John: I wanted to hurt him. I did. I admit that. I walked away, back towards the booth, because if I’d stayed there I would have hit him.
Pea: I could see Dad was worked up. I asked if he was okay and he snapped at me. And that was when AJ called out to me. ‘Hey, Pea, you might want to keep an eye on my brother. Looks like he’s getting pretty cosy with Bree over there. I mean, it’s my dick she’s sucking right now, but I heard he’s looking for someone who knows how to do the job properly too.’ I couldn’t look at Dad or Alex. I felt my face catch fire. And then the ride started up.
Alex: It wasn’t enough for him to rub my nose in the Nicole thing. Now there was Bree too. And on top of all that he was trying to humiliate Pea? Hell no. I felt as furious as John looked. I think it was John who said something like, ‘I wish I’d never heard that prick’s name.’
John: Pea said she wished she’d never heard his name. I think she even called him a prick. She wasn’t going to get any argument on that from me.
Pea: I didn’t call him a prick. Alex did. He said he wished he’d never heard the name AJ Silver.
Alex: Believe me, the way I felt, if there’d been time to unscrew that ‘go’ button and pull those wires apart to make the carriages crash, I would have done it.
John: I started the ride up. Sebastian came over and started talking to me about the possibility of him coming to work in the park after all, and I was so bloody pleased. I set off back to the office. I was planning to find Maggie and get her to sign something about the money. I left Pea and Alex heading overtowards Zak and that makeup girl. What had AJ called her, Bree? His words kept going over and over in my head, and I wasn’t sure what I was most cross about – Pea or the money.
Alex: That fury I felt for AJ had reminded me how much Pea meant to me. When her dad had disappeared, I pulled her into me for a hug, and we were still standing like that, bodies close, when it happened. The noise was like nothing I’ve ever heard before. The scream of metal. We sprang apart as if we’d been caught doing something we shouldn’t and looked over to where the noise had come from. But there was nothing to see. It was in the undercover part. I was pretty sure the two carriages had collided, though. Time slowed to a near standstill. Zak was on his feet, Bree too. John had already turned around and was rushing back over. I couldn’t make out the expression on his face. But I could make out the expression on Pea’s. She looked terrified. Zak called his brother’s name in a strangled voice. And then that doctor of AJ’s appeared, Dr Haskins, I think it was, and he rushed up the steps and into the little building.
Pea: It was weird, like I sort of left my body for a bit. I could hear Zak shouting AJ’s name, but I sort of felt like I wasn’t there. Sebastian came out of the booth, said that AJ’s doctor was checking them both over and he’d already called a private ambulance. I was like, ‘Don’t we just need to call 999?’ but it was like everything was done differently in AJ’s world. I guess he couldn’t just rock up at the local A&E the way I would have done. And then Dad was back, his face white, asking if anyone knew what the hell had happened.
Zak: It’s hard to go back there, even now. One minute Bree was telling me about the list of things she wanted to do in London after the tour, and the next, that sound. That crunching of metal on metal.
Lucian: I’m Lucian Valenza. AJ’s bodyguard and the only other person on that rollercoaster with him that day. Man, it felt like the longest wait. I knew there was something seriously wrong with AJ, because that kid was never quiet for a single second and I hadn’t heard a sound from him since we’d collided.
Zak: I knew it was bad, that it was something that was going to derail things. Not just one of those stories you tell after drinking for years and years. More a story that you never tell, because it hurts too much.
Pea: The time between the collision and the ambulance arriving felt like hours and hours, time unspooling like ribbon, but then pulled taut, because it felt like almost no time, too. I can’t explain it. If you’ve ever been in an emergency like that, a fire or an earthquake or a car crash or something, you might understand. Everything warps. Zak tried to go inside but Lou was at the doorway – I’m not sure when he’d appeared – and he said it wasn’t a good idea. I took that to mean that AJ didn’t look good. I remember Dad coming to stand by me, wrapping his arms around me from behind. It was the first time he’d touched me for a long time. He kept muttering the word ‘no’, over and over, under his breath. Nonononononononononono. Alex grabbed hold of my hand. It was like we all needed to feel each other’s body heat, needed that reassurance that we were all okay. I could see Zak from where I was standing, and I knew that his world was falling apart, but I didn’t go to him. I don’t know why. Then Maggie was there. I don’t know how she heard. She raced over to Zak, and they hugged awkwardly, and Zak let out a wail that sounded unholy.
Lucian: Dr Haskins checked me over but I knew I was fine. Going out of that building, though, when I knew everyoneoutside was gathered waiting to see whether AJ was going to make it, that was really tough.
Maggie: I knew in my bones that he was gone, I think. I didn’t say it. I held Zak’s hand and we just… waited for the verdict. When Lucian came out, he looked broken. His face full of guilt, like he couldn’t believe he got to be the one who was okay. It’s a bit like that, sometimes, with a celebrity. They seem so much larger than life. It’s a shock when you realise they’re mortal.
