‘Been better, been worse,’ James said, as he threw down a motorbike magazine he hadn’t been reading anyway and sat up so that he could see his sister.
‘You said yourself you thought something was going wrong,’ Lauren said soothingly. ‘It hadn’t been right for a while.’
‘I actually feel quite mellow about breaking up,’ James said. ‘What pissed me off was everyone knowing about it behind my back. Including you …’
‘I would have told you if it dragged on,’ Lauren said. ‘I haven’t got any loyalty to cheesy bloody Dana.’
‘Nice boobs though,’ James sighed. ‘And she was the first girl I slept with, so I guess she’s one I’ll always remember.’
Lauren smirked. ‘Didn’t you sleep with that other girl on your anti-gang mission?’
James laughed. ‘OK, I’ll rephrase it: Dana was the first girl I had sex with apart from two minutes of complete terror in a bathtub with a girl I never spoke to again.’
Lauren giggled. ‘Only you, James …’
‘It’s Gabrielle I feel sorry for,’ James said. ‘She was still crying her eyes out in Kerry’s room when I got back.’
‘What did Zara say?’
‘She came over to the medical unit, made me and Michael shake hands like a couple of five-year-olds – good news is that Gab
totally
mashed his nose. She’s letting all three of us off as long as there’s no more bad blood between us, but
I’ve
got to pay for Jake’s busted phone.’
‘How much?’
‘A hundred and fifty,’ James moaned. ‘That’s all my Christmas money, plus a fiver a week out of my pocket money until the end of March.’
‘Bummer,’ Lauren said, changing the subject in an attempt to cheer him up. ‘The last mud-bowl match was
so
funny: training instructors versus black shirts. Bruce scored a hat-trick, so Mr Pike and Miss Smoke grabbed hold of him and threw him in the lake at the end.’
‘Sounds fun.’
‘And the chefs served hot punch and mince pies in the tent so everyone could warm up afterwards. It had a bit of rum in it, so we were only allowed one each. You know what I was thinking?’
‘What?’ James asked warily.
‘There’s this big training exercise in America coming up. Seeing as your mission ended early, you might be able to sign up.’
‘Why would I volunteer for extra training?’
Lauren shook her head. ‘It’s in this place called Fort Reagan in America. It’s not exercise and stuff. It’s gonna be this massive war game up against American troops doing urban warfare training. We pretend to be insurgents, Mac’s gonna be the supreme leader of the bad guys and we get a mini-holiday in Las Vegas before it starts.’
‘Sounds pretty good, I guess,’ James said. ‘So you’re sure there’s no rock-breaking or hiking with heavy packs?’
Lauren shook her head firmly. ‘It’s not CHERUB training. It’s run by the US Army and British Special Forces. They want CHERUB in the mix to give their forces a different challenge.’
‘I could look into it, I guess,’ James nodded.
‘You could do with a break after the last few months,’ Lauren smiled. ‘And there’s a lot of kids clamouring for places, but with your record on missions I’m sure you’d make the cut.’
‘I heard Bruce talking about going,’ James said. ‘Maybe I’ll speak to Mac next time he’s on campus.’
‘Cool,’ Lauren said, as there was another knock at the door.
‘So, you showed your face,’ James said acidly, as Dana appeared in the doorway holding a large cardboard box.
Dana flipped James’ light on without asking and put the box down on the little sofa by the door.
‘For what it’s worth, James, I wanted to be straight with you,’ Dana said. ‘But Michael wanted to let Gabrielle down gradually. Then she started getting suspicious and she backed him into a corner and made him deny everything.’
Lauren snorted. ‘Sounds more like Michael wanted to have his oats and eat them.’
Dana snorted back. ‘In case you haven’t noticed, Lauren, your brother’s not exactly up for any fidelity awards.’
‘I only cheated on you once and I confessed straight away,’ James said, slightly bitter as he hopped off the bed and limped around to inspect the contents of the box. It was a mix of his CDs, bits of clothing, school books and other junk that had gravitated to Dana’s room over their thirteen-month relationship.
