The English Refugee: The Day It Happened Here, Page 2

  "Is Nan alright?"

  She nodded, and screwed up her chin a little, as if she was trying not to cry. "She's fine, Angel. We're just going to check if there's anything she needs. She's all on her own."

  "Since Grandad died."

  She nodded again, and her chin screwed up even more. I wished I hadn't said that. Grandad only died a year ago. I didn't want to make things worse. I do that sometimes, without meaning to.

  I found the bag. She stuffed some clothes into it, and we then went back to my bedroom and she found a change of clothes for Ben and for me. She noticed for the first time that my dressing gown was singed in a couple of places, and fussed over me for a little while, until I suggested that I get changed so I was ready to go. She'd already packed up my favourite top, but I found another one without making a fuss about it, and went to find Ben to tell him to get dressed, too.

  Dad was still making sandwiches. I don't know how long he thought it was going to take to get to Canterbury - it's normally only half an hour in the car - but he had a pile of buttered bread there which was nearly as tall as the toaster. Ben left him to it so he could go upstairs and change, after Dad told him that he could manage on his own for a while. Besides, I was there to help out now.

  I helped him put the filling in the sandwiches. He'd put the kettle on earlier, and now he filled a flask full of tea.

  "Who bombed us?" I asked.

  "Bad men," he replied with feeling. I think he thought I was still about four years old.

  "But who? And why?"

  "Flooding in China," he told me, but that made no sense at all.

  "Flooding?"

  "I'm kind of busy here, Little Man."

  I sighed. I would ask Ben later. I wasn't sure how much he actually knew, but at least he would make more sense than Dad.

  Mum came down, just as Dad was putting all the sandwiches in sandwich bags.

  "Aren't you ready yet? We have to go!"

  "I've been making sandwiches."

  "What for? She's only in Canterbury!"

  "That's what I said," I told her, not wanting to take sides, but wanting her to know that it was a good point as far as I was concerned. Dad had definitely gone overboard on the sandwiches, whatever he said, especially as most of them were tuna which is fishy and disgusting.

  Dad shrugged and went upstairs to get changed. Mum followed him to the foot of the stairs. "Ben! Are you ready? We've got to go!"

  "I'm ready," I told her, sensing the opportunity to score some points over him. She ruffled my hair, but I didn't mind as I'd forgotten to brush it so there was no harm done. "Good boy."

  "Why did they drop bombs on our street?"

  "Ask your Dad. He's good at explaining these things."

  Not that good, I thought. He just keeps going on about flooding! But I didn't say that. I was in her good books for being the first one to get ready, and I didn't want to ruin it all by pestering her about stuff she didn't want to talk about.

  #

  Dad and Ben only took a few minutes to get ready. We went out to the car. Our next-door neighbour - the bald man who never gives us our football back when it goes over the fence - was packing up his car, too, only his was full of teenage daughters and suitcases. I could see him talk to Dad through the window from the back-seat where I was sitting.

  "That's a lot of suitcases you've got there, Tom," Dad said, as he was about to get into the driver's seat of our car.

  "Don't know how long we'll be away," our bald neighbour replied, as he carried on cramming his luggage into his car. "Don't know if we'll be back at all."

  "It can't be that bad."

  "We've just been bombed by the Reds. That's about as bad as it gets."

  I thought the Reds were Liverpool, but I didn't think they'd be bombing anyone. Not even Manchester United would do that. I filed it away for future use, though, as it was a clue. It was another question I could ask Dad when he was more in the mood to talk.

  Our bald neighbour slammed shut the boot of his car. He came over and shook Dad by the hand. "Good luck, Ben." Dad's called Ben, too. My brother Ben's named after him. It's a good job we call him "Dad", as we'd have all sorts of mix-ups if we had to call them both by the same name.

  Dad looked worried. "Yeah, you too, Tom."

  Mum beeped the horn, anxious to be on our way. Dad looked as if he wanted to throttle her (which is just a saying, by the way; he wouldn't really have tried to strangle her as he'd be sent to prison if he did, and he wouldn't have liked that at all because they tell you what to do all day). He likes to be in charge, and he doesn't like being interrupted when he's talking.

