The Infinite

by Patience Agbabi

Chapter 11:00

  THE RED HAT

  Big Ben, Ama and I are in The Beanstalk having breakfast whilst everyone else is still in bed. Season’s set up breakfast, apologised and gone to lie down in the Common Room. Ama likes what she calls the Human Touch, home-cooked food served by a real person. At her school, it’s all done by robots. You get assigned one but never see it. You text your order in advance and collect it from a hatch in the wall. The food lacks soul. But the worse thing’s when your robot’s having a bad day.

  ‘Texts me stuff like DON’T EAT FISH AND CHIPMUNKS. FISH ARE FORBIDDEN AND CHIPMUNKS ARE FULL OF FAT. I block it some days. Once it put gravy on my sponge pudding. Probably revenge.’

  ‘So they’re like a person?’ I think of Mange-Tout slapping meat onto the barbecue.

  ‘Yeh. And no. Hates being ignored. Strange thing is,’ she puts her head to one side, ‘I’m missing them.’

  I’m eating porridge made with water, topped with almond cream. Ama’s eating a vegan pain au chocolat and Big Ben has a full English: rootveg rashers, hash browns, beancakes and baked beans. That’s one too many bean things. I won’t sit too close to Big Ben today.

  Big Ben says they had a great midnight feast. They smuggled so much food they couldn’t eat it all so they’ll supplement the vegan menu with all that meat. They stayed up till 3 a.m.! In our chalet, we all got to bed just after midnight, except Noon, who came back really late, but she’s allowed because she’s 4-leap. I stayed up all night reading my Bob Beamon book. I read it under the covers with the light from my TwentyTwenty like I do at home in case Grandma comes into the sitting-room to tell me to ‘go to sleep-o’. Once I start reading a good book, I can’t stop. Bob Beamon talked about how he was a criminal until he realised he was good at the long jump. Maybe MC2 should read the book so he can learn to be good at something and not be a criminal any more.

  Ama finishes her croissant and looks at me for a long time. Then she looks at Big Ben and says:

  ‘Fiona’s looking good this morning. Think the rain cleaned her off.’

  Big Ben leaps up and goes to the window. Ama lowers her voice.

  ‘Can we trust him?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘To keep a secret?’

  I nod my head. Big Ben’s very good with secrets. He never told Grandma I read all the Harry Potter series under the covers with the light from my phone. That said, he’s only met Grandma twice. Ama walks over to the window and says something to Big Ben. He comes back to our table. She did well making him stop looking at his new carfriend.

  ‘This is top secret,’ she says. ‘Promise you’ll tell no one!’

  We nod.

  ‘I’m here to find my brother,’ she says. ‘He went missing last leap day when he was 3-leap. I’m sure he came here. To this centre.’

  ‘Did he leap and refuse to come back?’ I say.

  She gives me a hard stare. ‘Millennia made it sound like Leaplings were runaways. But Kwesi wasn’t like that.’

  ‘You should tell the police,’ I say. ‘If someone goes missing, they send sniffer dogs to sniff them out.’

  ‘We did,’ she says, ‘but obviously we couldn’t tell them he was going on a Time Squad trip. Or had The Gift. They searched the local area, then stopped looking after a week.’

  ‘But it’s their job to find him.’

  ‘They can’t time travel, Elle. Kwesi’s super bright but a bit wild. He’s nonverbal ASD and gets frustrated when people can’t understand his signing. He’d already been in trouble with the police. Graffiti mostly. He talks in paint. Looks like his stuff’s coming out of the wall. But they made him whitewash his murals. Think they were glad he was out of their hair.’

  If I talked in paint, I’d use different shades of white but I bet Kwesi loves bright colours.

  ‘Did he go to a specialist school to help with communicating?’

  ‘Yeh. Where he swapped the term nonverbal for visual. Says Visual ASD’s a better fit.’ She smiles and takes a sip of marigold tea. I tried it earlier and spat it out. Disgusting. Like drinking a flowerbed.

  ‘Does his name begin with the letter L?’ I say, and Ama jerks her head as if I slapped her.

  ‘How did you . . .’ She shakes her head quickly. ‘No. His name’s Kwesi. Means born Sunday. But we nicknamed him Leapfrog. He was county champion at triple jump.’

  ‘Did he do the long jump?’ I say.

  ‘That too.’

