CHERUB: Class A - Robert Muchamore Page 0,5

James said, shaking his head. ‘We’d better clean up.’
‘We emptied the whole ocean,’ Amy giggled. ‘Anyway, I’m busting to pee. I’ll see you two scumbags in the morning.’
As Amy staggered away, she thought of something and turned back.
‘Oh, James.’
‘What?’
‘I told you so.’
James gave her the finger and wandered towards the main entrance of the hostel with Bruce in tow. The less contact they had with other kids, the less they would get flamed for mucking up the training exercise. They ducked down as they passed the recreation room, where about thirty kids were watching a horror movie on a projector screen. A couple of little red-shirt kids snickered at their paint-spattered clothes as the boys walked upstairs to the second-floor bedroom they shared with Gabrielle and Kerry.
The room was an L shape, with the girls’ beds at one end and the boys’ around the corner at the other. It was basic compared to their individual rooms back at campus: ceiling fans, tile floor, wicker chairs and a tiny TV. It hardly mattered because the kids were always busy and only used the rooms to wash and crash out.
Kerry and Gabrielle had been back a couple of hours. The TV was showing an episode of The Simpsons in Spanish, which both girls could understand. They kept quiet, not even commenting on the stench of sweat.
‘Well?’ James said.
Kerry gave an innocent smile. ‘Well, what?’
‘I know you’re gonna start on us,’ James said, sitting on his bed and pulling off his trainers. ‘So go on, get it over with. Rub our noses in it.’
‘We’d never do that,’ Gabrielle said. ‘We’re nice girls.’
‘My arse,’ Bruce said.
Kerry sat up on her bed. She was pink and shrivelled, like she’d just finished a long bath. James dumped his filthy polo shirt on the floor.
‘You better take that stuff down to the laundry when you’ve had your showers,’ Kerry said. ‘It’ll stink the whole room out.’
‘If you don’t like my stink,’ Bruce said, kicking off his trainers, ‘you take it down there.’
He balled up his crusty sock and lobbed it on to Kerry’s duvet. She flicked it away with the end of a biro.
‘So, how come it took you so long to get back here?’ Kerry asked, trying not to grin.
As soon as she said that, Gabrielle started cracking up.
‘What are you laughing for?’ James asked. ‘It’s fourteen kilometres between here and the villa. I’d like to see you two do it any quicker.’
‘They’re so thick,’ Gabrielle howled. ‘I can’t believe it.’
‘What?’ James asked. ‘What’s thick?’
‘Didn’t you bother checking out the house?’ Kerry grinned.
‘We couldn’t hang around,’ Bruce explained. ‘We had to be back here by midnight.’
‘There was money all over the kitchen cabinet,’ Kerry said.
‘What good could that do us?’ Bruce asked.
‘And there was a working telephone,’ Kerry continued. ‘And a telephone directory.’
James was getting impatient. ‘So what?’
‘This isn’t Outer Mongolia,’ Gabrielle said, making a telephone receiver out of her hand and putting it to her ear. ‘Why didn’t you pick up the phone and call a taxi?’
‘Eh?’ James gasped, turning around and giving Bruce a blank stare.
‘Taxi,’ Kerry snorted, hardly able to get the words out over her giggles. ‘T – A – X – I, they’re like a normal car, with a man to drive you and a little orange lamp on the roof.’
‘Oh…’ James said bitterly, looking at Bruce. ‘Why didn’t we get a cab?’
‘Don’t have a go at me,’ Bruce said. ‘You never thought of it either.’
Gabrielle was rolled up in a ball, laughing so hard the frame of her bed was shaking.
‘You two dickheads walked fourteen kilometres when you could have called a taxi and been home in an hour,’ Kerry said, pedalling her feet in the air with delight.
James’ socks were bloody where they’d chafed on the long walk. His back and shoulders hurt from carrying the pack, his elbow was agony and his leg still stank of dog mess, even though he’d washed it. One day, he would be able to laugh about this, but right now he was ready to explode.
‘This is bull,’ James screamed, hurling his trainers against the wall.
He kicked out at his wardrobe, but he was tired and lost his balance. He ended up in a heap on the floor, making the girls laugh even harder. Bruce looked just as mad, but he concentrated his energy into ripping off his clothes and heading towards the shower.
‘Give us two minutes before you go in there,’ Kerry said, wiping tears of joy from her eyes. ‘I want