  He went back to the front door, and double-locked it. He rattled the door-handle to make sure it was locked. Mum huffed in the front passenger seat. He walked back to the car, and opened the door. "Do you think we need to take more food?"

  "Seriously?" Mum asked.

  "Did you see how much stuff Tom had in his car? He doesn't think they're coming back. A few more sandwiches wouldn't hurt."

  "We need to go. Please. I need to make sure Mum's alright. We can get something to eat in Canterbury when we've checked on her."

  Dad got in and turned the engine on. We started driving down the road. Mum fished around in her bag and produced a pack of cigarettes. I noticed her hand was shaking as she tried to take a cigarette out of the pack. "Not in the car," ruled Dad. She put them back in her bag, but kept the bag in her lap, as if she needed to be close to the cigarettes even if she couldn't actually smoke them.

  We passed the houses which were on fire. Dad drove as far on our side of the road as he could, actually scraping the kerb as he tried to keep as far away from them as possible. I guess he was worried that the houses might explode, like cars do when they flip over in films. Mum stared at the flames as we drove by. I couldn't see what Dad did as he was in the seat in front of me, but he was always careful not to have any distractions when driving (we couldn't even listen to our music if he was driving, though Mum was fine and always turned it up loud if Dad wasn't there) so I guess he would have kept his eyes to the front.

  Another thirty second' drive further on, there were two or three people loading their cars with suitcases. Dad slowed down. Mum glanced over at him. He kept driving. And then, another 100 metres or so (it may have been more but I'm not great at distances) there was a whole row of flattened houses. It was starting to get light by now, so I could see everything clearly. Some people were digging in the rubble, trying to find something or someone. A lady was wailing like a fire engine. I hoped that if they were trying to find someone, that they would be okay, but it didn't seem likely. They would have been squashed flat beneath all those bricks. I was glad it wasn't our house, as I didn't think that standing under a door frame would have saved us.

  And then there were more people packing up their cars; maybe four or five of them by the time we got near the end of the road. Dad pulled over, and stopped.

  "We need to pack."

  "We need to see Mum," Mum said. She sounded cross with him again, even though he was just trying to look after us all.

  "It won't take a minute."

  "Please don't do this to me. We've wasted so much time already. I have to see her. She's on her own now."

  "We have to think of the kids."

  "Don't you dare say that to me!"

  I flinched. I was used to the two of them arguing lately, but I'd never heard her shout at Dad before. It was the voice she usually only used when Ben and I kept getting up when they were trying to watch TV downstairs, and I didn't think that she ever used it on grown-ups, let alone on Dad!

  The car drove forward again. Like I said, I couldn't see Dad, but Ben kept looking at him, and I guessed that Dad wasn't very happy that she'd used her "get-back-in-bed-now!" voice on him. Mum looked over at him, too. She clutched her bag to her tummy as if it would make everything better.

  "I'm sorry," she told him. "I'm just worried about Mum, that's all."

  She touche
d his arm.

  "Not while I'm driving," he said, and she put her arm down again.

  The road curved round to the left. We followed it round. Dad braked quickly. He swore. Mum put her hand over her mouth.

  I looked ahead. The road had run out. There was just a giant hole, maybe half the length of a house. We had come to a stop just a few metres away from the edge.

  Getting to Canterbury was going to be a lot harder than we thought. Maybe we would need more sandwiches after all.

  #

  We turned round. As Dad was doing a three-point turn, we were nearly shunted into the hole by a car coming round the corner. It missed my side of the car by a metre or two. Dad shouted at the other driver. I could see the other driver shouting back at Dad. I tried to shrink into my seat so I wouldn't get in the way. And then he drove backwards, Dad finished his three-point turn, and we were driving back the way we'd come.

