One of Us Page 3

  My heart starts beating faster again. How far would I go to stop the Strife from coming back? Is that what he meant? But why would he think I could do anything?

  We walk in silence until we reach the blank and ugly face of the halfway house. I wish I didn’t have to admit to Oskar that I live here. “This is it.” I stop. “Thanks for walking me back.”

  Oskar smiles his kind smile. “Good luck,” he says. “Don’t look so worried. I think things are going to work out for you.”

  “Thanks.” I hesitate. I don’t know how to say good-bye. I wait to see if he’ll say anything more.

  He says, “There’s something about you, K. You’ll go far.”

  But he’s wrong. I’m nothing but a loner and a loser. What can I do to change anything? I can’t even get myself to school. Nobody cares what I do.

  “Listen, K.” Oskar puts his hand over mine before I can press the entry buzzer. “Why don’t you meet me tomorrow? Outside Central Station at two o’clock?”

  “Central Station?”

  “It’s just that there’s a parking lot there. And I’ve got to go away soon. But if you’d rather not . . .”

  “No,” I say quickly. “I’ll be there.” Don’t go, Oskar, please don’t go.

  I press the buzzer and wait for the doors to release. Oskar turns away, walking briskly toward the station. I watch his back disappear.

  Then I turn back to the door and step inside, only to see my social worker, Sue Smith, watching me through the glass of the inner doors. Too late to backtrack. The street door behind me has clicked shut already.

  “K,” she says, opening the inner doors. “We need to talk about this.” She waves a folded piece of paper.

  She waits for me to collect my key and then passes me the paper. It’s a printout of my attendance record. I crumple it up in my hand, shrugging.

  “K.” Sue’s voice is brisk. “I’ve tried to fight for you, but unfortunately you missed an exam.” Her teeth flash in a smile. “You’re obviously an able girl, but things just haven’t worked out. And I’m sorry, but I’m being taken off your case, so there’s really nothing I can do. Why not forget about staying in school and start thinking about finding a job? After all, in five months’ time you’re going to be sixteen. Your government funding will run out. You’ll have to leave this halfway house and pay your own way.”

  Panic flutters around me. I open my mouth to speak, but then stop and look at her, in her black office suit, her short hair as tidy as a doll’s. She throws me another mechanical smile. What’s the point in saying anything? I turn away, and I’m through the swing doors to the corridor before she has time to speak. She doesn’t follow me.

  I RUN UP to my room and throw the newspaper I picked up outside the bus stop on to the bed. It falls open on a double spread about the Brotherhood bomber. I turn over and forty-nine faces look back at me. I sit down and spread it out, read each name. Some of them are wearing Brotherhood hats and checked shirts. The bomber even killed his own. And then I see it. The little boy’s daddy, on his face the same expression he wore as he picked up the bag of cupcakes.

  After that, I can’t look at the pictures anymore. A trapdoor below me has opened, and I need to shut it again before I fall in forever.

  I open the drawer where I keep my father’s paintbox and a pair of folding scissors that were my mother’s, and I fold the sheet of newspaper carefully and put it in there too. Because they’re not really strangers, are they? Not in their own lives, to the people who love them.

  CHAPTER 4

  I KNEW I’D go to meet Oskar, even though I haven’t been back to Central Station since the bomb last week. Yellow police tape still encircles the entrance and only one door is open. Next to it, I see Oskar leaning against the wall, wearing a motorcycle jacket. Does that mean he’s going away right now? I almost turn around, run away rather than have to watch him leave. But I can’t let him go like that. If only I didn’t have to say good-bye.

  I wait for the traffic lights to change. What will I do, in the long days, without the hope of seeing Oskar again?

  He sees me and saunters toward his motorbike.

  I hurry to reach him. “Are you leaving, Oskar?”

  “Not exactly,” he says. “But you could be.”

  He wants me to go away? I stop.

  “It’s only a proposal. You can always turn it down.” He fastens his helmet under his chin, smiling at me. “I want to take you for a ride. OK?”

