The Last Days of Jack Sparks Read online

  Oh yeah, I’m a rock star, baby. Who doesn’t love their name being spoken over PAs, for whatever reason? A killer mention from a user with thousands of followers. Right here, right now, everyone in Rome airport knows my name. This thought triggers another crazy head rush, flashing red this time for some reason, which almost makes me keel over.

  As I saunter on to the plane, I’m far too busy thinking about that video, and its disappearance, to worry about the rows of narrowed eyes passing by. Once strapped into my window seat, I charm the cute Irish stewardess into sneaking me a large gin and tonic. Come the stroke of midnight, we taxi on to the runway. I rest back and gather my thoughts.

  That video felt like something no one was ever supposed to see, as opposed to your average clip shouting, ‘Woot! Look at this!’ No irritating captions squeaked, ‘Add me on FB!’ or ‘See more on my other channel!’ It had no accompanying details whatsoever, not even a title. That very fact reeled me in. This was a found thing. The digital equivalent of a video cassette tape bearing no label and placed on your doorstep . . . that is then stolen from your living room a short while later. Someone wants you to see it, but not keep it. A glimpse of spooky stocking.

  YouTube videos are all about the attention. The hits, the numbers, the advertising. Monetise your content, it’s the new way. The only way. So when an arresting YouTube video appears, then vanishes after just a few hundred hits, I want to know why. While I have no doubt that its makers are ‘trying to deceive others’ (SPOOKS Explanation #1), the video’s raison d’être is something other than the norm. For whatever reason, these people have targeted me and it would be churlish for me not to react and play along.

  So then. Fair play to them. Game on.

  As our many tons of aeroplane arc gracefully up into the night, all I know is, I must see that video again ASAP. My obsession also cements my resolve to finish writing this book – an idea that came to me one day as a mere whim.

  Stretching my toes in 40A, I pledge to find the people behind this video. Because when I prove the most convincing (not that this is saying much) ghost video to be a fake, then all the others must be fake too.

  I gaze out of my small round window at puffball clouds, the light that pulses reassuringly on the wing and, thousands of miles below, the broad swathes of Italy on Halloween. The mighty forces of coffee and alcohol lock horns to make me feel distinctly alive, as I notice the tiny glow of a fire somewhere down in the hills. Someone’s bumpkin barbecue, way out of control.

  I feel even better when I remember that I have The Devil’s Victims to enjoy. I tug it from my shoulder bag, relax, turn to page one and chuckle all the way home.

  A huge devil-eyed gull bursts into flight, making a group of tourists duck in alarm beside the tarot wagon. Bex stares out of the bar window at this, her face bearing the healthy, happy flush of someone on their third pint.

  ‘So have you found out who made the video?’ she wants to know.

  ‘What I’m doing,’ I say, ‘is investigating upfront, to make sure I’m not about to make a fool of myself.’

  ‘God,’ she says with a smirk, auto-covering her mouth. ‘Imagine that. Impossible.’ Having enjoyed her own hilarious sarcasm, she becomes curious. ‘How d’you mean?’

  ‘It did occur to me,’ I say, ‘that the video could be a viral advertising thing for some company. God knows how they’d do it, or whether it would be legal, but I thought they might have shoved it on to several journalists’ YouTube channels, then withdrawn them to create interest. Leave ’em wanting more, all that stuff.’

  She thinks this over. ‘If that were true, what’s it advertising? What’s the brand – ectoplasm? And by the way: when are you going to tell me what’s in the video?’

  ‘What’s ectoplasm?’

  ‘You don’t know what ectoplasm is. And you’re writing a book about the supernatural . . .’

  ‘Well, I propose to learn as I go along.’

  She affects a ludicrously pompous take on my voice, rolling her eyes up into her head: ‘Well, one proposes to learn as one goes along.’

  ‘Hey,’ I say, jab-jab-jabbing her shoulder with an affectionate forefinger. ‘I don’t talk like that! I’m not Prince Charles. You’re posher than me. Anyway, I put the word out to the few journalists who actually still talk to me, and then they asked the ones who don’t. None had received this video. Social media doesn’t seem to have heard of it . . . apart from the people who saw it that evening, obviously.’

