The Imaginary (18 page)

After five minutes they had a pile of what Julia called dirty clothes, which to Rudger just looked like clothes, and a dolls' house full of naked dolls.

‘Now to wash them!' Julia said, stomping out of her bedroom towards the bathroom.

Rudger followed, a pile of clothes in each hand.

This wasn't the morning he'd hoped for.

On the one hand, he was safe from Mr Bunting. Julia believed in him (well, in Veronica, at least) and he wasn't Fading.

On the other hand, he was no closer to finding Amanda. Julia, who he'd thought would be a direct line to his friend, had turned out to be a dead end. She had no intention of going to the hospital and if
she
didn't go, then Rudger couldn't go either.

He had to come up with a plan. A new plan. An additional plan.

He tried to think while they stood at the bathroom washbasin washing dolls' clothes in soap powder and cold water.

‘Mum doesn't like me to use the hot water,' Julia explained when Rudger asked. ‘You can burn yourself
and
it wastes electricity.'

How do you get to go to hospital?
Rudger thought, as he perched on the toilet lid and hung the miniature clothes on a clothes line that dangled across the bath.

Amanda went there in an ambulance, didn't she? And the ambulance comes when there's an accident
.

But
Rudger didn't think he could have an accident. Not the sort that would take him to hospital. For a start someone has to see you in order to phone for the ambulance, and for another thing you have to really hurt yourself, and he didn't think he could do that.

He wasn't real, and being hurt was something peculiar to real people, he reckoned. He'd been knocked down at the same time as Amanda, by the same car, but he'd just rolled across the ground and stood up with nothing more than a bruised knee and a scuffed elbow, and even those had vanished before he'd really thought about them.

For an imaginary to get hurt, their real friend would have to imagine them
being
hurt, just like Julia was imagining him in a skirt and with red hair. And that's not the sort of thing friends do.

There was one way though, he thought. A plan had just popped into his head. It was dangerous, it could go terribly wrong, but if it worked, if it didn't backfire on him, then it would get him to the hospital.

But could he do it? Did he dare? Should he? It was exactly the sort of thing friends shouldn't do to one another, but he felt he had no other choice.

‘Julia?' Julia's mum shouted up the stairs.

‘Yes?' Julia shouted back.

‘Is…um…is Veronica still there?'

‘Yes, Mum. We're in the bathroom.'

‘Um…what are you doing, darling?'

‘
What do you think we're doing?' Julia shouted with a sneer. ‘I said, “We're in the bathroom.”'

Her mum went away.

Rudger looked at his plan again. He looked at the row of little dolls' clothes dripping into the bath and then he looked at Julia. This was what she did for fun, he told himself. The sooner he got back to Amanda the happier they'd all be. It was the only way.

‘What are we doing now?' he asked. Julia thought for a second, drying her hands on a towel.

‘A glass of squash, I think. After all this hard work.'

She walked out onto the landing. Rudger followed.

He looked his plan in the eye one last time, hoped he was doing the right thing and said, ‘Sorry,' under his breath.

As Julia got to the top of the stairs, he hooked one of his feet round her ankle, gave her shoulders a shove with his hands and sent her flying.

Julia tripped at the top of the stairs and plunged forwards into empty air.

‘Arrgghhh!' she shouted as she fell.

At that moment, as if luck were on her side, her mother walked into the hallway, phone in hand, saying, ‘Darling, put your shoes on, I've—'

Faced by the sudden surprising sight of her daughter plummeting towards her, she dropped the phone and instinctively flung her arms out.

Julia landed on top of her and the pair of them fell backwards, not falling over, but banging into the front door.

‘What happened? Are you okay?' her mum asked when she got her breath back.

‘
Veronica tripped me,' Julia said, almost in tears.

‘That's it,' her mum said calmly, but firmly. ‘I was just saying, I've managed to get you an appointment with a special sort of doctor.'

‘A doctor? I'm not ill. I don't need a doctor.'

‘Oh, darling,' her mum said, stroking a strand of hair away from Julia's face. ‘You don't know what you're saying. If you're still seeing this Veronica, if you really think she tripped you up just now, then I'm afraid you're going to
have
to see him.'

‘I hate doctors,' Julia said, pushing herself away from her mum. ‘They smell funny and have cold hands.'

Her mum picked her phone up.

‘Nevertheless, darling, we've got an appointment at the hospital in forty-five minutes.'

‘But…'

‘Put your shoes on.'

At the top of the stairs Rudger felt awful.

As soon as he'd hooked his foot round her ankle he realised that his plan was
wrong
, but it was too late then to stop his hands from pushing her. The plan wasn't wrong in the sense that it might not work, but wrong in the sense that it made him feel bad inside.

As much as he needed to get to the hospital to find Amanda, he shouldn't have to hurt someone else to get there. What would
Amanda
have said about it? She'd've been mad at him. Julia was her friend, and she'd be upset if Rudger hurt her.

He was just thankful that Julia's mum had appeared when she had. It made him feel slightly better.

Then he heard what her mum had said. She was taking Julia to the hospital. This was it. This was the chance he'd been looking for. It had worked after all!

He watched Julia dragging her heels as her mum opened the front door.

‘Mum,' she complained.

He crept downstairs.

Julia saw and gave him a dirty look. ‘You tripped me,' she said.

Her mum pushed the door to and whispered, ‘Is she still here, darling?'

‘She's on the stairs. I think she wants to come with us.'

‘Oh,' her mum said. ‘I suppose the doctor might want to see her too.'

‘No,' Julia said, gritting her teeth and turning away. ‘She can stay here. I
hate
her.'

Rudger felt the faintest of tingles in his left foot as she said the words. He recognised it. He'd felt it before. It was the first hint of the sort of faint tingle that came before you started Fading.

He really wasn't very good at this ‘being an imaginary friend' business, he thought.

He'd messed it all up. Entirely.

Julia slammed the door behind her before Rudger could get through it.

He pulled at the handle, but Julia's mum had locked it from the outside. He was trapped indoors.

He ran through the living room to the kitchen. There was a back door there. He'd seen it when they'd had breakfast, but when he tried the handle he found it was locked too.

The windows?

He'd have to climb up onto the work surface and then move that vase of flowers out of the way, but, never mind all that, they looked like the sort of windows that locked anyway and he didn't know where the key was.

It wasn't worth wasting time trying to look for it. Julia and her mum would probably be in the car by now and in a minute they'd be on their way.

He looked around. He'd come so close. Finally someone was going to the hospital, but it wasn't him. He could've screamed with frustration. Instead, he kicked the stool he'd sat on at breakfast.

It fell over and rolled across the floor.

Rudger looked at where it had ended up, next to the back door and he noticed something he hadn't seen when he was trying the handle.

There was a cat flap.

He
knelt down and pushed his head through.