Little Echoes

Tom Powell

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781350124844
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Theatre Playwriting

He looked the same as anyone else. Any of the other ones who come in. White boys. So I didn't clock anything different, cos there wasn't anything different. How was I meant to know? Shajenthran's brother has had acid thrown in his face and Shaj is out for revenge. Danielle's teenage crush on a pop idol develops into an illicit relationship, 'professional mentoring' becoming something much darker. June has spent twenty years serving the private needs of the super wealthy, but her new assignments confront her with the questions she's spent a lifetime running from. When their paths cross it is not something any of them will forget. Filled with love, coercion, loneliness and obsession, Little Echoes takes you through the city as you've never seen it before. A city of deep shadows, darker intentions, and where anything can change in the night…

SHAJENTHRAN – 8^th February 2019

He looked the same as anyone else. Any of the other ones who come in. White boys. So I didn’t clock anything different, because there wasn’t anything different. How was I meant to know?

I’m in the back. Meant to be doing stock check, cos we have stock, it needs checking, but a man can only do so much, you know? I’m scratching my balls and thinking I might have a Nik Nak, Rib N Saucy, not Scampi and Lemon, I’m not a monster, and noticing we’re pretty low on bottled water, Pot noodle and tinned beans. People must think the end times are coming.

I have a Nik Nak. Or, like, I open the Nik Naks, and one lonely Nik Nak is about to begin its delicious journey into my mouth and I am salivating, it’s been a long day, right and –

I hear screaming, like someone’s gutted a dog.

Rush out front and see a boy – the boy from the other day – standing over my brother.

Who’s clawing at his eyes and face as the colour goes from them.

I’m a statue and that boy waps on a helmet, jumps out the shop and onto a moped.

I . . .

His face is a pattern of lines and dots, splashes of nothing, eyes that are red and unnaturally white.

He’s just screaming.

I grab a bottle of water, pour it over him, hand him another, sprint outside, and the boy is gunning the engine, he sees me, and I go for him with everything I got –

My hands are inches from him but I’m left clutching air, he starts a wheelie as he goes down the street but I seen his plates.

I run, but he’s gone.

DANIELLE – 25^th October 2017

He’s coming to town in exactly three weeks and two days. It is the day after my birthday and I have been dropping savage hints. Like,

Mum, Dad, please can I have a ticket and a spare?

And they’re like, just you wait. But I don’t want to wait, because if they haven’t then it’ll be too late, and last year I wanted to go ice skating and I thought that was pretty clear but they just got me a mini-fridge for my bedroom so they are maybe, like, not the most reliable hint-retrievers.

I see on Insta there’s only a few tickets left.

It’s 11pm on Thursday. I’m in my room. And I know what I have to do.

In the hallway I can make out their voices.

‘Just one more bottle of wine to the online shop –’

‘What, so you can drink it?’

‘Of course so I can drink it –’

I realised long ago I was descended from robots. Really boring robots. They hear me coming down the stairs.

‘You want something?’

Errr yeah I have this Maths project and I like totally have to find out the height of a pound coin.

‘This is for Maths?’

Err yea.

‘I guess it’s one way of finding out the value of money!’

Mum reaches into her pocket and pulls out a pound.

Disaster.

Errr oh yeah and a fifty p.

‘Ok, no problem.’

And a twenty and a fi –

‘Purse is in the bowl.’

I am probably the smartest person to have ever lived. Albert Einstein can eat my shit. I take a whole bunch of coins from Mum’s purse, and two sly photos of her credit card.

I’m coming for him.

SHAJENTHRAN – 8^th February 2019

When I get back to the shop I can’t look at him.

I hold his shoulder and empty what must be a whole crate of Evian on him. Paras come, and they take him, but I have to wait for the police.

Waiting a long time.

Picturing his face, like a childhood photo some animal’s scratched up.

Them screams.

When they turn up they ask for everything, for a description, and I say –

I dunno, a white boy. Scrawny, twitchy. I’m not being funny officer, but he looked a lot like you.

. . .

Yeah, I got them.

MRN23.

I tell the police, but they don’t believe me.

‘That’s not how registration plates are put together.’

‘It must’ve been falsified, or . . .’

‘At times of extreme pressure, it is not unusual for your perceptions to be – well, a bit off.’

Are you not listening?

I know exactly what I saw.

You think, right, that everything is recorded, there are cameras everywhere, we got the technology now so everything is tracked – but a whole plane can disappear over an ocean and no one knows what happened. A whole plane, 239 people, can vanish without a trace – so what’s one boy in an entire city?

DANIELLE – 16^th November 2017

I can’t believe my eyes as I unwrap the tickets, not because they’ve finally got something right, but because they’re VIP, and I even feel a tiny bit of guilt about stealing the extra ones, just a tiny bit. Sorry Mum . . .

But I had to be sure.

It’s funny to think, right, that there was a time I didn’t love him. Didn’t even know him, even. That feels so long ago. Like being in the womb. Like not hav...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• About the author
• Dedication
• Contents
• Shajenthran – 8th February 2019
• Danielle – 25th October 2017
• Shajenthran – 8th February 2019
• Danielle – 16th November 2017
• June – 18th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 8/9th February 2019
• Danielle – 17th November 2018
• June – 18th February 2019
• Danielle – 18–24th November 2017
• Shajenthran – 10th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• Shajenthran – 11th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• Shajenthran – 11th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• Shajenthran – 11th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• June – 22th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• June – 23th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th November 2017
• June – 23th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 12th February 2019
• Danielle – 16th December 2017
• June – 23th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 13th February 2019
• June – 23th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 17th February 2019
• Danielle – 8th December 2018
• Shajenthran – 22th February 2019
• June – 23th February 2019
• Danielle – 4th February 2019
• June – 23th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 23th February 2019
• Danielle – 23th February 2019
• June – 5th March 2019
• Danielle – 23rd February 2019
• Shajenthran – 24th February 2019
• June – 6th March 2019
• Danielle – 24th February 2019
• June – 6th March 2019
• Shajenthran – 24th February 2019
• Danielle – 24th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 24th February 2019
• Danielle – 25th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 25th February 2019
• Danielle – 25th February 2019
• Shajenthran – 25th February 2019
• Danielle – ??? 2019
• June – 8th March 2019
• Danielle – Later
• Shajenthran – 4th March 2019
• June – 8th March 2019
• Shajenthran – 9th March 2019
• Danielle – The Next Day
• Shajenthran – 9th March 2019
• June – 10th March 2019
• June – 10th March 2019
• eCopyright