Plan B

Chapter Three

Brookie had already crashed out for the night when Fran returned an hour and a half later, now armed with a school security card, a timetable, a student diary and a map of the school.  Part of Fran was disappointed, because it had been fun winding him up earlier, but she was mostly relieved.  She didn’t have to face him, and, more importantly, there wouldn’t be anything awkward when she went to change.

Crawling under her covers in her pyjamas, Fran curled up and hugged her pillow.  A strangled sob escaped her.  It was the first time she’d spent the night alone in a strange place amongst total strangers.

I’m all alone in this.  The others can’t help anymore.  Fran shivered.  I just hope the plan works… I hope those creepy guys don’t follow me here….

Another sob seeped out.  What will the police do when they find out I’ve gone?  She scrubbed a tear away from her eye.

I hope Freddie’ll be okay without me.

Fran had completely lost track of time as she cried in the darkness, so she was surprised when a lamp suddenly flickered on from the other side of the room.

“For heaven’s sake,” groaned a sleepy tenor voice.  “It’s gone midnight.  Can you shut up?  Nobody died.”

Fran had to muffle a wail.  She buried her head in the pillow.  Shut up yourself.  Your problems are like flies compared to mine.

A hand tugged at the duvet.  With a little growl, Fran wrapped herself tighter in it and rolled over to face the wall.  There was a sigh and a thump.

“You homesick or something?”

“None of your business.”

“Look, I know it’s hard being away from home for the first time, but there’s no shame in admitting it’s tough on you.”

Fran glanced over her shoulder.  Brookie was sitting on her desk just opposite, wearing pale blue pyjama bottoms and a light pink hoodie, hood drawn up over his head.  He was palming sleep out of his right eye and looked like he should be filming a zombie movie.  The hoodie even had a picture of a zombie on it with a slogan that read DISECT ME BEFORE I EAT YOU.

The sight of him just served to hack Fran off.  He had everything – safety, comfort, happy family, friends, fame, good job – while her life was falling to pieces around her.

“You know nothing,” she spat at him.  Brookie stopped palming away sleep and raised his left eyebrow.

“Whoa.  Sorry for being understanding.”

“You couldn’t understand if you tried.”

Brookie held his hands up and got down from the desk.  “Glad I bothered.  Now I know not to in future.”  He vanished back to his side of the room.

Fran bit her cheek to stop herself from bursting back into tears as the light flickered out.  Was it really the right choice to come here?

Morning came far too early.  If Brookie’s alarm clock had been any kind of living organism, he would have ruthlessly murdered it on at least a thousand different occasions over the past five years.  As it was, he almost knocked the batteries out when he tried to hit the snooze button, and then resorted to attacking it when it went off again five minutes later.

He was already munching through a bowl full of cornflakes, which were swimming in a sea of milk procured from the common room fridge halfway down the corridor, when he realised that there was still no movement from the other part of the room.  For a moment, he wondered why it disturbed him, but then he remembered he had a roommate.