CHERUB: Shadow Wave (6 page)

‘Quite the hunk!’ Amy giggled, as she stepped back and looked James up and down. ‘Bit different from the chubby little brat that arrived on campus five years ago. I’d go as far as to say you’re a catch, but the real question is, are you man enough to take me down?’

Amy launched a fairly genteel Karate kick. James dodged it easily enough, but in doing so clattered into a plastic dustbin and skinned his elbow. Kyle, Amy and John cracked up laughing as James grabbed his wound.

‘Bastard arm,’ he shouted. ‘Jesus.’

‘Sluggish response, low situational awareness,’ Amy teased. ‘Looks like you’re still my bitch.’

‘I didn’t even know you were in the country,’ James said, smiling through gritted teeth.

Amy’s brother John explained. ‘Chloe Blake and I go back a long way. We did basic training and a couple of missions together. We’ve always kept in touch and it seemed like a good excuse to get on an aeroplane.’

‘And how’s your diving-school business going?’ James asked, as they began walking towards the car park.

‘So-so,’ John said, with a shrug. ‘I get lots of work with the Japanese because I speak the language, but there’s brutal competition. It’s hard to make it pay.’

‘I’m working in Brisbane now I’ve finished university,’ Amy said. ‘I mostly do translation and close protection work.’

‘What kind of thing?’ James asked.

‘Oh all sorts,’ Amy explained. ‘Visiting business people. Pop stars doing Brisbane concerts, sports teams. It’s not very exciting but plenty of people will pay lots of money to have a young female bodyguard.’

‘Have either of you ever thought of coming back to work on campus?’ Kyle asked.

‘Too damned cold,’ Amy said, rubbing her arms and shivering at the prospect. ‘I love the hot weather. We’ve got a nice place by the beach, good clubs and restaurants nearby, surfing on the weekend. I can’t see myself trudging through the mud on campus in the middle of January.’

‘I’m thinking of going somewhere sunny when I leave campus,’ James said. ‘With my maths, I might be able to get a scholarship to a university in the States. California or Florida maybe.’

‘Where does that leave Kerry?’ Kyle asked.

James shrugged awkwardly. ‘It’s tricky. Kerry’s a year younger than me. But American university courses are modular, so I can do one year, then drop out for a year and go travelling with Kerry.’

‘And Kerry likes the idea of going to America?’ Amy asked.

James nodded.

‘If they’re still together,’ Kyle smirked. ‘How many break-ups is it now? Five or six?’

James raised his hands.
‘Don’t
talk like that! It’s different this time. We’re more mature. We’ve both had other partners and stuff. But we’ve come full circle and realised we’re best off with each other.’

By this time they’d reached the station car park. James blipped the key fob to open the doors of the big Volkswagen and John loaded bags in the back. Two more people carriers, plus a Mercedes 4x4 were also taking wedding guests back to campus.

‘I’m really looking forward to this,’ Amy said enthusiastically. ‘Seeing all the old faces. Are there any new buildings or other changes on campus?’

‘There’s a library which is pretty cool,’ James said. ‘And they’ve refurbished the old gym.’

‘And they’ve finally got everything working properly in the mission control building,’ Kyle said.

‘Nah,’ James smirked. ‘The iris recognition system’s all gone wrong again and the roof leaks like a bugger.’

James fired up the engine and dropped the handbrake, but as he started backing out of the parking bay a man tapped urgently on the window beside him.

‘Room for one more?’ Norman Large grinned.

The disgraced training instructor appeared to have lost a lot of hair, but had compensated by growing his moustache into an enormous object that resembled a squirrel’s tail.

‘Ahh shit,’ Kyle said. ‘Who invited that wanker?’

James was tempted to drive off, but he’d been charged with picking up guests from the station and might have his driving privileges revoked if he mucked around.

Nobody liked Large and this fact hung in the air like a dog fart as James started the twenty-minute drive towards campus.

It was Kyle who finally broke the silence. ‘So what does a retired CHERUB instructor do with himself?’

‘Security work,’ Mr Large revealed.

‘Right,’ Amy smiled. ‘I do something similar myself out in Brisbane. What is it, politicians, celebs, that sort of thing?’

‘Asda,’ Large said sheepishly. ‘It’s not glamorous, but it’s easy work, regular hours.’

James couldn’t help laughing. ‘And woe betide any kid pilfering sweeties from your branch.’

