August (6 page)

‘That’s quite enough,’ snapped Rafe. ‘Don’t speak to your mother like that. If you really cared for her, you would answer her question. She feels like she’s already lost you. Don’t be responsible for her losing Gabbi as well.’

I studied my mum’s face. There was definitely something different about her. Like something had broken in her mind.

‘Please Cal. Please tell us what you’ve done with Gabbi,’ said Rafe. ‘Please, we just want her back home, safely.’

‘Mum,’ I said softly, ‘I really understand what you’ve been through. I’ve been through it too! But you mustn’t let it destroy your trust in me. I’m still the same Cal.’ I paused then, because what I’d just said wasn’t really true any more.

Something stirred deep in my mind–a warning.
You are overlooking a very important
connection
, said a tiny voice. Like when I’d first seen the key with the black tag thrown on Rafe’s bed, and couldn’t recall what it unlocked. Now, I tried
to reach back into my memory for it, but in a flash it was gone. For a crazy moment, I
wondered
if the guy who looked just like me had something to do with Gabbi’s disappearance.

‘Please, Cal. I’m begging you,’ said my mother, gripping Rafe’s hand, her knuckles white once more. ‘Tell us where she is.’

Rafe looked at Mum before he spoke. ‘Cal, there is a freshly deposited layer of DNA in Gabbi’s room that belongs to you. That means you were the last person there, so there is no point in lying to us. It’s only going to earn you more time behind bars. Please consider your poor mother and do everything you can to
cooperate
with the police investigation. Before it’s too late …’

‘There’s this guy,’ I said, tentatively, ‘that I’ve seen around the city a couple of times. He looks exactly like me.’ I searched my mother’s face, desperate for an answer, desperate to find some sort of recognition in her eyes. ‘Mum,’ I pleaded, ‘could I have a twin?’

Just as I finished the last word, Rafe pounced on me. Mum jumped up from her chair, crying.

‘Stop it!’ I yelled as Rafe shook me. ‘Get off me!’

‘No,
you
stop it! These lies! And now some crazy nonsense about a twin! You’re sick, boy!
Sick! How can you distress your mother like this? Can’t you see you’re breaking her heart? We just want to know our Gabbi’s OK!’

I felt his fingers closing around my throat, and heard my mother screaming as he shook me as hard as he could. I struggled uselessly,
hindered
by the wrist restraints.

Within seconds the police officer who’d left the room raced in again and hauled Rafe off me. ‘Calm down, mate,’ he said. ‘Take it easy. I understand how you feel, but you can’t be
jumping
on the kid like that.’ He shot me a filthy look. ‘He’ll be safely locked up in the remand centre tomorrow.’

Rafe pulled himself together, straightening his tie and smoothing his hair down. His eyes had welled up with tears–something I’d never seen happen to him before. For a moment his face reminded me of Dad.

‘I’m sorry, officer,’ he said. ‘I let my feelings run away with me. It’s the boy’s mother I’m concerned about. She’s been through so much. Too much for one person. We just hoped that Cal would … would … I don’t know. Gab’s been missing for days now. It’s been too long. Come on, Win. Let’s go. I don’t want him upsetting you any more.’

Rafe put his arm around my mum and began
guiding her out of my room. I wanted to cry like a baby. I wondered if the people who were
trying
to destroy our family had made a start on my mum as well. As if someone had cursed her. Crushed her spirit, and left a changeling in her place.

‘Please, darling,’ said my mother with tears in her eyes, turning back as she left. ‘Please, Cal, where is my daughter?’

Her desperate wailing trailed off as she and Rafe left me behind. Alone again.

Once upon a time, this might have broken my heart. But not now–not after all I’d been through. Over seven months on the street, surviving day by day, had made me tougher. If my mother believed these terrible things about me, then I didn’t need her.

Words suddenly spilled out of me; I shouted them into the empty air: ‘I’m going to prove to you that you’re totally wrong about me! I don’t know how I’m going to do that right now, but I’m promising you that I’ll get Gabbi back and then maybe you’ll realise how badly you’ve treated me!’

I leaned over to read the clipboard hanging off the end of my bed.

No grey stew that night for dinner; instead I was given a piece of rubbery white material that once might have been part of a fish, surrounded by a mixture of carrots and peas. It was my last night at the hospital. Tonight would be my last chance of escape. My last chance of saving my sister. I had to think of a way out.

I stared up at the crooked panel in the ceiling. And that’s when I thought of something that just might work. But first, I had to free my hands.

I felt around the mattress for the piece of scalpel blade I’d hidden, and almost cut my fingertip off when I found it. I figured if I could wedge it somewhere securely, I could cut through the nylon bands that tied my hands.

The timber of the window sill was a little weathered and cracked. Pushing carefully so as not to cut myself, and using a face cloth to protect my fingers, I forced one end of the broken blade down into a split in the wood. This left part of the blade fixed at an angle like a tiny bayonet. I pushed it to test it. It remained firm, tightly wedged into the timber. I dragged the chair over and sat down next to the window. It was going to take a while to carefully cut through.

