The Tornado Chasers

by Ross Montgomery

  ‘Right here, officers!’ she cried, waving her arms. ‘I’ll catch them!’

  Miss Pewlish made to grab me, but I dodged out the way at the last second and shot up the street away from her. She roared and flew after me, but immediately plunged her foot into the watermelon and flipped over backwards with a terrible shriek, somersaulting through the air several times and bellowing like a faulty firework before finally landing head first in a nearby bin.

  ‘Quick! Grab him!’

  The County officers sprinted up the street after me. I charged through the confused and shouting crowds around the square, barrelling through their legs, my head darting this way and that.

  ‘Orlaith! Ceri! Pete! Callum! Where are …’

  I suddenly fell out the other side and sprawled across the cobblestones. I was on the main square. The crowds had parted for the wedding ceremony, and up ahead I could make out Callum and Orlaith and Pete scrambling round the corner of the church. Ceri was still slung over Pete’s shoulder. She pointed behind me.

  ‘Owen, look out!’

  I turned round to see two County officers heaving through the crowd and waving their truncheons at me.

  ‘That’s him!’ said the one at the front. ‘The one in the wedding dress! Someone stop him!’

  Without another word a dozen men flew from the crowd and raced after me. Someone tried to grab my veil, but I managed to wrench myself free and flew around the corner after the others. They had come to a stop up ahead. The bride and groom had emerged from the church doors to rapturous applause, and the crowds were massed together, cheering and crying and waving flags and blocking the path.

  ‘Straight ahead!’ I bellowed to the others. ‘There’s a road on the other side that leads to the hills! Quick, they’re right behind me!’

  Pete nodded, and with a grunt threw himself into the crowd, barging people left and right. We followed at high speed. In front of us, the bride and groom were posing for their official photograph beside an enormous pyramid of champagne glasses and a lavish hog roast buffet. We flew past them just as the photograph was taken, to cries of horror and disapproval from the wedding party. At that exact moment, the men in pursuit of us appeared round the corner of the church. The County officer at the front pointed at me as I disappeared through the crowd.

  ‘That’s him!’ he cried. ‘Right there! He’s getting away!’

  The chasing men looked confused. ‘Which one?’

  The County officer jumped up and down. ‘The one in the wedding dress!’

  Without further ado the men flew forward, rugby tackling the bride to the ground and sending the groom flying into the tower of glasses. The hog roast was overturned and immediately savaged by a pack of stray cats that had been waiting at the sidelines for such an opportunity. The wedding party – having sat all morning through an excruciating church service, only to see their well-earned champagne and roast pork cruelly torn away from them at the last minute – clamoured for blood, heaving forwards in a wave of violent, hungry retribution. Punches were swung and handbags whirled round heads and bouquets used as clubs. Someone threw a bridesmaid. The lead County officer tried to run after us, but his attempts at escape were blocked by a pair of enraged maiden aunts who were standing in front of him and jabbing him with hatpins.

  ‘Someone – ouch! – stop those – ouch! – children!’ he cried.

  It was no good. We had already disappeared around the corner and were running down an empty side street, out of Skirting and into the hills as fast as we could.

  19

  The House

  We tumbled down the valley slope in the driving rain, our clothes soaked and stained with mud. We hadn’t stopped running since we left Skirting – and that was hours ago. Orlaith had dragged us on all day, her sights fixed on the black mass of clouds that slowly grew closer and closer in the distance. Above us the thunder cracked, and the trees were blasted with a gust of freezing wind.

  ‘Please!’ Callum begged, waving his arms weakly. ‘Let’s rest! Just for a moment!’

  He threw himself against a tree beside me, groaning with pain. I came to a slow and graceless stop beside him, bending over double with exhaustion. Pete put Ceri down on the ground and collapsed like a cow into the mud. Orlaith finally came to a stop ahead of us, leaning forwards on her knees.

  ‘Alright,’ she sighed. ‘We can stop now. It doesn’t look like we’re being followed. I was worried we wouldn’t even make it this far, but look – the tornado’s still miles away!’

  She pointed through the trees, to the distant bank of clouds.