Zak: It seemed to take forever, but eventually Dr Haskins came over and said it was bad, but Lou was arranging for a private jet to take him back to the States immediately. I said I wanted to see him, go with him, but he just shook his head, asked us to trust him.
John: Earlier, I’d wanted him to die, but just then, I really wanted him to live. He was just a boy. An arrogant boy with his head up his own arse, but still a boy. I’d hated him. Those last few days, my hatred for him had been palpable. I’d let it take over everything.
Pea: Mum appeared at some point. She just joined us silently, didn’t ask anything. Didn’t need to. Because right at that moment, the ambulance arrived and two paramedics jumped out of it with a stretcher.
Cathy: I was a mother, and I put myself in his mother’s shoes. Forget that he was a pop star, that he had this legion of adoring fans. He was a boy, with a mother, and she could be on the verge of losing him, and she didn’t even know.
John: I remember thinking that’s it. It’s all over. The park, all of it. We would never come back from something like this.
Pea: I can’t imagine anyone was thinking about the park. We were looking death right in the eye. It was horrifying.
Lucian: I couldn’t look at any of them. It wasn’t my fault, I knew that, but I’d been on that ride with him and I’d got out. Not a bump or a scratch on me. I would have switched places, I think. Because AJ was a cocky little shit sometimes but he was really something. He was seventeen and already as big as Michael Jackson and Madonna. I felt like I knew, that he wasn’t going to live, that we’d never see what he would go on to do. It can be hard to be the one who survived.
Pea: Suddenly, I was aware of there being a lot of people who hadn’t been there before. I was used to the park being crowded, of course, so at first it didn’t register. But then I looked around, a bit dazed, and saw that there were loads of girls, and they were all crying. Hysterical.
John: I’d opened the gates to let the private ambulance in. The crowd of girls that had been outside early on hoping for a glimpse of AJ had dispersed by then, so I hadn’t given it a second thought. There were more pressing things on my mind, weren’t there? But somehow, someone must have heard. And it was like those girls had telepathic powers to contact one another. There was a swarm of them, all of a sudden, crying and screaming. I shouted at them to get out. Said they were on private property and I’d have them arrested. They scattered a bit, but they didn’t go.
Zak: Oh yeah, the fans. I still don’t know how that all works. Anywhere we’d go, they’d be there, no matter how much we kept the plans under wraps. And they were there within minutes of the accident, gaining access through the gates that had been opened for the medical team. Vultures.
John: I knew we had minimal time before the press got wind of it. I went into damage limitation mode. What had caused the crash? I went back to those minutes in the booth with Sebastian, Pea and Alex. There was nothing. I closed my eyes, thought carefully. Had one of them messed with that override button? Could they have done? I was 99 per cent sure no one had.
Cathy: No one was thinking straight. You don’t, do you, when you’re in the middle of something like that? I went to the food hall and ordered a tea, put plenty of sugar in it and took it to Zak. He didn’t look up at me. That was the first inkling that there was a question of blame here. I said how sorry I was, how much I hoped he would be all right. It’s what you say, isn’t it? I wasn’t apologising for doing anything wrong.
Pea: Time carried on moving strangely, warping and weaving. His body was taken away. At some point, the police arrived and started to ask everyone questions. The press came, camera flashes and microphones shoved in faces. Zak punched one of the photographers in the face when he wouldn’t back away. I remember that. The pure fury in his eyes. It was scary. But I understood it, too. His whole world was crashing down.
Zak: I called Mom and Dad. Maggie offered to do it but I knew it had to be me. The press were somehow already swarming like ants. I didn’t want them to hear from someone else. I went to the office to make the calls from the landline. Mom sounded relaxed and happy, and I thought about the fact that I was going to take that away from her. I said I had to tell her something, and she must have known from my voice. She was hysterical. I tried to tell her that there was still some hope, but I didn’t want to make it seem less serious than it was. After I put the phone down, I called Dad straight away. I knew if I paused for a second I wouldn’t be able to do it. When I said somethinghad happened, he said ‘What? Is it your mum?’ I wondered, fleetingly, whether he still loved her. Whether there was any hope for them. Whether this might be the thing that brought them back together. I said, ‘It’s AJ, Dad. There was an accident.’ He went silent for about twenty seconds and then he started asking questions, rapid fire. His voice broke on some of them. I told him what I knew and promised to call him again later. After I ended the call, I thought about him, dealing with it on his own. Or maybe he wasn’t on his own; maybe there was a woman in his life, or at least a friend.
Maggie: After the initial shock, we headed back to the buses. I knew I had to get us all out of there. We’d fly back to the States in the morning, but I got us a hotel for that night. We had to get away from the place where it had happened.
