The Terrorist by Caroline B. Cooney Read Free Book Online

Never .”

CHAPTER 6
    O NE WEEK AFTER THE murder, Thomas went back to work.
    Mr. Evans took Laura to school. Laura did not ask why. She had become fond of Mr. Evans, glad when he dropped in every day. Going to school with him seemed quite natural.
    It was ugly out. Raw and rainy. Ordinary London weather.
    Laura wore a long crimson wool skirt, black boots, and a high-necked black sweater. Over this, she wore her flannel-lined denim jacket. Laura rarely used a purse, but stuffed bus pass, snack money, and pencils into her jacket pockets.
    Denim was so American.
    Even though American blue jeans were very popular abroad, Laura could always tell who was American and who was foreign but wearing American jeans. Sometimes she mixed up Australians or Canadians, until they talked, and she got the accent, but she never mixed up English or Europeans. They just didn’t wear denim the same way.
    Laura had considered wearing the no-color raincoat that was a London specialty. Indeed, Americans came to London just to purchase such a raincoat. Raincoats blended into the crowds.
    When you lived abroad, you found out that some stereotypes were true. Americans did talk louder, laugh harder, and swing their bodies more than the British. British posture was condensed. American posture, in comparison, was a swagger. Americans took up more space on the sidewalk than the English did.
    Laura was surprised at her own fashion statement, wearing that denim jacket, unwilling to blend. Surprised that she was going out of her way to walk American, as if she owned the sidewalk. Yes. I’m an American. Wanna make something of it? Wanna kill me, too?
    Laura made conversation—loud, like American tourists, using the vowel-switch Boston accent she did not really possess.
    Mr. Evans went with her into the high school building. Billy had not had classes there. Middle school rooms were separated by the cafeteria, and sixth graders had lunch at a different hour. But Billy had been too boisterous to go unnoticed, and everybody in high school had known him, anyway. You couldn’t help knowing him. His presence was noisy and full of energy, and people smiled when they heard him, even when he was being his most annoying.
    Laura and Mr. Evans were met by the headmaster, Mr. Frankel. Mr. Frankel was beyond flustered. He was scared.
    One of his students had been slain. Within hours, dozens of his students had bailed out, quitting to attend another school or leaving the country entirely. Was Mr. Frankel going to be stranded here with a building and no students? Of course it had to be other families with enough sense to go home. The Williams family, the dangerous ones, were staying.
    “Laura, are you sure you’re ready?” said Mr. Frankel, who was not ready. Mr. Frankel had moved to London the same year that thirty people had been incinerated in King’s Cross Underground Station. Terrorism. The thought of terrorism in his very own school turned him into a Ping-Ping ball, bouncing on the table of his fears. He was responsible for so many children.
    Yes, the school had bomb drills, but nobody expected to find bombs! Yes, the school had locks, television monitors, and armed patrols, but nobody expected to need this stuff. And what blockade would that be to a terrorist, anyhow? Obviously, none.
    “Your brother’s death, I’m sure,” said Mr. Frankel, hoping even now that Laura Williams would just go home, “is very, very difficult to face, and—”
    “I’m ready,” said Laura.
    Nicole Williams watched her daughter dress, and then watched from the window as Mr. Evans and Laura went up Heathfold Gardens toward the bus stop on Finchley Road.
    Nicole had always been able to believe that she was Billy’s mother. Billy coming home from school was an event. He never walked in: he sprang or raced or vaulted. He never had time to sit down for milk and cookies, but had to snack standing up because he had so much to tell, so many bartered treasures to show off, and a