By 11.25 excitement had turned to hysteria. James stood by his bedroom window dressed in black trainers, black tracksuit bottoms and a white polo shirt. He looked down at the girls milling about on the path between the chapel and the main building. It was a fine day and they all wore their sparkliest shoes and party dresses, a stark contrast with the combat trousers and boots girls usually wore around campus.

Kerry’s room was jammed with barefoot girls who’d been
almost
ready for the best part of an hour: Gabrielle, Amy, Lauren, Bethany and at least three others. Deodorant hung in the air and there was a racket coming out of the bathroom as girls did their make-up in the mirror. Rat, Bruce, Andy Lagan and Dante Welsh all squatted on Kerry’s sofa, looking rather smart in jackets and ties.

‘Ready when you are, Kerry,’ James said, as he leaned into the room.

Female jaws dropped as Kerry gasped. ‘James, you’re
not
going dressed like that! Where’s your suit?’

James pointed at his thighs. ‘I’ve still got stitches in my legs from when I fell down that cliff. The only things I can put on without killing myself are baggy shorts or extra large trackies.’

‘Well at
least
put on a proper jacket and tie,’ Lauren suggested.

‘I tried but it makes me look like a mental patient,’ James said. ‘Sportswear and formal don’t mix.’

‘You could have bought some looser trousers when we went shopping,’ Kerry said, before sighing noisily.

James tutted. ‘Unlike some people I haven’t been planning my wedding outfit for three months and I’m buggered if I’m spending money on something I’ll only wear once. The dress suits you by the way. Nobody’s even going to look at me when you’re so stunning.’

Disarmed by the compliment, Kerry broke into a smile. ‘I suppose you’re colour co-ordinated, at least.’

Rat tugged at the tie around his neck. ‘Well if James doesn’t have to wear one …’

Lauren killed Rat’s mutiny with a swift cuff around the back of the head. ‘Oh yes you will wear it,’ she growled. ‘If I’ve got to wear this stupid dress all day, you can wear a collar and tie.’

‘You look really nice, Lauren,’ Amy assured her.

Lauren perched a hat on her head as she slid her feet into a pair of ballet pumps. ‘And as for this bloody thing…’

‘It looks like you’ve got the wedding cake on your head,’ James grinned.

A couple of the boys laughed, but Lauren looked upset and turned towards Bethany.

‘I told you this hat didn’t suit me. That’s it. I’m not wearing it.’

Bethany gave James the evil eye. ‘Lauren, it looks great. I mean, are you really going to take fashion tips from a boy who’s going to a wedding wearing Nikes and the bottom half of a Primark tracksuit?’

‘If we want decent seats we’ve got to move now,’ Gabrielle said, as she glanced at her watch.

There was a mini panic as girls searched the room for hats and Kerry accidentally put on one of Bethany’s shoes. Three more girls emerged from Kerry’s bathroom and James reckoned that the only way so many could have fitted in there was if some had been standing in the bathtub.

‘Just going for a quick piss,’ Bruce said as he headed into Kerry’s bathroom.

A scream went up as he stepped in and saw a girl sitting on the toilet with her dress gathered up and her knickers around her ankles.

‘Get out!’ she yelled.

Bruce turned bright red as he backed out and wished he could have come up with a smart line to diffuse his embarrassment.

Out in the corridor James smiled as Kyle emerged from his old room. He was immaculately dressed in a tight fitting blue suit, with flared trousers, a matching trilby hat, a wooden cane and a pair of huge Elvis-style aviator sunglasses.

‘Kyle that is so
awesome
,’ Kerry grinned, grabbing him by the arm. ‘James can stay at the back, I’m strutting my funky stuff with you.’

‘This is style,’ Gabrielle said, pointing accusingly at the boys as she took Kyle’s other arm. ‘This is how you should
all
look.’

Dante shook his head and tutted as he walked down the corridor alongside James. ‘I know you said Kyle’s your mate,’ he said cautiously. ‘But
that
is the gayest outfit I’ve ever seen.’

Dante had gone from basic training on to one of the longest missions in CHERUB history, so he barely knew Kyle.

‘Kyle
is
gay,’ James explained. ‘You think I’d let him walk off with my girl on his arm if he was straight?’

Kerry saw the crowd waiting for the next lift and decided to slip her heels off and walk the six floors down to the ground floor. The whole group followed and joined a mass of bodies leaving through the rear of the main building and heading along the gravel path towards the chapel.