  Big Ben and I ask at the same time, ‘What was his PB?’

  ‘5 metres 90.’

  Big Ben shuffles in his chair. ‘89.49% for a 3-leap.’ he says. Some people don’t call him Big Ben. They call him The Human Calculator. But they’re wrong. He’s not a human calculator, he’s a human who’s super good at maths.

  ‘Was he training for the Olympics?’ I say.

  Ama rolls her eyes anticlockwise. ‘That’s irrelevant. He went on Leap 2100 four years ago and never came back.’

  ‘Leap 2100 doesn’t exist,’ says Big Ben, without pausing. ‘It’s not a leap year.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘2000 was leap. The next century leap year’s 2400. Century leap years have to divide by 400, not four. The maths has to fit.’

  Big Ben’s right. 1900 wasn’t a leap year either. Or 1800, or 1700. The previous centurial leap year was 1600. Ama wouldn’t know because she doesn’t study PPF. She probably studies history. Or maybe they don’t do history in 2048. Maybe they only study the present. She does something funny with her forehead so it’s parallel lines like a school exercise book.

  ‘So he lied?’

  ‘He must have invented an itinerary. That’s a lot of work,’ I say. But inventing something that isn’t true is still a lie.

  Ama shakes her head. ‘He never brought letters home from school. He rarely went to school. Just remember him texting me that he was going on Leap 2100. Maybe it was code for something.’

  ‘Did you keep the text on your phone?’

  She shakes her head. ‘I didn’t think it was important at the time.’

  For a split second I remember deleting SOS L but I try not to think about it.

  ‘As Leap 2100 can’t exist, maybe he was pretending to leap. Or wasn’t sure which year he was leaping to.’

  I’m surprised the words I’m thinking in my head are coming out of my mouth. Ama’s staring at me again. She takes a sip of her tea but makes a face like she finally realises she’s drinking a flowerbed.

  ‘How did you know his tag was a letter L? For Leapfrog.’

  ‘What’s a tag?’

  ‘A graffiti signature. They all have one so people know it’s them. Kwesi was proud of his art. How did you know, Elle?’

  ‘I didn’t.’ This is difficult. I’m trying not to think about deleting SOS L but I can’t help it. Maybe it was Kwesi who sent me the SOS message from 2048 and signed it L. Maybe he leapt from his Leap 2044 school trip to 2048.

  ‘How do you know he came HERE?’ I say.

  ‘Why did you ask if his name began with the letter L?’ She’s raised her voice. She looks angry and sad at the same time.

  I stare down at my bowl of cold porridge. I don’t know what to do. I’m scared that Ama doesn’t want to be my friend any more. I want to tell her about SOS L but when I open my mouth, nothing comes out. I stare down at my bowl of cold porridge. Ama is definitely angry now.

  ‘Elle. Look at me. If you know something, tell me. If you don’t, it’s the same as lying!’ Her eyes are wet. Maybe she’s going to cry.

  I don’t want to make Ama cry but I’m scared that Kwesi sent a message to me and he got killed in the future and Ama won’t be my friend any more. My head hurts from thinking about it. Too many thoughts. Too much.

  I stand up and walk out of the café, along the corridor to the other end of the building. The door to the Common Room is slightly open. I walk in. I don’t want to talk to GMT or Noon back in the chalet. Not that Noon says very much at all. Season’s stretched out on a sofa, fast asleep. The centr
e table still has the white cloth from last night, covered in cake crumbs. I lift the cloth and sit down under the table. This = having my own special tent. I wish we were camping and not staying in Hive 1. Hive 1 has too many smells in it, deodorant, hairspray, Noon’s Chanel No. 5 perfume. But the boys’ chalet probably smells of that hair gel Martin Aston uses, so I’m glad I’m not staying there.

  I sit for half an hour until my head stops hurting. I hear the door creak and voices. Le Temps and Millennia. The voices go away. I take out my phone and check in case there are more messages. Nothing. I’m not sure my TwentyTwenty’s working in 2048. Season has a coughing fit. Then there’s a strange gurgling noise. She’s being sick. I’m scared she’s going to choke but I can’t speak or move. She swears and I’m shocked but I don’t say anything. Adults sometimes swear if they hit their hands with a hammer. Then it’s permissible. I’m not sure you’re allowed to swear because you’re vomiting. Maybe Season was poisoned by her own beanburgers!

