Читать книгу Don’t You Cry - Cass Green - Страница 9

Rain dashes into his eyes and mingles with tears and blood, stinging his cheeks and dripping off his chin. The burden he carries seems to be getting heavier by the minute. Sometimes, though, he imagines there isn’t anything there at all and his chest swells with panic. This doesn’t make any sense. But he stops and checks anyway, peering awkwardly inside the neck of the coat that’s sucking in water like a sponge and making him move twice as slowly as usual.

Reaching a brightly lit mini roundabout he stops, disorientated, and has a moment of confusion about which way to go. Right? No, left. It’s left here. He’s sure of it.

He hurries on but this place is not designed for pedestrians. He is forced to huddle at the side of the slip road, his stomach swooping as a car blares an angry horn, and then he reaches the narrow grass verge. Lucas stumbles along next to the main road, cars roaring past, so close he could stretch out his fingers and lose an arm.

But he welcomes the terror, the biting cold and the pains in his face and ribs. These sensations are too powerful to allow contemplation to creep in. He almost wants to keep moving forever but the tiredness is getting to him now. For a second he pictures himself taking two steps to the right and stopping it all, but he knows he can’t do it. And it’s not just about him, is it?

Not far now. But what will happen when he gets there? Lucas stops for a moment, breathing hard.

This whole thing is a terrible idea.

But it’s the only one he has right now so he stumbles onwards.