  “All right.” I’ve never been on a motorbike before, but it looks fun.

  Oskar pulls the spare helmet over my hair, silky from washing. He leans down to adjust the catch. I can smell his aftershave and the mint on his breath.

  “That should do,” he says. “I want to show you something.”

  He straddles the bike and I climb on, desperately gripping the bar behind me as we shoot forward.

  Oskar brakes and twists back toward me. “If you try and stay upright, we’ll go over,” he shouts above the motor. “It’s easier if you put your arms around my waist and lean the way I do. You can put your hands in my pockets, if you like.”

  I can tell from his voice he isn’t flirting with me, just looking after me. I put my hands on Oskar’s leather sides, and he’s right, it feels much safer. But it’s hard to hold on to the smooth leather until I push my hands inside his pockets. It’s warmer too, with my face pressed against Oskar’s back. Now when the bike veers to the side, so do I. The wind sucks my breath away, whipping the ends of my hair against my neck.

  And now we’re roaring up the hill away from the square. But Oskar doesn’t turn left at the bridge. He slows down and drives on to it, straight into the Old City.

  “Oskar!” I shout. “Where are we going?” But the wind steals my voice away.

  I’ve never crossed the river before. In spite of its name, so many buildings here are new. Half-crumbled tenements sit next to hastily built blocks whose wooden paneling runs green with mold. Only the Meeting Hall rises proud against the heavy sky, its turrets and spire black with soot, sharp as thorns, like the evil twin of our Town Hall.

  We’re on the wrong side of the river. Am I imagining hostile glances from people on the pavement as the bike slows down for traffic lights?

  It doesn’t take long to get out into wooded hills, hazy with the greenish fuzz that promises leaves. You could draw them with a fine pen, against a watercolor wash, I think. We’re getting farther and farther away from the New City. Where are we going?

  “Not far now!” Oskar shouts. “Look to your left.”

  We purr along, past a stone mansion fleetingly glimpsed through the trees. It’s the building I can see from my room, I realize suddenly. It has a huge sign, proudly announcing The Institute. I’ve heard of the Institute because it’s the oldest school in Gatesbrooke. Everything about it seems to shout “Keep out!” from the high perimeter fence with its loops of barbed wire to the cameras trained on the road. It’s nothing like the school I went to. Of course, I’ve never been to a Brotherhood school. They keep themselves apart, in the Old City. We’ve had five hundred years to practice being separate, and only months, since the Reconciliation process began, of trying to integrate.

  Oskar pulls up on a path leading into the forest and turns the bike around. “That’s what I wanted to show you!” he shouts over his shoulder. “We’ll go somewhere we can talk now.”

  Before I can reply, we roar off back downhill toward the Old City. I turn my head as we pass the Institute gate. From this side of the road I glimpse a long drive with high fences and another gate at the far end. A security guard is patroling the fence, behind a row of tall narrow trees. Beyond him tiny figures run on the grass, little splashes of red against the green. It looks like a place from someone else’s life.

  Oskar slows down as we approach the Old City. I wonder why they never clean their old buildings. Up close I can see that they’re the same pink granite as ours, but black with grime. I hope we’re not stopping here. But we s
hoot over the bridge toward the square and Central Station. Oskar turns left, following the river Gate as it passes Jubilee Park and the fish market and then widens out into the estuary. Ahead of us are the derricks and cranes of the port.

  But we don’t go to the port. Oskar swerves across the road and pulls up beside the gate into Jubilee Park. “We can talk in the Aquarium,” he calls back to me as he climbs off the bike.

  My face is so cold that I can’t move my mouth. My hair smells of the helmet and the wind. We walk into the park toward the Aquarium, a low stone building near the gate. I follow Oskar inside and down the stairs into the first room. He stops in front of a tank full of seaweed. We sit down on a bench, Oskar’s gloves between us on the light wood. Fronds of dirty brown seaweed twist and sway in front of us and the coarse sand shifts suddenly as a camouflaged flatfish stirs, only its black button eyes clearly visible.

