Clomp-squeak-clomp-squeak …
There were people up ahead. Walking down the road. Grey shapes in the rain. More crazies probably. Ed gripped the armrests of his seat, ready for the jolt as they were knocked aside.
As the coach drew nearer, the walkers must have heard it. They turned round, their faces white streaks.
‘Wait!’ Ed shouted, leaning forward, craning to get a better look.
‘What’s the matter?’ the driver barked. ‘Sit down.’
‘Stop the coach. You have to stop. It’s Jack!’
17
‘What’s going on?’
The boys came warily up the steps. They looked wet and confused, but unharmed. Archie Bishop and Matt came first, with their younger followers. Then finally Jack. He looked at Ed, frowning.
‘What is this?’
‘We were attacked.’ Ed said it with a hint of shame in his voice, as if it had been his fault.
‘Attacked? Who by?’
‘Older kids. Teenagers, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen. There were too many of them for us. The coach came …’
Now Jack looked properly at the driver for the first time, then back to Ed.
‘Who is he?’ he said with a hint of accusation.
‘My name’s Greg,’ said the driver. ‘Greg Thorne. And if you want to come to London get off them steps and go sit down.’
Jack still looked at Ed. ‘He’s an adult.’
‘Oi!’ Greg shouted. ‘You can talk to my face, sunshine, or you can get off my bus.’
‘I don’t mean to be rude,’ said Jack.
‘Then don’t be,’ Greg snapped. ‘I’ve saved your mates’ sorry arses here. I think a thank-you would be in order, don’t you?’
‘It’s just …’ Jack looked uncomfortable, hovering halfway up the steps. ‘Everything that’s happened … You must admit it’s hard for us to trust anyone older than we are.’
‘The door’s still open,’ said Greg, nodding towards the outside world, where the rain was falling more heavily now. ‘You want to take your chances out there, that’s fine by me. But make up your mind – you’re letting all the heat out.’
Jack came up one step and looked along the coach. Matt and his gang had already made their way to where the survivors from the chapel group were sitting, urgently catching up with what had happened.
‘Do I look like I’m diseased?’ Greg said, jutting out his jaw in a challenge. ‘Do I act like I’m diseased? Can any of those dozy sods out there drive one of these things? They can’t even speak no more, let alone master a three-point turn. So I’m your best hope, pal. Your only bleeding hope. An adult with a clean bill of health and a bloody big bus.’
Jack came up the last couple of steps.
‘Thanks, Mr Thorne,’ he said stiffly.
‘Don’t bother with the Mr Thorne crap. You can just call me Greg – everyone else does.’
‘OK.’
Jack sat down next to Ed.
‘Did you see anyone else?’ Ed asked. ‘Did you have any trouble?’
‘No. The only trouble was being stuck with Matt and Archie and having to listen to their bollocks. So what happened to you then?’
Jack said it as if Ed had had some minor upset. How could he have known what it had really been like? For him the last half-hour had been nothing more than a boring walk through the rain.
‘Did anyone get hurt?’
Ed stared out of the window, unable to catch Jack’s eye. ‘Yes,’ he said quietly.
‘Badly?’
Ed couldn’t hold it in any longer. All the bottled-up fear and frustration and rage came pouring out.
‘Look around you, Jack, look who’s here,’ he shouted. ‘Can’t you see?’
‘You lost people?’
Ed nodded.
‘How many?’
‘I don’t know, I haven’t checked. I can’t face it, Jack.’
‘How many?’ Jack jumped up and started to make his way down the length of the coach.
Ed followed him. ‘What difference does it make?’
‘Who’s missing?’
‘They’re not missing, Jack, they’re dead.’ Ed grabbed Jack’s shoulder and pulled him back. ‘There was nothing we could do, OK? If Greg hadn’t come along, we’d all be dead.’
‘So it was all down to Greg?’ said Jack.
‘Yes.’
‘Not you? You didn’t do anything?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You didn’t whack any of them?’
Jack stared at Ed. Ed tried to say something but it just came out as mumbled nonsense.
