no one else here right now.
    Rabbit turns and looks at me. He puts his hand into his pocket and pulls out his mobile. He looks at it, presses a few buttons and then holds it up for me to see. And as soon as he does, my stomach ties itself in knots. There’s a picture of me on there, holding a gun. The gun. Trying to look like a gangster or something.
    ‘Explain this!’ he says. He sounds angrier than I think I’ve ever heard him before.
    ‘Shit!’
    ‘That’s your fucking bedroom,’ he says. ‘I must have taken that photo on Saturday night.’
    I take a deep breath and look away. Shit. I don’t remember that photo being taken.
    ‘That sure as hell isn’t my gun,’ Rabbit says, ‘so it must be yours. Now explain. Where the fuck did you get a gun from?’
    I open my mouth to speak, but don’t say a word. I’m not sure what to say. ‘It’s not what it seems.’
    Rabbit stares impatiently at me. He looks like he’s gonna hit me any second.
    So I tell him the lot. About me and Joe and how we found the car and the bag and the money. Except I don’t tell him the complete truth. There are parts of this he doesn’t need to know. Like the fact that there was twenty grand in the bag. I tell him five hundred instead. Don’t know why, it just comes out. And I tell him how I found the gun the next day, just before he came round.
    ‘I don’t believe this,’ he says when I’ve finished. He runs his hands through his