Fierce September (31 page)

I hoped our faces didn’t show our thoughts – and that nobody would ask for a lie-detector test. The next questioner, though, asked if we knew why we’d been the target of such hate. We breathed again as Camnoon answered, ‘We have no idea at all.’

That must have satisfied them. After that, the media people left in a rush. ‘Running to catch deadlines,’ Superintendent Smithson explained. ‘You’re free to go as well now that’s over.’ He sent us back to the Centre in a van.

I wasn’t looking forward to confronting Roop. I hadn’t guessed the depth of her distrust of me and of Hera, and even if I had I’d never have suspected she’d talk about us the way she had – and to an Outsider she knew nothing about. It was pure luck things had turned out for the best, and that was thanks to my stratum and not to her. I wasn’t ready to be kind to her.

She was waiting for us. Her eyes were swollen and she was still weeping. Merith clung to her.

Shallym ran to the little girl and lifted her into her arms. ‘Hush, Merith. Mummy will be better soon. Don’t worry. I promise.’

Hera wriggled from Mother’s arms. ‘Merith play with Hera.’

Shallym set her down and the two of them ran into the dining room, heading for the box of toys.

I stood back as Mother put her arms around Roop. ‘Roop dear, it’s all right, truly it is. Don’t you see? Because you talked to that man, everyone now knows that the terrible things people have been saying about us aren’t true.’

But it took a long time to calm Roop. I kept my distance. I was still angry but I was also aware that I should still be in quarantine. The fact that she had reason to hate me for that didn’t improve my temper. But she made the first move. She came over to me and put her hand hesitantly on my arm.

‘From my heart, I’m sorry, Juno.’

For a moment I didn’t respond, then I caught a meaningful look from Mother and I dragged out the right words. ‘But you have saved us, Roop. And you were right to be angry with me. I’m sorry too.’

‘Thank you.’ She turned away, and Mother led her to a table. ‘Sit down, Roop dear. I’ll make you some tea.’

I took deep breaths and was glad I’d avoided a scolding from my mother. I tried to put Roop out of my mind.

That evening we ate together in the big room, watching the television while we did so. Clips of what had happened in court replayed every few minutes, with commentary from various people asking questions nobody could answer. Who had developed the virus? Why? Who was evil enough to do such a thing? Without exception, each commentator said how people now owed the Taris group an enormous apology. Not one of them hinted that they too had blamed us.

‘I’d like just one of them to admit they blamed us and to say they’re sorry,’ Sina remarked.

It wasn’t going to happen and the more the commentators talked, the more they seemed to convince themselves that they had been the only ones to work out that we couldn’t have brought the virus and that we were good and honourable people.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Mother said. ‘The important thing is that everyone now knows we’re innocent.’

Most of us though felt it did matter, but we so clearly weren’t going to get any apology that shortly we switched the television off.

At around eight o’clock Fergus came in, looking for Biddo. He was smiling. ‘Phone call for you, mate.’

Biddo jumped up. ‘Who is it?’

‘Best you take it and find out,’ Fergus said. He handed over the phone.

‘Hello?’ Biddo sounded as if whoever he was speaking to might want to arrest him. ‘What? Really? Yes. No, that’s all right. Love to. Okay. I’ll be there. Sure. I’ll tell them.’ He threw the phone in the air. ‘Yee haaaa!’

Fergus caught it. ‘That would mean good news, I’m picking.’

Biddo calmed down a fraction. ‘It was the techno shop. They say they’re real sorry and will I come back. Oh, and they say sorry to everybody.’

‘Yay!’ Silvern shouted. ‘An apology! Good for them!’

And so the change in our fortunes began. Although I was deadly tired, I stayed in the big room while Biddo searched the net to find out what was being posted about us now. It was good, and here we found the apologies we wanted.

I’m sorry I got carried away.

I shouldn’t have believed that rubbish.

I always thought you looked like good people.

‘Thanks. For nothing,’ Rynd said.

There were job offers too: for computer work, in horticulture, animal husbandry, nursing, forestry, building. The offers poured in.

