Following Flora (13 page)

“But she didn't.”

“Of course not. She started crying that Zach didn't love her anymore, that she'd lost everything and that it was all his and her father's fault. And then she must have followed us and waited for us to come out. You know what happened next.”

Zoran said that he had wanted to tell Dad last night but Zach had begged him not to, and given what Zach had just been through and what he'd done for Jas, he agreed to wait. And then this morning he decided to go and see Mr. Rudowski.

“What did he say?” I asked.

“He begged me not to go to the police.”

“But she hurt Mum! Doesn't he care?”

“She's his daughter,” Zoran said gently. “And what are the police going to do?”

“Catch her!”

“She needs medical help, Blue.”

“But what about Mum? What if Wanda comes back and attacks her again?”

Zoran said that he would find her. He said he would never let anything bad happen to any of us, and that was why his biggest priority now was to make sure Wanda got the help she needed from doctors and from her own family.

“We have to tell Dad,” I said.

Zoran hesitated. “If that's what you want.”

“Of course it's what I want! Why wouldn't we tell Dad?”

“He has a lot on his plate right now. And David can get a bit—irrational himself. I wonder if we might wait. For Zach's sake.”

I thought about Dad last night, how angry he was.

“If you want to do the right thing by one person,” I said, “does it always mean you are doing the wrong thing by somebody else?”

Zoran said sometimes that was the case, but not always.

“Flora knows,” I told him. “But she won't admit it. She says I'm imagining things, but really she's afraid of upsetting Zach.”

“Let me find Wanda,” Zoran said.

Jas is sleeping with Twig tonight. I just stopped in Flora's room on my way back from the bathroom. She hasn't asked me where I went this afternoon, and I haven't told her.

 

TUESDAY, JANUARY 21

We went to the hospital today. Mum is on a ward with four other women. Her window looks out over the railway tracks and her bed is separated from the others by curtains. She says it's super-cozy and all the women chat to one another and swap stories, but she looked exhausted.

Maybe Flora is feeling guilty for her silence, because she flitted about Mum's cubicle arranging flowers and plumping pillows and feeding her soup she brought from home in a thermos like she was the sort of nurse you see in black-and-white films who look like nuns.

I read out loud to her from
Jane Eyre
.

Twig told us about the trains he could see out of the window.

Jas sat on the floor because there weren't enough chairs, hugging her knees and looking sorrowful. I got to the bit where Jane traipses across the moors, lost and abandoned without a hope in the world, and she started to sniff. Twig stared at her, amazed.

“Are you crying because of the book?” he asked. “Because I think it's the stupidest thing I ever heard.”

“You're just uncultured,” I told him.

“Let's not quarrel,” Flora murmured, and Jas howled even louder.

I asked her, “Are
you really crying because of
Jane Eyre
?” and she gave a giant hiccup and wailed that NO, OF COURSE SHE WASN'T, and then she threw herself on Mum's bed shouting MUMMY MUMMY MUMMY and that it was all her fault. Mum said no no no of course it wasn't and Jas said yes yes yes it was until a nurse came along and kicked us out, telling us we'd be the death of our mum if we carried on like that, which really didn't help at all.

Jake came around this afternoon. He turned up on the doorstep with a bag full of chocolate bars and before I could even open my mouth to talk he said, “I just wanted to say I'm sorry about your mum,” and I let him in. I wasn't sure what I should do with him so we sat on the stairs eating the chocolate while I told him what I could, which wasn't very much.

“It was such an awesome evening,” Jake said. “Until, you know, the attack and everything. Jas and the poetry and Flora's boyfriend, it was brilliant.”

I couldn't help smiling. Jake is basically inarticulate, but I always know what he means, and he's right. Jas and the poetry and Zach
were
brilliant. Then I wished I
hadn't
smiled, because he gazed at me, all hopeful, like he thought my smile meant something completely different.

“I really like you, Blue,” he said.

