suspected him of agreeing to that. He does so mutely nonetheless, and the task is finished not too long after Woody said it would be. "I guess that won't have hurt your appetite," Woody tells him.
Does he eat in his office? Ross has never seen him do so in the staffroom or even help himself from the percolator, which presents Ross with a gush of coffee so strong that an inch of milk still leaves it resembling mud. As Woody returns to his office Ross fetches from his locker the ham sandwiches he made last night while his father loitered in the kitchen as if he was close to finding a way to help. He drops them on the table and opens the crinkled foil they're wrapped in before flattening a cybergaming magazine beside them. If Mad saw him now she might emit a single tut and bring a plate to slip under the sandwiches; Lorraine would shake her head and her ponytail at the sight of the kind of magazine she says only men read. He finds himself willing them both to stay downstairs. He should have realised asking Lorraine out would lead to problems.
Enjoy your episodes, his father says. They're what life's made of. Don't expect to spend it all with one person; that's not natural. He sees this is his father's method of dealing with the way his wife left him with three-year-old Ross and never came back from a holiday with girlfriends that was meant to be just a break—it justifies how his father has never lived with anyone except him for longer than a few months since—but it feels right to Ross too. It was why he took his chance with Lorraine when she surprised him with friendliness, but should he have been no more than friendly? Is he bound to antagonise either her or Mad? Struggling to think about them reduces him to gazing at pictures of computerised fights while he sticks food in his mouth. When he hears Woody utter a sound too savage to have time for words, for a moment it seems to be expressing his own frustration. "What is it?" Connie cries.
"Little—" Whatever else Woody might have said he leaves behind as he flings the door to the stairs wide and bounds down them, missing every other one. Connie's startled gaze catches Ross's as she swivels her desk chair and peers into Woody's office. "We've been invaded," she says as though she doesn't understand what she's seeing.
She's watching the security monitor. Ross joins her in time to observe Woody rushing through the top left-hand quadrant while Frank the guard tramps across the sector diagonally opposite. The rest of the screen shows a pair of deserted aisles until two figures dart into the lower left-hand section, throwing books off shelves as they run. There must be a fault with the monitor, because the figures are trailing grey strands of themselves—but a fault can't explain why their faces look as though they've left all their skin and flesh somewhere else.
If they're made up or wearing masks, how reassuring is that? Ross feels as though he's less watching than dreaming the sight of two prancing dwarfish shapes with faces so basic they resemble primitive images. He has to see what they really look like. He runs downstairs almost as fast as Woody did and hauls the door open, to be met by two skulls topped with hair.
He sees the boys are wearing masks left over from Halloween before the wearers dodge out of reach, masks so cheap they couldn't be more rudimentary. As he starts after them the boys sprint past the counter and out of the shop. "Leave them to it, Frank," says Woody as they merge with the fog. "Just so they don't get back in."
"I think we may already have had to chase them once," Agnes says from the counter.
"Nobody told me. When?"
"The day we had the quiz. I think they're the ones that were being a nuisance."
"Explains the masks. If any more of those show up we'd better see their faces."
Woody stalks into Homecrafts, where his angry head ducks and reappears like a bird's as he picks up cookery books. When Ross starts to retrieve medical volumes from the
Does he eat in his office? Ross has never seen him do so in the staffroom or even help himself from the percolator, which presents Ross with a gush of coffee so strong that an inch of milk still leaves it resembling mud. As Woody returns to his office Ross fetches from his locker the ham sandwiches he made last night while his father loitered in the kitchen as if he was close to finding a way to help. He drops them on the table and opens the crinkled foil they're wrapped in before flattening a cybergaming magazine beside them. If Mad saw him now she might emit a single tut and bring a plate to slip under the sandwiches; Lorraine would shake her head and her ponytail at the sight of the kind of magazine she says only men read. He finds himself willing them both to stay downstairs. He should have realised asking Lorraine out would lead to problems.
Enjoy your episodes, his father says. They're what life's made of. Don't expect to spend it all with one person; that's not natural. He sees this is his father's method of dealing with the way his wife left him with three-year-old Ross and never came back from a holiday with girlfriends that was meant to be just a break—it justifies how his father has never lived with anyone except him for longer than a few months since—but it feels right to Ross too. It was why he took his chance with Lorraine when she surprised him with friendliness, but should he have been no more than friendly? Is he bound to antagonise either her or Mad? Struggling to think about them reduces him to gazing at pictures of computerised fights while he sticks food in his mouth. When he hears Woody utter a sound too savage to have time for words, for a moment it seems to be expressing his own frustration. "What is it?" Connie cries.
"Little—" Whatever else Woody might have said he leaves behind as he flings the door to the stairs wide and bounds down them, missing every other one. Connie's startled gaze catches Ross's as she swivels her desk chair and peers into Woody's office. "We've been invaded," she says as though she doesn't understand what she's seeing.
She's watching the security monitor. Ross joins her in time to observe Woody rushing through the top left-hand quadrant while Frank the guard tramps across the sector diagonally opposite. The rest of the screen shows a pair of deserted aisles until two figures dart into the lower left-hand section, throwing books off shelves as they run. There must be a fault with the monitor, because the figures are trailing grey strands of themselves—but a fault can't explain why their faces look as though they've left all their skin and flesh somewhere else.
If they're made up or wearing masks, how reassuring is that? Ross feels as though he's less watching than dreaming the sight of two prancing dwarfish shapes with faces so basic they resemble primitive images. He has to see what they really look like. He runs downstairs almost as fast as Woody did and hauls the door open, to be met by two skulls topped with hair.
He sees the boys are wearing masks left over from Halloween before the wearers dodge out of reach, masks so cheap they couldn't be more rudimentary. As he starts after them the boys sprint past the counter and out of the shop. "Leave them to it, Frank," says Woody as they merge with the fog. "Just so they don't get back in."
"I think we may already have had to chase them once," Agnes says from the counter.
"Nobody told me. When?"
"The day we had the quiz. I think they're the ones that were being a nuisance."
"Explains the masks. If any more of those show up we'd better see their faces."
Woody stalks into Homecrafts, where his angry head ducks and reappears like a bird's as he picks up cookery books. When Ross starts to retrieve medical volumes from the
Similar Books
