“I saw you poking at it yesterday, when you first got here,” she said. “It’s very old, and fragile, and you’re big enough to know better. So you can just keep to the house from now on, and leave the Oak alone.”
Heat rushed into Timothy’s face. Was that what she really thought-that he’d been trying to damage the old tree? Pick off the bark and carve his name into its skin like some ignorant lout with no respect for nature or other people’s property?
“I’d never do anything to hurt it,” he protested, trying not to think of the fact that only yesterday he had-albeit by accident. “This is because of the suspension, isn’t it? Just because I got into one fight at school, you think I’m some kind of troublemaker?”
Peri folded her arms and looked at him, her mouth a straight line. She didn’t speak, but all at once Timothy understood.
“No, I get it,” he said with sudden bitterness. “You don’t want me here. That’s why you never even asked me, isn’t it? Five months at Greenhill, and I never heard from you or Paul once. And now that you’re stuck with me you’ve been trying to make the best of a bad lot, but what you really wish is that I’d never come here in the first place.”
“Timothy, it’s not-”
“Yes, it is. I can tell.” He was shaking now, though with cold or anger he couldn’t tell. He felt hollow inside, like an empty cage: His last hope of security had flown and there was nobody he could count on now, not even himself. “Fine. I’ll go. I’ll stay out of your way. And I won’t touch your precious Oak again.”
“Timothy!”
She sounded distressed, but Timothy was in no mood to listen. He turned his back on her and stalked off toward the house.
He didn’t come down to supper when Peri called him, or answer her tentative knock at his door. But when he heard the drone of the stair lift, Timothy realized that he’d taken his rebellion too far. He opened the bedroom door to find Paul sitting in the corridor just outside, hands gripping the wheels of his chair as though preparing to ram the door down.
“Sorry,” said Timothy, before his cousin could speak.
“It’s not me you should be sorry for,” said Paul curtly.
“I know. I’ll apologize.”
“That you will.” Paul wheeled into the room, his cool gaze sweeping over the clothes scattered across the floor, the unmade bed. “Peri’s willing to make excuses for you, but she doesn’t know your parents. They’re good people-and I know they raised you better than this.”
Somehow Timothy could tell that when Paul said this, he didn’t just mean what had happened between him and Peri. He looked down at his feet.
“It can’t have been easy for them,” Paul went on, “sending you away. Obviously, they thought you’d get a better education here, but it can’t have been cheap, either. I’m guessing Uncle Neil doesn’t make a lot of money, church support or not.”
There was a dead bluebottle on the windowsill. Timothy brushed it off and leaned his forehead against the cold glass, suddenly weary. “It wasn’t just them. I wanted to come.”
It had seemed like an adventure, back then. But nothing had turned out the way he’d hoped. Academically, Greenhill was an excellent school, but the so-called Christian atmosphere didn’t seem to have done much for Timothy’s schoolmates. At best they’d kept an uncomfortable distance, not knowing how to talk to a boy who looked English but didn’t care about any of the things the rest of them considered important, like the plots of Hollywood action movies or how to play the latest video games. At worst they’d mocked Timothy openly, finding fault with his clothes, his accent, and most of all, his love of Uganda.
Timothy’s confidence in the transforming power of Christianity had begun to weaken, his doubts growing as he encountered scientific books and articles that argued against his faith. Then the Gospel Hall he’d been attending-the closest thing he could find to the Brethren chapel he’d been part of in Kampala-closed down after one of the elders was caught stealing from the missionary fund. When Timothy’s isolation became unbearable, he’d prayed fervently that Paul and Peri would invite him to Oakhaven, but they hadn’t called or written once. By the time he’d seen a bus advertisement telling him that God probably didn’t exist, Timothy was ready to believe it.
“So is it really that terrible for you, being here?” Paul persisted. “Or is it just the school you hate?”
“Greenhill’s all right,” said Timothy, his eyes following a pair of crows as they flapped past. “I mean, the teachers are decent, and I’ve been getting good marks and that sort of thing. I just…don’t fit in.”
“The battle cry of the McCormicks,” said Paul dryly. “I see your genes have done you no favors there. But was it really necessary to get yourself suspended to prove the point?”
“What makes you think I-”
“Oh, come on, Tim. Even as a kid you were a calculating little beggar. Don’t think I hadn’t noticed you timed that stunt perfectly so you’d end up being sent here, instead of moping about in Tunbridge Wells with my mum and dad. What are you figuring, then? That if you make yourself odious enough at Greenhill, your parents will have to pull you out and send you to a different school instead?”
Timothy shifted uncomfortably. “It’s not like that.” Well, maybe it was, but he hadn’t planned that far ahead yet. All he’d been able to think of while he was at Greenhill was that somehow he had to get away from there before he went insane.
“What is it like, then?”
The words came automatically. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Right. Because no one has ever felt the way you do.” Paul blew out a sigh. “Fine then, I’ll leave you to your beautiful misery. But if you’re planning to sulk your way through the next three weeks, I may as well drive you into town right now and book you into the hostel. Peri’s got enough on her mind at the moment-she shouldn’t have to deal with your attitude on top of everything else.”
Humiliation scorched through Timothy. To be thrown out of Oakhaven, the one place in England he’d counted on always being welcome…It was the worst thing he could imagine right now. And why? Just because he’d touched some old tree and dared to be curious about what Peri had been doing in the garden? What kind of sense did that make?
“Anyway,” remarked Paul over his shoulder as he pivoted the chair and rolled toward the door, “if you can stop brooding long enough to eat, Peri’s kept some supper for you. Otherwise, we’ll see you tomorrow.”
Timothy waited until the hum of the stair lift receded before slamming the door and throwing himself down on the bed. Anger seethed inside him, and it took all his resolve not to snatch the alarm clock off the nightstand and hurl it across the room.
So that was all he had to look forward to at Oakhaven? Three weeks shut up in the house, with strange things happening all around him that he wasn’t allowed to question, let alone investigate? There was no way Timothy could stand it.
May as well drive you into town right now and book you into the hostel…
He grabbed his backpack and pulled out his wallet, leafing through its contents. The bank card was good for a couple hundred pounds, plus he still had fifty-no, sixty-left over from Christmas. If he was careful, it might just be enough to get by. And if he got stuck, he could always make some money by playing his guitar.
In which case there’d be no need to come back here, except to pick up his suitcase…Timothy shoved the wallet into his pocket, then dumped the schoolbooks out of his backpack and started stuffing clothes in. Halfway through the process he paused to tear a page out of one of his workbooks and scrawl a hasty note:
Thanks for the food, sorry for the trouble.
See you in three weeks.
Timothy
He was just shoving the last pair of his socks into the backpack when the light above his head winked out. Annoyed, he dropped the pack and opened the bedroom door-to find the lights in the corridor still glowing brightly.
A fuse must have blown, but he wasn’t about to go downstairs and ask Peri to fix it. Timothy left the door open and returned to finish packing as best he could. But then the corridor lights flicked off as well, and in the distance he heard the thin chuckle of running water.