Desperate Measures (12 page)

‘Let’s go to the shop and buy some stuff,’ said Jamie.

‘Yeah, come on!’

But as usual Vicky was being a pain.

‘No way. We can’t risk it. They’re looking for us. We all turn up at the shop and that’s it. Game over.’

‘We could dress up so no one knows it’s us,’ I said.

‘What as – the three little pigs?’ said Jamie.

‘Jamie’s got his spiderman suit.’

‘Back home. And it’s “age five”. It doesn’t fit any more.’

‘Look, we’re not dressing up, OK Re? One, we’ve got nothing to dress up in, two, we’d look really stupid and three, everyone would notice us straight away.’

‘Well I think it’s a good plan.’

‘Trust me, it’s not.’ Vicky went out of the cave and Jamie turned to me.

‘Come on. I’ve got an idea.’

‘What?’

‘Let’s go and find some roots and berries,’ he whispered.

‘What for?’

‘To eat of course. That’s what they always do in survival stories and stuff.’

‘OK,’ I said.

‘But don’t tell Vicky.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because she’ll stop us. You know her.’

‘Yeah. Always fussing.’

‘Anyway . . . she wouldn’t know a root if it was hanging off her nose,’ said Jamie with a giggle.

I gently put the tin down in a corner of the cave. I tucked Jamie’s T-shirt over the rabbit so he wouldn’t be cold and put my little penguin next to him so he wouldn’t be lonely, then we went out. Vicky was sitting outside. She asked where we were going.

‘Nowhere,’ said Jamie.

‘Don’t go far.’

‘We won’t.’

‘It’ll be dark soon. Stay together!’

We followed the stream for a bit and then started looking
for berries. I don’t know where they all were but we couldn’t find any. We were just going to give up when I saw some green ones. Jamie thought they were blackberries but they weren’t ripe. There weren’t any other berries so I said to Jamie we’d better just get some nice roots. Jamie said good idea and started digging at the ground with his hands. They got covered in brown mud but he kept digging and digging one hole then another one and another. Then he pulled something up. It looked like a big hairy worm.

‘I’m not eating worms Jamie.’ Ollie Stanmore ate a worm once for a dare and then he was sick over Charlene Slackton’s new shoes. They had peepholes and it all squelched out over her toes. It made me feel yucky just thinking about it.

‘It’s not a worm, it’s a root.’

‘Oh.’

He put it to his nose and sniffed it.

‘What does it smell like?’ I asked.

Jamie shrugged and put it under my nose.

‘Eurgh! Smells like a worm!’

‘It’s not a worm, all right? It’s not a worm! It’s a flipping root!’

I watched him sniff it again. He made a face then threw it back on the ground.

‘Aren’t you going to eat it?’ I asked.

‘No.’

I’m glad. Being sick is horrible. Especially when bits of chewed up worm come down your nose.

‘Let’s just get some leaves instead,’ I said.

Jamie picked a couple off a tree and we nibbled one each but they were disgusting. We spat them out. It was getting dark and Jamie was cross.

‘If we could have lit a fire we could have cooked a wild pig or something,’ he said.

‘Where would we get a wild pig?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know – here in the woods . . .’

‘But we can’t even find any berries.’

‘Shut up Re.’

‘I’m hungry!’ I told him.

‘So am I!’

‘But you said we’d get something to eat. You said —’

‘Shut up!’ he shouted really crossly.

‘But —’

‘Shut up, just shut up or I’ll . . . I’ll cook your stupid rabbit.’

I looked at him. ‘You wouldn’t dare!’

‘I would. Yum yum . . . Rabbit stew, here we come . . .’

He laughed really nastily and turned round to go. I pushed past him and started running. I had to get back to the cave before him and make sure he didn’t touch Peter.

It was getting dark when Jamie came back. I was furious.

‘I said don’t go far! Where the hell have you been? And where’s Re?’

Jamie shrugged.

‘She ran on. She should have been back ages before me.’

‘You let her go off by herself?’

He wouldn’t look me in the eye. I caught hold of him but he twisted away from me. ‘I can’t help it if she runs off, can I?’ he shouted.

‘Jamie – you know she doesn’t go anywhere on her own. You know that. We have to look after her – she can’t look after herself.’