  Then I hear slow footsteps coming into the room and Millennia’s voice.

  ‘Mrs S, what in the name of Time are you doing?’

  Season mumbles something I can’t quite hear but it sounds like she’s shuffling around on the sofa.

  ‘Oh my word!’ says Millennia. ‘We need to get this place cleaned up. We don’t want one of the Leapers to—’

  ‘If you really cared about the Leaplings, you’d close the centre.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘You didn’t inform Intercalary International. Or the local schools. It looks like a cover-up. Do you really think they’d have put pupils at risk? How many more need to go missing? You let Le Temps talk you into . . .’ Season can’t find the right word.

  ‘Enough! Leapers who break rules put THEMSELVES at risk. The schools are at liberty to leave if they cannot trust their pupils. This is neither the time nor the place for such a discussion. See me in my office at 10:30!’

  And I hear Millennia’s footsteps leaving the room.

  I’m scared to breathe in case Season hears me and thinks I hid here on purpose. I no longer feel scared and sad. My mouth is a capital O with shock. Season didn’t want us to come here. Season wanted to keep us safe. Season is good. But Millennia and Le Temps, they wanted us to face danger. Millennia and Le Temps are BAD. It must have something to do with SOS L. It must.

  Mrs C Eckler finds me at 9 a.m. Season has gone back to the kitchen. I hear other voices in the room: Ama, Big Ben, GMT. The Mind Full workshop must have started and I’m supposed to be in their group.

  ‘Elle,’ she says. ‘It’s Mrs Eckler. Are you there?’

  I don’t answer. I hope by not answering she’ll know to leave me alone. But she doesn’t give up. I can tell by her voice she’s much closer than before when she speaks again. Her words come out faster than usual and a bit out of breath, like she’s been running.

  ‘It’s OK to stay here till you feel better. But I need to see you to know you’re safe. That’s my job on this trip. I must do my job.’

  She’s right. I like people who do their job properly. Not like the police, who wouldn’t look for Kwesi for more than a week.

  ‘Elle, if you want me to lift the tablecloth to check on you, knock once on the table. If YOU want to lift the cloth, knock twice.’

  I pause before knocking twice. I shuffle forwards on my bottom as I’m sitting cross-legged and lift the cloth. She lowers her head, then gets onto her knees to check. When she sees I’m OK, she smiles. Maybe Ama told her about Kwesi and she was worried I’d gone missing too.

  ‘Elle, Ama wants to talk to you. Is that OK?’ she says. ‘Knock once for yes, and twice for no.’

  I knock twice. I don’t want to talk to Ama because she shouted at me and doesn’t want to be my friend.

  ‘Elle, will you let Ben talk to you?’

  I knock once. I don’t lift the cloth, though. He can talk to me through the cloth. It’s like a veil. It makes me feel safe and I don’t have to look at people’s faces to see whether their eyes are rolling clockwise or anticlockwise if I say something rude.

  ‘Am I your boyfriend?’ he says.

  ‘No,’ I say.

  When I’m tongue-tied, talking to Big Ben is like talking to Grandma. Sometimes when I’m tongue-tied I only talk to them. If it’s Armageddon like after I got SOS L, I don’t talk to anyone. There’s a gap before he speaks again. Even though I can’t see him, I imagine him screwing up his face to think of the next sentence. He’d rather talk totally in numbers.

  ‘Do you want my hat?’ he says.

  ‘OK.’

  Big Ben gives me objects when I’m sad. Lots of people find that weird but I like it because if the object’s soft, I can stroke it. Enjoy its texture. The crumpled red hat appears under the folds of the cloth. It still has mud and twigs on it. At least it doesn’t smell too bad. Just of the earth and Big Ben’s hair. I hold it in my hand. It’s dry, bristly with the caked-on mud, but some areas are still soft. I stroke the soft bits. It’s like an animal that ran away for a week and came back, skinny and covered in mud but bits of it still soft and warm. I don’t know where that thought came from. I stroke the hat. It’s comforting. I turn it inside out. The inside is red fleece and there’s a white label with black writing on it. 100% bamboo, waterless wash 20°C, SAVE THE PLANET.

  But over the top of the print there are handwritten words. It reminds me of when I want to say two sentences at the same time and it’s so overwhelming I end up saying nothing. On top of SAVE THE PLANET, three words written in faded black biro.

