Desperate Measures (13 page)

‘Morning, dear . . .’

‘Hello,’ my voice wobbled. I pushed the corners of my mouth up into a smile as I tried to stop myself shaking. I quickly walked past her and into the shop.

‘Be with you in a moment,’ she called after me.

The shop was empty. No sign of Alf. Near the door was a wire stand with fresh loaves of bread, cakes and sausage rolls sitting on white doilies. The smallest loaf cost eighty pence. As I looked at it hungrily, my stomach gave out a huge rumble in sympathy. The delicious smell of fresh baked bread filled the tiny room. I stared at the golden bumpy crust just waiting to be torn apart to reveal the soft
white inside, and my mouth watered like it had never watered before.

Peeping through the door, I saw the woman with her back to me, chatting nineteen to the dozen with someone. I knew it was wrong but we needed food to survive. We were desperate. I reached out, snatched the loaf and tucked it under my arm. There were three sausage rolls on the rack underneath. I grabbed them too and stuffed them in my jacket pocket. Unable to stop myself, I wheeled round and filled my other pocket with several bars of chocolate. Then I shoved a packet of biscuits and a tin of ham down inside my jacket, bracing my arm across my stomach to stop anything falling out. I was about to take a block of cheese when the woman bustled back in. I froze in panic, my face burning. I felt sick as I looked down at my scruffy clothes bulging with the things I’d stolen.

‘Now then. Just the loaf was it, dear?’ she asked.

She hadn’t noticed. I had to stay cool.

‘Um . . . and a box of matches, please.’

She turned momentarily to take down the matches from a high shelf. This was my chance. All I had to do was run past her out of the door and I’d be safe. For what seemed like an eternity but must have been only a nightmare split second, I hesitated, my feet rooted to the spot. The moment was lost as she swung round, blocking the shop doorway behind her. I was trapped.

‘On holiday, are you dear?’ she said pleasantly as she handed me the matches.

I nodded dumbly, acutely aware of my bedraggled
appearance and desperately praying she wouldn’t notice my bulging pockets. The packet of biscuits had worked its way round to my hip and was threatening to slip out from under my jacket at any moment. I tried to edge it back up with my elbow.

The shop door opened. Someone else was coming in. I didn’t dare look. It was probably Alf. There were now two of them to catch me. I wouldn’t stand a chance. Another second and they’d put two and two together and realise something wasn’t right. Another two seconds and my stash would come slipping out from under my jacket and cascade on to the floor. Angrily, they’d bar the door, Alf would call the police, they’d arrive in a flash, Re and Jamie would be rounded up and we’d all be sent back in disgrace to Mrs Frankish who would frostily dispatch us to wherever she felt fit without a qualm. This was it. The end of our journey. The end of us as a family.

‘Lovely part of the world, isn’t it? Wouldn’t live anywhere else if you paid me,’ the woman was saying. ‘That’s one pound and five pence, please.’

Sweating and playing for time, I fumbled in my half empty purse then gave all the money I had to the woman.

‘Ooh. There’s only fifty-five pence here.’

‘Think you might have dropped this outside,’ said a voice from behind me. I swung round. It was Daniel. He was holding out a fifty pence piece. I had never been more glad to see anyone in my whole life.

‘Oh yes . . . Thank you.’

He handed it to the woman who was now staring at me oddly.

I didn’t wait for her response. Red-faced with shame, I quickly scurried past them to the door and ran out across the road and round the back of the village hall where Jamie and Re were waiting.

‘What’s up, Vick?’ asked Jamie when he saw my face.

I shook my head. I couldn’t speak. If I’d have tried to say anything I knew I would have burst into tears there and then.

Daniel came out of the shop a little bit after Vicky. I waved to him. He stopped, looked round then walked over to us. I gave him a big hug.

‘We thought you’d gone away!’ I said.

‘I went over to my gran’s for the night. We got home about half an hour ago.’

‘Come back with us to the cave, Daniel, I want to show you Peter.’

‘Who’s Peter?’

‘My rabbit.’

I asked Vicky if it was all right and Daniel could come with us. She didn’t say anything. She just nodded.

‘We can all be friends again,’ I told her.

She still didn’t say anything.

‘Don’t you like Daniel any more?’ I asked her.

‘It’s not that,’ she said, kicking the ground.

‘Didn’t you get any food?’ I asked.

‘Yeah I got some.’