Jamie looked uncomfortable. I ran into the cave and grabbed his torch from the shelf, glancing at the rabbit.
It was still curled up in the tin next to the little penguin ornament. I could see its ribs faintly moving as it laboured to breathe. I didn’t need to be a vet to know things looked pretty pear-shaped.

Outside the cave, Jamie was scuffing the dirt with the toe of his trainer. He looked upset.

‘I’m going to find her,’ I said.

‘I want to come with you.’

‘No. You’ve got to stay here. If she does manage to find her way back, she’ll wonder where we are.’

I turned on the torch. Its faint beam lit up a tiny circle of ground. Jamie pulled a face.

‘The batteries are run down. I let Re play with it.’

I quickly turned it off, thinking I might need it more later. I glanced around me. The woods looked different in the dimming light. Unfriendly and unwelcoming. I set off alongside the stream half wishing I’d asked Jamie to come with me.

Then I thought of Re and I felt sick. I didn’t like the dark much, but ever since Mum died Re had been absolutely petrified of it. I had to find her quickly.

I scoured the woods calling out her name. There was no reply, only the rustling of leaves and the snuffling of what I hoped and kept telling myself were just cute little woodland animals. Once or twice I allowed myself to get spooked and swung round, terrified and convinced there was someone or something following me. Then in the distance I heard the faint whine of motorbikes. Thinking I must be nearer the road than I realised, I
turned away from the noise but must have misjudged where it was coming from as the whine became louder and more insistent and grew into a roar. It was then I saw Jamie about ten metres behind. The little tyke had followed me. I was furious and about to lay into him when, through the darkness, two separate headlights beamed around the woods illuminating trees and bushes. I motioned angrily to Jamie to hide and we both ducked down low so whoever they were wouldn’t see us. Two dirt bikes threaded their way through the trees, revving as they mounted each slope and screeching down the other side. I knew Jamie would have been impressed and just prayed that he had enough sense to keep his head down. We couldn’t afford to be spotted by anyone. I watched the riders weave their way into the distance. At one point, one of them tried to swerve round a bush but he misjudged the angle and nearly came off the bike, swearing noisily as he got his balance back and revved off. At last they were gone, the whining sound slowly faded and I got up from my hiding place. Without their headlights it was frighteningly dark. I called softly to Jamie and he emerged from the shadows. He was soaking wet.

‘Couldn’t you have found a dry place to hide?’ I hissed angrily.

‘I couldn’t help it . . . I slipped over.’ He was shivering and his teeth chattered uncontrollably.

‘I told you to stay at the cave.’

‘I was worried about Re. It was my fault she ran off.’

His grimy face was streaked with the tracks of his tears. I softened.

‘Come on. We’ll find her.’

I turned on the torch. Its faint beam was pathetic but it was all we had.

It was too dark. And everything looked different. The cave wasn’t where it was before so I didn’t know which way to go. I wanted Vicky but I was too scared to shout for her in case they heard me. You know who I mean. The things with sharp teeth and claws, the things that come out from their hiding places just when you’re on your own and suck out your insides before you even see them. The shadow things. I knew they were waiting. Hiding. They like the dark. They want you to think they’re not there because you can’t see them. But I knew just where they were. They were behind the trees. When the branches tap on your window in the middle of the night. That’s them. They used to tap on the window outside Mum’s room at the hospital but I always asked one of the nurses to leave the light on all the way through the night. Maybe one night they forgot so
that was why Mum wasn’t there in the morning. Maybe it was the shadow things that took her away.

I didn’t want to think about this so I kept walking really quietly. Then through the trees I saw some really bright lights moving about and it suddenly got noisy. The monsters were coming to get me! The lights got nearer and nearer and then I saw it wasn’t shadow monsters at all, it was people on motorbikes. It was too late to run off. One of them shouted at me and pointed and then they both started riding their bikes round and round me in a circle like they were playing a game. I didn’t like it. They didn’t have helmets on so I could see their faces. It was the boy and girl that got off the bus. They rode their bikes closer and closer. I was scared they were going to run me over.

I told them to go away but they didn’t take any notice. The girl looked at the boy then turned round and with a nasty smile started to drive her bike straight at me. I shut my eyes and felt her whoosh past. The boy followed. The front of his bike scraped against my legs and I fell over backwards into the mud. They both laughed. I got up and ran. They chased after me for a bit but then I tripped over a big sticking-out tree root and fell on the ground again. Now I started yelling and yelling as loud as I could. I didn’t care any more if the shadow monsters heard me or not.

