Mo
The next day, I went to school determined to do whatever it took to get some information from Jax.
‘You look like you mean business,’ Lottie said, as we walked to school.
‘So?’ I said.
‘It’s a bit scary, that’s all. I’m used to fluffy bunny Mo. This grizzly bear Mo will take some getting used to.’
‘I thought you wanted me to toughen up,’ I said.
‘I thought I did, too.’
‘Well, make up your mind, Lottie. If you want me to lock Jax in a cupboard and force him to answer our questions, fluffy bunny Mo isn’t going to cut it.’
‘Are you OK?’ she said.
‘No. I’m not OK,’ I said. ‘Everything is horrible and I hate feeling like this.’
‘I’m sorry, Mo.’ She squeezed my hand.
We crossed the road with no Hector to help us, and walked through the school gates.
With the presentations for the Discovery Competition only a few days away, we were given all morning to work on our inventions. Jax hadn’t joined in very much over the past week. He’d kept to himself, scribbling on bits of paper and staring into space. Because he still didn’t know that we were now working on a completely different invention from the one he thought we were, we hadn’t bothered trying to include him too much.
‘We need your help in the storage cupboard,’ Lottie said.
He looked up, surprised. ‘I thought you two had everything covered.’
‘Mostly,’ I said. ‘But we need you for this part.’
‘OK.’ He shrugged and followed us to the lostproperty room.
As soon as we were inside, I closed the door behind us and turned the key in the lock.
‘I’ll look after it, Mo,’ Lottie said, taking it and concealing it somewhere on her body. I couldn’t see exactly where and I didn’t want to think about it.
‘What’s going on, guys?’ Jax said, looking confused. ‘Mo? Is everything OK?’
‘Everything isn’t OK, Jax,’ I said.
‘And it’s because of you,’ said Lottie.
‘What do you mean?’ Jax said, pushing past us to the door. ‘Let me out of here.’
‘Not until you’ve answered our questions,’ I said.
‘Why are you doing this, Mo? What’s your problem?’
‘We know what you are,’ Lottie said. ‘And we know what you’ve done, so stop pretending you’re Mo’s friend.’
‘I’ll shout for help if you don’t let me out,’ Jax said – that dark look that I’d seen before clouding over his face.
‘Shall I gag him?’ Lottie said, turning to me.
‘What? That’s crazy!’ I said.
‘But we don’t want him making too much noise.’
‘How will he answer our questions if he’s gagged?’ I said.
‘Good point,’ she said.
‘Anyway,’ I said, ‘we’re not going to hurt him.’
‘We aren’t?’ Lottie said.
I looked at Jax. ‘No, we aren’t. We’re not like his mum and dad.’
‘What do you know about my mum and dad?’ Jax said.
‘We know plenty,’ Lottie said. ‘But what we don’t know is what they did to Mo’s dad.’
Jax looked at the floor. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ I said.
‘That’s because he’s lying his pants off,’ Lottie said.
‘Just tell us, Jax. I need to know what happened to him. He’s my dad.’
‘Yeah, and I have to look out for my dad, too,’ Jax said. ‘Only total jerks betray their own family.’
‘But you aren’t like them, Jax,’ I said.
He turned away. I thought about punching him. Part of me wanted to punch him. And I was totally sure that Lottie wanted to punch him. Probably in the nuts. But I knew that wouldn’t get me the answers I wanted; it would just make him hate me.
‘Please tell me,’ I said. ‘We’re friends. You’ve come to my house. My mum’s cooked you dinner and you’ve eaten with my family. You owe me this.’
‘Time to get heavy then,’ Lottie said, cracking her knuckles and doing some lunges.
‘What are you doing?’ I said.
‘Warming up, of course.’
‘I told you, we’re not hurting him.’
Lottie pulled me into a corner. ‘Are we doing good cop/bad cop here?’
‘No!’ I said. ‘I’m serious.’
‘But he’s not going to tell us anything.’
‘Then we’ll find another way.’
I turned back to Jax. ‘Will you help us, Jax? Please.’
‘No. Let me out of here now.’
‘Let him out, Lottie,’ I said.
‘Are you sure? I’ve been practising this move where I squeeze his head between my knees, do this sort of twist, and throw him to the floor.’
‘I’m sure,’ I said.
‘Boring,’ she said, producing the key from somewhere and unlocking the door.
Jax ran out the door and out of school. We didn’t see him again.
After that morning, we stopped seeing the Junkers everywhere we went. There was no sign of Mr Gideon crawling up the streets behind us in his van. We didn’t get any visits from Lorelai and, when we looked at the windows, there was no movement from the curtains to suggest anyone was looking out. Jax never came back to school.
‘Well, that’s a relief, at least,’ Lottie said.
‘Is it?’ I wasn’t so sure. It didn’t feel like the end of the trouble – it felt like the start of something worse.
We’d decided not to risk another visit to the Junker house. Instead we focused all of our efforts on the Discovery Competition. We knew we had to win and, even though it was the last thing we felt like doing, we tried to put the distractions out of our minds and do the best job we could.
