Someone’s whistling. I follow the noise and see a woman with short fair hair wheeling a red push bike across the field towards the cows. The AV is in plain view through the gate – she must have seen us. A million things race through my brain at once, from the events of last night, to whether Luc has recovered this morning.
I sit up quickly to look into the front of the vehicle and my stomach lurches to find his seat empty. Perhaps he’s slipped down into the passenger footwell. I lean forward to check. But no, Luc has disappeared.
Fumbling, I unlock the AV and fall onto the wet grass. I scrabble to get upright and scan the area for Luc. The woman is now riding her bike as she herds the cows back across the field. How could she not have spotted me or the huge AV? She hasn’t even glanced in my direction. What am I supposed to do now?
Chapter Sixteen
My brother David ran into the house at five pm on Thursday August 10th.
‘Turn on the news!’ he shouted. I heard the crackle of the TV being switched on in the lounge. ‘Come and look at this, Ellie!’
Everyone else had been at work that day as I lounged around the house in summer holiday mode and daydreamed about Connor. He was also at work, helping Dad at the factory.
‘Do you want a cup of tea?’ I yelled from the kitchen.
‘No, just come and look at this will you! It’s hit the fan!’
I poured a few drops of milk into my tea and dismissed my brother’s over-dramatic tone. I sauntered into the lounge, where David knelt in front of the television. He looked up at me and shuffled backwards to give me a better view of the screen.
An anchorwoman stood in front of what looked like a shopping centre. Behind her, people were running and screaming. A stream of text scrolled across the bottom of the screen: so far there have been explosions in London, Manchester, Leeds Birmingham, Bristol… The list went on. The anchorwoman spoke,
‘It’s the same story throughout Europe. Also, the U.S., Australia, South Africa, India… A global attack, the like of which has never been seen before… thousands feared dead… as I am speaking I am getting reports of still more explosions in Scotland, in Cardiff…’
Sirens screamed behind her and she wore a crazed look, like she couldn’t believe the enormity of the story she was relating.
‘Oh my God.’ I felt sick. ‘David, what’s happening? I’m scared.’
He turned to look at me and we both exhaled slowly through our mouths, at the same time. There had been a couple of terrorist attacks earlier in the summer, but nothing compared to the stories we now witnessed on the screen. I sensed this was something that wouldn’t be forgotten anytime soon.
The next couple of weeks were odd. No one we knew of in our village had been hurt. But we all obsessively focused on the news. Four days after the first attacks, there were more bombings. Again, they were worldwide. Not as extensive as the first round of attacks, but still horrific, and enough to refuel a mass panic of the population. Nobody felt safe. There was none of the distance that normally accompanies big news stories. It all felt real and close. Most of us knew people who had been directly affected.
Because the police had now diverted most of their efforts to stopping the attacks, there were too few of them to deal with the rapidly escalating crime wave that overtook the country. To try to prevent total chaos, the armed forces came onto the streets. Soldiers on the beat meant the police force could concentrate more fully on investigating the terror attacks. But, whilst they had intercepted a couple of plots, the enormity of the task they faced was plain for all to see.
So far, there had been twenty-eight bombings in the first wave of attacks and nine in the second. And this was just in the UK. The devastation had been wrought by a combination of suicide bombers, sophisticated car bombs, plane hijacks and vicious nail bombs left in public areas. The attacks occurred in airports, sea ports, shopping centres, transport systems, office blocks and bars.
The damage and suffering grew beyond anything anyone could have imagined and the world could only watch in horror as the death toll mounted each day.
Chapter Seventeen
I climb back into the AV and sit here, trying to decide what to do. Suddenly, there’s a sharp rapping on the windscreen. I jump and look up. It’s Luc with a smile on his face. Standing next to him is a small wiry man in a worn tweed jacket and matching cloth cap. I open the door, ecstatic to see Luc. When I get out, I want to wrap my arms around him, but I restrain myself. The air smells of wet grass and manure.
‘You’re alright!’ I say. ‘I thought you were never going to wake up and then when I woke up and saw you weren’t in the AV… Where were you? Are you okay?’ I immediately feel awkward at my outburst. My cheeks burn and I shift from foot to foot.
‘Hey, Riley, I’m okay. Just feel a bit sick and I’ve got a banging headache. I woke up and needed a pee. I didn’t know where I was, but when I saw you lying on the back seat I didn’t know if you were alive or dead. I had to check you were breathing.’
‘What?’
‘Well I didn’t know. I still don’t know what happened. When I realised you were just asleep, I didn’t want to wake you. What happened? How did you get us out of there? Sorry, I haven’t introduced you. This is Fred. It’s his land we’re parked on.’
‘Morning.’ He tips his cap and gives a tight-lipped smile, but his eyes are warm and humorous. ‘I found your man here, watering my field and was wondering if you’d care to take some breakfast with us. Jessie’s just gotta take the cows across for milking.’
‘Umm, great, yeah. If you’re sure that’s okay,’ I stammer, taken aback by the man’s apparent friendliness after the hostilities of last night.
Luc looks at me and shrugs as if to say ‘why not’.
‘How are you?’ he asks me again. ‘Tell me everything. Are you alright? How’s the AV? Does it still drive okay?’
‘I’m fine, the AV’s fine. It drove okay last night, but it took a bit of a battering. Maybe we better look underneath and we should check the tyres.’
We do a brief check and the only damage we can see, is a bent wheel arch and scraped front bumper. The engine still starts fine and miraculously the tyres are unpunctured.
Fred waits while we’re doing this, then he explains we’ll have to take the long way round as his fields are electrified and wired-off and there’s a five-feet-deep ditch around them as well. It dawns on me I could have easily fallen into this ditch last night. He gestures to us to follow and then strides on ahead, leaving Luc and me to stumble after him.
We make our way across the dew-sodden field. I’m still wearing my flip flops – the most impractical footwear on the planet – and have to skirt around prickly thistles and large steaming cow pats. As we walk, I fill Luc in on what happened last night after he’d been knocked out.
‘God, Riley, you saved our lives! You’re amazing and I was completely useless.’
‘Well, there’s not a lot you can do when you’re unconscious.’ My cheeks flush under his gaze.
‘True.’ He grins.
‘Changing the subject though, do you think it’s safe to follow these people?’
‘Well, I spoke to both of them for about half an hour before you woke up and they seem normal and decent. And they’re offering us breakfast. I’m starving, aren’t you?’
I realise I am.
We’re nearly at the barn. The cows are still mooing and I spot a cockerel on the fence, crowing for all he’s worth. A couple of collies sit to attention in the yard and then eagerly circle the woman as she exits the field with the cattle. They make me think of Woolly. It feels like ages since I’ve seen him, even though it was only yesterday. I almost wish we’d brought him with us.