Rise: Cook 1

One thing I've learned?

 is you should never look back.

The past is dead and buried. You get nothing from living there. It's all about today.

But I've been having these dreams.

In them, nothing's real. Nothing's solid. Everything's fantasy, fucked — an illusion.

In these dreams, I'm a life that's already gone by.

Places I can't name. Faces I shouldn't see. A pair of eyes that look right through me like they used to know who I was...and maybe wish they hadn't.

Sometimes there's laughter, soft, behind a door I never open.

Sometimes I hear someone crying, and I don't know if it's them or me. Sometimes...there's just silence.

And it's louder than anything.

Today means nothing.

Today is just a ghost that's haunting me. I'm at the end of the world, on the edge of things. I think about letting go. I think about falling.

My name is James Cook.

I did something once.

And my ghost won't let me forget it.

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The rain didn't fall so much as hang in the air — thick and grey and bitter, like the city of Manchester had given up trying to spit him out and just decided to soak him instead. Cook sat behind the wheel of a rust-bitten car, engine ticking like it had a grudge.

Cook sat in the driver's seat, engine idling low, watching headlights blur into white smears through the glass. His hands rested on the steering wheel, fingers tapping with that dull, twitchy energy he could never shake. 

He barely looked up as the door opened and a group slid in. Three teens, barely shaving age. Cook sighed, didn't bother greeting them properly.

"All right, guys? What you after?"

The girl, who'd gotten into the front blinked. "Er... what do we want again?"

One of the lads leaned in. "I want one, yeah."

"No, you want two. I want one," the taller boy corrected.

The girl scrunched up her face. "Right. And I want two, so that's..."

The other one piped up with a grin. "That maths GCSE paying off, Susie?!"

"Oh, fuck off, Norman."

She turned back to Cook, flustered. "Four, please."

The first boy patted his pockets. "Actually, I think I've only got enough for... one."

The girl groaned. "Oh my God, why do you have to make everything so complicated?"

"I'm not making this complicated!"

"Yeah, you are," She muttered. "You're being an idiot—"

"I've got enough for one!" He argued.

They all started talking at once — arguing, overlapping, flapping notes around.

Cook banged the heel of his hand on the steering wheel. "Guys, guys — whoa, whoa, whoa! Hey!"

Silence.

"...How much have you got?" he asked, already regretting it.

They did a quick tally, counting fingers and cash like drunk accountants.

"So we get enough for four and three-quarters," one of the guys concluded proudly.

Cook blinked. "Good maths. But I don't do quarters."He handed over the fifth one anyway, flat expression. "You look after that, sweetheart. And them."

The girl handed him the scrunched-up notes. 

"Cheers." Cook nodded. "All right, you happy?"

"Yeah," she said.

He glanced at the rest. "You guys happy?"

A chorus of yeahs.

"Right. Piss off, then."

They shuffled away in a gaggle of stupid laughter.

Cook watched them go, rubbed a hand down his face, and muttered under his breath laughing:

"Fuckin' kids."

Then came another knock. Another deal. Same story.

The faces changed, but the shape of it never did — desperation, bad math, and too much eye contact.

It had been two years since someone got into his car and asked how he was doing.

Two years since he'd had any real friends.

But this was life now... Or maybe death drawn out like a joke.

He'd been running with Louie's lot for just under a year. Not officially part of the crew- he didn't want to be. He had the look though. Scarred, scrappy, like a bloke with nothing left to lose. Which, all things considered, wasn't too far off.

His phone buzzed against his thigh. He debated ignoring it. Answered anyway.

"Ey up, Louie."

"Cooko," Louie's voice rasped through the line. "Need a favour."

"You always fuckin' do," Cook muttered.

"Need you to pick up Charlie from Kings Street and bring her to mine."

"Charlie?" Cook blinked. 

A short pause.

"My girlfriend, mate." Louie said it slow, like Cook was thick. "You know Charlie."

Cook shifted in his seat. "Right. Your bird. Sure."

"Mulligan Street. Don't keep her waiting, yeah?"

Click. End of call.

He dropped the phone on the passenger seat. 

"Brilliant."

He didn't like picking people up. Especially not one of Louie's lot. Especially not his girlfriend.

But he started the engine anyway.

Because that's what you do when your life doesn't belong to you anymore.

THREE DAYS LATER

Cook sat on the edge of Emma's mattress. Jason's rings had left a neat line of purple along his cheekbone, but the ache in his chest was sharper than the bruise.

Emma—occasional shag, convenient couch—knelt in front of him, dabbing a warm cloth along his split lip.

Cook had ducked outside for air at Louies party and heard muffled giggles behind the bins. Jason's voice. Charlie's.

What the fuck was she doing?

He'd rounded the corner and found them tangled up, Jason's hands on places that would get the bloke killed if Louie ever saw. Charlie hadn't even looked sorry—just bored. Jason had jeered, shoved Cook for lurking. Cook hadn't swung; Jason had. Two punches and Cook tasted metal. He walked away, thinking only, She's gotta stop messing about. Louie's no fuckin' idiot. He'll find out...

"Why are you lying to me?" Emma asked now, voice hushed but steady. "Tell me what's going on."

Cook winced but didn't flinch. "It's nothing, babe."

That was always the line—enough to end a conversation, enough to bury it. Safer that way, for her and for him.

"Are you in trouble?"

"Now't I can't handle."

She didn't buy it. He saw the flicker of doubt in her eyes.

"You don't look like you're handling it well."

Cook's head throbbed; the room drifted every time he blinked. "What do you want me to say, Em?"

"Let's get out of here."

"Hm?"

"Let's just go. You've got money—let's get in your car and drive. London, Liverpool, Bristol... Fucking Scotland if we have to."

Bristol. A sucker-punch of a word. His face froze—just a twitch, but enough to send him inward. He hadn't heard that name aloud in years. He never let himself say it. Never let himself think about what he left behind. Think about her.

His phone buzzed, slicing through the silence.

Cook blinked out of the daze and checked it. Charlie.

"I want to see you," she said, voice low and rushed. "Mulligan Street. On the corner."

Click. She hung up.

Cook stared at the screen.

"Who was that?" Emma asked.

He pocketed the phone. "Nothing. No one. Don't worry,"

Emma narrowed her eyes. "Is it that girl? That girl from the party?"

He didn't answer.

"For once, yeah? Be honest."

Still nothing.

"Be honest!" she snapped.

He still didn't speak.

"Forget it," Emma muttered.

"Emma—"

"No. Just fucking forget it!... Look, I don't know a fucking thing about you! Who the hell are you!? Where'd you come from, why are you even here!?"

Cook stared at the wall. The buzzing in his ears was back—loud and familiar. He tried to steady his breathing, but his heart was racing.

"No," he said finally.

"Why not? What are you hiding from?"

He almost laughed at that. What wasn't he hiding from?

"I can't fuckin' tell you!" he snapped. His voice cracked. "Look—I have no choice, okay? That's it. That's all I know."

"Then get the fuck out."

Emma turned away, back to the bathroom, the bloodied cloth still in her hand.

Cook stood still.

And all he could think about was Tess.

The way she never got a proper explanation. The way he disappeared from her life like a ghost. The way he'd crawled into bed beside her, trembling, whispering he loved her like it might save him. And then left. Left her to deal with the aftermath.

And she never even knew why.

Because he couldn't face what he'd done. Not then. Not now.