  We went back past the people packing their cars, and back past the houses which were still on fire. Dad stopped to tell the people packing their cars that the road was "impassable" ahead (I thought he was saying "impossible" at first, but after a couple of times I realized he wasn't). I could see Mum looking more and more tense every time he stopped the car, but she said nothing. She just clutched her handbag tighter and tighter, like it was a teddy-bear or something.

  I could see her relax a little as we drove past our house. I think we were all expecting Dad to stop and start packing bags left, right and centre, but he kept on going. He must have done it for Mum, so maybe things weren't so bad between them after all.

  We had only been driving a minute or two past our house when he had to stop again. This time, a house had actually collapsed into the road. It was knee-deep in rubble.

  "Can't you move it?" Mum asked. "Clear a path? There's not all that much there."

  Dad laughed, but he didn't sound like he thought it was funny. He did another three point turn. We were on a straighter stretch of road this time, so there were no near misses with other cars.

  "We were so lucky," Ben said to me. It was the first thing he'd said since we'd got in the car. "Bombs both sides of us. That could have been us."

  I didn't like to think about that, especially after my dream. We had Mum and Dad upstairs anyway. They would have kept us safe, like they always had before.

  Back home. We went in the house. Our bald next-door neighbour was letting himself back in, too, but none of us spoke to him and he didn't speak to us either. There wasn't much to say.

  "What are we going to do?" Mum asked, when we were back indoors.

  "We stay here until the power's back on," Dad told her. "And then we turn on the TV and find out exactly what's happening. There'll be advice from the Government. They'll tell us what we need to do."

  "But Mum. What about Mum? We've got to go and see her."

  "What else can we do? We're not walking to Canterbury. Not with the kids."

  "I'll go, then."

  "No."

  "No, Mum, please don't," Ben said. "It's dangerous."

  "Do we know anyone with a bike I could borrow?" she asked.

  I held her hand. She looked at me. Her chin wobbled again. "I don't want to leave you guys, but she's old. I'm the only one she's got."

  Dad held her other hand. "The power will be back on soon. And the Council will clear the roads. Or maybe the army, even. We can drive there this afternoon; it'll be quicker to wait for that than to walk all that way. It'll take you all day to walk it. Wait here, see what advice we're given, get the travel news, and then we go and see your Mum as soon as the roads are clear again. Okay?"

  She nodded. I'd never seen her look so sad.

  Dad went upstairs to pack a suitcase. Overnight bags weren't enough anymore. Ben went with him to keep him company. Mum and I made sandwiches until the bread ran out.

  #

  After everything that had happened that morning, it felt really weird playing Monopoly. I think Mum and Dad just wanted to take our minds off things while we were waiting for the power to come back on. They would usually have left us to watch films or play games on our i-pads but I think they wanted to do something we could all do together, so Monopoly it was. For the record, I won. I don't think Mum was concentrating as she didn't say anything when I landed on all her hotels on Park Lane and our rules are that if someone doesn't notice when you land on their properties, then they've only got themselves to blame. Ben usually tells on me (and I tell on him) but he couldn't have been concentrating as he didn't say anything either.

  The power didn't come back. Dad had left the TV on so that it would come on straightaway when the power was back again, but it stayed off. He sometimes pressed the on-button on the remote control, just in case, and double-checked the fuses again, but there was no power at all. He went next-door to see his bald friend, but they told that they didn't have any electricity either. Mum suggested another game of Monopoly, but no-one's heart was in it.

  Ben and I ended up in our room. I think Mum had wanted us to stay together, but Ben kept pestering her to let him go and see his friends and in the end I think she decided that the only way to keep him quiet was for them to be in different rooms from us. It didn't keep him quiet, of course. It just meant that I was the only one who had to listen to him moaning about being stuck indoors.

  "It's dangerous out there," I pointed out. I've never been a thrill-seeker. Ben's ideal day would be spent at a theme park: Chessington or Thorpe Park. Mine would be reading a comic on the beach, with as much ice cream as I could eat on the way home. I love ice-cream. It's the best food ever, everyone knows that.