  Kwesi Atta Asante.

  The missing boy.

  Chapter 12:00

  THE UNDERSTORY

  ‘You can pick these.’

  Season’s giving us a tour of the grounds. It’s the tour that should have taken place yesterday but it was raining and we made birthday cake instead. All 12 of us are here, plus Mr C Eckler, as Mrs C Eckler meditates on a Sunday. I feel guilty hearing that, because I promised Grandma I would pray on Sunday, as our church doesn’t exist in 2048, but I haven’t done it yet. I’ll do it after this tour, back in the chalet, not aloud like Grandma but quietly in my head. It shouldn’t take more than half an hour.

  There’s light rain but it’s mild and you can smell the grass. I love the smell. The tour was supposed to be done by Le Temps but he’s busy dealing with An Emergency. Maybe one of the cows has run loose and is pooing all over the paths! We’re walking so slowly we’re almost going backwards. I’m glad Big Ben and I ran yesterday. It was much more fun. Season’s teaching us about foraging – free food you can pick in the wild. And the understory – the part of the forest under the shade where things grow in the damp, like mushrooms. She’s telling us which ones we can pick and which ones will kill us.

  ‘Have you killed anyone by mistake?’ says Jake.

  Season laughs. ‘Not that I know of. Some of them make you nauseous but most of them won’t kill you.’ She holds out her bag and we throw in some pink mushrooms with black stems that Season calls Velvet Shanks. They look poisonous but they’re not.

  ‘Do any of them make you throw up?’ I say.

  ‘The bolete might but they’re too bitter to . . .’ She frowns at me as if she only just realised what I said. I find my mouth speaking before my brain tells me to stop.

  ‘Is that why you threw up this morning?’

  She shakes her head like I’m talking nonsense. ‘That wasn’t mushrooms, that was too much rich food. I’m usually careful but once every four years . . .’ She shrugs her shoulders.

  We’re walking the same route Big Ben and I took yesterday until we get to the steep path on the left. There’s a cordon across it, yellow-and-black-striped, like crime tape. Jake starts to fiddle with it and Season goes still as a statue.

  ‘We can’t go that way. It’s too dangerous.’

  ‘Did someone get killed?’

  ‘No. Something to do with the path. Le Temps is dealing with it.’

  As we continue down
the path, I drop back with Big Ben, Ama and GMT. We told GMT about Kwesi after lunch as she’s in our group and older than us so she might know something. She went very quiet.

  ‘Weird vibes happen. But Leap 2100?’ she shook her head. ‘Thought ’68 was far out. Some years are clean outta synch.’

  ‘What’s that in English?’ Ama finds GMT difficult to understand. I only understand one word out of three but I love her speaking like song lyrics. Better than talking in tongues in our church.

  ‘Leap years that ain’t leap, dudes disappear. Like a Black Hole.’

  ‘Black Hole, black magic. Why is everything spooky always BLACK? You think Kwesi’s in another universe?’ Ama gave her the bull’s-eye stare.

  ‘No idea. Just, 2100’s spooked. In space–time. You leap, end up some year else. Your luggage lost en route, your Chrono gets a glitch, texts flip to the wrong time.’

  That might explain why I got the text. Maybe it wasn’t a Predictive but a text that went to the wrong time and place. But I didn’t say anything. The hat brought my voice back but I hadn’t found the right time to tell them about SOS L.

  ‘Did you ever meet my brother?’ Ama said.

  ‘Meet him? I KNOW him. Free spirit. Speaks with his hands. But I never heard him talk about Leap 2100. I’ll ask MC. He’s omniscient.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Knows everything, everyone, everyplace. If he don’t know, I’ll eat my hat.’

  I hope her hat isn’t covered in mud and twigs!

  Now, the four of us stop at the junction.

  ‘That’s the path we took yesterday. Where we found the hat.’

  Ama looks like she’s patting an invisible dog with her hand. ‘Keep your voice down, Elle. Chat later, yeh.’

  It’s hard to know when to speak and when not to speak. When to be loud and when to be quiet. It’s not 2048 that’s outta synch. It’s me. I wonder whether I’ll ever learn how to say the right things at the right time. Getting it wrong makes me so angry. When Big Ben gets so angry that he has a meltdown, he throws chairs. I’ve never thrown a chair, though I feel like doing it ten times a day.