I couldn't think of a single thing to say. All I could think about was Mum and how she looked this afternoon and Jas screaming MUMMY MUMMY MUMMY as the nurse pushed us out of the room.

“I'm really sorry about Talullah,” Jake went on. “I don't know what I was thinking. I think I went a bit crazy, remembering the beach and surfing and stuff. Like, even though we were back in England, it wasn't real life, you know?”

He looked so sorry for himself I almost started to feel sorry for him too. I love Jake in a way, I really do, but he does pick his moments to try and get philosophical.

“Can't we try again?” he asked. “You're one of my best friends, Blue. I hate that we don't talk anymore.”

“You're one of my best friends too, Jake,” I said, and he beamed.

“That thing you did with the milk shake was wicked,” he said. “I mean, you kind of ruined my hoodie and everything, but the way you just
did
it was mad. It was like you couldn't care less what I thought.”

Boys are so strange.

“So are we back together and everything?” Jake asked.

I told him, all I said was he was one of my best friends too, and he said yeah, I know, but that meant something, right?

I figure there are enough miserable people in the world. Why add to them unnecessarily? And maybe it would be nice to go out with Jake again. Maybe this time, if I didn't expect too much from it, it could work.

“I'll think about it,” I said.

Jake said that was awesome.

“You'd better go now,” I said. Jake said okay, and asked if I was coming back to school tomorrow. He leaned toward me but I moved away. I'm really not in the mood for more kissing practice.

“You can leave the chocolate,” I said as he went to pick up the bag.

Flora says I am making a big mistake. She swooped down on the chocolate from the first floor landing the minute Jake was gone. She was listening to every word we said. She says when it comes to boys, you have to let them know exactly where they stand at all times and that it's only inviting trouble if you don't. She says that in the long run, it's kinder to be cruel.

She still hasn't said a word about Zach's mum.

 

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 22

Jas announced this morning that she had had nightmares all night.

“It's true,” Twig said. “She came and slept with me again.”

I glared at Flora. She looked away.

I called Zoran last night, but they still haven't heard from Wanda.

On the way home from school today, Dodi repeated that she was tired of leaving messages on the house phone that no one ever answers.

“Either you buy a new phone,” she said, “or we get the old one back from Madame Gilbert.”

“Madame Gilbert hates me,” I said, and then I switched off because Dodi started saying how the reason she called me last night was to talk about Jake, and I'm not comfortable discussing Jake right now. I think Flora may have been right about needing to be more clear. This morning there was another rose pinned to my locker, and during Math he gave me a drawing of a little dog wagging its tail and looking hopeful. I'd forgotten how good he is at drawing, but seriously, a little dog?

“You're not listening,” Dodi said. She gave me this really sharp look, a bit like Grandma, and said, “Tell me everything.”

“I'm not sure I'm allowed to,” I said.

“Forget
that
!” she snorted.

“I
can
sort of understand Flora not wanting to stir things up with Zach,” she admitted when I'd finished. We were at home now, carrying tea up to my bedroom and talking in whispers. “He seems to be pretty protective of his mum. And I guess if
your
mum's okay . . .”

“It's not right,” I said. “It's like she's more loyal to Zach than to Mum. And also, what if Zach's mother does it again? Zoran says he's going to find her, but he hasn't. We
have
to tell the police.”

Dodi whispered that she thought I was probably right. Then, because she can never be serious for very long, she nudged me, nearly making me spill my tea.

“I'll say one thing for Jake,” she grinned. “However useless he was as a boyfriend, at least his mum isn't a known criminal. She might be a bit boring, but she's definitely not the rock-slinging type.”

“It's not funny,” I told her, but Dodi nudged me again, and I started to smile. “It's not a great recommendation for a boyfriend though, is it?” I said, and she agreed that the fact that Jake's mum didn't hurl stones at people probably wasn't enough of a reason to go out with him. And then we were going into my room, and Dodi jumped and this time the tea did go all over the carpet as she yelled, “WHAT ARE YOU
DOING,
” at Jas who was standing on my bed like a little ball of fury, holding my diary and waving it above her head screaming, “You knew! You knew and you didn't say!”

