Squishy Taylor and the Bonus Sisters (6 page)

Vee and Jessie whoop and laugh.

When we get in the lift, the familiar scowly man is there too. Somehow, he’s even more scowly than before. He looks at us and the pram, and the look in his eyes makes me wonder if he’s not angry, he’s sad. The others are glancing sideways at my bag and trying not to laugh, so they don’t notice his face. He gets out on the fifth floor and as the doors close, the twins
collapse
with laughter.

Vee is clinging to the pram, flopping over the side, and Baby grabs her hair so when she stands it makes him sit up. Then we laugh even harder and nearly forget to leave the lift.

But as soon as we do, I shush them. Mr Hinkenbushel’s door is closed. Now’s the time, before he comes home.

I crouch by Mr Hinkenbushel’s doormat and tip the contents of the bag onto it.

‘This is for you, Alice,’ I whisper.

Wow. That was a
big
dog. Everything that dog did was big. I stare at the mound on Mr Hinkenbushel’s doormat and then hurriedly stand up and back away.
Disgusting
. We pile into our place, giggling.

The HRC has made its first move.

I
roll
from the top bunk …

Grab
the rail with one hand …

Swing
and
kick
my feet out horizontal – and then
land
, standing, on the desk.

I have to steady myself against the wall, but Vee claps anyway from the top bunk. ‘Awesome!’ she says.

The whole bunk is still creaking and the telescope is rattling on its feet.

‘Can you show me the next bit?’ I ask, jumping down to the floor.

Vee follows me to the desk, but she doesn’t stop there. She grabs the top of the wardrobe,
commando-rolls
across it only inches from the ceiling, and then kicks off the wall, returning to lying down flat on her bunk. The bed shakes wildly and I clap.

Jessie looks up from where she’s reading the iPad on her bunk. ‘There are no boys reported missing for this area in the last week,’ she says. ‘At least none who are Not-John’s age.’

That stops Vee and I in our tracks.

‘It must be Mr Hinkenbushel,’ I say. ‘He can’t report it, because then they’ll know he’s been keeping prisoners.’

Jessie looks doubtful, but I’m starting to wonder if I might be right.

‘I wonder if he’s
trodden
in it yet,’ Vee says and we all shriek with laughter. Vee does a
Quick-Drop
to the floor and then a
Kicking-Two-Jump-Scramble
back to her bunk. The wardrobe booms hard against the wall and a moment later, Alice appears in the doorway.

‘Enough!’ she says. ‘I take you rock-climbing so I don’t have to suffer this. Can’t you do something very quiet for an hour? Like build a website? Sonja’s boy builds websites and he doesn’t make noises from one hour to the next.’

We spend the hours before dinner making an HRC website on the iPad. Jessie drives the iPad while Vee and I help by listing Mr Hinkenbushel’s
crimes
and all the ways we’re going to get him back.

While Jessie is doing the complicated bits, Vee and I take it in turns to look through the telescope at the boring people in the offices across the road. When the website is pretty much finished, we make a YouTube clip of us
‘declaring vengeance’
, as Jessie puts it. It’s awesome.

‘Dinner!’ Dad calls. We tumble into the kitchen. ‘It’s roll-your-own rice-paper rolls.’

The table is covered with lots of bowls of things cut up small. I pile my first roll with pork and satay. Yum. I add a little bit of carrot when Alice does an
eat-your-vegetables face
at me. There’s too much pork and the whole thing falls apart, but I don’t care.

I pick bits up with my fingers and smear them around the sauce on my plate. Alice seems to have got over being shouted at yesterday, and dinnertime is back to normal. Except that in the old normal, Jessie and Vee weren’t this nice to me.

‘Is it Saturday-night movie night?’ I ask.

Jessie is halfway through a neat roll. ‘Can we download something new, pleeeease?’ she asks.

‘
Ba-ba-ba
,’ says Baby, slamming a plate of cucumber sticks to the floor. We all laugh, including Baby, and I jump down to pick them up.

‘Ten-second rule!’ I shout as I gather the cucumber pieces together. It’s not until I stand up again that I see there’s something white sitting at the door. ‘Hey, what’s that?’

‘What’s what?’ asks Dad.

‘It’s a piece of paper,’ I say, going over to the door. ‘That’s weird.’ We don’t get paper under our door. Letters come to the letterbox downstairs in the foyer.

‘Give it here,’ Dad says, reaching for it, but not before I get a glimpse of the picture. It’s Not-John, with
‘MISSING’
written in big letters across the top.

My heart slams into double-speed. I try to see over Dad’s shoulder, but my eyes are jumping around, trying to read everything at once and not getting anything at all.

‘There’s a boy missing from the building,’ Dad says.

Alice gasps and grabs her mouth. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a grown-up look so scared.

‘Apparently he left a note, and he’s been texting his dad pretending he’s at his grandmother’s.’ Dad looks up at Alice. ‘Sounds more like a runaway than a kidnapping.’

Alice’s hand drops away from her mouth. She looks a bit relieved, but not much.

Dad keeps reading. Jessie and Vee and I can’t help staring at each other.

‘The note is from the boy’s father, who only realised his son was missing when he talked to the grandmother …’ Dad checks the clock, ‘… an hour ago. But he’s been gone for three days.’

‘
Three days
.’ Alice looks like she’s going to cry. She grips Vee’s hand, who’s sitting next to her.

‘He wants to know if anyone has seen his son.’ Dad puts the note on the table.

None of us feel like eating.

‘The poor man. He must be so terrified,’ Alice says, pushing back her chair and taking the note. ‘I’m going round to visit him right away.’

As soon as she opens the door, the whole apartment begins to smell of dog poo.

‘We have to tell them,’ Jessie hisses. We’re stacking the dishwasher and putting uneaten food in the fridge. Dad is in the other room talking on the phone. Baby is sitting on the floor between us,
dribbling
chewed cucumber. The kitchen stinks and I’m seriously regretting our first HRC revenge attack.