  “I won’t be based at Gatesbrooke for much longer, K.”

  Oh, Oskar. You are leaving. “Where are you going?”

  “I can’t tell you that.”

  I stare into the murky tank. “But then, how can I . . .?” I stop.

  “Keep in touch?” Oskar smiles at me.

  I look into his kind eyes that make me feel as if I’ve known him forever. But I can’t tell him that he’s my best friend, my only friend. That when I’m with him I feel as if my life matters. So I look away.

  “K,” says Oskar. “If you were one of us, things would be different.”

  One of us? One of who?

  A family comes in, the two little boys running to get stools and clattering them down next to us. Oskar touches my arm lightly as he stands up. I follow him into the next room, where the light is dim. I stop in front of a gravel-floored tank full of dull green water. Oskar leans toward me, so that his head almost touches mine. “The Institute,” he says. “How would you like to finish school there?”

  “What do you mean? I’m not Brotherhood!” Surely Oskar doesn’t think that?

  “Of course not,” says Oskar. “But what if you had papers that said you were? That gave you a Brotherhood identity? You could study Art at the Institute.”

  I know. The New City Art Gallery is full of old paintings from when the Institute was an Art school. In citizen schools Art isn’t a subject, and I wonder what it would be like to be able to do it.

  Oskar steps forward, resting his hand against the glass and letting his fingers spread out and relax.

  He’s remembered that I’d like to be an artist. He doesn’t know that in my back pocket is the letter that came today, telling me that because of my missed deadlines and poor attendance I’ve been expelled from school. I won’t even be able to take my exams.

  And how would going to the Institute help me keep in touch with Oskar? I watch the sea grass waft in an invisible current. “I don’t understand.”

  He lowers his voice. “We believe there’s a cell of militant Brotherhood extremists at the Institute, maybe even linked to the Central Station bomb.”

  I feel my heart start racing again. How can Oskar ask me to go somewhere like that? “Who’s ‘we’?” I ask. “Why do you . . .”

  “K,” he says.

  “OK, I know you can’t answer that.” I stare into the water and right at the back I suddenly see a small seahorse with its tail curled around a stem.

  “That’s where you come in. We want you to infiltrate the Brotherhood cell. We need someone they’ll trust.”

  “You mean . . . you want me to be a spy?” I stare at Oskar. Then I laugh, the sound harsh in this quiet place of humming pumps. “Me? That’s crazy.”

  Oskar has seen the seahorse too. He’s watching it move away, its gentle head bowed and the fin on its back whirring. Maybe he’s a fantasist. I step back.

  “No, no, no.” Oskar turns toward me, holds my gaze with his eyes. “All we want you to do is go to the school, then just keep your eyes and ears open. You can feed back the dynamic of the groups: who’s saying what, who’s doing what, who’s in charge. You might not find out anything at all. That’s fine. We’re playing a long game. But if you do, you might be able to prevent the deaths of innocent people.”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  Oskar and I both turn as the two boys run in. We move without speaking into the next room. The circular tank in the middle is full of bright fish swimming purposefully round and round. I stop in front of the glass and wait for a middle-aged couple to walk out through the other doorway.

  “I don’t know much about the Brotherhood.” Grandma made sure of it. “I’d never be able to pull off a big lie like that.”

  Oskar rests his hand against the tank. The water is clear and blue, with tiny silver bubbles fizzing up from clam pumps. “It’s a lot for you to think about,” he says. “Of course it is. But K, we can make a new world, one where people will be safe. It has to start small, with people like you and me, because we know the real cost. We have to be determined and brave. And remember, you won’t be on your own. You’ll be part of something bigger.” Between the cage of his fingers a yellow striped fish darts past.

  He thinks I’m brave. Is that true? Will he be there for me? For always? I bump my finger gently against the face of a curious ultramarine fish on the other side of the glass. I wish I could paint it with colored inks, so that the colors would bleed into each other.

  “And I can’t stress strongly enough,” Oskar says, “that you won’t be a spy at the Institute. All you have to do is be there and establish yourself as a Brotherhood girl.” He’s trying to make it sound easy.

