The worst part was the senselessness. Nobody seemed to know how the accident had happened or what she’d been swerving to avoid. The car’s steering had failed as his mum had tried to straighten out of the unexpected turn, but nobody seemed to know why. Tom had blamed everybody he could think of – in his head he’d shouted at mechanics, policemen, the ambulance crew and his dad. Especially his dad. He was closest, he was easiest to blame.
When it was all over, when the last goodbye was choked out through the final tears, it was just the two of them. Tom looked at his dad, a shell of the man he’d been three weeks ago, and said, ‘I’m off to bed.’
Sleep had taken him away for almost two days.
10
Annie flinched as she heard the door lock behind her. The sense of finality, of being cut adrift was disorientating; she’d gone from the locked room full of her friends to being alone in a deserted corridor with an armed man. Neither situation was safe but her tentative plan suddenly felt reckless. Could she really do this?
‘So, where’s the girls’ toilets?’ the man asked. Annie wasn’t sure if he’d been allocated the name Curly or Mo. Had he been the one who’d originally been at the window or the one standing guard by the door? The window, she was almost certain. That made him Mo. For some reason that had amused his colleagues, but she couldn’t work out why. Mo? Homo? Was it some sort of homophobic slur?
Her thoughts were spiralling out of control – they seemed to be slippery and fleeting. She vaguely remembered that she’d been asked a question, but she couldn’t remember what it had been. ‘What?’
‘Left or right? To the toilets?’
The words made no sense. She couldn’t remember which was which.
‘Hey!’ The man grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her twice, hard. ‘Left or right?’
The jolt seemed to free the blockage in her brain – she could focus again; the words made sense. ‘Left. That door down there, opposite the entrance.’
There was a dark figure standing next to the door that led into the playground – another clone dressed in black and armed with a stocky rifle. Annie hadn’t anticipated this. Of course they’d have somebody guarding the main door. How could she have not thought of it? Rapidly, she reassessed her plan. It might still work even though there were now two armed men to avoid. All she had to do was keep her nerve and lie her head off.
‘Come on then.’ Mo grabbed her arm and pulled her for a few steps until she was walking on her own. ‘Haven’t got all day.’
The other man had turned to watch them, but his ski mask prevented Annie from assessing whether he was curious or completely disinterested.
‘Eyes front,’ Mo snapped at his colleague who immediately stood bolt upright and shifted his focus back to his view of the playground.
As they approached the entrance, Annie tried to lean round the guard to see what was happening outside. Did anybody out there know what was going on? They must do. There might be armed officers all around the humanities block just waiting for an opportunity to shoot one or all the men that were holding her class hostage. And any slight motion might attract their attention and put everybody in danger. What the hell was she doing?
‘In there?’ Mo asked even though there was a female symbol clearly displayed – black against the pale blue of the door.
Annie bit back a sarcastic comment about the level of his powers of observation. ‘Yes,’ she replied, trying to make herself sound terrified – not difficult considering she was shaking with fear.
‘Right.’ He leaned round her and pushed the door open. Was it her imagination or was he deliberately rubbing up against her? What might he try if they were alone in the toilets? This wasn’t going to work.
‘Do you mind?’ she asked. ‘It’s the ladies. And I’d like to go to the loo while I’m there.’
Mo stood still his eyes flicking from the sign on the door to Annie’s face as if he was trying to work out the appropriate etiquette. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m coming in. Or I’ll get the things myself.’
‘I still need the loo,’ Annie persisted. ‘And not for a wee. Please. I’ll be quick but I can’t do it if you’re outside the cubicle listening.’
‘Windows,’ the man said. ‘You might climb out and run away.’
‘They’re too small to climb out of,’ Annie said. ‘And they’re too high up. Go in and have a look.’
‘Don’t tell me what to do!’
Annie took a step back as his spittle sprayed her face.
‘We’ll both go in. If you’re telling the truth I’ll give you two minutes to get the towels and do your business.’
Annie led the way into the toilets almost in tears at the ordinariness of the dark blue cubicle doors and the shiny white sinks. Here Jess had confessed a pregnancy scare after the relief of getting her period three days late. Here she’d held Leanne’s hair back as she’d puked her first hangover into one of the sinks.
‘See,’ she said, pointing up at the windows. Barely six inches wide and two feet long they were spaced along the top of the wall, above the toilet cubicles. ‘They only open about that far.’ She indicated about four inches with her thumb and forefinger. ‘The sanitary towel machine’s there.’ She pointed to the back wall.
‘And what’s that?’ Mo walked over to the door that nestled next to the furthest sink.
‘Cleaner’s cupboard, I think,’ Annie said,
