The Key to Finding Jack by Ewa Jozefkowicz (best classic books to read TXT) 📕

Thirteen

The closer we got, the more convinced I became that it wasn’t a good idea. I wasn’t sure that Simon would want to see us.

‘It’s this one,’ said Keira, motioning towards a house with a neat front garden, complete with a mini palm tree struggling against the wind, and a swing seat.

I rapped on the door before I could change my mind and a split second later it swung open. A tall greying man stood before me in jogging bottoms and a zip-up hoodie. There was a black sports bag slung over his shoulder. He was rushing out and clearly hadn’t expected anyone to knock. He was probably Sol – the first S.F. whose name I’d discovered. I’d never met Simon’s dad before.

‘Hello, is Simon in?’

‘Oh, hi,’ he said absentmindedly and motioned for us to come inside. ‘He’s in his bedroom,’ he said sighing and there was a fleeting look of worry on his face. ‘Shout up to him, he’ll come down,’ he advised and then headed out. Before I could say anything else, he was gone. The front door slammed behind him and moments later we heard the bleep of his car door unlocking and the engine starting.

‘What do we do?’ I asked Keira.

‘Call his name.’

‘I can’t. Won’t he think we’re right weirdos, standing here inside his house? We need to go back out and ring the doorbell again.’

She nodded and I lifted my hand to undo the lock, careful to be as quiet as possible.

That was when we heard the Spanish voice upstairs and Jack’s name among the scramble of words.

I froze. There was movement on the landing. Simon was coming down the stairs, an exasperated look on his face.

He was so engrossed in his conversation that it took him a while to notice us, but when he did, he smiled a sad smile and finished the call.

‘We’re sorry. We didn’t mean to turn up like this,’ I began, ‘your dad let us in…’

‘It’s fine – don’t worry. Are you all right?’

‘Kind of. Not really. You?’

‘Same.’

‘This is Keira,’ I said. ‘Have you met before?’

‘Yes, at your house once. Hi, Keira. D’you both want something to eat? I’ve put on a pizza.’

‘Sure, I’d love some,’ I said, feeling suddenly ravenous. ‘I didn’t know you spoke Spanish.’

‘Yeah, I’m not brilliant. But we lived in Barcelona when I was younger and although I went to an international school, we had some lessons in Spanish. We moved around a lot because my dad’s a diplomat.’

‘Oh yeah. That’s why you only came to our school in sixth form, right?’ I could tell that we were both avoiding the subject of Jack.

‘Yeah, it wasn’t easy to be honest. I’d moved schools a lot but I’d never found it that bad. It was only here that it was tough,’ he said, manoeuvring the pizza onto the chopping board.

‘Really? Why?’

‘There were a couple of guys in our class who had it in for me from the beginning. They laughed at my weird accent and braces. It was like they were looking for someone to bully.’

I glanced at Simon’s immaculately straight, white teeth and wondered whether they would be laughing now.

‘It was awful. One day they cornered me after school. It was this time last year and it was absolutely freezing. They nicked my coat and emptied a bucket of water over me. By the time I got home, I was properly shaking. I got ill after that and I think they freaked out that I’d tell one of the teachers. Tuck in,’ he said, motioning to the pizza and offering us both plates.

‘And did you? You should have done!’ I said, feeling furious on his behalf.

‘No, I didn’t in the end. Jack convinced me not to. He said it would make it worse. Anyway, they seemed to back off a bit when Jack, Darren and Leon made friends with me. It happened when things got so bad I was seriously contemplating quitting school.’

‘Quitting? But where would you go?’

‘Oh, I have no idea. I suppose I was thinking I might miss the end of the year and then start again in another sixth form in September. At the time I’d come back from school and lie on my bed for hours and hours. Dad persuaded me to go to the tennis club with him and that’s where I made friends with Jack. I knew him from school, but not very well. He started inviting me to stuff with him and his friends, and slowly life became more bearable.’

‘Because you had people to hang out with?’ I knew that Jack and Simon had met at the club, but I had no idea about the other things he’d mentioned.

‘Yeah, I think they respected Jack in a weird way and weren’t sure how to react when we started hanging out. They laid off me after that. Jack was awesome. He’s one of the most genuine people I’ve ever met.

‘And now this… It was meant to be the trip of a lifetime. I’m sorry, that’s a stupid thing to say,’ he said, running his hand over his face, embarrassed. ‘I was supposed to meet Jack there on Saturday – I’d had my stuff packed for ages. I still can’t believe it.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘We overheard you talking to someone on the phone. Was that about Jack?’

‘Yeah. I called Ariane, who Jack mentioned in one of his last emails – she’s the woman who ran the trip to Arequipa, which he was on before all this happened. I wanted to find out if she knew him or if he mentioned his plans for what to do next.’

‘How did you find her? What did she say?’ Keira asked.

‘I looked her up online and found her contact details. It’s amazing I managed to get through as a lot of the phone lines are down. She was so helpful – she said that she remembered Jack very well as he’d made friends with loads of people. He apparently met an Aussie guy called