Dana’s voice firmed up. ‘Let’s not pretend we had something we didn’t. I’m a weirdo who you only went out with because I’ve got big tits. You’re a good looking guy who knows it and can’t say no to anything in a skirt.’
James was bitter about what had happened and part of him wanted to end things with a screaming row where they threw stuff at each other; but his ankle and back hurt, plus he didn’t have the energy.
‘Take whatever,’ he said, pointing casually towards the bathroom. ‘Most of your stuff’s in there.’
Lauren could see James was stressed and while Dana picked up her junk in the bathroom – plus a few bits of clothing and the copy of
Lord of the Rings
James had never got around to finishing – she stood beside James with a hand resting loyally on his towelling-covered shoulder.
‘Have a nice life,’ James said half sarcastically, as Dana lifted her hand and headed out, holding the box which was now filled with her own stuff.
‘You too,’ Dana said, closing the door behind her.
‘It’s just a shame it all had to happen right before Christmas,’ Lauren said.
‘My arse it is,’ James smiled. ‘First thing tomorrow I’m off to the shops and I’m getting a thirty-six ninety-nine refund on her Christmas present.’
It was Christmas day, 6.58 in the morning and Meryl Spencer stood outside the assembly hall in the main building being crushed to death by hysterical red shirts.
‘Everybody stand back,’ Meryl roared. ‘If there’s
any
more pushing and shoving you can all go back to bed until eight o’clock.’
Several kids groaned, but you could see that all the red shirts knew it was an idle threat. Most of them had got up in a hurry and had made the frosty journey from their rooms in the junior block dressed in odd combinations of carpet slippers and pyjamas, covered with outdoor jackets and the occasional woolly hat.
Despite not taking the time to get dressed, most red shirts had been up for an hour or more and one pair were even caught trying to break through the fire doors outside the assembly hall at 4 a.m.
‘They make me feel old,’ Kyle smiled. ‘Ten years ago I would have been down there waiting for my prezzies too. Every minute seemed to last an hour.’
James stood next to him, along with a bunch of other teens who probably could have settled for a couple of hours’ lie-in and opening their presents over a late breakfast; but they’d all got out of bed to see the little kids going crazy. Kids of ten and eleven like Kevin Sumner and Jake Parker were in between: young enough to be excited, but trying to act cool and not let it show.
‘BAAAACK!’ Meryl screamed, as one of the junior-block carers grabbed a near hysterical boy out of the crowd.
‘Don’t you dare hit her,’ the carer said, as she grabbed the boy’s wrist. ‘Now you can hold my hand and I’ll let you in last.’
A cheer erupted as Chairwoman Zara Asker and a bunch of other staff arrived. A plastic clock on the wall above Meryl’s head ticked over to 6.59 and everyone started counting the seconds.
‘Fifty-nine, fifty-eight, fifty-seven …’
‘AAAAARGGGGHHH!’ a red-shirt girl called Coral shouted. ‘I can’t stand it. I’m so excited!’
Kevin’s seven-year-old sister Megan grabbed his arm and used him as a battering ram to get to the front of the crowd.
‘For god’s sake, Megs,’ Kevin moaned, feeling horribly self-conscious as he was surrounded by smaller kids. ‘Does a few seconds really make that much difference?’
‘Sixteen, fifteen, fourteen …’
On ten, Meryl turned around and placed a key in the large double doorway. She turned it on three and pushed the doors open on the stroke of zero. Meryl had won an Olympic sprint medal, but couldn’t ever recall moving as fast as the seventy red shirts storming the assembly hall.
The red shirts’ gift piles were arranged in rows in the centre of the wooden floor and organised alphabetically by surname. While six- to nine-year-olds ploughed into their gifts, ignoring stockings and little parcels and going for the biggest presents at the bottom of the pile, some of the youngest red shirts who hadn’t quite mastered the alphabet were helped out by a couple of bleary-eyed carers who’d been up since four, setting out all the piles of presents.
By the time James and co. got into the hall the centre of the room looked like a piranha feeding frenzy, with red shirts taking the place of the fish and chunks of flesh replaced by flying tufts of wrapping paper.