We heard Rhianna’s shouts and found her cowering in a ditch between some tree roots, crying uncontrollably.

‘Re! Are you OK?’ I asked as Jamie pulled her to her feet.

‘I told them to stop but they wouldn’t. They wouldn’t stop!’

I put my arms round her and hugged her tightly. Gradually the sobbing slowed to a few random hiccups. She grew calm and we helped her brush the mud from her clothes and hair.

‘It’s all right now. They’ve gone. Let’s get back to the cave. We’ll be safe there.’

We started to retrace our steps, but it was harder than I thought and we seemed to be going round and round in circles. It was more by luck than judgement that we
eventually found our way back. After seeing the same fallen tree for the second time, I was just beginning to give up when I spotted a stream. With our fingers crossed that it was ours, we started to follow it. We were lucky. It was our stream and it led us all the way back to the cave. Jamie was quiet as he pulled off his wet clothes and crawled into his sleeping bag.

‘I’m sorry, Vicky,’ he muttered as he snuggled down inside.

I heard a muffled sob from his direction and saw him turn his head away from me. I remembered he was only a kid.

‘It’s all right. Forget it now.’

‘But what are we going to do? We haven’t got anything to eat. We’ve got to eat.’

‘Go to sleep now. Things’ll look better in the morning.’

I slept really badly that night. I had dream after dream about food. Plates of bangers and mash, school dinner sponge and custard, piles of cakes and biscuits – lovely, luscious, delicious food but always out of reach, either on the other side of a ravine or suspended over a pit of snakes or guarded by a pack of vicious wolves. I was just about to get my hands on a huge double cheese and pineapple pizza when I woke to find Rhianna shaking me. I looked out of the cave entrance and saw it was morning already. Jamie was awake too and the pair of them were staring down at me as if I had the power to produce a full-blown fry-up from inside my sleeping bag.

‘I’m starving. And so is Peter.’ She thrust the rabbit under my nose. Its eyes were glazed and its nostrils caked
with brown gunk. Food was probably the last thing on its mind. I looked at Re and Jamie, expecting, depending on me to do something. But what? I thought about Daniel. What if he had gone away for a few days? He and his parents had left carrying a holdall and rucksack. And they’d taken Jip. Even if Daniel was back now, he’d been really angry with us yesterday. What if he didn’t want anything more to do with us? I sighed.

‘OK. We’ll go to the shop. But we’re going to have to be very, very careful.’

I reached over and found my purse. Hopefully, I emptied the contents on to my sleeping bag. My heart sank. We had precisely fifty-five pence. At least we could buy some matches so we could light a fire and cook the last few potatoes.

We reached the village just as the shop was opening up. We hid behind the old village hall with its painted corrugated iron walls and watched as the lady in the flowery apron darted in and out, carrying boxes of fruit and veg which she placed on a slatted bench in front of the window. As she worked, she greeted people as they passed and still managed to keep up a monologue to someone inside.

‘Alf, these carrots are on the turn! Morning, Mrs Gratton – not looking so good today, is it? Alf, bring me out some of those bananas, would you? Still, if we get a bit of rain it’ll do the garden good, won’t it? They’re in the back storeroom! Mr Gratton all right, is he? Nasty thing arthritis. My mother suffered terrible. That knitting pattern’s in . . .’

It was now or never. I turned to Jamie and Re.

‘Wait here,’ I told them.

‘But I want to come too,’ pleaded Re.

‘No. Stay here with Jamie.’

‘Please!’

‘People are looking for three runaway kids. Our pictures have been on the telly and in the papers. If I’m on my own, there’s less chance I’ll be recognised.’

‘But what if you get caught?’

I hesitated before I replied, hoping neither of them detected the worry hiding in my voice.

‘I won’t. Now stay out of sight. I’ll be back in a minute.’

I smoothed down my matted hair, brushed a patch of dried mud off my jeans then took a deep breath and started walking as calmly as I could towards the shop. I knew I had to behave as normally as possible but felt as if there was a hammer banging away in my chest that could be heard a mile away.