“Give that back!” I cried, but she backed up against the wall, holding it behind her.

“I heard you!” she shouted. “You were talking about it with
Dodi
!”

“Calm down, shrimp,” Dodi said. “I'm her BFF.”

“I'm going to tell Daddy!” Jas screamed. She made a run for the door, but Dodi caught her. Jas tried to bite her, but Dodi is surprisingly strong.

“Dad's at the hospital.” I tried to keep very calm, even though I was shaking.

“Then I'll phone him!” Jas shouted. “I'll run away! I'll tell the police!”

“Tell the police what?” Flora wandered into my room. “Why is Dodi holding Jas? What is Jas screaming about? What on earth is going on?”

“She'll come back,” Jas insisted. “It's all here in Blue's book. She's mad and she hates Mum, and Zoran can't do anything to stop her!”

“What are you talking about?” Flora repeated.

“She killed her own mother!” Jas wailed. “And now she wants to kill ours.”

Flora looked at me. I shrugged, and told Jas to give her my diary.

It was weird, watching Flora read. It was like she stopped breathing, like a balloon with a tiny puncture, getting smaller and smaller until she was almost completely flat.

“Why didn't you tell me you'd spoken to Zoran?” she said when she'd finished.

“You didn't want to hear,” I said.

Jas said, “I'm really scared, Flora.”

And even though Flora's loyalties may be divided, she's still our big sister. She started to breathe again and held her hand out to Jas.

“Come on,” she said. “I think it's time to go and have a chat with Zach.”

 

SAME DAY, MUCH LATER

I'm so tired I can barely hold my pen.

Dodi left us on the way to Zoran's flat. She may not be the most tactful person in the world, but I think even she realized that she might get in the way. Flora marched down the street in silence, still holding Jas's hand. I don't know what she was thinking as she walked, but she looked more and more angry with every step.

“It's me,” Flora snapped at the intercom when Zoran answered, and then she stomped up the stairs. Zoran was waiting on the landing. He didn't even say hello. He took one look at Flora and stepped aside to let us in. Flora stormed straight into the living room.

“Stay with Blue,” she ordered Jas, who transferred her hand from Flora's to mine.

The way Flora barreled into that room, I thought she was going yell and scream and try doing some of the things Dad said he wanted to do, the ripping and stamping and punching stuff. She looked like some warrior queen about to dismember invading hoards, but then Zach turned around from the window where he was standing and she stopped dead in her tracks.

Zach looks dreadful. Not just like a bit sad or worried or depressed, but truly horrible. The purple smudges under his eyes are almost black, his eyes are darker than ever, and his skin is so pale he looks like he might be dead. He was actually a bit scary, and I know Jas thought so too because she moved closer, so she was standing right up against me, but that is not the effect he had on Flora.

The effect he had on Flora was that she gasped, then held her arms out and rushed toward him, crying, “Baby, what's happened to you!”

“I'm sorry,” Zach said. “Zoran told me you knew. I'm so, so sorry about what she did. I should have said something.”

“No,
I
should have said something!” Flora said. “I guessed, but I didn't want to upset you. I shouldn't have left you all alone.”

Then she threw her arms around him and showered his face in kisses.

“It's not her fault,” Zach said when Flora finally let him breathe again, and we were all sitting around Zoran's tiny coffee table. “She gets so jealous. I should have seen it coming.”

“Of course it's not your fault!” Flora cried. She started kissing him again.

I glanced at Zoran who was frowning, looking worried. Jas moved even closer to me and whispered, “Ask him where she is now,” but I had another question first.

“If she gets so jealous of you, why did she go away?” I asked. “Before, I mean, not just after Christmas.”

“Leave him alone, Blue,” Flora said.

“It's a valid question,” Zoran murmured.

“It was Grandpa,” Zach said. “Their fight, after Grandma died. He didn't give her a choice.