Days Like This (4 page)

‘Who knows why he visits us all the time,’ Dan said.

‘It’s not as if we welcome him with open arms. What does he get out of the relationship apart from the chance to throw his weight around and feast on
tidbits
?’ Lily said.

‘Yeah, and paw at Alice,’ Dan added bitterly.

‘What did he mean about harvest time?’ Lily said.

‘I think I’ve got an idea, Lily,’ Dan said. He glanced at the door.

Lily noticed his face was pale, even paler than usual. ‘Are you getting a headache?’ she said, anxiously.

‘Yeah, look, let’s talk more tomorrow. I’m exhausted now,’ Daniel said.

But Lily didn’t get a chance to talk to Dan the next morning. Even though it was a school day, Daniel stayed in his room, recovering from the headache that had kept him awake the night before. Lily wanted to talk to him about his attempts to hack into Committee software, but Dan was lethargic and unwilling to engage. Eventually, Lily left him alone.

At dinner Daniel sat with his head down, staring at the table. He usually helped with the cooking, but tonight he was listless and gloomy, as though every movement was an effort. Lily and Alice were dishing out spaghetti when their parents joined them. These days it was unusual for Pym and Megan to eat with them. Tonight Lily had been hoping for a quick meal, then bed. Last night’s dinner with Max had been hard enough to endure, without having to face her parents over another strained meal.

Pym was holding three chocolate bars. They had blue wrappers with old-fashioned scrolled writing. A flush of silver stars swept across the blue like a milky way.

‘These are for you kids.’ Their father held out the chocolate.

Daniel sat up, suddenly more alert. He frowned, his eyes flicking between his parents.

‘Why?’ Lily said. They hardly ever got chocolate. It was a super-luxury item.

‘Is it because you let them kill Sherbet?’ she said.

‘Stop it, Lily,’ Megan said, as Alice’s lip started trembling.

‘Or is it because you let Max behave like a pig as usual last night?’ Lily couldn’t help herself.

‘We just thought you deserved a treat,’ Pym said, ignoring Lily, who exchanged a look with Dan.

‘Can we eat it now?’ Alice said excitedly. When their parents nodded, she pushed aside her spaghetti, ripped off the wrapper and gobbled the chocolate greedily.

Lily ate a few casual forkfuls of her dinner, but it was hard to resist the pull of the sweet. As slowly as she could, she picked up the bar, peeled back the foil carefully and examined the chocolate on all sides before eating it in tiny bites. It took all her willpower not to cram the entire thing inside her mouth at once while tap-dancing on the table from the brilliant taste of it. Daniel, on the other hand, put his aside.

Their parents sat down and tried to make conversation. They were careful not to mention Sherbet or Max or the Committee or their children’s ongoing house detention or any of the other contentious issues that usually came up when they were together these days.

Daniel continued resolutely eating his pasta. His self-control was admirable and Lily felt a pang that of the two eldest siblings, she was the undisciplined one.

‘Can I have that?’ asked Alice, pointing to Dan’s treat, her teeth still covered in chocolate from her own bar. Their parents glanced nervously at each other. Lily looked down at the empty wrapper beside her plate and it occurred to her that maybe she should have thought before eating the chocolate.

‘So, can I?’ Alice said again, her voice beginning to quaver.

Daniel picked up the bar, peeled back the wrapper and ate it in three bites, staring at their parents who watched on avidly.

‘I hate you,’ Alice yelled. ‘You didn’t want it and then you only ate it because I did. You’re mean.’

‘Quiet, Alice,’ Lily said.

‘You’re mean, too, Lilla,’ Alice said. Their parents smiled indulgently at their youngest daughter.

That night Lily dreamed she was in a dark room with strangely curved walls. A light shone directly into her face. She sat on a hard, upright chair that hurt her shoulder blades. Her hands were tied to her sides. She faced a long table that fit into the curves of the walls. At least ten men were seated around the table. The light was shining in her eyes so she couldn’t see their faces. One by one they questioned her, but their words were jumbled and confused. The more she couldn’t answer, the angrier they got, the brighter the light shone and the more her body hurt. Eventually her eyes adjusted to the dark and she saw the men’s faces. They had no features at all, just deep, complete, suffocating nothingness.

In the morning Daniel was gone when Lily and Alice woke, a lot later than usual and groggy.

Their parents refused to give them an explanation. Not even Alice could make them talk.

‘Where’s Daniel?’ Alice grabbed their father by the arm, her eyes flashing between him and their mother.

‘He’s gone, Alice. It’s for the best,’ was all Megan would say.

