One of Us (13 page)

But it's all right, because I don't know the man who is filling the coffee machine behind the counter. He looks up, and his smile hardens.

“No Hoods!” he shouts. He edges out from behind the urn. “I said no Hoods.” He fixes his eyes on mine.

Of course he means me. Look at how I'm dressed.

He steps forward.

I slam the door shut behind me and run from the cafe so that I don't have to look at the cold hate in his eyes. After a few minutes I force myself to walk, while my heart hammers against my ribs, and my wet skirt slaps against my legs.
It's not really me he hates; it's not me
, my feet pound. But when I reach the other side of the bus depot and look back at the yellow lights of the cafe, I know that it is. I am the stranger he wanted to hurt. I catch my breath under a bus shelter. A “Hood.” It's as if I'm not a person.

I didn't even have time to look for Oskar. The rain is slashing into puddles now. Where can I go? I watch a tram rattle over the bridge and into the Old City. I've never walked there before. But why not? I'm dressed in the right clothes for it. I feel a spark of excitement as I cross the road to the bridge and climb the steps.

In front of me the sooty stone of the Old City's Meeting Hall rises against the dull sky. I walk over the bridge and stop to look around. On the other side of the road a boy in a baggy gray jacket and baseball cap darts into a cafe: The Pelican. It would be warm and dry in there. But the memory of Fred's
Cafe sends a stab of fear into my stomach. Instead I walk around to the front of the Meeting Hall. It's almost as grand as the Town Hall. I look up at the entrance with its arched doorway and double staircase the width of the building.

Beside it is a rundown shopping center, and when I wander through it I come out alongside a canal basin with houseboats and barges moored up against neat walkways. The water is murky green, pitted with raindrops. I stand on the strip of grass at the edge of the water looking at the boats. The oldest-looking one has been painted with swirling flowers in bright colors against its chipped green paint. Each petal is a single free brushstroke. But I'm too cold and wet to stand still for long so I walk down the service road that goes around the shopping center. The Meeting Hall towers above me.

I look up at the entrance again. Why shouldn't I go inside? I'll fit in here. Through the glass in the door I can see that the lights are on. I have to clasp the door handle with both hands because all the blood has drained out of my fingers and left them waxwork yellow. I don't go into the grand wooden cave of the main hall, which smells like the Reception at the Institute. I follow a small corridor ending in a glowing frosted-glass door.

I can hear cups clinking and voices from inside. “It's not us it would help,” says a soft voice. “It's the young ones.”

I push the door open. It's a kitchen. Three old Brotherhood ladies are sitting around a pine table, with a teapot and green cups and saucers, and a
plate of chocolate chip cookies. All the women stop speaking and look up.

“Hello, dear,” says one. “Would you like a cup of tea?”

I think I know what they see: a nice Brotherhood girl to look after.

“Sit down.” One of the women gets up and fetches another cup and saucer. “Oh, you're wet through.” She smiles at me as she sets it on the table. Her eyes are the same color as the cornflowers on her apron. “What's your name?”

“Verity Nekton.” It just comes out.

“Nekton.” She nods, and smiles at me again. “That's a good name.”

I curl my fingers around the cup and take a long warming sip of tea. My fingers are beginning to turn red as the blood returns.

Her friend pats my arm. She has rings on all her fingers and curly hair dyed a purply shade of brown. “We're just talking about the Identity Cards, dear.”

“Identity Cards?”

“Yes, dear. What it would mean not to have cards for all us Brotherhood.”

Suddenly I think of Grandma. What if she was sitting with her friends, in her community center, drinking tea with a Brotherhood girl dressed in citizen's clothes? I can see her face change to horror and disgust.

My cup clanks back on to the saucer. I look at the woman with the washed-blue eyes. “I'm sorry, I've got to go.” My chair grates on the linoleum tiles as I stand up.

“But you haven't finished your tea, dear.” She pauses, her hand on the teapot.

I pick up my cup and gulp the rest. “Thank you so
much. You've been very kind.” Then I turn to the door.

As I walk down the corridor, I hear her gentle voice. “I think we frightened her off!”

I close the door quietly behind me as I step back out into the rain.

I
HURRY OVER
the bridge, splashing through the puddles because I can't feel my feet anymore in these shoes, which are thinner than slippers.

“Stupid useless shoes,” I mutter out loud. “Wish I had my boots.”

Where can I warm myself for a couple of hours? Department stores, the library, the shopping center? I walk through Jubilee Park toward the main shopping center. The cherry trees have just burst into flower. They splash pink against the gray lid of the sky.

I thought I'd feel more comfortable here in the New City, but it's the opposite. I hear footsteps round the corner of the ice-cream stand. Is someone following me? When I look back down the path I see the boy I saw on the bridge. His gray jacket collar is hunched up around his neck and his cap hides his face.

And maybe there is a security camera trained on me now as I walk through the park in the rain in my Brotherhood clothes. I even have a bag to keep a bomb in. I run toward the gate, looking behind me. But the park is empty.

The New City shopping center is shiny glass and marble, not gray cement and fading special offer signs. I go to the bookstore, where even a Brotherhood girl can sit and read for as long as she likes, and I pick up
the free newspaper someone left on the table.

