Free Aftershock by Bernard Ashley Page B

eyes and leaned her head on Makis’s shoulder, who held it there for a long time until slowly, slowly, she began to calm down.
    â€˜I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘It just… caught me…’
    Makis released his grip. To think that this was the book he’d brought to please her. And with his insides churning, he heard her words again and felt the pain of his father’s death. Not the pain of the fact of his death – Makis was always feeling that, but the terrible understanding of how much his father must have been hurting to make his face look like the runner’s in that picture. He imagined the agony of being buried by crushing stones, fighting to breathe beneath a fallen building. Poor man! Poor Papa!
    Sofia was trying to pull herself together, to put on a brave face, but she looked as lost and alone as a child without friends in the playground.
    â€˜What… time… is it?’ she asked.
    But right now, Makis didn’t care what time it was. Cup Final or not, he wasn’t going to leave his mother in this state. He must stay with her until he knew she would be all right on her own. Wasn’t that what his father would have done?

Chapter Thirteen
    â€˜Makis! It’s your football match! You’ve been picked. You can’t let your team down.’
    With a steadying hand on the table, Sofia pulled herself up straight and became his mother again. And when a mood like this overtook her, there was no ignoring it. ‘Get yourself to school!’ she ordered him.
    The clock said nine forty-five, and he needed twenty minutes to get to school, even running. He had to hope Mr Hersee didn’t march the team to the bus at ten o’clock sharp. He tore himself away from his mother and, grabbing his bag, ran up the stairs, out into the ground floor hallway, and frightened the old woman in black from the top of the house – who flattened herself against the wall. In seconds he was outside and pelting along Georgiana Street towards the crossroads.
    Please don’t go on time, Mr Hersee!
    Why can’t people in the street walk in straight lines? And why do they have to suddenly stop to look at nothing at all and get in your way? He crossed roads, he dodged cars, he swung his bag and accidentally knocked it against a woman’s leg.
    â€˜Oi! Watch out!’
    â€˜Very sorry.’
    He didn’t slacken his pace. He pushed on at top speed like the man who ran to Sparta, hot, out of breath, his legs aching, and his heart thumping – to turn the last corner into Imeson Street, and see the school closed. ‘Oh, crikey!’ There was no line of boys fidgeting just inside the gate like before. The gate was already locked. The caretaker had vanished. They had gone. They had left to catch the bus to Regent’s Park without him.
    So now he had three choices. He could run to the bus stop. He could go back home, but that, he knew, was not a choice. Or he could run as fast as he could to Regent’s Park – except that he didn’t know the way.
    He chose the last option: he would ask someone. He turned on his heel and ran to the main road where the buses ran. Phidippides couldn’t have run harder. He stopped for a gasp of breath and asked a man, ‘Regent’s Park? Which way? This road?’
    â€˜That’s right, son, Pancras Road. And when it stops being Pancras Road, go right—‘
    But already Makis was pelting along the bus route on Pancras Road – in too much of a hurry to hear the man finish, ‘go right on’. He ran past one bus stop, past another – until, looking up with sweat in his eyes to check the road names, he saw that Pancras Road stopped at this next junction and became Crowndale Road. What had the man said?
Go right when Pancras Road stops.
Makis took the turning to the right, and he suddenly recognised where he was. This was Royal College Street, and it led back towards his own home! He would have