‘For the best?’ Alice cried. ‘He’s my brother, how can it be for the best? Where’s he gone? We’re not even allowed out of the house, so where could he be?’

‘You have to trust us, Alice darling,’ their mother said. ‘You just have to. He’s gone and it’s for the best. It has to be.’

It was like every other Central Governing Committee or parental edict they’d had to accept without explanation. Like when suddenly there was no more school; or when the Wall went up right outside their house; or when they were forbidden from going outside. Or when Max had to visit and everyone hated him. Or when the Blacktroopers hurt people out in the streets and came week in and week out, scaring everyone, even their parents, making them swallow the pills.

But Lily wasn’t willing to just accept Daniel’s disappearance. She couldn’t imagine getting through the days in that stale, oppressive house without him. She didn’t know what she’d do if anything had happened to Daniel.

Lily kept thinking about her last real conversation with him. He’d talked about his computer hacking and reading about people being serum enhanced and hormonally lucrative. She was positive these things were somehow linked to his disappearance. She thought about how easily the Blacktrooper had killed Sherbet. She needed to find her brother.

That night, Lily waited until the house was quiet and Alice had switched off her light. Then Lily turned off her own light, opened her bedroom door and listened. There were no sounds, but Lily knew that even silence could be deceptive. She couldn’t be entirely certain her parents were safely shut inside their wing of the house. And they moved so quietly, gliding along – almost like the Blacktroopers.

Lily steeled herself, closed her door and made her way carefully along the passageway to Daniel’s bedroom. She slipped inside quickly, stopping short because his room smelled so strongly of him. In the gloom, she saw a shape on his bed.

‘Daniel?’ she whispered. She crept closer, breathing deeply to try to slow her heartbeat. But the shape was only a pillow thrown carelessly on his rumpled bed. Lily carefully straightened and smoothed the covers, gently replacing the pillow where it belonged. Then she scrubbed at her eyes, set her torch on Daniel’s desk and began to search.

Dan had told her he was close to hacking the Committee’s central data system, that there was a problem with their security firewall and that he was trying some codes. She had to find those codes. Knowledge was power, and Lily was determined to arm herself with as much information as she could before she escaped from her parents’ house. Because she knew now that she had to escape.

Dan’s desk was littered with paper, notebooks, printouts of his schoolwork and pages of messy writing. Lily began methodically searching through Daniel’s work and neatly piling up the papers and notebooks as she made her way through them. She searched until the few birds that remained in their devastated world started their mournful calling, telling her it was morning. Deeply frustrated, she slipped out of Daniel’s room, closing the door behind her. She would have to come back tonight. She wouldn’t give up until she found the codes. They had to be there somewhere.

Neither Lily nor Alice could make their parents say where Daniel had gone. In the days that followed, Lily could hardly eat and concentration was impossible. Missing Daniel was like something sharp lodged in her throat.

She barely slept, creeping back to Daniel’s room every night to continue her search. She had gone through all the neat piles again and again, had even risked turning on his computer briefly, hoping to find a clue there. But she was pretty sure he wouldn’t be keeping anything filed in such plain view of parental or online tracking surveillance. No, he had to have written something down, but where?

Friday came around again. Blacktrooper day. Lily waited, staring at the door. When the troopers finally glided into the living room, she couldn’t contain herself.

‘Where’s my brother’s pill?’ She pushed away her fear, addressing the Blacktrooper with the padded bag, the one who had killed Sherbet.

‘Quiet, you,’ the leader snarled, taking a step towards her. ‘Don’t you remember what happens to rude children?’ He lifted his hand swiftly as if to hit her, but instead ran his finger down the yellowed bruise on her face. His fingernail dug into her flesh. Beside her, Alice gasped.

‘Hush, Lily. You too, dear,’ Megan said quickly, pulling Alice against her. Alice was whimpering, her thumb jammed in her mouth. Pym ignored his family, but from the way his arms were folded across his chest, his hands clutching each elbow, Lily could tell how tense he was.

The Blacktrooper thrust the vial containing Lily’s pill at her. ‘You do not speak unless we speak to you.’ He enunciated each word clearly, his face close to hers.

Lily saw herself reflected in his visor and glared back at him. She would not flinch. After a long pause, she took the pill from him. She noticed it was oblong, like Daniel’s used to be. Lily held it in her mouth for as long as she could, but eventually had to swallow it. As the troopers left, she felt pain swelling inside her head.

That night, Lily looked out of her small bathroom window and thought about escaping. She knew if she didn’t get out, she’d be taken away like Daniel. She had no idea where she’d go once she left, just that she had to get away from this stale house and her cold, unrecognisable parents. And she had to find Daniel.