One of Us (11 page)

“Serafina's hurt. We were attacked. They're coming back.” My eyes search frantically for the hole, but I can't see it. With a sinking heart I realize that this isn't the place where I met Oskar after all. Greg is looking up at the fence to see if he could climb it, but it's too high, and there are rolls of barbed wire along the top. “There's a hole,” I say, still breathless, “it's by the big oak.”

I run down alongside the fence, my breath gasping in my throat. On the other side, Greg crashes through the undergrowth. Then I see the oak towering above the other trees. “There it is!” But where's the hole? I search frantically by the long grass.

Greg barrels out of a bramble thicket. “I can see it!” He crouches down in front of the hole. “You got through here?”

“Yes.”

It's hardly big enough for him. I start pulling the wires toward me, away from Greg. It's difficult, with my right hand wet from the blood on Serafina's neck. I wipe it on my skirt.

Greg starts clambering through.

“Bend it out,” I say, clutching at the wires. I try to hold them back but they tear into his jeans.

He stands up, panting. “Where is she?”

I point uphill. We both run across the road to where Serafina lies in the ditch, still unconscious. Greg kneels down beside her.

“She needs an ambulance,” he says. “We'll have to take her back through the fence and carry her up to the school.”

I shake my head. “There's no time, and it's too far. The rioters might be coming back.”

Greg looks behind him into the undergrowth. There's a large laurel bush, vivid yellow in the gloomy light. “There?” He slides his arms under Serafina and half-carries her into the middle of the laurel. I follow him inside, bending her knees so that her feet are hidden under the leaves. Serafina starts groaning again.

Greg sits in the leafy cave of the laurel bush with Serafina cradled in his arms. Her head is lolling down and I put out my hands to support it. Over Serafina's wild brown hair, dotted with tiny white raindrops, our eyes meet again the way they did in Art this afternoon. Greg's eyes are very dark, just as I drew them. He's breathing fast, trying to be quiet. His breath puffs against my face. We both stay very still, listening.
Please stop groaning, Serafina.

If they come back, they're certain to find us.

I can feel Greg's arm vibrating as he struggles to hold Serafina without moving. His breath has stilled.

He didn't tell anyone about the swimming. I want to trust him. He lets out a long hiss of air. He has a little scratch down his cheek. It's not bleeding, but the skin is red and drawn up into a row of bumps. I find myself thinking I should have used pen and ink instead of pencil to draw him this morning, because of the clean lines of his cheekbones.

Serafina's head feels very heavy. I don't like the snuffly, snoring sound she's making.

I peer out through the wet leaves. The road is empty. Dark clouds are stealing the daylight.

“We should call an ambulance.” Greg has a phone to keep in touch with his family overseas.

He frowns at me.

“With your cell phone.”

“You can't get a signal in the Institute grounds,” he says.

“Not in there,” I say. “But out here you can.”

He shakes his head. “I never get a signal outside the gate.”

Oskar's phone worked here. But I can't tell Greg that. “Come on, Greg—just give it a try!”

He stares hard at me. Then he gets out his phone and punches in the emergency number. “Ambulance,” he says. He listens to the twittering voice. “On the road out of Gatesbrooke, a few minutes downhill from the Institute.” He pauses again. “They can look for the bike by the side of the road.”

I hold Serafina up until he's finished the call.

“You were right.” His brown eyes bore into mine as he tucks the phone back into his coat pocket. “Now we just have to wait.”

I look away. He must know I met someone here today—someone who cut a hole in the fence. Maybe he was watching. Maybe he saw Oskar. Anyway, it's too late now to worry about what he'll do.

I meet Greg's eyes. I'm not going to beg for his silence. I have so much to lose, but I look steadily at him.

He stares back at me. His hair has gone black in the rain. There's no future or past, just this moment, the two of us trying to save Serafina.

But the ambulance doesn't come. We lay Serafina down on the earth. Time ticks by.

“Call them again?” I suggest.

Greg gives a short laugh. “What for?” he says. “They won't come, will they? Not for us.”

From up the hill there's a sudden bang—an explosion that makes me scramble to my feet. Then an engine roaring down the hill. What if it's the woman on the motorbike again?

I pull the laurel leaves apart. But it's the white van I saw before. It screeches to a halt next to Serafina's bike. The passenger door opens and a Brotherhood boy gets out, looking up the bank toward us. I freeze, but Greg clambers out into the road.

Serafina groans, so I don't hear what Greg says to the boy, but when I look up again, they are both running toward us, pushing the leaves aside.

“It's OK,” Greg says. “They're going to take us to the hospital.”

I look over at the van. The back doors are open and inside I can see Brotherhood men and one girl sitting silently, watching us from the benches on either side, tension crackling off them. They're all wearing balaclavas or scarves wrapped over their faces. Greg and the other boy are already carrying Serafina over to the back of the van.