  ‘It won’t pass through the valley below until tomorrow morning!’ she said triumphantly. ‘We can rest here for tonight.’

  She put her hands on her hips and faced us. We glanced at each other.

  ‘Er … Orlaith?’ said Ceri. ‘Rest … where exactly?’

  The forest around us was descending into blackness. We were outside with night coming fast, right beside the Great North Caves. A fresh sheet of freezing rain suddenly blasted through the trees, spraying us with leaves and dirt. From further down the valley came the creaking of branches. We jumped. There could be bears anywhere around us – hundreds of them. Orlaith swallowed nervously.

  ‘Well … I suppose we’ll just have to sleep rough for one more night.’ She turned to me. ‘After all, we’ve still got all that bear repellent with us – haven’t we, Owen?’

  Everyone’s eyes fixed on me. I reached for my pockets, and my stomach dropped.

  ‘Oh no,’ I said.

  The cans were in my shorts, back in the sidecar of Pete’s bike – the other side of Skirting. I looked at the others in horror.

  ‘We’ve got nothing,’ I said, my voice taut and panicked. ‘We … we have to find shelter, quick!’

  Callum’s eyes boggled. ‘Shelter? Are you kidding? Look at this place! Where the hell are we going to find a proper shelter now, right here in the middle of nowhere …?’

  Ceri pointed to the distance. ‘Well, we could always try that house over there.’

  We turned around.

  ‘Oh,’ I said.

  In the middle of the forest below us was a house. It was made of bricks, with a roof and a chimney and four perfect square windows. It was unusual to see it here on the other side of the valleys, in the centre of a clearing of trees, with no path leading up to it.

  It was also unusual because it was lying on its side.

  We stared at the house for some time. It was Callum who eventually broke the silence.

  ‘What the hell is that,’ he said.

  We walked cautiously up to the house, and peeked through the windows. There were no lights on inside. The windowpanes were laced with cobwebs.

  ‘Look at it,’ said Orlaith. ‘It must have been here for years. Maybe since the last tornado, even.’

  I shivered. ‘Well, it looks warm. There could be dry clothes in there, too.’

  ‘And food,’ added Ceri.

  We stood in silence. Around us, the rain pounded down.

  ‘Do you reckon … there’s anyone still inside?’ said Callum.

  Orlaith gulped. ‘Someone should go and check.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Callum. ‘Someone.’

  There was another prolonged silence.

  ‘Well, someone go inside already,’ Callum snapped.

  I gulped. ‘Maybe … maybe we should draw straws for it.’

  ‘A democratic vote would be better,’ said Orlaith nervously.

  ‘I vote Owen,’ said Callum.

  ‘Hey, guys! In here!’

  We turned around, and nearly leapt out of our skins. Ceri was already stood on the other side of the window, waving at us cheerfully.

  ‘Ceri!’ I gasped. ‘How did you …?’

  ‘Chimney!’ she said, pointing over at the side of the house. We glanced over. Sure enough, the house’s chimney stuck out the roof at ground level beside us. ‘Just crawl through! It’s really nice in here. And get this – the ceiling is
a wall and the wall has a carpet on it. How cool is that?’

  We crawled through the chimney, one by one, and emerged from the fireplace into the living room. It was uncanny. The doorways, the lights, the windows, the wallpaper – all old and faded, but perfectly preserved. Even the carpet on the floor – which, true to Ceri’s word, was now a wall – was still soft. The only difference was that everything was on its side. The contents of the living room lay spread around us in great broken piles, covered by a thick layer of dust.

  ‘Pretty cool, isn’t it?’ said Ceri. ‘Bit messy, but I guess we could make some room to lie down next to this broken glass here …’

  Pete suddenly marched to the centre of the room and pushed her aside, kneeling down on the floor where she had been standing. We watched in confusion as he rooted through the piles of broken picture frames at her feet. It was like he was looking for something. He suddenly heaved aside a pile of rubbish, and magically revealed a single wooden door on the floor. He swung it open and lowered himself through into the room below. Within seconds we could hear the clattering of saucepans and the slamming of cupboard beneath us.

  ‘Er … Pete?’ I said, leaning over the hole in the floor. ‘You alright down there …?’