  "Sam's only five minutes away. It's not like I'm gonna fall into a hole or anything. I'm not stupid. I'm eleven for God's sake! Nearly twelve!"

  "You should stay here. We might have to go in a hurry when the power's back on."

  "They could pick me up on the way past. Besides, Sam's Dad's got a four by four. It would be easy to see Nan using that. Dad could drive over bricks and everything in a car like that."

  "Can they do that?"

  "Easy. That's what they're for. They drive them through rivers in the countryside."

  "Would they lend it to us?"

  "If they're not using it."

  "Should we tell Mum? Maybe we could go and see Nan after all, without waiting for the roads to be cleared up? It would be cool driving there in a car like that. Maybe we could drive through some rivers on the way."

  "I can't ask Sam to borrow it, though, not when I'm stuck here. If she lets me go round there, I'd ask his Mum. She's really nice. I'm sure they'd let us borrow it. We could be at Nan's for tea if she lets me go out now."

  "Shall we tell Mum, then?"

  "There's no point in me asking. She won't let me go. You can ask her if you want, though."

  I didn't want to, though. I'd wanted him to do it, in case asking made her cross. "Can't be bothered," I told him. "He's your mate, not mine."

  He played on his i-pad for a while. The battery had run out on mine, and I couldn't re-charge it, so I tried reading Dr Seuss instead. It was hard to concentrate, though. I wanted to talk.

  "Were you scared?" I asked him.

  "Wait for me to get to the next level," he said. I waited for what seemed like ages. After about a million years, he saved his game, and came and sat next to me on the bed.

  "What was the question again?"

  "Were you scared? When the bombs fell."

  "Course not. We're safe here. Were you?"

  "Not at the time. It was quite fun." It wasn't actually fun at all, but I thought he might be impressed if I said that. "But then when I saw all those houses outside. And you said that it could have been us. It got me thinking, that's all."

  "I was just teasing."

  "You didn't sound like you were teasing. You said it all serious, like. I wouldn't want our house to be squashed flat. Not when we were all in it."

  Ben looked at me sternly. "You're not gonna go all girly on me, are you?"

/>   I shook my head. "Course not."

  "I thought I had a brother. If you start worrying about bombs, I'm gonna have to treat you like a sister instead. Maybe put a dress on you or something."

  I shook my head again. I didn't want him to treat me like a sister. They played with dolls and stuff, and they were rubbish at games on the i-pad as far as I could make out from school. A lot of them didn't even like football, which was crazy!

  I heard Dad rushing up the stairs. He hurried past the door to our room and ran up the stairs (two at a time, which I'm going to do all the time when my legs are bigger if I live that long) to his bedroom. Ben and I followed him up, because I wanted to know what was going on. We found him pulling an old suitcase out from beneath his bed. It was full of old junk that he and Mum never used but hadn't quite got the heart to throw out. He took out a radio, which was older even than Ben.

  He turned it on. Nothing. "Batteries," he said, and he was off down the stairs again. We followed him again, as we had nothing else to do. There was no way I was going back to my bedroom, just in case there were any more questions from Ben about whether I was his brother or a sister.

  Dad was going through drawers in the kitchen. "Where's the effing batteries?" he asked (he didn't say "effing" though). Mum came in. She went to an overhead drawer, and found the batteries straightaway. "Where they've always been," she replied, as she handed them to him. That was quite funny, as Dad's usually the organized one and Mum doesn't usually know where anything is. He didn't laugh, though.

  He looked around the room. "Where did I put the radio?"

  That was funny, too.

  She raised her eyebrows and pointed to the radio he'd left on top of the microwave. He snatched it up and put in the batteries as quickly as he could, as if it was a race or something. He turned it on. Still nothing.

  "Some of them might not work," Mum said, handing him some more batteries.

  "Then why haven't we thrown them away?"

  "You tell me! I'm not the battery monitor, you know!"

  He took off the back of the battery compartment, huffed when he couldn't get the batteries out with his fingers, and grabbed a fork to help him wriggle them free. The old batteries came out, the new batteries went in. Still nothing.