She wouldn’t tell me what she got. She was in a right moody. I don’t know why. Jamie wasn’t talking to Daniel either, so I walked with him and told him all about Peter.

Daniel said he’d show us a short cut. As we walked past an old church we saw two dirt bikes on the ground.

Then we saw them. They were sitting on the steps at the back, smoking and laughing.

‘It’s them from last night,’ I said, moving closer to Vicky.

Daniel was worried too. He looked round as if he wanted to run away. The girl looked up and stared straight at him.

‘Hey, it’s Lurgy Boy!’ she shouted. She threw her cigarette on to the grass. ‘How’s your lurgy, Lurgy Boy?’

She laughed and turned to the boy. He nodded back at her. Then they got up and started walking over to us.

‘Who are your saddo new friends, Lurgy Boy?’

The girl stared at me. I tried to hide behind Vicky.

‘Hey, it’s that retard from last night – you want to watch where you’re going if you don’t want to get run over . . . Retard.’

Jamie looked really angry – he was ready to whack them both. Vicky caught his arm and pulled him back.

‘Let’s just walk the other way,’ whispered Daniel, turning round.

‘You’re not running back to Mummy today, Lurgy Boy. You stay right where you are!’

Daniel started to turn away.

‘I said stay, Lurgy Boy!’

Daniel stayed. He looked very small. The bullies went up to him.

‘Now then, what are you Lurgy Boy?’ said the girl. ‘Tell these saddos what you are.’

‘He’s our friend,’ I said to the girl. ‘Stop teasing him!’

‘Stay out of this retard,’ said the girl, spinning round to me.

Daniel stepped forward. ‘Leave her alone,’ he shouted in a wobbly voice. ‘She hasn’t done anything.’

‘Ooooh . . . Come over all brave, have we now? That’s new. I wonder what’s got into Lurgy Boy?’

‘I’ll find out,’ said the boy. He leapt on Daniel’s back and locked his arms round his neck. Daniel struggled with him but the boy was much bigger and stronger. Daniel started making coughing noises.

‘Nope! Same old Lurgy Boy!’

‘Stop it!’ Vicky shouted.

With a roar Jamie ran forward, grabbed the boy and ripped him off Daniel. The boy yelled. He thumped on to the ground. Jamie dived on to him and sat on him so he couldn’t get up. He was much smaller than the boy but he was really really angry now. When Jamie gets angry you don’t want to mess with him. Really you don’t. He pushed his face close up to the boy’s. His caterpillar eyebrows were nearly touching him.

‘Don’t you ever pick on him or my sister or anyone, ever again!’ said Jamie.

The boy looked scared now. ‘He’s hurting me! Get him off!’ he wailed. He started wriggling and kicking his legs around trying to get away from Jamie. The girl grabbed at Jamie’s hair with her hands and started pulling it.

Now Daniel tried to pull her off Jamie but she punched him away like he was a little fly. Jamie shouted at her but she carried on. He swizzed round and was going to hit her but suddenly the boy kicked her right on the nose. I don’t think he meant to do that. She let go of Jamie’s hair. A trickle of red dribbled down on to her white top.

‘You idiot! This is brand new!’ she screamed at the boy. She whacked him over the head.

‘Wasn’t my fault!’ he whined. He rubbed his short spiky hair with his dirty hand.

‘Come on!’ said Vicky. She grabbed my arm. We all started running.

‘We’ll get you back . . . We will . . . Just you wait!’ the girl shouted at us as she rubbed blood and snot across her face.

Once out of the village, we scrambled through the woods, along the stream and back to safety.

We were almost back at the cave when Daniel turned to Jamie. ‘Thanks,’ he said quietly.

Jamie suppressed a grin. ‘Any time,’ he muttered as he pretended to re-tie his trainer lace.

Boys are such uncomplicated creatures; this was all that was needed for them to be friends again.

Re grabbed the loaf of bread from under my arm. ‘Come on. I’m starving.’

Daniel opened his rucksack and took out a big plastic bottle of milk, a jar of peanut butter, a bunch of bananas and a huge bar of chocolate. ‘Bought it to go with the bread,’ he said with a smile.

I hurried into the cave and started unloading my stolen
stash of food on to the shelf, too ashamed to tell the others what I’d done. I didn’t hear Daniel come in and, turning round, dropped the handful of chocolate bars in surprise.

He looked at me, puzzled.

‘Thought you didn’t have any food . . .’

Ashamed, I started scrabbling on the floor, picking them up. I indicated the rest of the food on the shelf.