On a normal day James would have known every face on campus, but weddings were always an excuse for a campus reunion and today there were three hundred retired CHERUB agents and former staff on the grounds.

James shouted at Kerry, as she walked five metres ahead of him. ‘Oi darling, do you think
we’ll
get married on campus some day?’

Kerry snorted. ‘Who says I’m marrying you?’

There were a few laughs. James looked down and noticed the black scorch marks where his hand-built racing buggy had crashed and burned out eighteen months earlier. Two middle-aged women stood on the grass pointing towards the upper floors of the main building.

‘I remember it all being built,’ one woman said. ‘That was my room at the end of the sixth floor. And in those days all the boys were up on the seventh and the top floor was mission preparation.’

More nostalgia,
James thought to himself as he looked across at Amy. She was twenty-one and looked stunning in her strapless dress. But she’d lost the mystique she’d held six years earlier, when James was a new recruit and Amy seemed like an impossibly sophisticated and experienced black shirt.

These days Amy worked as a bodyguard, Kyle was a university student with a part-time job in a nightclub, while fearsome instructor Norman Large guarded frozen chickens in Asda. The prospect of life after CHERUB had never seemed duller and James felt depressed as he approached the rows of white plastic chairs on the lawn in front of the chapel.

A hundred and fifty specially selected guests would be crammed inside the small campus chapel. The rest would sit outside and watch the ceremony on a large video screen. If it had been raining, the chairs and screen would have been in the hall in the main building.

Kerry left an empty seat for James, but as he shuffled between the rows he was hailed by Meryl Spencer. His former handler had just been promoted to Chief Handler, which meant she was now in charge of campus life for every qualified CHERUB agent.

‘Whatever it is, I’m innocent,’ James grinned, as he stepped up to Meryl in the main aisle between the chairs.

‘Cuts healing OK?’ Meryl asked.

James nodded. ‘Stitches out Monday. Hopefully I’ll be able to wear some decent clothes after that.’

‘You get on well with Joshua Asker and some of the other little red shirts, don’t you?’

‘Yeah. I’ve helped out with their swimming lessons and stuff.’

‘Great,’ Meryl smiled. ‘We’ve got a couple of carers up the back who’ve worked with Isaac for a long time. They really deserve to be inside the chapel, but they’re stuck out back keeping an eye on the little red-shirt boys. Would you mind sitting back and keeping an eye out so they can go inside?’

‘Course,’ James nodded. ‘Just the boys?’

‘Every girl aged between three and eight is a bridesmaid,’ Meryl explained. ‘All thirteen of them.’

The five little boys were fidgety so they’d deliberately been placed at the back. They looked cute dressed in matching shoes and jackets, though the littlest one was barely three and he’d already thrown off his tie and shoes.

Five-year-old Joshua Asker sidled up to James with a huge grin on his face.

‘Can we do swimming again now you’re back?’ he asked eagerly.

James raised one eyebrow and shook his head. ‘You’re too smelly.’

‘You’re smelly,’ Joshua shouted back noisily, before erupting with laughter and flicking James’ arm.

A few people looked around, including Joshua’s mum, Zara. As CHERUB Chairwoman, she’d be giving away the bride.

‘Behave,
Joshua,’ Zara said firmly.

Joshua pointed at James. ‘He called
me
smelly first.’

As Zara shushed Joshua a white Rolls-Royce emerged into the avenue of trees that led up toward the chapel. A few warm-up blasts from the organist came through the loudspeakers and everyone sitting outside swivelled around as the car stopped.

‘I can’t see,’ one of the little boys moaned, as Chloe Blake stepped out of the car. The army of little bridesmaids gathered behind her in pale lemon dresses. Joshua put his lips against James’ arm and puffed his cheeks out to blow a big raspberry.

‘I wouldn’t,’ James warned. ‘Your mum will
kill
you.’

Joshua raised his eyebrows thoughtfully before taking his lips away from James and sitting back in his chair. The giant video screen came to life, showing Isaac standing nervously at the altar. Chloe was a couple of metres behind James. She had too much make-up on and looked like she wasn’t completely sure of what she was about to do.

‘Please be standing for the arrival of the bride,’ the vicar announced from inside.

Chloe and Zara linked arms and paced slowly between the lines of plastic chairs to the sound of
Here Comes the Bride.