  Pete suddenly re-emerged at the doorway and clambered back out. In his hands were a mop and bucket, a dustpan and broom, and a duster. He pulled on a pair of yellow rubber gloves and turned to us.

  ‘Get some dry clothes,’ he said. ‘I’ll sort this out.’

  He had already flapped open a recycling bag and was filling it with tatty old magazines from the floor. We glanced at each other.

  ‘Pete, are you sure …?’ Orlaith began.

  ‘Busy,’ he said, hurrying us outside. ‘Shoo.’

  Getting upstairs was easier said than done, given that the staircase was now on its side. We had to lower ourselves into the bedrooms to search for old clothes. There were plenty scattered inside, but none for children. Whoever lived here once was old, and long gone. We found some dusty suits and shirts that were two sizes too big for us, and clambered back down to the living room.

  We gazed in disbelief at what Pete had done in the short time we were away. The chaos of broken furniture had been completely cleared. In its place was a circle of sofas and armchairs, arranged like a camp at the centre of the room. A bonfire of old books was gently kindling in the sideways fireplace, the warm light flickering through coloured bed sheets and velvet curtains draped from the ceiling. On top of the fireplace sat a makeshift stove, made from the upturned grate. A dozen carefully opened tins of soup stood bubbling gently on top, filling the room with the smell of leek and potato.

  Pete suddenly emerged from the hole in the floor, wearing an apron and carrying an old sack of potatoes. He looked us up and down in our baggy, dusty clothes, and frowned.

  ‘I hope you washed your hands,’ he muttered.

  We sat on the sofas and warmed ourselves through with mug after mug of piping-hot soup while the wind howled outside, rattling the windowpanes. We picked the tubers off the old potatoes and wrapped the potatoes in foil, baking them in the embers of the fireplace until they piped and squealed and we couldn’t bear to wait any longer. We ate them in silence, with no butter. Afterwards we lay back on the sofas, passing around a tin of fruit cocktail.

  ‘I think that might have been the best meal I’ve had in my life,’ I said.

  Everyone muttered in agreement. We were full, and we were dry, and we had done it all ourselves. We were happy. Orlaith stretched out lazily, like a cat.

  ‘We should get some sleep,’ she said. ‘We all need to be up first thing tomorrow.’

  We arranged the bedding around the sofas, and clambered into place. The fire was slowly dying, and the room was cast in oranges and dull browns around us. Pete found a set of pyjamas in an upstairs bedroom and joined us on a sofa, the springs squealing and dipping as he lay down. We lay on our backs, watching the fire lines dance on the ceiling and walls around us.

  ‘So this is it,’ said Ceri excitedly. ‘Our last night before the tornado.’

  The information settled on us. I don’t think any of us had ever expected to find ourselves here together, so far from home, so close to the end.

  ‘What do you think it’ll be like?’ said Ceri.

  We turned to look at her.

  ‘The tornado,’ she said. ‘When we’re next to it. What do you think it’ll feel like?’

  We thought about it.

  ‘Windy,’ said Pete.

  ‘Really windy,’ said Callum. ‘Like in a film when there’s a big explosion and everyone gets thrown backwards.’

  ‘Actually, tornadoes draw you in,’ I said. ‘Like a whirlpool. And the bit in the middle is completely still.’ I held my hands out flat. ‘No wind at all. They call it the heart of the storm. It’s when people think it’s all over, but it’s not – it’s a trick. There’s more to come.’

  Callum rolled over, propping himself up with a cushion. ‘Since when did you find out so much about tornadoes?’

  I shrugged. ‘My grandparents left lots of stuff behind. Books, flight notes … that kind of thing. They’re all kept in cupboards and boxes in the attic, hidden out the way. My parents would be furious if they knew I’d looked through them.’ I frowned. ‘To be honest, I think they’d be angry if they found out I’d been up the attic ladder by myself.’

  The others muttered in agreement.

  ‘Tell me about it!’ said Ceri. ‘My dad keeps all the scissors in our house in a locked drawer. All of them. If I want to cut out paper I have to use my teeth.’