‘I’ve seen you, Ed, in a fight,’ said Jack. ‘Or rather should I say I’ve not seen you in a fight.’
‘Please, Jack.’
‘You can’t hit them, can you? You won’t get your hands dirty. You’re bloody useless.’
Before Ed could protest Jack had turned away and was walking on down the aisle.
Ed felt like crying, but knew he had to hold it together. The thing was, Jack was right: he still couldn’t bring himself to hit any of them. He’d hoped Jack hadn’t noticed. But Jack didn’t miss a thing.
‘Malik?’ Jack called out. ‘I don’t see Malik?’
Ed caught up with him.
‘No,’ he said, the word catching in his throat. ‘He didn’t make it. This is all that’s left of us.’
‘Jesus.’
Jack was trying to take it in. Who else was dead? He spotted Bam. At least Bam was all right. He was sitting with Piers who had blood seeping from a head wound. Bam was trying to bandage him with a piece of ripped shirt.
‘Where’s Johnno and the others?’ Jack asked him.
Bam just shook his head.
‘All three of them?’ Jack couldn’t believe it.
‘Yes.’
‘But they were hard guys. They were good fighters.’
‘You weren’t there, Jack,’ said Bam, staring Jack down. ‘You don’t know what it was like. They ambushed us. There was nothing we could do. It was a bloody massacre. You had no right to talk to Ed like that. Ed looked after the little kids, and the girl. I saw him. He got us all on the bus. So you apologize to him. Right now.’
Jack dropped his head, put a hand out and squeezed Ed’s arm.
‘I’m sorry, mate,’ he said quietly. ‘I shouldn’t have said that. I was out of order. It’s just … It’s not real. It’s totally freaked me out. I said goodbye to you all less than an hour ago. Who’s left?’
He carried on checking the seats. Ed walked behind him.
Justin the nerd was sitting by himself, his head in his hands. Both his friends were missing. Jack couldn’t see any of the Field House boys.
‘They can’t all be dead.’
‘They are.’
Matt was sitting with the remaining four boys from the church group who hadn’t set off with him to London.
‘You should have come with me,’ he said as Ed went past. ‘The Lamb would have protected you.’
‘Shut up, Matt!’ Ed yelled at him. ‘Your poxy made-up religion wouldn’t have made any difference.’
‘But it did make a difference, didn’t it?’ said Matt with a smug smile. ‘We weren’t touched.’
‘That was just luck.’
‘Was it?’
‘Leave it, Ed.’ Jack kept walking. ‘There’s no point in arguing with him. I’ve tried it.’
Frédérique was all right, as were Kwanele and Chris Marker, who as usual had his head buried in a book, oblivious to the world. Arthur and Wiki were sitting together. They looked very pale and shocked, but at least they were unhurt.
Further back were a little boy and a girl with long curly black hair, who Jack didn’t recognize. Greg must have picked them up earlier. They looked at Jack and Ed as if they were intruders, strangers who had got into their safe place, but then the girl smiled at them. A big open friendly smile showing tiny white teeth.
‘Hello,’ she said, ‘my name’s Zohra. I’m nine. This is my
brother, Froggie. He’s seven. I’m looking after him until Mum gets back. We’re going to London. Everything’s going to be all right there, Greg said so.’
Froggie smiled too now. The smile was so hopeful and trusting it broke Jack’s heart. He was aptly named. He had big, slightly bulging eyes and a wide mouth. Jack wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that he had webbed feet.
‘Yeah,’ he said kindly. ‘Everything’s going to be all right.’
‘I’ve never been to London,’ said Froggie. ‘I want to go on the London Eye.’
Jack was about to say something to try to reassure the little boy when he was stopped by a shout from the back of the bus that hit him like a slap.
‘Hey. You. Ketchup face! What’s your name?’
18
There were three girls half hidden behind a wall of cardboard boxes, as far back as they could get on the bus. There were loads more boxes stacked up around them and crates of bottled water wrapped in plastic film.
Jack walked towards them. ‘Are you talking to me?’ he asked as he got nearer.
‘Don’t see no one else with crap all over their face.’
