One of Us Read online

  Copyright © 2015 by Jeannie Waudby

  All rights reserved under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions

  First published in Great Britain in 2015 by The Chicken House, 2 Palmer Street, Frome, Somerset, BA11 1DS, United Kingdom, www.doublecluck.com.

  First printed in the United States by Running Press Book Publishers, 2015.

  Printed in the United States

  This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher.

  Books published by Running Press are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200, Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call (800) 810-4145, ext. 5000, or e-mail [email protected].

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2015930722

  E-book ISBN 978-0-7624-5820-2

  987654321

  Digit on the right indicates the number of this printing

  Cover images:

  Seamless Plaid 0018 © AvanteGardeArt Group of People © Thinkstock/Rawpixel Ltd. Cover and interior design by T.L. Bonaddio Edited by Rachel Leyshon and Imogen Cooper Typography: Trade Gothic, Heavyweight, and Fairfield

  Published by Running Press Teens An Imprint of Running Press Book Publishers A Member of the Perseus Books Group 2300 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103–4371

  Visit us on the web!

  www.runningpress.com/rpkids

  For

  PETE

  RORY

  KIRSTEN

  AND

  CARA

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  CHAPTER 45

  CHAPTER 46

  CHAPTER 47

  CHAPTER 48

  CHAPTER 49

  CHAPTER 50

  CHAPTER 51

  CHAPTER 52

  CHAPTER 53

  CHAPTER 54

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  I’M NOT AFRAID of spiders or snakes.

  I’m not afraid of graveyards at night.

  I’m not afraid of deep, dark water.

  I’m not afraid of ghost stories or horror movies.

  And stations? I make myself get on a train every day.

  But I am afraid of the Brotherhood.

  Normally you can see them—you know who they are, with their scarlet-checked clothes. They stand out. But today, as people hurry through the sleet to Central Station under umbrellas and raincoats and scarves, I can’t tell the difference between us and them.

  I keep watch through the slanting snow, because how can you face a danger you can’t see? A person who looks like any other person, but who secretly wants to kill you and everyone like you? I don’t know why I’m thinking like this now, when I have to make this journey to school every day. What would the odds be, for me to be caught up in another bomb at Central Station?

  Slowly the crowd funnels into the station. I look up at the sign looming over the door: One City, Two Ways. That’s not how it is, though. Everyone knows this is a divided city. Under the cover of the doorway, umbrellas swish down and people pull rain hoods off and unzip coats. Now I can see everyone for who they are. Ordinary citizens, dressed in the usual dark clothes we all wear these days. And the Brotherhood. Dotted through the crowd in their signature check.

  I edge into the station just as three Brotherhood boys are pushing their way out. One boy crashes into me, his hands fending me off. For a second his dark eyes stare into my face. Then he says something sideways to his friend. They all laugh. What did Grandma used to say? Never make eye contact with a Hood, K. It’s like dealing with an angry dog—if you turn away, it won’t attack you. So I turn away.

  “Do not abandon your luggage at any time. If you see unattended baggage, move aside and alert staff . . .” I hate these announcements. I shuffle into the station along with everyone else. They make me jittery. Steeling myself, I head toward the elevators that take us down to the tunnels.

  Deep underground, the platform’s already crowded, and a man elbows in front of me as he struggles to get two huge suitcases closer to the edge so he can be first on the train. Someone jumps on my foot, and I wince. It’s a little boy pulling on his dad’s hand. He’s looped the strap of his backpack over his forehead like a headband. That makes me smile.

  It’s then that I see the bag on the bench, brown paper with string handles. As soon as I notice it, I look around for the owner. It’s habit. But I can’t see who it belongs to. That means it’s alone—“unattended.” And the more I look at it, the less it seems like just a bag. Who left it there? The Brotherhood boys upstairs flash into my mind. Should I pick up the phone on the wall and report it?

  As I move toward the phone, the little boy points at the bench. “Daddy!” he calls. “The cupcakes!”

  His dad turns, still holding his son’s hand, and darts across to the bench. He grabs the bag, and as his eyes meet mine for a second he half-smiles sheepishly. I hear someone tut.

  Warm wind heralds the train, which rushes out of the tunnel and comes to a screeching halt: “Watch the gap. Move right down inside the train cars . . .” The doors swoosh open, and the man with the suitcases starts heaving them on. I wait behind the boy and his father. The train’s packed, like it always is at morning rush hour.

  I could wait for the next one, but then I’ll be late for school.

  I put one foot on board.

  A bone-shattering, chest-crushing bang lifts me into the air.

  And everything slips away.

  WHEN I OPEN my eyes I can’t see or hear a thing. There’s just a heavy, ringing silence and a terrible smell, a fearful smell, that hits the back of my nose. Smoke and something else underneath. I start coughing and my hand flies up to cover my face but hits a rough surface right in front of me. A wall? Where am I? I feel the panic rising, then stop myself. Stay still. Take little breaths. Something trickles down my face. Blood?

