Running with Rogues

CHAPTER 25 - TIME TO GO

I pulled my t-shirt over my head and wriggled back into my jeans. It was cold enough in the tent that there were Goosebumps pricking my skin, and I spent a good few seconds hunched over, hugging myself to try and trap some heat in my clothes.

Finn rolled onto his stomach. He was in the process of lighting a cigarette, and there was a little part of me that wanted to knock it out of his hand. "Where are you rushing off to? It's past midnight. Everyone's asleep."

Not everyone.

"My own bed," I said cheerfully. "I don't ... y'know ... stay."

He looked at me sidelong. "Suit yourself."

I tried and failed to pull my shoes on and had to go through the demeaning process of untying the laces. By the time I'd finished, Finn had finally finished wrestling with his lighter. He took a long draught of the cigarette before offering it to me. I shook my head. The smoke had reached my nose by then, and it was an effort not to sneeze.

"Those things will kill you," I told him.

Finn just smiled. "Not if the flockies kill me first."

"You're an idiot," I told him. There was a fondness to the words that took all the sting out of them.

"Yeah, I am," he agreed, grinning now. I'd finished tying my laces, and he knew it was time to rap it up. "Well, this has been fun. Try not to die in Silver Lake, and I guess I'll see you around."

I couldn't help my snort. "Goodnight, Finn."

Ducking out of the tent, I took a deep lungful of the nice cool outdoors air and smiled to myself. The camp had gone quiet in the last hour, and now I was standing in a town of tents and trees. The shadows danced every time the wind blew. It might have been alarming for most people, but I'd grown up in camps like these, and I loved to watch the moonlight rippling in the breeze.

Showers first. Then bed.

***

My hair was damp. I could feel it dripping water down the back of my neck, but there wasn't much I could do about that. I'd already attacked it with a towel until it had felt like my scalp was rubbed raw. But when I ducked into the tent, I found it was so nice and warm inside that it didn't really matter. Forget the flockies' central heating — I had two human furnaces.

Carefully, I eased my way between Rhodri and Liam. They'd left my sleeping bag out for me, and there was space on the pillow to lay my head. It was only when I was comfortable that I risked a glance to my left. Sure enough — awake. He was watching me with a half-smile on his lips.

I was too drowsy to start a conversation, but I did bump fists with him before I closed my eyes and began the long, gruelling process of turning my brain off. It was doing that thing where it decided to install updates without ever asking permission. My thoughts ticked along at about a mile an hour. There was a lot to process from today, not least the brand new tooth-marks on my neck.

An hour later, and I was still tossing and turning. The pain from my elbow had faded over the course of the day, but the problem with being in bed was that there was absolutely nothing to distract me from it. I knew Liam was awake because he had been in and out several times. I didn't blame him, really. Lying awake all night was boring.

"Hey," he said after I kicked the sleeping bag off altogether.

"Hey," I replied in a whisper. If we woke my cousin, someone was going to die in this tent.

A moment's pause. "This isn't like you."

I rolled over to face him and gestured towards my elbow. I could now move it, after a fashion, so the damage wouldn't be permanent, but it would be a while longer before it was back to normal.