Amidst the rustling and the odd jingle from an electronic toy came shouts of
Oh wow I got the light sabre/racing car/Barbie
or whatever and the distressed howls of one small lad who’d been accidentally kicked in the face by the eight-year-old girl attacking the pile of gifts next to him.
James and the other qualified agents had stacks arranged on tables running along the edge of the room. Their presents were smaller than the little kids’ toys, but every kid on campus got exactly the same amount spent on them. The only differences were in the number of presents received from friends.
As an A for Adams, James had the second pile of gifts, with Lauren’s haul next to him.
‘Looks like we’ve all got new laptops for our rooms,’ Lauren smiled, as James opened a tall cylindrical present from Meryl that looked uncannily like a bottle of booze, but turned out to be a fancy chrome toilet brush and packet of disinfectant cubes.
‘Haaaah!’ Lauren laughed. ‘It looks like she saw the state of your old toilet bowl!’
‘That wasn’t filth,’ James grinned. ‘That was my skid-mark hall of fame.’
Most red shirts had now opened their main presents and had started popping the indoor fireworks in their stockings while cramming down squares of Dairy Milk. James pulled a stripy package of Paul Smith aftershave off the top of his stocking before burrowing down and pulling out an indoor firework shaped like a champagne bottle.
Lauren was opening a pair of animal-friendly New Balance running shoes as James popped it next to her ear.
‘Git,’ Lauren yelled, digging James in the ribs as yellow streamers floated down on to her head. ‘You damn nigh blew up my eardrum.’
‘Happy Christmas,’ James said, as he pulled his sister into a hug. ‘Who needs a girlfriend when I’ve got a sister like you?’
‘If you say so,’ Lauren giggled. ‘But if you start getting frisky there’s gonna be trouble.’
‘James, my man!’ Bruce shouted, as he punched the air wearing a huge chrome knuckleduster with an obscenely vicious array of spikes, barbs and blades. ‘Best present ever, mate. You could kill people in so many different ways with this!’
‘I thought of you as soon as I saw the dodgy eBay auction,’ James smiled, as he pulled more little gifts out of his felt stocking, including fancy silk boxers and a bag of gourmet jellybeans.
Unlike the little kids who were in it for the goodies, present opening was more of a social occasion for older kids like James. He was content to savour his presents and wandered over to see how Kerry was going.
‘Happy Christmas,’ James said.
‘You too,’ Kerry replied, before giving him a hug.
She hadn’t showered because it was early. The back of her neck smelled like fresh Kerry sweat and the tang made him insanely jealous of Bruce.
‘Poor Kyle,’ Kerry said, as he wandered by. ‘All grown up and no official presents!’
James had started a trend by hugging Lauren and Kerry and everyone else was soon doing it. He even hugged people like Bethany who he didn’t like.
James still hadn’t opened all of his loot, but he spotted Mac helping some of the younger red shirts load their haul of presents into giant bin liners so that they could carry them back to their rooms and play.
‘Mac,’ James smiled. ‘I’ve been looking all over for you the last couple of days.’
‘Really,’ Mac smiled back, crouching down and scooping pieces from a six-year-old’s K’nex set back into their box. ‘Fahim and I have been staying with my son down in London. I came back to campus to catch up with some paperwork last night and I thought I’d stay overnight and see the chaos.’
‘How’s Fahim doing?’ James asked.
‘Good,’ Mac nodded. ‘He’s the same age as my youngest grandkids and they really seem to hit it off.’
‘And you?’
‘Been married a
loooooong
time,’ he said sadly. ‘It’s never going to be the same without her, but it’s harder on my son. He lost a mother, a wife and two children.’
Mac’s eyes were glazing over, but the little red-shirt boy stared impatiently with hands on hips. ‘My K’nex!’ he demanded.
‘Sorry, mate!’ Mac smiled, as he began scooping up the last of the pieces. ‘Are you sure you’ll be able to carry that whole bag back to your room in one go?’
‘For sure,’ the boy nodded. ‘I’ll put it on one of the electric buggies.’
‘So,’ James said, as the red shirt dragged his presents towards the back of the hall. ‘I wanted to ask if there were any spots left on this training exercise in America.’