“Greg?” I begin. “Is this a good idea?”

I don't think he heard me. They lay Serafina down in between all the feet. I follow them and put my hat under her head so that her hair isn't resting on the floor of the van, and climb aboard myself, squeezing in beside the other girl. The doors bang shut and then the only light is from the sliding window into the front. The van shudders into motion.

It careens around the bends much too fast, and I'm thrown against Greg more than once. Under the seat, wooden bats and other weapons roll against my heels. A gasoline can and bottles. Who are these people? What was the explosion we heard? We're in a van full of Brotherhood activists. Who knows what else they've done? I look at Greg, but he's just staring straight ahead. Does he know them? Is he one of them?

“Got to hurry,” says the boy who helped carry Serafina. “The police will come, now that
we've
shown up.”

I can still hear the explosion ringing in my ears. What will the police think if they stop us? How will Greg and I be able to prove that we weren't fighting the protestors too?

W
E DRIVE IN
silence. When we stop, the man from the front seat opens the doors to reveal the back of a hospital where bins are lined up behind a screen. I see the Gatesbrooke logo above the door.

“You're on your own now,” he says to Greg. “Gotta go. We always drop off here, no cameras. Take her through that door . . .” and he points to a fire door wedged open with a brick. “There's usually some wheelchairs just inside. Follow the green line.”

He helps Greg lift Serafina out. I grab my hat and follow. He's right about the wheelchairs. Greg pushes Serafina through the corridor and I keep one hand on her shoulder to stop her falling out. When we reach the waiting area, a passing nurse in green clothes sees Serafina's unconscious blood-streaked face. He immediately takes the wheelchair from Greg, pushing it toward the swinging doors while we hold them open.

But before we can follow, the woman behind the reception desk snaps: “Not you!” Her eyes run over our Brotherhood clothes as we turn back. “You can give me the details.”

We wait at the counter while she goes out to the room behind. I hear her say, “Hoods.” Then she picks up the phone.

I look at Greg in shock. Even here, in the hospital?

He shrugs. “What did you expect? She's probably calling the police. I'll call Brer Magnus.”

That will really help
, I think. I can't say anything.

“You can wait over there,” the woman says as she comes back out.

What if Serafina doesn't regain consciousness? I imagine waking up in the morning and seeing her neatly made bed, instead of the usual hump of blanket and the flinging off of sheets and fluffy animals. Even in the short time I've known her, I've realized Serafina is never still.

I let my hat fall over my face and press my knuckles hard under my nose. Greg gets up and goes over to the vending machine, his phone in his hand. While he has his back to me, I wipe my eyes and blow my nose and push my hair behind my ears.

He comes back carrying two plastic cups. “Hot chocolate,” he says. “I know you like tea, but it looked really orange.”

“Thanks,” I say, though I like orange tea. He's trying to be kind.

He sits down beside me, and the sleeve of his shirt brushes against mine. It's nice. I want his arm to stay there.

“I phoned Brer Magnus.” He pauses when I don't reply.

What can I say, when I don't know what to think? Suddenly I blurt out: “Was that a bomb? I heard a bang. Was it them?” When he doesn't answer, I carry on: “I saw the bottles and the gasoline can.”

Greg drinks some hot chocolate. “They torched one of the cars,” he says. “Nobody was in it.” He balances his cup carefully on the sloping seat beside him. “Brer Magnus said not to say we were there. He's coming, to explain that we're just students who were out of school at the time. Otherwise . . .”

I nod. I glance at his troubled face.

He turns to me. “You did a good thing.”

I look at him, but his brown eyes just look serious.

“And it's good you were there,” I say. “I couldn't have carried her.”

But what was he doing there anyway? Close behind me again. He should have been in the auditorium.

We wait. Greg's arm is still against mine, but that's OK, because there's not much room in this row of chairs. I'm starting to get warm now and it's quite nice not to feel alone. We look like two Brotherhood kids, and some people give us the evil eye as they pass. I eye them back from under my hat.

“G
REGORY. VERITY
.”

I look up. Brer Magnus is striding across the waiting area.

Greg springs to his feet, so I stand up too, suppressing the little shiver that Brer Magnus's presence always gives me. I wish I'd asked Greg not to tell Brer Magnus about the hole in the fence. But now it's too late.

“So, Verity.” He fixes me with his ice-blue gaze. “Mr. East only opened the gates for Serafina. How did you get over the fence?”

Before I can reply Greg speaks. “Verity found a way out.”

Here it comes. I dig my fingernails into the palm of my hand. It's over.

“There was a gap,” Greg continues. “Somebody must have cut a hole in the fence. The rioters.”

I look at Greg, but he's staring straight ahead at the reception desk.

“I'll get Security to look into it,” says Brer Magnus. “We can't leave the school unprotected. Not with the increased threat from the
majority
.”