AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No,” Luke lied. “This is where I have to go, so I’m going.” And he did. He got out of the car and walked up the stairs, through the knots of other boys, the tearful mums, the proud dads, and didn’t think anything at all.
He’d kept his promise, though, as long as he could. He’d looked after Kane once his brother had come to join him three years later. Kane hadn’t had nearly as much coaching from their dad, other than a short visit to New Zealand every year at Christmas and a longer one in August, but he had more natural talent than Luke. At rugby, and at cricket, too. Luke still worried about how soft he was, but sport would help with that. Eventually.
Besides, Luke was there. He wasn’t going to let anyone bully his brother, and every boy in school knew it. He might only be twelve, but he didn’t care about pain. Most boys did care. When their nose got bloodied or they got hit in the ribs, they stopped. Luke didn’t stop.
That was what he thought for a term, anyway. Until his mum collected the two of them for Christmas and told Luke in the car on the way home, “That’s it for you, then. You’re off to En Zed.”
“What?” he asked.
“That was always the plan,” she said. “You stay here until you’re twelve, and then you go to your dad, so he can make a man of you.”
Luke didn’t say, I’m not a man. I’m a boy. No point. He said, “You didn’t tell me that.” His voice cracked, because the dread was hollowing out his belly, tightening his throat, but he kept his face as expressionless as he could, so she wouldn’t see. You couldn’t keep from feeling bad, but you could keep other people from knowing.
“Of course I did,” she said. “It was always the plan.”
“No,” Kane said. Just one word, and this time, he didn’t cry. He’d learned. But his face had gone pale, his hands gripping the seat.
Luke asked, “When?”
“After the New Year,” his mum said. “The New Zealand term starts at the end of January, but Dad’ll need some time to get you kitted out, and you’ll need to be able to shift for yourself once his season starts and you’re in school. You’ll have to start the school year over again, of course, but that’s good. Make you a bit older when it’s time for First XV selection.” The rugby squad that would compete for the national secondary schools championship. That was years and years away, and every boy who played rugby wanted to be on that squad and most would never get there, but it didn’t matter. His dad believed in planning. He believed in discipline. He believed in structure. And he believed that all those things would make his sons elite rugby players, because they were his sons.
Luke had discipline, and he had structure. That didn’t mean he had to like this. “Why am I going?” he asked. “Why should I? Why should Kane? Dad doesn’t want us.”
His mother glanced at him sharply, probably shocked. Luke didn’t care. He knew he had to go, but why shouldn’t he tell the truth first? Why shouldn’t he ask for the truth?
“Of course he wants you,” she said. “He wants to coach you, for one thing.”
“He’s got a coaching job,” Luke said. “Let him coach them.”
“You’re his son,” she said. “You’ve got his name.”
“I’ll still have his name whether I play rugby or not. What if I’m rubbish? Do I have to change my name?”
She stared at him once more, for long enough that he got a bit worried about her driving, but got herself under control again, of course. “Nonsense. You won’t be rubbish. You’ll do your best.”
He wished he could say, I won’t, though. But rugby was what he was good at, and anyway, you needed a place at school where you fit, especially when you didn’t fit at all inside. He said, “So that’s it, then?”
“Yes,” she said. “That’s it. You’ll come here for Christmas every year, and you and Kane will spend the August holidays in New Zealand as always, as that’s when Dad’s season ends, and he’ll make you an All Black.”
“What if he doesn’t want to be an All Black, though?” Kane asked.
“Of course he does,” their mum said. “He’s a Kiwi, isn’t he?”
“Not really,” Kane said. “We live here, not there. And you’re English.”
“In rugby,” she said, “being a Kiwi is better. Why wouldn’t you want your dad’s coaching? You’re lucky to have it.”
Luke didn’t know how to explain. He didn’t know what to do. So when they got home, he did what he always did. He did his press-ups, he did his sit-ups, and most of all—he ran. Through the fog and the rain and the cold, past houses with their Christmas trees lit up even in the daytime against the gloom outside, the smoke curling from their chimneys. Luke tried to imagine the storybook families inside and couldn’t quite do it. They’d play board games together, maybe, and drink hot cocoa in front of the fire, and maybe … read books? Throw a ball for a dog? Do … baking, possibly, and make special dinners? He wasn’t sure. In his family, you were mostly either outside, training or being out of the way, or in your room, doing your schoolwork, or if you couldn’t be either, shutting up. That was what he knew, and what Kane knew. Which may have been why Kane ran with him, doing his best to keep up, and why Luke slowed his pace for his brother. Running was what they did together, and this was the time they had left.
On the last day, the coldest yet, with the damp hanging in the air like streamers, he took Kane on the bus so they could run on the path beside the nearly-freezing river Tyne. He didn’t quite know why. Maybe because it was the last day, and he felt like they had to do something.
Kane said, “If we kept running, would we get all the way to the North Sea?”
“Reckon we would,” Luke said. “If we kept running.”
“I think we should, then,” Kane said. “We should get on a fishing boat and escape. We could be the crew.”
“We don’t know how to fish, though,” Luke said. “And you’re nine.”
