If I Could Fly (10 page)

The back door is opening and my mum is stepping out, her arms folded against the cold night air. She is peering towards the bushes where I’m hiding and muttering to herself, taking a deep breath, shaking her head.

‘My
kon dee
. . .’ she says softly.

I nearly melt when I hear her special Thai name for me. I am about to jump up and run to her when I see a policewoman standing in the kitchen doorway. I want to yell at my mum to get out of there, but no sound
comes. Little Bird turns and moves inside, closing the door. I see her putting the kettle on. This might be my last chance.

I creep across the lawn and stay low under the kitchen window. I can hear voices – my mum’s and the woman’s. They are speaking quietly. Little Bird doesn’t seem frightened by her. I wonder where my dad is. At the pub, probably. I don’t understand why there’s a cop in our house and why my mum is making her tea. Maybe she’s waiting for me and Mum is just playing along. If she’s under house arrest, what choice does she have?

I wait until the talking stops and raise my head a fraction above the window sill. Little Bird is taking milk from the fridge. She glances my way and drops the carton. Its contents spill on the floor.

‘I love you,’ I mouth at her. She moves to the door swiftly and opens it. She is crying and speaking. I can just make out what she is saying.

‘Take care of my child, St Francis.’

‘Mum!’ I whisper loudly. But the door has closed again and I can see the shadow of the cop moving about. The sink tap is turned on. I should use the noise as cover and make for the bushes. But I feel paralysed, as if I’ve turned to stone.

Did Little Bird see me? If she did, why didn’t she speak directly to me? And what was all that about St Francis? Mum’s a Buddhist, not into saints. Maybe she’s trying to tell me it’s not safe. How can it be, with a policewoman in the house? She’s protecting me, just like she has, every day of my life.

It’s dangerous to stay. It’s dangerous to go. The sit-u-a-shun is bad, every which way. I think I’m in shock. My thoughts are jumbled, full of voices, shouting. I put my hands over my ears. It doesn’t help. The yelling gets louder and my thigh starts to ache so badly I feel sick.

I have to get myself to a safe place, somewhere I can get my head down, think things through. And there’s only one destination that ticks that box.

Om mani padme hum.
Bless you, Little Bird. Bless me.
Na myoho renge kyo.
May everything be as it should. May there be peace. May our worries be lifted. May our hearts be full of joy. May Dair and Furball be safe, wherever they are tonight.

I’m climbing into the hospital through the hole in the café window, the one place that seems not to have been boarded up. Dawn is breaking, but all I want to do is lie down and sleep. I’ve been running for hours across fields and through woods. There was no Mr Carter, no black van, to give me a lift this time. I had to use my free-running skills to stay off the roads. Every part of me feels bruised and battered. I can’t put my full weight on my left leg either.

It’s a miracle I’ve made it back.

I am grateful I’ve not been caught. I am grateful I
have clothes to wear, unlike some kids. I am grateful for shelter in this building. I am trying to remember all the things to be grateful for, so that I don’t turn into a crazy person.

‘My
kon dee
.’ That’s what she said, my poor mother. She looked so sad, her arms wrapped round her small body. Was Dad there in the background, ready to come down on me like a ton of bricks for the shame I’ve brought on the family? Has he been twisting her arm, the way he sometimes does, when she doesn’t give him full attention? Has he shopped me to the authorities? Is that why there was a policewoman in the house, waiting?

I have slunk back here like a guilty cat. I had to wait until first light to enter the grounds. There were FISTS and police swarming all over the place. Then the men in white vans arrived to secure the doors and windows. Lucky for me they weren’t too thorough.

Back inside, where Dair lay, there are only sodden tiles covered in a layer of thick slime. My feet skid and
slide. The muted light of morning is disorientating. I reach for the wooden rail, which is no longer there.

The steps are slippery too. I place my trainers sideways and climb like a scuttling crab on shifting sand. I reach the landing. There are wide holes where the ceiling has become sky. The corridor is now an assault course of masonry and massive metal lintels, some upended like megaliths. It’s as if someone has dropped Stonehenge from a great height.

The name above the ward entrance has lost more letters. It just reads
Wonder
now. Maybe that is all we are left with, when our world crumbles. Unanswered questions and awe.

I’m staring into the space ahead. It’s the same place I left yesterday, but it looks as if it’s had the opposite of a digital make-over. Its muted colours have faded to black. Soot coats the walls, window panes and Dair’s precious chair, which is in its familiar position, but minus its blankets.

I force myself to look at the strange, dark silhouette
to my right. It reminds me of the woodland cottage in Snow White: ramshackle, with crooked lines. By some miracle, most of my house seems to be standing. I move towards it like a soldier walking through a minefield. The floorboards could give way any minute. If I fall, no one will hear me cry out.

The front door has disappeared, along with the library. The plastic sheet on the roof has spared the interior the worst of the falling debris, but smoke has penetrated everywhere. All the books have black covers and edges and there is dust a couple of centimetres thick on all the flat surfaces.

My kitchen drawer has been upturned, its contents strewn across the cotton rug. With a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, I realise my lighter is missing.

I locate my torch and in the glare of its white beam, conduct a more thorough search. This reveals many things I would rather not have discovered: that my clothes store has gone from its box and my curtains have been wrenched from their fragile tracks. My
wooden photo frames and both my pillows have been spirited away too.

But sitting sadly on the bare mattress, there is a small, black bear with glass eyes downcast.