  Callum turned round on the sofa. ‘I don’t get it. Why are all your parents such weirdoes about you lot being safe?’

  Orlaith glanced at him. ‘Yours aren’t?’

  Callum snorted. ‘Ha! Are you joking? My parents are barely even at the house! It’s just me and my babysi … I mean, my bodyguard.’

  I shrugged. ‘My parents have always been like that. I mean, it got worse when the valleys went under SW5, but still …’ I thought about it. ‘I guess it must have been hard for my dad as a child, watching his parents risk their lives all the time. Not knowing when they’d come home. Or even if they’d come home. Rather than make him adventurous too, it sort of … did the opposite.’ I sighed. ‘I guess that’s why Barrow seemed so perfect for both of them. They wouldn’t have to be worried about everything any more.’

  Ceri nodded. ‘Same for my parents. They didn’t even used to live in Barrow, you know – they lived in High Bunting, then moved to Barrow when I was born. They were worried about my legs – they thought I wouldn’t even be able to walk at one point. Now I can, and they don’t even notice. They just think I won’t be able to do anything. They don’t even let me try.’

  Pete sat up on the couch.

  ‘We used to live in High Bunting, too,’ he said with a smile. ‘When my parents left, Nan moved us to Barrow. Where the tornadoes wouldn’t hurt us.’

  I sat up in confusion.

  ‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘So – all of our parents moved to Barrow from other villages?’

  Callum shook his head. ‘No way! I’ve been around since Barrow started. I mean, my dad’s the one who built all the houses there, isn’t he? That’s why we’re so loaded.’

  Ceri spun round in shock. ‘Wait – that’s what your dad does? He … built Barrow?’

  Callum nodded. ‘Well, yeah. Him and some others. They put the houses there, and the ring of stormtraps around them, and said it was the safest village in the valleys and that no tornado could ever go near it. It was right after the last storm, wasn’t it? So all these families who were frightened of tornadoes came pouring in. My dad made an absolute packet out of it.’

  Orlaith looked at him coldly. ‘And you’re proud of that, are you?’

  Callum shrugged. ‘What – making money off scared people? Why wouldn’t I be? It’s their problem if they can’t hack it.’

  Orlaith looked away, chewing angrily at a fin
gernail. I shuffled on the cushion.

  ‘What about you, Orlaith?’ I said. ‘Where did you used to live?’

  She cleared her throat. ‘Little Mews – my dad and my mum and me. Only right after I was born, my mum got really sick – no one saw it coming, and she just …’

  She paused to quickly pick at her fingernails again, and let the words hang in the air.

  ‘We moved to Barrow after she died. My dad blames himself for it, I think. Like if he’d been taking better care of all of us, if we’d been safer, then she’d still be here. That’s why he’s angry all the time. He doesn’t mean to be. He’s just … frightened.’

  Callum glanced at her. ‘Frightened? Of what?’

  Orlaith looked at him. ‘Of me dying, too.’

  The sentence lay on our group like a lead weight. It was as if we had forgotten what the stakes were now – what could happen to us. We sat in silence for a moment.

  ‘What about Skirting?’ I said. ‘Those people weren’t frightened – were they?’

  The others turned to look at me. I stared up at the ceiling that was really a wall.

  ‘The tornado was right beside the village,’ I said. ‘And they were all outside. They were … shopping.’

  I shook my head. It still didn’t make any sense.

  ‘I mean, that was the whole point of us doing this – right?’ I said, turning to the others. ‘To do something scary. To do something that no one else would dare to do. Only now, it turns out everyone in Skirting’s been doing it all along.’

  Silence fell on the group. No one had an answer for

  ‘Maybe …’ said Ceri. ‘Maybe some people just don’t care about that sort of thing, you know?’

  Orlaith frowned. ‘But how can you not care about dying?’

  Ceri bit her lip. ‘Maybe anything’s better than living in fear.’

  ‘As if,’ muttered Callum. ‘How can dying be better than anything?’

  Pete shifted noisily on the sofa.

  ‘At least when you die, you get to go to Heaven,’ he said softly.

  Orlaith glanced at him. ‘Not everyone believes in Heaven, Pete.’