From time to time, I peered around to check
the little window in my door, occasionally
walking
over to see what was going on in the corridor. In his seat across the hall from me, the cop who was supposed to be guarding me sprawled, head back, mouth open and eyes shut.

It was a long and painful process. Sometimes I’d slip, and cut my hands, and after an hour or so, I had quite a sore, raw wound on the side of my wrist.

I kept at it. I had nothing to lose.

It was hard to see what I was doing in the dim light from the corridor but finally, I was able to snap through the nylon. One cuff fell to the floor; the other remained like a bracelet around my wrist. I was free. At least, my hands were free.

I pulled out my drip and bandaged my injured wrist with part of the top of my hospital pyjamas, tying it off with a knot. Then I quickly changed into my clothes from where they’d been folded in the cupboard beside the bed, and stepped into a pair of canvas and rubber hospital slippers.

After checking that my guard was still
dozing
in the corridor, I started a close inspection of the ceiling panels. The crooked panel was one of those that ran along the wall, and directly under it was the basin. Just above that were two steel brackets that held a narrow, wooden shelf
on which stood soap and toothbrushes. If I could trust the two steel brackets to hold my weight, I could reach the ceiling and swing myself up into it …

7 AUGUST

147 days to go
…

The thought of escape had filled me with
adrenaline
and excitement. ‘Hang on, Gabs,’ I
whispered
, preparing for the next part of my escape plan. ‘I’m coming for you.’

Moving silently, I glided to check the door. The corridor cop had woken and now was a few metres away up the hallway, leaning against the counter at the nurses’ station. He was chatting to the night sister. This was my only chance.

Although the light in my room was off, light from the corridor shone in, enough for me to see by. I tiptoed over to the sink and basin, silently putting a chair beside it.

I climbed up on the chair and then tentatively put one foot in the sink, slowly transferring more weight into it. The basin held, but this was only half my weight. If it smashed under me, not only would it bring everyone running and put an
end to my escape plan, but the broken ceramic of the sink could cut like glass, and open my leg right up.

I took my foot out of the sink and climbed down for a minute, shoving the seat of the chair under the sink, hoping that it would give some support if the sink cracked. I took the thin piece of wooden shelving off the brackets and quietly laid it under the bed.

‘This is it,’ I told myself, using the back of the chair to climb up next to the sink again. This time, moving as quickly as I could, and only using the sink as a brief foothold, I got one foot on one bracket and lunged towards the ceiling.

Feeling around for the other bracket with my other foot, I found it, and pressed flat against the wall. I slowly straightened up. I held my breath.

The brackets held.

I straightened my legs, reaching for the tiny gap between the crooked ceiling panel and the wall.

The bracket under my left foot suddenly gave way. I had no time to lose. As I regained my
balance
on the remaining bracket, my right hand grasped the timber joist that I could see through the small gap in the crooked ceiling panel.

The second bracket gave under me, leaving me dangling like a gibbon. Surely the cop outside my room would have heard that.

I swung for a few more seconds, listening for voices outside the room. There were voices–that of the cop and the night nurse–and they were talking and laughing quite loudly, completely unaware of what I was up to. That was why the copper hadn’t noticed the crunching sounds made by each of the brackets as they came away from the wall.

I prepared to pull myself up.

With a loud creak, the door to my room
suddenly
started swinging open. I didn’t wait to see who my visitor was!

My body galvanised in an upwards dive, and I grabbed the ceiling joist with both hands,
hauling
myself up, bashing the crooked ceiling panel aside with my head and shoulders as I pulled myself into the roof space.

Instinctively, I grabbed a beam above my head with one hand, while I squatted, my legs straddling two ceiling joists, avoiding stepping on the thin plasterboard panels that I was sure would collapse under even part of my weight. I nudged the
ceiling
panel back into position with my free hand.

There was a small crack through which I could see a tiny section of the room beneath me.

The lights switched on. I sensed, rather than saw, people running into my room, and heard their agitated voices.

‘He’s not here!’

‘Well, where is he?’

‘Maybe the doctors took him? Or the police? Was he collected by Remand already?’

‘No! He’s escaped!’

‘Call security! And call for back-up!’

It would only be seconds before they noticed the damaged wall brackets and worked out where I’d gone. I had to move quickly. And carefully.

Crouched in the dark ceiling space I looked around in the murky light that shone through tiny cracks in the roof.

‘He must have slipped past us somehow.’

‘No way. The door was locked and his hands were tied. And I’ve been on guard out here for hours.’

‘Look, he’s busted the shelf brackets!’

‘Must have been looking for something to use as a weapon!’

‘This ward is locked. He can’t have gone far,’ one voice claimed desperately.