The girl sniggered and a hot flush of anger passed through Jack, as if his blood had suddenly turned to acid. He glared at the girls. At first it was as if the three of them were one single creature, the way a gang of girls can be, stronger than their individual parts. They looked to be about his age, dressed in clothes that must once have been fashionable, but were now dirty and tattered. They were a riot of bright colours, big hair, too much make-up, broken accessories and ripped tights, like a new girl band with an extreme image.
Apocalypse Divas …
There was an overpowering smell of cheap perfume coming off them. Presumably they’d drowned themselves in the stuff to hide the fact that none of them had had a shower in ages.
Jack was suddenly aware of his own body odour in the cramped confines of the bus, made worse by the damp fumes rising from his soggy clothes.
It was the pretty blonde one in the aisle seat chewing gum who’d shouted at him. She looked at him defiantly. Daring him to say something.
Jack just stood there, too angry to speak.
‘You been in a fight then?’ she asked.
‘Yeah, I’ve been in lots,’ Jack snapped. ‘But that’s got nothing to do with this.’ He put a hand to his birthmark.
The girl carried on staring at him. Like a fussy shopper wondering whether to buy something.
‘So, what is that all over your face, then?’
‘It’s a birthmark.’
‘A birthmark? You mean you was born like that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Does it hurt?’
‘No.’
‘Why don’t you do something about it then? You know, get it removed? Like a tattoo? Can’t you get it removed?’
Jack shrugged. His anger was fading away. At least this girl was direct and honest. Most people when they first met him were embarrassed and pretended not to notice anything different about him, and then they’d secretly stare at him when they thought he wasn’t looking.
‘So, what’s your name, then?’ she asked, her jaw working away at the gum.
‘Jack.’
‘Jack,’ she repeated, trying it out. ‘Are you lot all, like, from the same school, or something?’
‘Yes. Rowhurst.’
‘Never heard of it. Must be posh. You look posh. Some of you is wearing suits. Only posh kids wear suits. Are you rich?’
Jack shrugged again.
The blonde girl nodded to Ed, who was hanging back behind Jack. ‘Who’s your friend?’
‘I’m Ed.’
‘I’m Ed,’ she mimicked him. ‘You’re even posher than he is. I bet you’re a millionaire.’
‘Money doesn’t really exist any more, does it?’
‘Yeah, but were you a millionaire?’
Ed laughed. ‘No.’
‘Was it horrible back there?’ asked the girl nearest the window, whose black hair and dark skin were almost the opposite of her blonde friend. ‘We couldn’t look.’
‘It was pretty bad,’ said Ed. ‘We lost a lot of mates.’
‘I’m sorry.’ The girl offered him a sad smile.
‘My name’s Aleisha, by the way,’ she added, then nodded to her blonde friend. ‘She’s Brooke. She’s got a well big mouth on her, but she’s a’right.’
‘I ain’t a’right,’ said Brooke. ‘I’m a right bitch, but I’m pretty so I can get away with it. Unlike Aleisha who’s an ugly little midget and has to be nice to everyone.’
‘Ha, ha,’ said Aleisha. ‘Everyone knows I’m prettier than you.’
‘On what planet? My butt is prettier than you, Mrs Shrek.’
The three girls laughed.
Jack felt self-conscious, awkward. He’d always been slightly nervous around girls, not helped by his birthmark. Ed was different. Ed was easy and relaxed with everyone. Didn’t matter who. Already he was settling down comfortably on the edge of a seat, leaning forward, smiling at the girl’s jokes. Jack stood there in the aisle feeling like an idiot, shuffling from one foot to the other. He wanted to go, but thought it might look like he was running away from them.
Ed wasn’t hanging back.
‘What are you called?’ he asked, eyeballing the third girl.
‘That’s Courtney,’ said Aleisha.
‘We’re like a set,’ said Courtney, who was larger than her friends, not exactly fat, but not thin either. Her hair was scraped back and she had a nasty bruise under one eye that she’d tried to hide with make-up.
‘Brooke’s like white bread,’ Courtney went on. ‘Aleisha’s black, I’m half and half.’
