“I’m sorry,” I mumble. I haven’t spoken to anyone who was in that maths exam since it happened but I have every reason to believe they all hate me. It’s the last thing you want, isn’t it? Someone causing a drama when you’re trying to concentrate on geometry.
“Forget it,” she says, softening. “I’m just winding you up. Anyway, we all applied for special consideration on account of the disruption you caused. You’re a hero to a lot of people.”
I half laugh and for an instant she gives me a surprisingly warm smile. “What’s it like doing retakes at home?” she asks.
“It’s OK. Convenient.”
“Don’t you miss people? Going out?”
I should lie and tell her I go out all the time. I should tell her that I’ve made older friends who’re working and who play in a band and when they move to London I’m going to go with them.
“I don’t really get out much,” I say. “Um … at all.”
“You’re a shut-in?”
It’s so abrupt I don’t know how to respond.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean… I got a bit like that after I was sick. I didn’t want to leave the house. Couldn’t leave the house. That’s just what I called it.”
“The Japanese call it Hikikomori,” I say. “It means someone who avoids social contact. It’s a real thing.”
Farah doesn’t say anything. I stare hard at the ticket in my hand in order to hide my embarrassment.
756. Definitely 756.
Still, I feel better for having someone to talk to, even if it is Farah. I take a shaky breath. Maybe it’s OK, I think. All that weirdness – the lack of people, the blurry vision, the strange man who spoke to me – maybe it was all in my head. Maybe I’m starting to feel better.
“What number are you?” I say.
“755,” she says.
“How long have you been waiting?”
“About nine days.”
FIVE
Nine days? She’s joking, right? I mean, she has to be joking. But there’s something about the way she looks at me that makes me horribly afraid she’s not.
I stare at the salty streaks of dried tears on her cheeks. She’s scared.
My brain fizzes. A woman in blue scrubs passes by. A moment later, a man in green scrubs passes the other way. They don’t even glance at us.
I must be dreaming, I think.
I pinch my nose and force my ears to pop. Then I count my fingers: thumb to index, thumb to middle, thumb to ring, thumb to pinkie. I do it with both hands simultaneously, like I’m playing scales. It’s a technique a doctor showed me once to calm myself down – to check I’m still here, the world is real, I’m not dreaming.
“What on earth are you doing?” Farah says, half laughing.
I put my hands down quickly and slide them under my knees, my face reddening. “Nothing.”
Not dreaming, I think. But I already knew that. It’s too physical for a dream. I can feel myself sweating, my shirt sticking to my back and beginning to itch. I can feel the saliva catching at the back of my throat, making me swallow compulsively. The air in my nose, the grit under my fingernails, the pressure of the chair against my backside.
Somebody else in blue scrubs walks by. I leap up and try to intercept them but somehow I miss. They breeze past.
“Don’t bother,” Farah says. “They can’t see you.”
I give her a cold stare. “What do you mean?”
Farah shrugs, turns away and chews her thumbnail, like she regrets saying it. Something hangs between us. I’m not sure I want to know what it is.
“What’s going on?” I say.
“Have you noticed that there’s no lights, no electricity?”
I frown. “I guess.”
“But we can still see?”
I glance around and see immediately what she means. We’re in the guts of the hospital, heavy doors block off every corridor that might even remotely connect to a window.
But there are no shadows. Just a sort of dull, flat, grainy reflected light that comes from nowhere.
“What does it mean?” I say.
“It means we’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto.”
