Un Lun Dun - China Mieville [48]
“Yesterday?” He looked thoughtful. “About six, wasn’t it? No. I’m not sure.” He shrugged.
“What was we talking about at supper, Mum?”
“At supper, darling? It was about…your schoolwork?” Her mother turned it into a question and forgot about it.
It wasn’t as if time had stood still, and it wasn’t as if they’d forgotten her, or as if she’d been replaced by a phantom. Instead, all the time she was in UnLondon, they’d simply not worried. They’d all spent the time thinking that they’d seen her a few moments ago, or that she’d just popped into her room, or that they’d have a word with her in a second. They stayed calm—phlegmatic—because they didn’t, and couldn’t, realize that she’d really gone.
Deeba was pleased that her parents and brother and her friends and teachers hadn’t been panicking. She would have hated for them to worry. She had to admit, though, it made her a bit uncomfortable to realize that no one had been thinking about her and Zanna.
She was also uneasy when she thought of the moment of hesitation her family had shown on her return, the first time they saw her. Deeba tried not to think about it, even when her teachers and school friends did the same thing.
Zanna took a day off school, was laid up taking painkillers for her head and cough syrup for her lungs. In the playground, Deeba watched the sun and smiled into its fat, full little face. It was deeply strange not to see the empty hoop of the UnSun.
The sunlight was more vivid; she felt soaked in light.
“You’re in a good mood,” said Miss Edwards, looking at her oddly. “Haven’t seen you this happy since…” she said, and then her voice petered out, because of course she could not quite remember when she had last seen Deeba, because of the phlegm effect.
Zanna’s dad had gotten over the guilt of the accident, and that put Zanna in a good mood. Keisha and Kath were still a bit wary around Deeba, but something in the air between them had changed. They smiled at her cautiously during the lunch queue, and mentioned that Becks would be back in class soon. If that one sight of the Smog scared you, Deeba thought, you wouldn’t believe what I’ve been doing the last few days.
She almost couldn’t believe it herself. In the light of that bright little sun, all her memories of grossbottles and Slaterunners and bridges to and from anywhere and flying buses and her little carton Curdle seemed like daydreams.
When what had happened seemed impossible, she made sure no one was looking, and brought out the glove, and read it. If Zanna remembers, she thought, I’ll give it to her. Till then it’s mine.
Mostly it was single words or even just a few letters, but here and there were snippets of sentences. She soon knew them all by heart.
BRICK WIZARDRY AND THE PIGEONS
AT ALL, BUT ONLY TO REGRET IT
FICULT TO GET IN, AND NO EASI
ENTER BY BOOKSTEPS, ON STORYLADDERS
UNLIKE ANY OTHER
She read them again and again in the same order, reciting them quietly like a poem.
Zanna was soon back at school, and then Becks, and the slow patching-up of relations between the friends continued. Within a couple of weeks, things between them were all good again.
It’s back like it was, Deeba told herself.
She said it to herself even though she knew that was not true.
Becks was still in her cast. Zanna suffered from headaches, and she wheezed a bit when she breathed too hard. She was physically slower than she had been, too. Only Deeba knew why.
Deeba could never talk to any of her friends about what had happened. If her conversation ever veered even close to anything even a little bit strange, Kath or Keisha or Becks would start to panic and get aggressive.
Once, when Deeba was alone with Zanna, she said gently: “Do you know what the word Shwazzy means?” In her pocket, Deeba felt the glove. By rights it’s yours, she thought.
Zanna frowned with concentration. She opened her mouth and nothing came out, and a look of great alarm, even fear, crossed her face, and she began to cough violently. She doesn’t want to remember, Deeba realized, patting her friend’s back. It’s too scary.