‘Oh God,’ said the corridor cop, with a strong sense of dread. ‘Here comes trouble.’

Someone new stormed into the room, with a voice full of authority and anger. ‘I want that adolescent psychopath found immediately and I
want him escorted to the Remand Centre! I want him out of my hospital! Now! Do you understand? Find him, cuff him, and get him out!’

They hadn’t worked out how I’d disappeared, or where to, yet. But it was only a matter of time before they’d realise I was somewhere in the dark and dusty ceiling above them.

I scrambled through the roof cavity as quickly as I could, stepping from joist to joist. After a while I came across another loose ceiling panel and paused to look through and get my bearings. I could just make out the reception area.

I peered through, quiet and still.

A cop with a familiar, agitated swagger was pacing across the open space just in front of the main entrance to the hospital foyer.

He turned and I caught a glimpse of his face …

Kelvin!

What the heck was Kelvin doing here? Decked out as a cop?

Oriana de la Force had what she wanted, so why had she sent one of her assassins? Surely she had everything she needed from me already!

Whatever the answer was, it was more reason for me to get out of this place where I was a
sitting
duck.

I had to move fast. I remembered a movie I’d seen where this guy had used the air
conditioning
ducts to wriggle through. I had no idea if this was possible or not, outside of Hollywood, but I had to try. Running along the wall around me was the long, square, aluminium ducting, and at the end of it, facing me, was the big exhaust fan, covered in wire caging. The ducting looked wide enough to fit me inside, if I could just get in there and start crawling. The exhaust fan would have to be my entry point.

I had no tools. All I had were my hands, one of them with painful cuts.

Crawling along the narrow joist, I made my way to the cage. Now that my eyes had adjusted to the dark better, I stared at the intimidating trio of fan blades that sliced around the opening of the duct. They were moving slow enough for me to make out the number of blades, but fast enough to take my head off.

The cage covering was secured by four clips, one near each corner. It didn’t take me long to undo them. That was the first problem out of the way.

The blades spun, unobscured in front of me. They suddenly seemed more powerful and sharper. I looked around, frantic for an idea on how to get past them.

There were four thick metal joins–parts that connected the exhaust fan to the ducting–around
the inside rim, just behind the blades. I needed to try and find something to wedge in between one of the joins and a blade, to stop them all from spinning.

My shoe! I ripped one of my canvas shoes off, almost losing my balance and tumbling onto one of the thin ceiling panels in the process.

I held the shoe out, trembling in my hand. I had to get the timing right, or I’d mess it up and make a whole lot of noise, signalling my location to security. Blowing all hope of escape. And all hope of finding Gabbi.

Or I could lose my hand.

I watched the blades go around, around, around …

Here goes!

Swiftly, I tossed the shoe in.

It bounced around a bit, and I cringed at the noise it was making, but then it stopped beside one of the joins, as I’d hoped, and the blade hit it. It stopped!

Unable to continue spinning, the blades hummed and groaned, like they were desperate to keep going, desperate to fight whatever had stopped them.

The commotion in the hospital below was increasing. There was no time to lose. I crawled into the space between the blades, praying I
wouldn’t dislodge the shoe that was keeping me in one piece.

I squeezed through the narrow gap and crawled into the opening of the square duct. I turned back, amazed I’d made it, then jerked my shoe back out. The blades quickly started spinning once more, picking up speed with every second. I slipped my beaten-up shoe back on.

Ahead of me, the length of the duct was pitch black. I began worming my way ahead, hoping the aluminium labyrinth was strong enough to hold my weight. I had no idea where the tunnels would lead, or where I should go. My plan was to just get out of the secured area of the hospital. Maybe if I could find my way to another part of the hospital, I’d have a chance of getting out unseen.

My heart started racing uncontrollably. For a minute I felt like I was trapped inside the
claustrophobic
walls of the coffin again. I gulped air down, reminding myself that I could breathe as much as I liked.

A sudden roar made me jump. The air
conditioner
had kicked up a notch in power, like it was on an automatic timer, and a rush of air blew dust up into my nose and eyes. Air whistled past
my ears, but I put my head down and shut my eyes–it was too dark to see ahead anyway–and I kept crawling along, forcing my way ahead.

I swung a hard right when I reached a
corner
, carefully manoeuvring my body around the bend. Ahead the air carried the faint scent of coffee and food and, further along the tunnel, I could see light.

I came to a large grille–some sort of
lightweight
filter. Through the mesh, I peered cautiously into the room beneath me. A long table was visible, surrounded by chairs, its surface partially covered by magazines and coffee mugs. It looked like a staff room, but luckily for me it was completely empty.

It didn’t take much effort to prise the grille up. I couldn’t wait to get out of the confined space. As I pushed the grille to the other side of the opening, a shower of dust fell onto the table below. I must have been covered in dirt.

I lowered myself through the hole and into the room as far as I could, and then let go of the duct, landing on my feet on top of the table.