Days Like This Read Free Page B

Blacktroopers and Max. Shiny, greasy Max who pawed and slobbered. Lily shuddered.
    None of them had ever liked Max. Lily suspected that her parents didn’t even really like him, but he had always just been there. He and Pym had gone to school together. Max smiled a lot, though it never seemed sincere. It wasn’t as if there was much in their world to smile about these days. But the more the world changed, the more Max smiled his stupid smile. One day his smile would stretch so far around his head the top half of it would tip off and bounce along the ground like a sliced-off boiled egg.
    The other thing about Max was that he liked to touch people. His hands were always snaking out towards you all moist as if he’d dipped them in oily water. Lily had perfected the art of twisting and slipping away from him. She shuddered again.
    They’d waited too long; hoping things would change on their own for the better. Hoping they’d be allowed outside again. Hoping the Blacktroopers would stop coming and their parents would become more like they used to be before the Wall went up. But waiting wasn’t working and Daniel’s headaches were getting worse and making him weak. The Blacktroopers were becoming more violent. It was time to find out what was going on.

    Lily had barely been at her computer screen an hour the next day when the study door swung open. Daniel stood there with a cheeky grin on his face.
    ‘Tryhard,’ he teased, squinting at her screen. She might be the runty twin, but at English comprehension she was working well above his level.
    Lily leaned back in her chair and rubbed her eyes. ‘You know how shitty Dad gets when we don’t finish our work.’
    ‘Stuff him,’ Daniel said. ‘What’s the point, anyway? Who cares if we finish our levels? This isn’t bloody school.’ He flicked her screen hard with his fingernail. ‘It’s a screen full of bullshit! Where are the other kids? Where are the teachers?’ He went to look under Lily’s chair. ‘Nup, no one there.’
    Lily nodded glumly. Even twelve years later, they both still remembered how great their school had been before it was shut down along with all the other schools in the city. Still, she tried to make a joke of it. She was worried Daniel’s anger would trigger another of his headaches.
    ‘It’s the rules, you know, Daniel,’ she said, imitating Megan’s high-pitched voice.
    They both laughed.
    ‘Screw the rules,’ Daniel said, grabbing a box off the shelf by the door. ‘It’s Scrabble time.’
    ‘You know I’ll cane you,’ Lily said. It was good to see Daniel back to normal. He hadn’t had another headache since the Friday before when the Blacktroopers had killed Sherbet.
    Maybe the headaches won’t return
, she thought, though she didn’t really believe it.
    Lily tapped her keyboard and her screen went black. ‘I’ll finish it later,’ she said.
    They sat opposite one another, Lily delving into the Scrabble bag for a letter.
    ‘A,’ she crowed. ‘I’m up first.’
    ‘Dumb luck as usual.’ Daniel racked up his letters with a flourish. ‘Bloody hell! A whole bunch of vowels. Who needs vowels in life? They’re completely pointless,’ he said.
    ‘Just remember, there’s no such word as
mimble
,’ Lily said.
    ‘’Course there is.’ Dan frowned at his letters. ‘It means nimble, only with an “m”. Any idiot knows that.’
    ‘Well, this idiot is scoring nineteen. Actually, it’s a double-word score for first player so it’s thirty-eight.’ Lily plonked down ‘zombie’ in the centre of the board.
    ‘Whatever,’ Daniel grumbled. ‘There you go.’ He attached two letters to the ‘m’ of zombie. ‘Moo. How good is that?’
    He glanced over his shoulder, got up carefully and swung open the door. There was no one there.
    ‘You can never be too careful,’ he said. ‘Listen, Lil, I’ve got something important to tell you. I was serious about what I said yesterday, you know.’
    ‘What?’ Lily was studying