Troublemakers by Catherine Barter

Author:Catherine Barter
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781448188635
Publisher: Andersen Press Ltd

THIRTY-TWO

The meeting with the bus drivers is cancelled. Everybody makes a lot of phone calls. I stand in front of the office window and press my forehead against the glass. The street outside is quiet – no cars or dogs or anything – and the row of beautiful white terraces opposite all look like they’re empty. Dark, curtainless windows and no movement.

Here’s what I am thinking about. I am thinking about my mum at nineteen. Only four years older than me and she had a baby. Imagine that. I think of her with her curly hair and a baby in a sling, imagine her in dungarees and a bandanna, her and her friends with a rainbow banner saying Women Against the Bomb, shouting at the police. I’ve made this picture up. What else can I do. I have a twenty-second video and a torn-up postcard. But I can imagine: wet grass and mud, sleeping in a tent and sharing their food. The baby crying. She is brave. Wild and very strong. Determined. She doesn’t watch television helplessly, turning if off when things are too bad. The world is a thing that she thinks she can change. She sleeps with men and forgets their names. She loves her friends most of all. She has a best friend, like I do. They are inseparable. She is nineteen. She has a baby. She is never lonely. She is not interested in being safe. She is part of something. She’s alive: wet grass between her toes, heart beating and neurons firing, breath clouding the morning air, baby crying for her. She is needed. She is doing something. That’s what I’m thinking.

I’m spacing out. Danny is talking to me. ‘Lena. Alena. Are you listening to me?’

‘What?’ I turn round. He’s standing with his arms folded, tie loosened.

‘I don’t want you to go anywhere. All right? You’re staying here.’ He looks at Leila. ‘I don’t want her to go out.’

‘Lockdown,’ says Leila. ‘Got it.’

‘We’ll be an hour. Two hours, maybe. That’s it.’

‘What?’ I say. ‘Where are you going?’

‘Do you listen to anything I say?’ says Danny.

‘Apparently not.’

‘We’re going to go and meet with Jake. He’s on the other side of town. There’s a taxi on its way.’

‘Can’t he come here?’

‘He needs to stay where the cameras are,’ says Will. He appears behind Danny wearing a black wool coat that looks expensive.

The whole office is overheated and my eyes feel dry and tired, my skin prickly. There is black ink from the photocopier smeared on my jeans and Will in his super-smart office clothes makes me feel uncomfortable. I ignore him and look at Danny.

‘Is it, like.’ I start and then I stop. ‘Is anybody worried there’ll be another one?’ I say.

‘Yes,’ says Danny.

‘No, they’ll catch him,’ says Leila. She’s at her desk. She looks up at me and smiles. ‘Don’t worry, they’ll catch him now.’

‘Right,’ says Danny. ‘No, that’s right. They probably will catch him now.’

‘I need my phone back. In case there’s an emergency.’

Danny considers this and then says, ‘Yeah, all right.

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