  The booze is making Bex increasingly enthralled and frustrated, like this video is the one thing left in the world. She shifts over to sit directly beside me, then grabs the front of my T-shirt. She twists it up into a ball, constricting my Adam’s apple. At first, it feels like genuine retaliation for my forefinger poke. Maybe I jab-jab-jabbed her too hard.

  ‘What. Was in. The fucking. Video?’ she demands, her pouty lips worryingly, deliciously close to mine. Whatever would her boyfriend think if he walked in?

  Go on, Lawrence, I dare you: walk in right now. Then run back out sobbing and jump in the sea, bashing your head on the way down.

  ‘Have you considered anger management classes?’ I say, my voice coming out as Donald Duck’s. Bex’s only reply is to tighten her grip on my shirt-ball. I hold my hands up in surrender, then smile when she releases me.

  ‘As I said, I’ve only seen it a few times and I was really drunk. It’s like trying to remember a dream. Basically, it’s shot in what looks like a basement . . . and there’s someone standing there on the other side of the room. You can only see their legs and feet and—’

  ‘What, they don’t have a top half?!’

  ‘No, it’s just that . . . Oh, you know what, I’m honestly not trying to wind you up, but it’ll sound rubbish if I try to describe it like this. I’m a writer, not a talker.’

  Bex’s expression is best described as tempestuous.

  ‘You need to find this video.’

  ‘I’m bloody trying!’

  ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘You really are.’

  It’s dark by the time our backsides plunge back on to the big fat yellow sofa, even though it’s only about half six. Bloody November. We’re doing that thing where you can’t stop the momentum of an afternoon’s drinking, so just stumble blindly on. Hence the bottle of wine that I’m trying so hard to open, while Bex skins up. As much as I’m tempted to justify dope-smoking as research for communing with the spirit realm, I’m sticking to the booze.

  On the TV we’ve selected a Channel 5 documentary about huge babies with syphilis or something. Behind us, an enclosed balcony offers panoramic views. The Palace Pier, a fuck-off Ferris wheel and a full moon highlighting the broad black sea, recalling the cover of The Sisters of Mercy’s Floodland album. It’s one hell of a flat: the reason I moved from London to Brighton five years ago. As faithful readers will recall, I then joined a gym where I met Bex and learned she urgently needed somewhere to stay. I wanted her to move in so badly that I sacrificed my study and hurriedly turned it back into a bedroom.

  Get the fit girl to move in, even though you’ve only just met her? Yeah, that’ll totally end in a fulfilling relationship. Loving your man logic there, Sparks.

  ‘Why didn’t we get a screw top?’ I grumble, neck arteries straining as I yank at the cork. ‘Always get a screw top.’

  ‘You big twat,’ she says, taking the bottle off me. As I watch her ease out the cork, it strikes me she’s the only person on earth who I’d let speak to me that way.

  By the end of the second bottle, things are hazy, and the room’s pungency would rival an Amsterdam coffee shop. I have flashbulb memories of some freakishly large onscreen babies; of telling Bex about my myriad plans for this book; and of the room revolving in a good way: slow, manageable, chilled out.

  There’s only one part of the evening I remember vividly. Second by second, breath by breath, pore by pore.

  I’m in the middle of proudly telling Bex what SPOOKS stands for when she leaps upon me, roari
ng as she pins me down on the sofa. This tigress straddles me, panting in my face, her hands tightly securing my wrists, her red ringlets dangling in random clumps. A breathtaking turn of events.

  ‘Stop talking about you,’ she says, with comically exaggerated ferocity. ‘I’ve wanted to tell you something huge all day, but I haven’t had a chance. You talk over me. You only ever talk about you and your work, which is also about you. Are you aware of that, you fucker? It’s really annoying to live with someone who is either talking about themselves or waiting for their chance to talk about themselves. Do you know what I mean?’

  I stare up at her, profoundly in love.

  ‘Yes,’ I manage. ‘I’m really sorry, but you did keep asking about Italy. And I—’

  She releases her grip on my right hand and clamps her palm over my mouth. ‘No, no, no, Scooby-Doo: I talk now, you listen.’

  I nod, conscious of how her denim-clad groin feels against my midriff. Also, how her smooth skin feels against my lips. I could so easily lick at the salt, but I don’t.