  “I couldn’t do that. I’d have to be, pretend to be . . . Brotherhood.” I think of their long skirts and hats. Long hair for women, short for men. Getting married so young.

  Oskar stays silent, watching the fish swim past.

  “I’d be alone in the school.”

  “You’re right.” Oskar smiles his warm smile. “But you’ll be part of the fight against fear and chaos. So you’ll know inside that you’re one of us.”

  “I am one of you.” I turn to look into his face. I think how wonderful it would be to completely belong to something that important. To be that important. “But . . .”

  “You can do it, K,” says Oskar. “I’ll help you. You’ve heard of Brer Magnus?”

  I nod. He’s always in the news making anticitizen comments.

  “He’s a Brotherhood leader but he’s also the school director. He runs a student group and big meetings at the Institute. The police haven’t been able to get him for anything yet. Someone will give him your cover story before you even get there—”

  He puts up one hand to stop me interrupting. “It’s based on the truth.” He takes out a notebook. “Who are you? Verity Nekton. Daughter of Brotherhood activists sadly killed when the Strife began.”

  He stops and looks searchingly at me. His fingers tap lightly on the glass. “Where have you been?” he continues when I don’t say anything. “In care since your parents died. No grandmother. It’s not your fault you were raised citizen not Brotherhood . . .”

  The yellow fish glides past again, its eye cold and black. I pull my thin jacket more tightly around me.

  Oskar touches my arm in warning as the children run into the room. He guides me toward the door. The spiral stairwell beyond is empty and we start climbing. “You see, now you’re nearly sixteen and old enough to make your own decisions, you want to return to your roots.” His knuckles look yellow against the handrail. “That’ll explain why the Brotherhood’s new to you.” He laughs shortly. “Everyone at the Institute will feel sorry for you. They’ll want to help you truly be a Brotherhood girl.”

  “But why will they believe it?” I take two steps at a time to keep up with Oskar. “What will they do to me if they don’t?” Why am I even thinking about this?

  “Why won’t they, K? Verity Nekton’s social worker will visit. She’ll have all the paperwork, birth certificate, and so on. And Nekton is a respected old Brotherhood name.” Oskar stops
when he reaches the landing. “And of course I’ll keep in touch, all the time.”

  He’s planned every detail, as if it’s real, as if I’m part of it already. He must have been checking me out. But it was me who told him everything, wasn’t it? I climb up the last flight of stairs. Why does Oskar think I would be able to do all this, when he doesn’t even know me? Nobody else thinks I can do anything, not even the social worker who’s supposed to help me. But this almost-stranger believes in me.

  “Where would I live?”

  “At the Institute,” says Oskar. “It’s not a boarding school, but some of the older students live there.”

  I don’t speak, because I’m afraid that if I open my mouth I’ll just say yes to him.

  “It won’t be that hard, K.” Oskar walks toward the doors. “All you have to do is be there and keep your real feelings to yourself.”

  That should be easy for me. It’s the one thing I’m really good at. Years of living with people you can’t trust will do that. I smile at Oskar, and in the glass door behind him I see my eyes lit up, green and alive again, not dull and sad.

  “Take all the time you need, K.” Oskar isn’t smiling now. “You’ll do the right thing. You know what’s at stake.” His eyes hold mine. “We both know we have to do everything we can to prevent the Strife starting again.”

  I look back into his eyes. Since Grandma died, Oskar is the only person I’ve known who understands a loss like mine. And now he’s offering me a way to do something about it. A chance to set my own life aside and work with him to stop our country from plunging back into war and chaos. Oskar opens the door and an icy wind cuts in.

  AS WE ROAR uphill back toward the station I make two lists in my mind:

  If I say yes, I’ll be working with Oskar. Isn’t it true that an individual, weak and helpless on their own, can become strong when they are part of a bigger whole? Doesn’t the possibility of saving even one person make it worth trying? This might be my only chance. It’s now or never. And I could study Art, for the first time.