Becoming P.T. Lyfantod - 10
A serial fantasy novel
What follows is Part 10 of Becoming P.T. Lyfantod
If you missed Part 1, start there:
Chapter Four:
Old Magick
I awoke frightened and angry late Sunday morning, hiding beneath the covers from the world. I’d been dreaming. Mam-gu and I had boarded up the front door with planks and nails, and buttressed it with our bodies. My mother pounded the other side, demanding we let her in. The door shivered under her blows, and dust rained from the ceiling. She had an eviction order. The house was to be demolished to make way for a palace, and if we weren’t out soon, they’d knock it down with us inside. If we were unlucky enough to survive, we’d be locked in the dungeon, once it was built. Geralt rode a bulldozer, parked in the front lawn. He was just as I’d imagined—with a stupid beard and stupid sunglasses, and stupid bleach-blond hair—taunting us with bacon. Grease dripped from his lips and stuck in his beard as he folded chewy slices into his mouth, laughing and shouting for us to come out.
Rubbing my eyes, I got up and went to the window. No bulldozer. My stomach rumbled. The house really did smell like bacon. And toasted, buttery bread. If mam-gu was making bacon butties… it could only mean she knew something was wrong. But what did she know? My mother couldn’t have told her much. That was good, because it meant we wouldn’t have to discuss her terrible idea. And bad… because it meant mam-gu would want me to tell her what’d happened. And I really, really didn’t want to talk about it.
Hiding out in my room was a losing strategy, and I knew it. It was a matter of time before there’d come a knock at my door, and awkward questions. Breakfast was a trap, but skipping it would only make things worse. No, my only hope was to go down, eat, and get out of the house as quickly as possible; try to put off the conversation till dinner. Maybe by then I’d have a plan.
I decided to tell mam-gu I was going to the library to do a report. Maybe I’d meet up with Iain and Stuart. Come dinnertime, I’d say I hadn’t finished writing, and she’d have to leave me be. I hoped. The best—and worst—thing about my plan was that it wasn’t entirely a lie. I did have a report due Monday. I just didn’t mean to start writing it until after dinner. I had no intention of spending a whole, precious Sunday doing schoolwork.
I came downstairs rehearsing evasions in my head, certain mam-gu would start her interrogation the moment I appeared. But the questions never came. Perhaps she was hoping I’d talk in my own time. Or maybe she was trying some new hands-off approach to parenting, which would be a welcome first. Whatever the reason, she seemed content to leave me be. And a good thing, too. Because I was so flabbergasted by what I found waiting beside my crispy bacon sandwich that I might’ve told her anything.
It was the book. The book. The one the man in green had been fighting over. The one I’d left on the shelf at the bookstore, right before dashing out the door. “What’s this?” I demanded, holding it aloft.
Mam-gu didn’t look over from where she stood at the stove, cooking eggs. “It looks like a book to me.”
“I know it’s a book. I mean what’s it doing here?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea. Your mam dropped it off after you came home yesterday and locked yourself in your room. I assumed you knew.”
She—? But… how—? I stared at the cover. Thomas Willoughby stared back.
“Right,” I said. “Of course. It’s for school. Which reminds me, I’m going to go out to work on a report after breakfast, if that’s all right.”
“Fine, fine.”
“Mam didn’t err—say anything to you… did she?”
“No.” Mam-gu set a plate of runny eggs beside my sandwich. “Is there something I ought to know?” Her eyes flicked toward mine; piercing, grey, and all-seeing.
“…No.”
“Hm.” She turned back toward the stove. “Eat your breakfast.”
I didn’t argue. Mam-gu made bacon butties when she thought I needed cheering up because they were one of my favorite foods, and she did them better than anyone—crispy, greasy, and dripping with ketchup. I hardly tasted mine. I was too busy thinking about the book.
“Wish I had bacon,” Rudy rubbed his stomach.
“Me too,” said Coira. “I’m hungry.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” I reached for my waterlogged rucksack, which I’d somehow managed to hold onto during our capture. “I’ve got, ah… a loaf of bread, and some fruit.”
“Wasn’t hungry till you started talking about bacon,” Rudy muttered. “You got any of that in there?”
“Would you really eat bacon that’d been in this rucksack?”
“I’ll have fruit, please.” Coira held out a hand.
“Gimme the bread,” said Rudy.
“I’ll give you some of the bread. I don’t know how long this will have to—oh, look at that, it’s gotten wet…”
“Whatever, just give it to me.”
“Yes, fine.” I held out a few soggy slices. “Now where was I? Ah yes, the Book.”
I finished my breakfast and told mam-gu I was off to the library. As I shoved the book in my rucksack and hurried for the door, she called after me. “Dinner’s at seven. Sharp!”
The October air held a chill. The sky was luminous, almost white, and not a speck of blue was visible through the unbroken ceiling of cloud. The neighborhood was quiet except for the muffled hum of cars on the main road, and the faint rumble of a distant lawnmower. I’d only gone as far as the pavement when I nearly died of astonishment. Standing across the street two houses down—lurking, really—half-concealed by a parked van, was the man in green. He’d exchanged his emerald suit for something with a bit more yellow in it, but otherwise he looked exactly the same. And there was no mistaking it: he was watching me.
My mind flashed to the book stuffed in my bag.
His book.
He’d come for it. He’d found me. He knew where we lived. How—?
Neither of us moved. He had to know I’d spotted him. I was staring at him with my mouth open. But he didn’t react. He just stood there, looking back. And while I was busy fighting apoplexy, a voice called out behind me.
“P.T.!”
I whirled around, wide-eyed.
Mam-gu stood on the porch, holding out my jacket, completely oblivious. “Forgetting something?”
I dashed toward her. “Mam-gu—”
“I swear, boy, you’d lose your head if it wasn’t attached to your shoulders.”
I shook my head and took her by the arm. “Look!” I demanded, and turned, pointing at—
At…
Nothing.
“What is it?”
I ran across the street, thinking he must have gone behind the van.
“P.T., what are you doing?”
I tried to look in every direction at once. There was nothing. He was gone.
“P.T.!”
I slunk back, peering over my shoulder. “How does he do that…?” I didn’t understand it. There was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to run, even if I believed him capable of running…
“What’s gotten into you?” Mam-gu asked.
“He was right there,” I complained, pointing toward the van.
“He? He who?”
“The man in green!”
“Oh—are you on about him again? You know, I rather like the color green myself, I don’t know why you’ve such a problem with it.”
“It’s not just his clothes. It’s that he always disappears whenever I try to show him to you! And this book—”
“Perhaps he’s private. Or maybe he’s a ghost, and only you can see him. Either way, I’ve things to do, and I don’t need an excitable teenager to trip over on top of it all. You said you were having a day out and I’m holding you to it. Go on. Off with you.”
“But—”
“I’ll hear no more about it. Remember what I said—dinner’s at seven. If you’re late again, I’ll eat it myself.”
I sighed and turned, muttering to myself. There was no chance of getting her to listen now. I headed in the direction of the library—I couldn’t well do any different with mam-gu watching. But the instant she went back inside, I turned around and made for Iain’s house instead. I had to tell him and Stuart about this. They knew about the man in green, of course, though like everyone else in my life, they assumed my imagination was making him out to be more than he was. But between the incident at Baughan’s and now this, there was no way they’d be able to deny that something was afoot.
But no one answered when I rang the bell at Iain’s. Then Stuart’s mam answered the door to inform me he was off spending the day with his cousins in Neath.
I was on my own.