‘I stole it all from the shop this morning,’ I mumbled, hanging my head and waiting for his reaction. ‘I’m a thief.’

He didn’t say anything for a moment.

‘You were only trying to look after Jamie and Re.’

‘But up till today I’ve never stolen anything in my whole life.’

Suddenly I thought of Dad. How did he feel when he was delivering all those stolen tellies? Gramps, his dad, had been a policeman. As a boy, Dad had been brought up very strictly, and that strong moral sense had stayed with him.

‘Dad always used to tell us it was important to do the right thing. Not to tell lies. Not to cheat – even at Monopoly. Not to take biscuits from the tin without asking. But then he goes and does a whopping great wrong thing himself. He knew full well it was wrong but he’d carried on doing it again and again until he was caught.’

‘He must have been totally desperate,’ said Daniel. ‘Just like you were.’

I felt the tears prickling in my eyes and screwed them up to force them back.

Daniel didn’t say a word. He just wrapped his arms round me and hugged me. I felt calmer. I looked up at him.

‘Thanks for what you did this morning. You were really brave,’ I said.

‘You’re joking, aren’t you?’

‘Not at all. First, in the shop you saved my skin, then when that horrible girl started on Rhianna . . .’

‘I didn’t do much though, did I? If it hadn’t have been for Jamie —’

‘Oh, Jamie’s always fighting. It’s like it’s his hobby or something. You were really scared but you still spoke up.’

Daniel smiled at me.

‘I couldn’t sleep last night,’ he said. ‘I thought you were really angry with me, for throwing that stupid wobbly and leaving you at the lake yesterday. I thought I’d blown it and you wouldn’t want anything more to do with me.’ He glanced at me then added quickly, ‘You and Re and Jamie, I mean.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ I said, thinking how nice his eyes were when he smiled. ‘I . . . We all really like you.’

Re came running into the cave. She saw Daniel’s arms around me and did a double take.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.

‘Nothing,’ Daniel and I said at exactly the same time.

‘Then why are you hugging?’

Daniel and I immediately stepped away from each other. I caught his eye and we both smiled.

‘Because we’re all friends again,’ he said with a shrug.

Breakfast was like a feast. A celebration. Maybe it was the food or maybe it was just the fact we were all together, but
everyone was in a good mood. Jamie and Re had made peanut butter, banana and chocolate sandwiches and we washed them down with the cool fresh milk. Daniel wouldn’t have any. He said he’d had a huge fry-up for breakfast and happily watched as we demolished the whole lot between us. We joked and laughed about all sorts of silly stuff, like furnishing the cave with a few luxuries – maybe a DVD player and telly run off solar panels, a fancy barbecue to cook hot meals and a hot chocolate drink dispenser with marshmallows, whipped cream and sprinkles as standard. We fantasised how we could happily live undiscovered at the cave for years. Finally, one day we’d come out of hiding like a bunch of Rip Van Winkles and surprise everyone by our re-appearance.

When we’d finished every single crumb, we lolled back on the grass. Re carefully showed Daniel the tin containing the rabbit. He was hunched down even more on Jamie’s T- shirt.

‘I’m only keeping him till he’s better,’ she told him, ‘then I’m going to let him free, because he’s a wild rabbit not a house one.’

I watched as Daniel gently stroked the rabbit’s back then darted me a knowing glance.

‘He’s lovely and soft,’ he told Re.

It was late morning by now and despite what the lady in the shop had said, it was turning into another beautiful day. We decided to go down to the lake. Jamie and Re wanted to go for a swim and I said I’d paddle. It was getting hot and the thought of cooling off in the clear water was irresistible.

Daniel said he’d come with us and we made our way through the trees laughing and joking in the warm sunshine
as if we didn’t have a care in the world.

We came to an abrupt halt as we reached the edge of the woods. Looking down towards the lake, Rhianna blurted out what I was thinking.

‘What if those bullies are down there waiting for us?’ she asked fearfully.

‘I’m not scared of them,’ Jamie replied with a scowl. But we still hid behind trees while he and Daniel checked out the shoreline. The place was deserted. Jamie beckoned to us and we joined him and Daniel at the water’s edge. The water looked deliciously cool and inviting.

‘Hey, Daniel, you coming?’ Jamie called as he waded in.

Daniel hesitated for a second. Then he quickly pulled off his T-shirt, revealing the angry scarring on his stomach and chest. This time Jamie didn’t bat an eyelid.