  What happened . . .? There was a noise, a blast, and I fell . . . Don’t know where I am, but I have to get out . . . Get out, K!

  I struggle to my feet, but there’s no room to stand. Something solid’s above me, forcing me to crouch. I try to move back, but there’s no space there either. I reach up and touch a sort of metal ceiling, bulging in toward the rough wall in front of me, or is it not a wall . . . is it . . . is it the platform? I reac
h above me, and there’s a gap. Watch the gap . . . That’s when I realize: I’m under the train. At any moment it could tip over and crush me. Metal slides against the back of my hand. It’s moving!

  Now I’m panicking and screaming, screaming for help—I know I am, except I still can’t hear or see in the darkness. My hands scrabble at the wall, at the platform edge, reaching up from underneath the train. There’s smoke in my eyes, in my throat . . . The smell’s in my mouth . . . Please . . . I can’t move, I can’t breathe. Every mouthful of air is a choking cough, bringing poison, not oxygen, into my body, and all at once I see it clearly:

  I’m going to die.

  Then a hand clasps mine. A warm, soft, human hand. Strong and safe.

  I feel my own hand close around it. I am never letting go.

  Another hand reaches down and clamps itself around my other wrist, and little by little I am lifted up, up, squeezing through the gap and onto the platform.

  I fall forward, my face smacking against the concrete. My mouth fills with blood and ash, dust mingling with iron, choking me. My eyes are streaming in the gray smoke.

  Whoever lifted me out is still holding me, hoisting me to my feet. A man. I still can’t hear anything, just the blood thumping in my ears. I clutch at his clothes but can’t hold on: he’s wearing something hard and slippery. Dim light now, and I can see the train is right in front of me, the doors buckled over the gap where I was thrown. That’s what was moving above me. And there’s the man with the two suitcases. But he’s lying half in and half out of the carriage. His eyes are closed and his mouth is moving. There’s a figure kneeling next to him. They’re holding hands.

  My head starts to spin and my legs go, and suddenly I’m being picked up and carried away. The smoke’s fading, the smell too. The train never even left. It’s still waiting at the platform but with blasted doors and twisted metal. We’re climbing stairs, I think. Yes, you can’t use an elevator in a fire. I should try to walk, I think, and struggle to get my feet down, but that makes us both fall, hard, onto the steps.

  Sound slams into my head: “Evacuate the station. Move calmly to the nearest exit. Evacuate the station. Move calmly . . .” The ringing isn’t in my head. It’s the station alarm.

  I start to cough again, choking coughs that I can’t control, and my rescuer leans in to me, patting my back. He looks young, but he’s got a scarf tied around his mouth and nose, so only his eyes are visible. His chest is rising and falling because he’s struggling to breathe too. I want to ask him about the suitcase man, but I still can’t talk, can’t think.

  His arm tightens around me and we begin climbing again. One, two. I cling to the pocket of his jacket. Leather: that’s why it’s so hard to hold on to. Five, six. It takes a long time. Ten, eleven . . . I lose count. And all the while, the alarm’s ringing and the disembodied voice is shouting: “Evacuate the station. Move calmly to the nearest exit . . .”

  That’s what we’re doing, moving calmly, his arm around me, my arm around him, two strangers clambering to safety. I almost faint again, but I hear his voice near my ear: “Not far now. Stay with me.”

  And then there’s daylight ahead, the gray light of winter gleaming through the glass roof of the station. I make my legs walk up the last few steps, and fall on to my knees, racked by a coughing fit that tears through my rib cage. Other noises rush into my ears: sirens from outside the station, shouting and screaming and running feet . . .

  When I stop coughing he gets me to my feet, puts his arm around my waist and walks me across to a bench under the display board. He helps me sit and crouches in front of me, taking the scarf from his mouth. Under his sandy hair his face is streaked with sweat and ash. His gray eyes are level with mine and I can’t look away. No one has ever looked at me so kindly. Not since Grandma.

  “Thank you . . .” I cough out.

  “You OK?” He takes a bottle of water from a woman who has come up to us, and unscrews the lid, passing it to me.

  I nod, even though we can both see I’m not. “What about the man with the suitcases?” It’s all I can think about—his moving lips, the figure kneeling next to him holding his hand.

  The gray-eyed man gets up and sits heavily beside me. Then he shakes his head. “I think you’re the last one to walk out. I was going to leave, but then I saw your hand come up from under the train.”

  I take a sip of water, but it doesn’t wash away the taste of smoke and blood. Now I start to notice what’s around me: police and paramedics and rows of stretchers. People are huddled in groups—some in dark clothes and some in Brotherhood red. From their grimy faces and hair they must have been on the platform too. Smoke drifts up the staircase from the tunnels below. There’s an ache in my chest.

  “What happened?” I ask. “Was it a bomb?”

