Rob Ewing - The Last of Us

‘ Tha I garbh ,’ I say. ‘It is windy.’

Everyone has to write it down. I wait until there isn’t any more sound of pencils scratching.

‘ Tha I frasach ,’ I say. ‘It is rainy.’

I listen for the time of their pencils stopping.

The classroom fills up behind me. Calum Ian comes in, then Duncan. They are quiet getting to their seats.

Then Mum takes a seat. She’s at the back, sitting beside the classroom assistant.

‘I’ve forgotten how to say “It is sunny”,’ I say.

Nobody helps. They all just wait, including Mum, who could be the biggest help if she wanted.

Feeling nervous, I eat my mid-morning snack. Even though it’s still early. Nobody tries to be helpful. They don’t join in with eating their snacks, either.

‘Did you read what it says on the wall?’ I ask everybody.

Nobody answers, so I have to read it:

‘Be honest. Be responsible. Be trustworthy. Be respectful. Be kind ♥ – and see the love heart after kind. That’s emphasis.’

Nobody says anything, so I have to put my head on the desk. Have to listen to the sound of the floor, the hissing sound that’s near or faraway.

‘What’s under the floor?’ asks Alex. ‘Ground. Then under the ground? Dirt. Under that? More dirt. Under that? Lava.’

But his voice isn’t true. It’s mean and scary. So I cover my ears and do lalalala s until he stops.

It’s been fifteen days. He never said what to do if it was longer than five days. I checked the rules, but it doesn’t say.

Sometimes it’s easier to pretend they’re here.

There are no small dogs left. Also, the sheep stopped coming near the village. I never knew what happened to the small dogs, until I saw one of them being chased by five big dogs, and then I knew.

Yesterday I left the school door open. Now it’s off its hinges. That was a daft thing to have done. I write the rule on my hand so I remember it for later: No doors left open .

Shopping got harder. I can only go shopping the old way for now, because it feels safer.

In the Co-op, some of the lights fell down. Also part of the roof, where the wind got in. Now I go to the back store instead, where there’s tall shelves, no windows. A big stack of wooden squares which I forgot the name of, beside the world’s biggest roll of clingfilm. Plus a machine that looks like the crusher at the back of a rubbish truck, only it’s indoors.

I find a packet of orange jelly down the back of the shelves. Beside, a buckled tin of sweetcorn.

When I tear open the pack of jelly I find it’s gone mouldy. The tin, though, is a good result.

I open the tin, sit out on a bench to eat it.

The wind isn’t blowing too hard. There’s kid-spots of rain, but also sun. I look for a rainbow, don’t see one.

Sometimes I cry just when I didn’t think I was going to. Like now. I mean, the food is just stupid sweetcorn. And there’s not too much wind, or rain. So why?

Up on the road I meet three big dogs. They stop to sniff. I keep an eye on their tails to make sure they’re friendly.

I also make sure I’ve got my knife.

Mostly the big dogs are friendly. But after what happened to the little dogs, I’m not playing with any chances.

In the butcher’s shop I find something we missed before. It’s called a mood-ring. It tells you how you’re feeling. Right now I’m passionate and sad but also with a hint of mixed emotions. But maybe that’s because I’ve been holding the ring for too long. Still, I think it might be true magic, because when I woke this morning I felt a mixture, and that’s what the mood-ring has shown.

The sea got something bad in it. Maybe that’s what happened to the world. Maybe I remembered it wrong. What truly happened is – the sea got greedy. It wanted everyone, so it sent poison into the air. That made everyone walk towards it. Except for only a few, like me, and the people who’d already gone. It’s like the opposite of the zombies that Alex worried about: the ones that could walk across the seabed to get to him. The ones that walked up out of the sea.

Maybe that’s why Duncan and Elizabeth, and Calum Ian and Alex and Mairi, all left. The sea wanted them. Because it was greedy then and it still is now.

My tooth hurts. At first it hurt just a little, but now it hurts a lot. Can’t put my toothbrush anywhere near it because it’s too sore. I should’ve remembered to brush before now, but I forgot and that was a lot of my fault.

Can’t remember if it’s not all right to eat toothpaste. Or the best way to brush? Was it around, or up, down? Plus my toothbrush got yellow and chewed. But that’s easy to sort: there are about a hundred toothbrushes still on the shelf at the Co-op. Enough to last for years.

I add Toothbrush to my shopping list. Then beneath that, Medicine for tooth hurting.

Now I wake up and it’s been ages and I’ve fallen asleep but forgotten when. The light is different in the window, so it’s been a while. Hours? Days? My head feels sweating hot. My mouth is truly very sore. My gum feels like it grew, like it belongs to a bigger person.

Elizabeth’s books are no good, they don’t tell toothache. It’s too sore even to drink.

I look for Elizabeth’s medicine bag, but she took it, it’s not there. Then I remember – ice cubes might help: but there’s no fridge plus no electricity so no ice cubes.

The best plan is to sleep beside my teddies. I gather all the teddies of mine plus Alex’s and Elizabeth’s, and I just hold them. It’s a bit of relief, especially if I pretend they all have sore teeth, and I’m the one helping.

In the morning it’s less sore. My mouth tastes yuck. When I try to speak my gum feels sore but less big.

There’s yellow water, sterilised. It hurts to drink at first but I’m thirsty so I don’t mind too much.

My tooth comes out. I almost wrap it in tissue and put it under my pillow, but that’s stupid.

‘There’s no tooth fairy,’ I tell myself in the mirror. ‘You knew that for ages, stupid dummy . What – you going to expect the Easter bunny next year as well?’

After this it’s too sore to talk, so I shut up again.

Mum honks her horn. We’re in a car jam. I never saw a car jam before, not on our island. In films, maybe. Never in real life.

It’s nearly dark. The telegraph lines are whistling. The sea looks stormy, white. The cars are in a long line.

After ages the red lights go off the car in front, and we move along one, and then the lights come on again.

Me: ‘Why’s it taking so long?’

Mum: ‘They have to ask questions, that’s why.’

Me: ‘I remember we did see a car jam before, once. Getting on the ferry. You remember?’

Mum smokes. She turns off the van to save diesel.

They’ve put orange and white fences across the road, which means that just one car can get through at a time. Next to the fences, there’s a lorry. On the back of the lorry are the big metal baskets they were using to strengthen the cliff road. Now the workmen have changed their mind; they’re using them to narrow the road instead.

‘Keep down,’ Mum says.

Seonaid, the nurse from hospital, is standing at the fences. She’s wearing a white all-over suit, like the one Dr Schofield wore, plus a mask and eye protectors.

She looks cold, she bounces, jumps to stay warm.

Mum gets me to curl up on the floor as we get closer to being the frontmost car.

When it’s our turn Seonaid shines a light inside and finds me hiding. She hands Mum a piece of paper. I want to look at it first but Mum won’t let me.

‘Rona, then,’ Mum says.