RECONCILIATION AGREEMENT THREATENED

Critics Call for New Laws Targeting

Suspected Brotherhood Terrorists

I scan through the measures listed in the article. Some of them are familiar to me from Oskar's Manual but the curfew for all Brotherhood people is new. I flick through the rest of the paper but I can't find anything about the attack on the Institute last week. I put the paper down and get a book instead.

At last it's five thirty. I can meet the others soon, if I want to. It might be nice not to be alone. Passing the register I notice a box of paintbrushes like the one Greg gave me. Maybe he bought it here. I pick up a putty eraser and a charcoal pencil. The sales assistant puts them in a pink-striped paper bag.

As I leave the bookstore, I look around. I can't see the boy in the baseball cap. I don't think anyone is following me now. But it's hard to tell because of the crowds surging toward Central Station.

The others aren't at the bus stop. I huddle into my jacket under the shelter, watching darts of rain slant down. In a puddle beside the curb, a rainbow gleams in the grease.

Maybe they've left without me.

CHAPTER 14

W
HEN I SEE
the three of them coming toward me across the concourse, I can't stop the grin that spreads over my face.

As I climb the bus steps, my bag slips off my shoulder. Greg is behind me and his hand reaches around me to catch it. Celestina and Emanuel share a seat because they're still worrying about their Math problem. I sit in the seat behind. I don't expect Greg to sit beside me, but he does. He doesn't seem to mind me being with them now. Maybe he was worried about his class before. He reaches down and puts my bag on the floor beside my feet.

The bus grinds through the Old City, past the cluttered shops and featureless office blocks and the houses with their golden lights. Each house looks like a warm haven. I know they may not be. It's just how they look to me, with my face pressed against the glass and my teeth chattering.

“Verity.” Greg touches my arm.

“Mmm?” Why is he suddenly friendly again? I can't work him out.

“You look very cold,” he says. “You want my jacket?”

“No, it's OK,” I begin, but Greg takes his jacket off anyway and wraps it over my shoulders. It's like his checked shirts, red plaid, with wool on the outside and padding on the inside. “It'll get wet,” I say.

“Doesn't matter.” He tucks it around me, under my chin and behind my shoulders.

His jacket's still warm. It's heaven.

“Thanks,” I say. “Was your Math class good?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Greg leans down to rummage in his backpack. He takes out half a bar of chocolate and offers me some. The chocolate melts around my teeth. I didn't realize how hungry I was.

Greg breaks a piece off and passes the rest through the gap in the seats in front.

I tuck my arms into the soft cotton of his jacket and close my eyes. I want to sleep, not think, but as soon as I shut my eyes, thoughts jostle for attention; the man in the cafe, the footsteps behind me . . . I push them away.

I'm warming up. Tears of rain run down the glass. Greg leans forward to argue with Celestina. I listen to them until I drift off, my head
bump-bumping
against the pane.

The bus is growling uphill when I wake up. My head has fallen the other way, against Greg's shoulder. I stay very still, pretending to be asleep. I can feel the warmth of his arm against my cheek. I can see his hand, holding an open book. It was so simple when Greg and I were working together to hide Serafina under the laurel bush. Just for a moment I close my eyes and imagine I'm who they all think I am. I know Greg suspects me of something. But for this one moment, I'm pretending he doesn't.

“Verity,” says Greg.

I sit up and move away from him.

“We're nearly there.”

Outside I can make out the dark shapes of the fir trees that surround the Institute.

I reach down for my bag and feel the rustle of the paper bag from the bookstore. I take it out and hand it to Greg. “I got this for you.”

“Oh!” he sounds shocked, but peers inside. “Yeah. Thanks. That's cool.” He tucks it away in his backpack and gives me an uncertain smile.

I look straight into his eyes. He seems suddenly . . . doubtful, and that makes for a nice change.

“No problem,” I say.

I reach back down to get my bag, but it's fallen open and my purse has slid out onto the floor. I fish around, the blood rushing to my head.

When I pull the bag up to my knees, I see why it's open. “The button's come off.”

“I'll look for it.” Greg gets down on his hands and knees and scrabbles about under the seats. He even gets out a little flashlight on a key ring. He has to wind it up first.

I stop myself from laughing.

“Nope,” he says as he comes back up. “Nothing there.”

He takes out the paper bag I gave him and looks at the charcoal pencil and the putty eraser. “Great.” He takes out the eraser. “I needed one of these.” He smiles at me, a warm, friendly smile.

He's never smiled at me like that before.

CHAPTER 15

W
E TRUDGE UP
the gravel drive. A dark silhouette stands behind the glass door into Reception. Brer Magnus. He waits, unmoving. As we go through the gate, he opens the door.

“Ah, Verity.” He steps back to let us in.

The sight of Brer Magnus wipes away the memory of my friendly bus ride in an instant.

“You've got a visitor.”

I can't read the expression on his face. It could
be disapproval, or even pleasure in catching me out.

Celestina gives me a knowing look. Greg pauses in the doorway. He isn't smiling at me anymore.

Is it Oskar? Surely that's too risky?

“I've put her in the waiting room,” says Brer Magnus. “It's your social worker.” There's no hiding the disapproval in his voice.