  “An explosion,” he says carefully. “It’s too early to say what caused it. Listen . . . if you’re OK you should go to the cafe across the square. They’re setting up a first-aid post there so the paramedics can use the station for the badly injured and the fatalities.”

  Fatalities. He’s matter-of-fact. What about the suitcase man—is he no longer a person, just a fatality? I can’t make sense of it so I just stand up. The gray-eyed man takes hold of my elbow.

  “I’m fine,” I say too quickly. “Really. Thanks.” But what I’m thinking, illogically, is: All I want to do is stay with you. He makes me feel safe.

  “Well, in that case, I’d better go.” He looks across to the police cordon.

  Of course. He’s obviously with the emergency services. “You’re a policeman?”

  He looks back at me. “What?” Then he nods. “Oh yes, a policeman. That’s right.”

  He touches my shoulder and his gray eyes seem to smile at me, as if we’ve always known each other. “Take care.”

  “Thank you,” I say. It’s not enough for someone who’s just saved your life, not nearly enough, but he just nods again and turns away as if he’s used to it.

  I should’ve said a better thank-you. I stumble to the exit. I didn’t even ask his name. Without him, I would still be wedged in the gap between the train and the platform, surrounded by crushing metal and stone, breathing the terrible smoke, the smell I can still taste in my mouth. Or maybe not breathing at all. I turn to look for him, but he’s gone.

  The little boy from the platform is there, though. He’s standing very still, his arms hanging stiffly at his sides. He hasn’t got his backpack around his forehead anymore. I look for his dad, but a policewoman comes and crouches in front of him. She says something close to his ear, because it’s even noisier out here with the sirens shrilling, then she takes his hand and leads him away. I see his face, running with ash and tears, and even from here I can make out the word he’s crying, over and over: “Daddy.”

  I have to get out.

  OUTSIDE, THE FREEZING wind feels good against my face. For a moment I lift my head and look up at the dark Old City towers with the Brotherhood Meeting Hall spire looming up the hill behind the square. I close my eyes and open my mouth, letting the sleet run in. The main road outside the station is closed except for police cars and ambulances, but in front of me the square is full of people running toward the station or just standing, staring.

  I walk slowly across the square, head down against the driving sleet, forcing myself toward Fred’s Cafe. After a few steps I look back at the station. There’s a tendril of smoke twisting from the entrance—how does it form such a graceful curve? If I was painting it, I’d let the smoke and cloud merge together, make those tiny dots of movement opaque. Pastels? Or maybe charcoal, black and dense. Like the smoke from a crematorium. I give myself a shake. How can I even think of my drawing now?

  It’s steamy and warm in Fred’s Cafe, my cafe, where I go every morning before getting on the train. It’s packed but someone immediately comes over with a blanket. I don’t know why, but I’m still shaking. I sit down in a corner so no one notices me. There’s a television above the counter. Scrol
ling across the bottom of the screen are the words, BREAKING NEWS . . . SUSPECTED BOMB AT CENTRAL STATION . . .

  I feel the shock, like a fist, deep under my ribs. I knew it. That was what I felt as I walked toward the station. I was afraid and I didn’t know why. The group of Brotherhood boys in the entrance flicker into my mind. Is the Strife starting up all over again? What about the Reconciliation process?

  Fred brings me a mug of tea. “Sugar, for the shock,” he says. “You’re hurt, K. Were you there?”

  I wipe my face and my fingers come away red. “I’m fine,” I say, but I know he’s not convinced.

  “Someone will clean that up for you in a minute,” he says.

  I pick up the mug, but my hand is trembling so much that I have to hide it under the table. And the TV subtitles keep on rolling . . . BROTHERHOOD BOMB . . . My teeth are chattering . . . CASUALTIES AT CENTRAL STATION . . . I clutch my mug and stare at the screen.

  I think of the Brotherhood boy who collided with me in the station doorway. I want to run back and catch hold of him, make him tell me he was the one who did this, make him look at the people on stretchers in the station. Make him look that little boy in the eye.

  How can you face a danger you can’t see? A person who looks like any other person, but who secretly wants to kill you and everyone like you?

  I turn my face toward the wall. I can’t cry here, in the crowded cafe.

  Fred strides back to the counter. “Hoods,” he says, knocking the TV off at the switch. “They’d kill us all if they could.”

  CHAPTER 2

  I DREAMT THE BOMB: that’s my first thought. Then I realize that I can still smell the smoke, still feel the grit in my swollen throat as I start coughing.

  When the spasm finishes I gulp down some water from the bottle they gave me at the station. I get out of bed and pull open the thin curtains, to see the view I hate. Today the station is cordoned off and the square in front is full of police vans. It’s transformed from the usual gray emptiness to a mosaic of tiny colored figures. There’s nothing to show the horror of what happened yesterday. Behind is the Old City, the turrets of the Brotherhood Meeting Hall dominating the sooty buildings that sprawl up the hill to the woods beyond. Far to the north, the roof of a stone mansion shows through the tree branches.