  Bex brings her face down closer. Only her hand separates her lips from mine. Then she uncovers my mouth and says, ‘Yeah. You listen closely.’

  Oh my God. I suddenly remember an app on my phone called Secret, which lets you read anonymous confessions from your contacts. Recently, one of them wrote, ‘I really want to sleep with my flatmate, but we’ve been friends too long.’

  That was Bex! She’s going to tell me she likes me. Then she’ll kiss me. And after the sex, in bed, or maybe still right here on the sofa, she’ll tell me she’s breaking up with Lawrence, that it’s the right thing to do.

  Bex’s eyes are twin glowing lanterns. Her breath dances on my face as the words gush out. ‘Lawrence asked me to move in with him. And I said yes.’

  The room starts to revolve in a bad way.

  Matters only improve when, slumped beside our toilet, I check my email. Through bleary eyes, I see that someone has sent The Video whizzing right back to me.

  Alistair Sparks: ‘Having felt somewhat stung by our exchange of texts on 28 October, I am sorry to say I never replied to the 3 a.m. email below.’

  Date: 2 November 2014

  From: Jack Sparks

  Subject: Huh?!?!

  To: Alistair Sparks

  While I was buying a book at Rome airport, I saw you on the shop’s TV screen. You were talking to the camera, with the Hollywood Hills in the background. WTF? The sound was off so I couldn’t hear what you were quacking about.

  So what’s the story?

  You’ve always been gagging to follow in my footsteps, haven’t you, eh? Must admit though, mate, I never expected to see you on the box. At a push, you’ve a good face for radio.

  By the way: you know a guy at Scotland Yard, right? Tracks down child abuse videos and stuff? Do a passable impersonation of a brother and hand over his contact details, yeah?

  Jack

  Alistair Sparks: ‘Isla Duggan is a thirty-two-year-old air stewardess who lives in West Sussex and was born in Kinsale, Ireland. She was among the cabin crew on Flight 106 from Rome to London Gatwick, on which my brother claimed to be a passenger on 31 October 2014. The following is my interview with her . . .’

  ALISTAIR SPARKS: Could you confirm which seat you believe Jack Sparks to have occupied that night?

  ISLA DUGGAN: Yes, he was in 40A. A window seat.

  ALISTAIR: Is there any doubt in your mind that this was Jack Sparks?

  ISLA: None at all, now I’ve seen pictures and videos of him in the newspapers and on TV. He spoke the exact same way, you know, his mannerisms and stuff? And of course there’s the fact that he had to show his passport at least twice, or he wouldn’t have got on board. But he did act strangely on the plane, freaking out like that. I don’t know how out of character that was.

  ALISTAIR: Was he late for the flight?

  ISLA: He delayed us by almost twenty minutes. People weren’t happy, but it happens all the time. I keep saying we should have a zero tolerance policy like the budget airlines. Jack came on all casual, like, as if he hadn’t done anything wrong. I could tell he’d been drinking heavily, and he wanted more before take-off. So I pulled the old stunt of handing him a glass of ice and tonic with a drop of gin rubbed around the rim.

  ALISTAIR: So what then went wrong?

  ISLA: Well, as we taxied along the runway, I moved up the aisle, doing the usual checks. I saw Mr Sparks looking shocked and disturbed. He was all pale, like he’d just heard some really terrible news he couldn’t take in.

  ALISTAIR: Did you talk to him at that point?

  ISLA: I asked if he was okay, and he flinched when I lightly touched his shoulder. I can’t remember exactly what he said, but words to the effect of ‘I’m fine’. But he didn’t look it. He went back to reading a book, looking like he . . . I suppose . . . couldn’t believe what he was reading.

  ALISTAIR: The book seemed to be the cause of his disturbance?

  ISLA: I guess I just assumed it was a Stephen King or something. Anyway, the real trouble started just as we were about to take off. Passengers are at their most tense, so the last thing you need is one of them becoming alarmed – especially as we crew members are all strapped into our own seats. We aren’t even allowed to get up if the passengers start killing each other. The first thing I heard was a couple of passengers telling Mr Sparks they couldn’t ‘smell that’ at all, like they were trying to reassure him. So as soon as our seat-belt lights went off, I made a beeline for Mr Sparks. I wanted to get there before my number two, the guy I was working with, because he often got aggressive with problem passengers.