Finally, Camnoon asked Biddo to help him post a message. He wrote:
We of Taris thank you for your generous
offers. In three days all our people who have been helping around
the country will be back with us again. We will respond then to
the kind offers of work.

Amid all the drama and excitement of the day, I’d not had time to think about the return of Dad and my grandparents in a couple of days’ time. They were booked on the evening train and would be with us at midnight. For a moment I had even forgotten that Grif would be absent. Now, the reality of what had happened was beginning to sink in.

I bade the others goodnight and went up with Mother and Sina to our apartment. Sina walked in a glow of happiness. Jov would be with her in two days and he would hold his son for the first time.

The following morning, Brex came in early to tell me to hurry up unless I wanted to be left behind – they were all going into town. But Mother said, ‘You’re still in quarantine, Juno. Don’t give anyone cause to blame you for anything.’

I wanted to argue, but knew she was right. I booted a cushion instead. ‘I hate this stupid place!’ The previous day’s euphoria had vanished in an instant.

Brex hugged me. ‘Sorry Juno.’ Then she was gone. I didn’t blame her – I’d have done exactly the same.

They were a long two days while we waited for our people to come back, waited out my quarantine. When my stratum got home that first evening, they told of how people had kept stopping them to say they were sorry, and how much they looked forward to us living among them.

Silvern handed me a brown paper parcel. ‘For you. From the bookshop guy.’

I ripped the paper off. Inside was a book of myths and legends of Aotearoa. I opened it, full of wonder at the rich pictures. I owned two books –
two.

‘He said to tell you he understands why you didn’t tell him who you were,’ she said, laughing at me.

‘Tell him thank you. Oh wow!’ Then I remembered Magda. ‘Tomorrow, would you go into Newtown?’ I told them how Magda had been so kind to Vima and me, and how she had helped us the day the pandemic started. ‘I’d like to know that she’s all right. That she’s …’ I couldn’t say
still alive
. ‘That she’s well.’

They promised, pleased to have a reason to explore a different area of the city.

The next day, Mother, Hera, Sina and I spent much of the day on the roof, lying in the warmth of a weak sun while I read them stories from the book. That evening I waited for my friends down in the lobby. They burst through the door, happy and hyped from another day of freedom in a world that no longer hated us.

‘Did you see her?’ I scanned their faces.

‘She’s fine,’ Silvern said. ‘Sends you her love and says to tell you she’s well and happy.’ She handed me a cardboard box. ‘For you, with love from Magda.’

It was a chocolate cake decorated with tiny flowers. I wanted to share it with them, but Paz rubbed his stomach and said, ‘She’s already fed us. We mightn’t ever need to eat again.’

He just grinned when we mocked him.

Marba said, ‘Share it with your mum and Sina.’

I took the cake upstairs. It was hard to believe, but it now seemed that life would be good to me in this Outside country. First there was a book and right now there was cake to eat. Tomorrow, by midnight, the rest of my family would be with us. Tomorrow I would be out of quarantine. Vima and Wilfred would come back – and Jov too. Trebe, Oban and others who had gone far away would begin their journeys back to us. All would be well – except that somewhere out there was a person evil enough to kill people indiscriminately, cunning enough to devise a plan that put the blame on us, and we were no closer to knowing who or why.

I
WOKE VERY EARLY THE NEXT morning — my first day of freedom. I didn’t have to stay locked up anywhere: not here, not in Vima’s tiny rooms and not in a jail cell. It was good, especially the bit about the jail cell.

When I couldn’t stand the waiting a second longer, I ran and hammered on Silvern’s door.

‘Juno? Bug off. It’s the middle of the night!’

‘If you won’t come with me, I’ll go out by myself,’ I yelled. I held my breath, hoping she wouldn’t say,
Good,
now disappear.
Instead she hauled the door open.

‘Listen, you! It’s too bloody early. Nothing will be open. Give it a rest and come back in an hour.’ She slammed the door.

