Surviving The Evacuation (Book 8): Anglesey (3 page)

“What do you mean
read
?” I asked.

He held out the bundle of papers. It was my journal.

“You did what?” I yelled.

“You heard,” Annette snapped back, switching her tone from apologetic to defensive.

“Bill,” Kim said warningly.

I bit down another pointless rhetorical question. Instead, I picked up the bundle of photocopied papers from where I’d dropped them on the kitchen table. “You copied my journal,” I said, stating the blindingly obvious. “You know, two people came up to me this morning and asked for my autograph?”

“Really?” Kim asked barely able to suppress a laugh. “Did you give it?”

“It’s not funny,” I said. At least, I didn’t think it was. Nor had it been funny to be accosted by two almost-strangers and asked to sign the bundle of papers. Miguel and Collette had thought it just as hilarious as Kim, and that wasn’t helping my mood.

“How many copies did you make?” I demanded of Annette.

“Why does that matter?” she replied.

“You photocopied them,” I said. “We can’t make any more toner. When it’s gone, it really will be gone. As it is, I doubt any of it will survive the damp of the winter.”

“Right, exactly,” Annette said. “So if we don’t use it, it’ll be gone forever, so where’s the harm?”

“Think of all the other things we could have done with the ink!” I said.

“Like what?” she said, her tone rising to match mine.

“I… I…” I couldn’t think of anything. “That’s not the point,” I said. “It was my journal. You had no right to copy it.”

“Then you had no right to put us in it,” Annette said. “It’s just as much my story as it’s yours. You said as much. You said you were writing it for me and Daisy so we’d know what happened and why. That means it’s ours, and that means I can make a couple of hundred copies if I want.”

“A couple of hundred? You can’t be serious?” I’d assumed it was just a couple of dozen.

“It’s important,” Annette said. “It’s everyone’s story, and everyone needs to know. It tells them how they came here. Honestly, I don’t see why you’re so angry.”

“Really? You don’t? Do you even know what invasion of privacy is?”

Behind her, Kim shook her head.

“You gave it to me,” Annette said. “When you went off to kill Quigley without even saying goodbye, you gave it to me. You didn’t… didn’t…” Tears bubbling up in her eyes, she ran from the kitchen. I turned to go after her.

“Leave her,” Kim said. A moment later the front door slammed. “On the whole,” she continued, “I think it’s possible you could have handled that worse. I’m not entirely sure how, but give me time and I’ll think of something.”

“You think this is funny?” I asked.

“I think this is one of those laugh or cry moments, Bill,” she said. “Given all that’s happened, I know which I’ll choose.” She picked up the journal. “Your handwriting’s terrible. Maybe as a punishment you could get her to type it out.”

“Doesn’t she know about privacy? About boundaries?” I said, ignoring the invitation to laugh the whole thing off.

“If you’re just going to start listing words, I’ll get you a thesaurus,” Kim said.

“Why did she do it?”

“You don’t have much experience of teenagers, do you?” she said.

“Not since I was one,” I said.

“And that was in an all-boys boarding school. Look, there are only about thirty kids here around her age, and they’ve formed their own cliques. She wanted to fit in, but she’s the latecomer, the outsider. She needed to impress them. How better than with this? It’s proof that she did what they didn’t. She survived out there on her own. She rescued Daisy long before we found her. She wanted the other kids to know. Be thankful, that after all she’s been through, this is the way she’s acting out.”

“She did this just to fit in?” I asked, confusion replacing anger

“Not entirely,” Kim said, “and not consciously, but that’s the motivating factor. She lost everything, Bill. Her parents, her home, her friends, even her childhood. She’s only thirteen, and finds it hard to articulate, so she puts on a cheerful exterior. Underneath, she’s a roiling cauldron of rage.”

“Wait, you knew about this?”

“I found out last night,” Kim said. “I was going to tell you after we’d had breakfast.”

“Why not yesterday?” I demanded, anger returning to the fore.