‘Andy!’ I exclaim, a nanosecond of joy quickly dulled by the realisation that someone must have put him there, the same someone who has taken most of my flammable possessions, carried them up to the top floor, stacked them on top of each other and set light to them.

I’m curling up on my damp, dirty mattress, Andy held tight in my arms, my body shuddering under the weight of this awful truth. The worst part is I won’t ever know why Dair did this. Some deep instinct is telling me he is far away and I will never see him again.

I thought we were friends. I thought we looked out for each other. Just like I believed our life at the hospital could stay a secret and that seeing my mum would make everything better. As usual, I was wrong about everything.

I am too exhausted to get undressed. My bad leg now feels like it is being burned at the stake. I lie on my mattress and hope the oblivion of sleep will come quickly. My eyelashes are heavy with salty liquid, but I’m too tired to cry. My brain is throbbing with a regular, insistent beat. Maybe it’s an echo of my heart, letting me know it’s still working, despite being broken. Maybe it’s just a headache, although it feels more like the stomp of a marching army.

What good are memories if they are so painful? The night before last, Furball was sleeping next to me, her cute whiskers twitching every time she breathed out. I miss the warmth of her small body, the smell of her fur. Three of us felt like a family. I don’t think I want to stay here on my own. I hope, when I close my eyes, that this damaged, desecrated den will swallow me up for good and that wherever Dair has gone I can follow him, if only in my dreams.

‘Not exactly the coolest crib on the planet, is it?’ says a husky voice, very near by. I open my eyes, try to
scramble to my feet and scream, all at the same time. The wall of books between the bedroom and kitchen gives way and as I sprawl across a hundred volumes of bedtime stories
Grimm’s Fairy Tales
lands on my head with a heavy thump.

‘Who are you?’ I bark. The looming shape isn’t clear in the dim morning light. I fumble for my torch. When I click it on, its beam illuminates the face of a boy, blinking at me and smiling. It’s a familiar shape, one that is framed by a huge mass of thick, curly brown hair.

‘I’m Alfie. I live over there,’ he replies, motioning with a small hand. ‘I’m the one who waved at you and your rabbit.’

‘You’re the FACE,’ I exclaim, surprise causing me to make a strange horror-movie-type noise in my throat.

‘Not that scary, I hope.’ He does a Frankenstein impression then morphs into a sweet choirboy, to prove his point. ‘Anyway. I thought you might want some company.’

My head is still hammering and it’s hard to think
clearly. I haul myself to my feet. I notice we are about the same height, but Alfie is wider than me all over.

‘How did you get in?’ I ask, suspicious that this might be a trap to lure me into the child detention van.

‘Same way as you, through the café window,’ he replies. ‘It’s well cool that they didn’t board it up. Saw the fire. Man! All that smoke . . . Are you OK?’ he asks gently.

‘I wasn’t here. I mean, it started after I –’ It’s difficult to talk about the events of yesterday. I’m still so confused, not sure if this is a waking dream. ‘Shouldn’t you be getting ready for school or something?’

‘Yeah. Can’t stay long. Anyway, my mum will be back from work soon, so I’d better get going.’

‘She leaves you alone at night?’ I say, surprised.

‘It was the only job she could get, monitoring the CCTV cameras in the town centre.’ He shrugs. ‘She hates it, but we need the money.’ He thrusts his hands into the pockets of his low-slung jeans and glances at the floor. I notice that both his trainer laces are undone.

‘Don’t you get scared?’ I ask.

‘Only when I look in the mirror,’ he answers, his wide smile and thick eyebrows stretching into the funniest contortions. One moment, he looks like a geeky scientist, the next a naughty puppy with droopy ears. I start to laugh and Alfie gives me a big grin. ‘What about you?’

I want to say, ‘I’m afraid every minute of every day,’ but that sounds lame so I raise my shoulders in a ‘maybe’ sort of gesture.

‘Do you know where the crazy guy has gone?’ asks Alfie. The huskiness has returned to his voice. Must be the damp air in here.

‘Nope. And Dair’s OK,’ I state defensively. ‘I’ve lost Furball,’ I add sadly. ‘I’m going to search for her in the grounds tomorrow, just in case she’s hiding.’

‘Good plan.’ Alfie nods. There’s an awkward silence.

‘Don’t you want to know what I’m doing here?’ I ask him warily.

‘Living a life of wild adventure?’

‘Don’t be silly. I’m only thirteen.’

‘We could be twins. Kicking!’ says Alfie, pleased.

‘Get lost, I’m half Thai.’ I realise how nice it is to have someone to talk to again.

‘Have you ridden an elephant?’ he asks, impressed.

Only in my dreams, Little Bird
. ‘Nope,’ I admit. ‘Not many of those in Collingford.’

‘That’s in Zone Four, isn’t it?’ Alfie asks, then notices my discomfort. ‘Look, you don’t have to explain if you don’t want to.’

I hold his gaze for a moment, wondering if I dare begin. Can I trust him? He’s watched me for three weeks and hasn’t reported me, not even to his mum. It would be so great to have a mate my age to share secrets with. But it feels too soon, too risky, to open up.

‘I get it. Mystery Girl,’ he says. ‘That’s what I’ve called you on my blog.’

I look horrified at this and am about to lay into him about the danger of meddling in other people’s lives, when he puts a finger to his lips. ‘Kidding,’ he says
quietly. ‘Blogs have been banned, anyway.’

‘Since when?’ I ask.

‘A few weeks ago. Some new law from Europe. The president said it was a good idea,’ he replies. ‘Mum calls him Banana Head.’