I hadn’t thought about things not being open. But I couldn’t stay inside, and there was plenty else to explore apart from the shops. I went to tell Mother that I was going for a walk, probably down towards the sea, and discovered Hera was awake too, and demanding to come with me. We eyeballed each other, but I was the one to cave. I knew she must be as fed up with this place as I was.

‘Only if you come in a pushchair,’ I warned.

‘Go fast,’ she said, nodding her head off. ‘Go fast like a bird.’

Once I got outside I was glad to have Hera’s company in this wide, open world, for I couldn’t quite shake the feeling of danger, of being watched. When I focused on the feeling though, it faded. I decided it must be just the strangeness of being able to walk freely, of knowing the hate against us had died. I hoped so.

I ran to the sea, taking in great lungfuls of salty air. I wanted to shout, to sing – but refrained, for I could do without the attention that would bring. Soon the loneliness got to me, and although I was ashamed of being such a wimp I turned and pushed Hera at high speed back to the Centre.

I figured I would be all right so long as my stratum was happy for all of us to go exploring together. I didn’t want to tell them why I wasn’t keen on going unaccompanied. They’d tease me without mercy because I was the girl who had wanted so desperately to be Outside and able to walk alone.

I needn’t have worried. Dreeda was knocking on our door almost as soon as we’d finished breakfast. ‘Hurry up, Juno or we’ll go without you.’

What a strange day it was. Everyone knew who we were. Some people just smiled as they passed us; others called out things like,
Hiya, how’s it going?
Some stopped us to chat, to tell us they were sorry we’d been treated so badly. Some even apologised for thinking the worst of us.

Our first destination was the bookshop. ‘The guy told us to be sure you came to see him,’ Marba said.

‘And then we have to visit Magda again,’ I reminded him.

Paz looked as if this would be no hardship.

The bookseller was as friendly as I remembered him, and seemed almost excited to see my friends again as well. ‘It’s not every day we get a pack of celebs in here,’ he joked.

Celebs? Us? We walked taller after that – for a few steps anyway.

In the Newtown café, Magda hugged me. ‘I kept telling people you weren’t a bad lot. And now I’ve been ringing them all up and saying
Told you so.
’ She laughed. ‘So satisfying.’

Back at the Centre, there was further excitement in greeting those who had come back while we were out. Jov had returned. He held his son, a look of awe on his face – until Jovan cried. Then Jov looked panicked. Sina laughed but she didn’t rescue him. ‘Rub his back and whisper to him. He just needs soothing.’

I was dying to see who else had returned – Vima for starters. But she hadn’t come back. Galla said she’d called to say she’d be with us later in the evening. It seemed weird, but it was so like Vima not to do what was expected of her. Whatever she had in mind, I was willing to bet she hadn’t spent her first day of freedom shut up in that tiny flat. Then I got caught up in watching a movie in the big room and forgot to look out for her homecoming. Mother had come downstairs too, with Hera who stuck her bottom lip out and said, ‘Not bed. Want to see my daddy.’

Mother settled her on a cushion and tucked a blanket round her. ‘We’ll wake you up when he gets here.’

She closed her eyes. ‘Grif’s not coming back.’

No.

When the movie ended there was still more than an hour to wait. I couldn’t bear it.

‘Come on,’ I said, ‘let’s take Hera and go to meet the train.’

Mother didn’t need persuading – she jumped up and rushed off to grab a pushchair.

We walked through the city. Taxis passed us. A monorail car zipped along overhead. There were plenty of people milling about, and somebody was singing.

We weren’t the only ones waiting at the station either. We stood back from the crowd, trying to see over their heads. ‘There!’ Mother shouted, and she was off, running to Dad.

My grandparents began to run too, when they saw us. Danyat felt insubstantial as I hugged him. ‘Danyat?’ I touched his face. ‘You are well?’

Yes, he assured me, he was well. But how, I wondered, could a person be well when the fabric of their life had ruptured?

Then Dad was there, wrapping his arms around me and swinging me in a wild circle. ‘We’re so proud of you, my daughter. So very proud.’