“Because we were having such a nice, normal evening,” she said. “I had this crazy notion that you weren’t going to take the news well. I can’t think why I imagined that. Look, Bill, you weren’t out in the wasteland alone. What you went through, I went through too, and what I went through on my own was far worse than the betrayal you suffered. If anyone should feel upset about having her secrets told to the world, it’s me. And I’m not happy. I’m certainly not happy with the way you portrayed me, but it’s done. You wrote it, Annette copied it, people have read it. There’s little point arguing over what’s done.”

Kim was right, of course. I’d been stuck in my flat during the evacuation and those chaotic months that followed. At the time, I thought I was hard done by, but in comparison with what she and Annette had experienced, I was lucky. They both went on the evacuation, and survived it and the worse that came after. Hindsight’s a wonderful thing, but right then I was too angry to consider the truth in her words, or how the amusement had dropped from her voice.

“This can’t be excused,” I said. “And it can’t be ignored. It was just wrong. What she did was wrong!”

“I think,” Kim said, “you need some time to work out precisely why you’re upset. Watch Daisy.”

“Why? Where are you going?”

“To find Annette,” she said.

She left and I didn’t follow. Considering all I’d said, it was the best decision I’d made that morning. Though we’d travelled together, fought together, and saved one another’s lives, we weren’t a family. Not quite, not yet, and not in the way the word would have been used a year ago. For good or ill, though, we were stuck with one another.

Daisy was at her quarter-size plastic table next to the wide windows that looked out on the overgrown garden. She was stabbing a paintbrush at a sheet of paper in a lacklustre fashion.

“It’s all right, Daisy,” I said. “If we didn’t love one another, we wouldn’t bother to argue.” I pulled out a kitchen chair, sat next to her, and stretched out my leg. The new brace was comfortable in a way that only emphasised how makeshift were those I’d made myself. The leg is a few inches shorter than it should be. Dr Knight suggested re-breaking it so it could set properly. I didn’t need to spend long remembering my months in a cast before giving a definitive no. My hand gave me the most bother. The stumps of my missing two fingers itched, ached, and occasionally seeped. I resisted the urge to scratch.

“What are you painting?” I asked. “Is it a house?”

“No.”

Daisy had few words, or few that she shared with us. It was hard to be sure of her age, but I’d have said she was around two. That was what we were talking about the previous night. We were going to pick a date for Daisy’s birthday and plan a real celebration. An event that would mark the beginning of our new lives in our new world.

“Are they trees?” I asked, wondering if the green paint had been chosen for a reason other than that it was the one closest to her hand.

“No.”

“A boat?” I asked, taking a stab in the dark.

Daisy turned her head to give me a frown as if she was wondering how I could be so stupid not to immediately recognise what it was, then she turned back to her paint. I sighed, stood, and went over to the kettle.

“It’s nice to have a kettle again,” I said. “A cup of tea always puts things into perspective, doesn’t it?” Daisy didn’t reply. “Then we’ll go back to the baker’s and see what a birthday cake would cost.”

Daisy turned her head, this time with far more interest.

“That’s right,” I said. “A birthday cake.” I thought back, but couldn’t think of an occasion when we’d have used those words during our time in the wasteland. “Do you remember cake? Or was it the baker? Baker? Ah well, wait until you see what a cake is. Of course, that brings us back to the question of how we’ll pay for it. There’re only eight teabags in the box.” I placed one in a cup. “I don’t think we’ll trade for it. Maybe there’s some work we can do for Mrs O’Leary. Then again, what work am I qualified for?”

The water boiled, and the kettle clicked off at the same time as the back door opened.

“Morning, Daisy,” Sholto said. “That’s a great picture. It’s a bird, right?”

“B’rd!” Daisy said, stabbing the brush at the paper for emphasis.

“Where’s everyone else?” Sholto asked as I tried to work out what parts of the blob were the wings.

“We had a row. Annette copied my journal and distributed it across the island.” I gave him the edited highlights of the confrontation.