‘You’re a sort of yellow,’ said Aleisha.
‘I ain’t yellow,’ said Courtney indignantly. ‘Do I look yellow to you?’
‘Yeah, an’ I’m not black neither,’ said Aleisha. ‘Black is like black, like black ink. My skin ain’t black. It’s brown. I’m African-Caribbean. Not like you, I don’t know what you are.’
‘Who are you kidding, sister?’ said Courtney. ‘You’re black as they come.’
‘So how did you end up on the bus, then?’ Ed interrupted before they got into another argument. ‘Were you all friends before?’
‘This is our bus!’ said Brooke.
‘Your bus?’
‘Our bus!’ said Courtney and Aleisha together.
‘We was on a school journey, near Bilbao, in Spain.’
‘Spain’s a dump,’ said Courtney. ‘Don’t go there.’
‘We was there when people started getting, like, sick,’ said Aleisha. ‘It was really scary, like a disaster movie or something. At first it looked like we was gonna be stuck there, but in the end our teachers said we had to try and get home. We drove all the way across Spain and France to get to the ferry, and all the time it was getting worser and worser. We heard it on the radio. Our mobiles wasn’t working, so we couldn’t speak to none of our families nor no one.’
‘By the time we got to the ferry the port was closed,’ said Courtney. ‘The French ferry people was on, like, strike. They said they didn’t want to spread the disease.’
‘We was in this, like, grotty hotel for ages in Calais,’ said Aleisha. ‘With no food.’
‘Calais is a dump,’ said Courtney. ‘I am not ever going back to Calais, man.’
Brooke took up the story. ‘Some of the kids went off with a teacher to, like, try and get back on their own,’ she said. ‘But in the end the British government arranged for this, like, special ferry to bring everyone back who was stuck there. We was the last ferry out of France.’
‘It was horrible,’ said Aleisha. ‘People was going mad trying to get on, but because we was, like, children, they let us go, yeah?’
‘Back in England it was worse, though,’ said Brooke. ‘The roads was all jammed, people getting sick and going nuts all over the place. We couldn’t believe it. Half our teachers was losing it big time. We had to get o
ff the motorway in the end. Our driver was getting sick. We went to a place called Ashford.’
‘Ashford’s a dump,’ said Courtney.
‘Some more kids split when we got there,’ said Aleisha. ‘But we didn’t know what to do. It was all happening so fast. That’s what was really freaking us out. It was like the end of the world or something. Nothing was working and there was people everywhere, just sort of wandering about, and more and more of them was getting sick. It was horrible. Some of the kids got in a fight with some grown-ups. Then one of the teachers tried driving the bus. Took us to the, like, what do you call it, the countryside.’
‘The countryside’s a dump,’ said Courtney.
‘That was the last teacher,’ said Aleisha. ‘Mr Betts. He was a’right. Looked after us, but then even he’s got sick.’
‘We was stuck on the bus in the middle of the countryside,’ said Courtney. ‘With all these grown-ups around.’
‘It was like a what-d’you-ma-call-it, a siege or something,’ said Aleisha. ‘They was all, like, trying to get on the bus. Luckily Greg come along and sorted them out, but us three’s the only ones who made it out of, like, a hundred.’
‘There was never a hundred of us,’ said Brooke.
‘Well, there was a lot.’
‘Greg’s rescued us last night,’ said Courtney. ‘We been a’right since then. It ain’t so bad on here. We got food and water and a toilet. But it’s bare slow, because most of the roads is blocked. Is a nightmare. We got to keep going round other ways, stopping and starting, avoiding people, going back the way we come. I dunno how long it’d normally take, but Greg’s already been driving for, like, hours.’
‘I reckon we’ll be a’right now,’ said Aleisha. ‘There’s more of us. Greg keeps picking people up. It’s better with more people. And you boys look tough enough.’
‘You can stay,’ said Courtney with a snigger.
‘So long as you do what we tell you,’ said Brooke. ‘Our bus, our rules.’
‘Where’s Greg taking you all, though?’ said Jack.
‘He’s gonna get us to London so’s we can go home,’ said Courtney.