  Mr Sparks was basically having a panic attack. I gave him a sick bag to breathe into, but he just kept talking and insisted he could smell burning, when there was absolutely no burning smell. All around there were all these worried and irritated faces, expecting me to sort this. When I tried to reassure Mr Sparks, he got angry: he told me I was ‘trying to cover it up’ and called me ‘an effing liar’. We’re not supposed to take that kind of language, but there’s no point escalating a situation if you’ve no need. At that point, our purser dimmed the overhead lights – purely, in my opinion, because she was still hungover from the previous night – and his eyes shot up to them, scared. I knew I had to act fast, before he really started yelling.

  ALISTAIR: So how did you handle the situation?

  ISLA: I could have given him Ativan, our on-board sedative, but it’s not that easy: you have to radio America to get permission. Ativan plus alcohol isn’t a great idea, either. Then the last resort would have been to restrain Mr Sparks in his seat, which is no fun for anyone. If it turns nasty, a staff member can end up with a broken bone or worse. I really wanted to try a different approach. The people in 40B and 40C had already switched to other seats, so I sat next to Mr Sparks and spoke to him very calmly, smiling.

  I explained that if anything had been burning, our sensitive alarm system would have picked it up. That was a white lie, mind: there are smoke detectors in the toilets, and the flight crew might get an indication if something bad happens to the engine, but that’s about it. I did also tell him a true fact. I said our plane had gone through freezing rain on its way to Rome, so needed to be sprayed with de-icing fluid on arrival. When a de-iced plane takes off, you get a smell coming through the air con. It’s unusual and people don’t know what it is. After I told him all this, he said, ‘Promise me you’re telling me the effing truth.’ And I actually said back, without being at all aggressive, ‘Yes, I effing am.’ I’ve found that if you swear back at a sweary customer it kind of short-circuits their brain and bewilders them.

  ALISTAIR: Did matters calm down from that point?

  ISLA: Yes, he started breathing into the bag. He still seemed nervous of the book, though, because he asked if I could ‘wrap it in something safe till London’. Which was a bit mad, but anything for a quiet flight. Once we’d done the food service, I wrapped the book in loads of tin-foil lids from hot meals. Mr Spark
s disembarked at Gatwick without saying sorry or thanks, and that was that. When I came to read about, you know, the terrible things that happened, it took me a while to put two and two together. I was shocked. He seemed like a good guy. Cocky and quite troubled, but basically good, you know?

  ALISTAIR: Did you ever get a sense of why the book had scared him?

  ISLA: No, but I remember the title: The Devil’s Victims, written by the priest on the cover. Creepy subject matter, right enough. The Devil’s always frightening, isn’t he?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ‘Oh my God,’ says Bex, with stoner slits for eyes. ‘We’re actually going to watch it?’

  It’s somewhere north of midnight. She and I stare at the video file that sits on my PC’s desktop, waiting to be double-clicked. I’m at my desk with vomit stains down my shirt, dispelling any final hint of sexual frisson that might have survived after Bex’s Lawrence bombshell. She’s perched on one corner of my bed. I don’t particularly want to talk to her right now, but also couldn’t resist telling her about the video’s return. Paradox.

  The video has found its way back to me courtesy of one of my fans, Calvin from Cardiff. A confirmed tech-head, Calvin ripped the video from my YouTube channel during the brief period it was online, intending to scrutinise it. Seeing my online appeal after the video disappeared, he dropped me a line via JackSparks.co.uk with the file attached. Love this guy.

  Bex frowns at me. ‘You all right, Dolly? Thought you’d be more excited about the video.’

  ‘Still don’t feel well,’ I lie, smothering fury that she’s moving in with a total cockhead when she should clearly be with me.

  She nods, then folds her arms and faces the screen, expectant, demanding.

  By the time you lay your hands on this book, dear reader, you’ll probably have already seen the video. If not, you can do so online at (Eleanor: insert the URL here, cheers).1 But since that’s not strictly in the spirit of reading books, and because you may be optically challenged, I shall now describe it for you in full.