“You want my advice?” he asked, and continued before I could say no. “Apologise. Always apologise and swiftly move on. Life is far too short to let an argument fester.”

“Kim said much the same thing,” I said. “Where were you?”

“Walking,” he said. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“You’re thinking of America again?” I asked.

“Of the people,” he said. “A house is a house the world over, but the people? Now that I’ve time, I can’t help but wonder what became of them. I don’t know if they’re still holding on, but if they are, they could be dead tomorrow. Anglesey might be the refuge they need. I was hoping Sophia Augusto might give me a ride over there, but since she’s gone south to help tow that hospital ship back, I have to wait. That’s what’s getting to me, the waiting.”

“The Harper’s Ferry?” It was a U.S. Navy hospital ship that the Vehement had stumbled across when it was hunting Quigley’s submarine. “There’ll be American crew on board who’ll want to know what happened in the States,” I said. “I’m sure someone will organise an expedition.”

“Yeah, me,” he said.

“Ah. You’ve decided to go, then?”

“I think so,” he said. “Someone has to. No, it’s not that.
I
have to. I have to know. I have to see it for myself. I won’t be able to rest until I do. Is there any coffee?”

“Not much. That’s something we need to discuss, but it’ll wait until Kim gets back with Annette. In fact, that might be a good way of framing my apology.”

I drank my tea, and he his coffee, talking around his return to America without ever explicitly mentioning it. I’d spent my life thinking I was an orphan. Having discovered I had a brother, I was reluctant to see him disappear, but wouldn’t be so selfish as to ask him to stay.

The unfamiliar sound of an engine outside was a welcome relief from the increasingly awkward conversation. We both hurried to the front door. Petrol was scarce on Anglesey, and though there are plenty of abandoned cars, this was the first time I’d seen a vehicle actually being driven. A minibus had pulled into the drive. It looked as if there were only two occupants. George Tull and Gwen, both of whom we’d first met with Donnie, Francois, and the others on the Welsh beach before I set out to confront Quigley.

“Is Kim here?” George called out, through the open passenger window.

“No. Why?” I asked, taking a step nearer.

“Where’s she gone?” George asked.

“No idea,” I said. “Why?”

“Shame,” George said. “I wanted to borrow her rifle. Her, too.”

“What for?” I asked, not bothering to hide the irritation in my tone.

Gwen stuck her head out of the window. “A group went over to Caernarfon on a supply run,” she said, speaking quickly. “They were due back this morning, but radioed in to say they were trapped. The radio went dead. We’re trying to get a rescue together.”

“By driving around in a minibus?” Sholto asked.

“Are you two busy?” Gwen asked, ignoring the question.

“I’m watching Daisy,” I said.

“Bring her,” George said. “You can leave here in Menai Bridge. She’ll be safe. Come on.”

“I… I…” I began.

“People are in danger,” Gwen said. “They might already be dead. There’s no time for equivocation. Get your daughter, get your weapons, and get in the van.”

“We’re the help that comes to others,” George said. I met his gaze, saw the concern, and remembered the many times I’d hoped for a rescue that never came. I nodded.

As Sholto ran to grab his rifle, I scrawled a quick note for Kim, grabbed Daisy, my weapons-belt, and, after the briefest of hesitations, the fire axe I’d left in the umbrella stand. Pausing only to note that Kim’s rifle was gone, and assuming she’d taken it when she’d gone after Annette, I limped out to the minibus. I reached it just as Sholto appeared from around the side of the house, his rifle slung across his shoulder.

“How quickly things change,” I murmured. “Or change back.” I got into the bus.

“Hi, Bill, Sholto,” Gwen said, adding more brightly, “Hello, Daisy. There’s no child seat, I’m afraid, so hold onto her. Shouldn’t be a problem, it’s not like there’ll be any other traffic.”

“So what’s going on,” Sholto asked, as Gwen reversed back onto the road.