Underdogs by Markus Zusak Page A

room, I asked Rube where he would have put the sign on the wall in our room. Maybe I asked it to forget what Steve had said to me.
    “Here?”
    “Nah.”
    “Here?”
    “Nah.” “Here?”
    I didn’t get an answer for a long time, and that night the light was left on for a while as Rube thought thoughts about things I would never know. All he did was lie on his bed, softly rubbing his beard, as though it was all he had left.
    Once settled on top of my own bed, I thought intensely about the next day, working at the Conlons’. Rebecca Conlon. I’d thought the day would never come, but the next day, I was going back. Once I forgot about Rube and Steve, it was beautiful to be alive, conscience free and awaiting a girl who was worth praying for.
    After a long while, Rube made a statement.
    He said, “Cameron. I wouldn’t have put that sign anywhere on our wall.”
    I turned to look at him. “Why not?”
    “You know why not.” He continued staring toward the ceiling. Only his mouth moved. “Because the moment Mum saw it, she would have killed me.”
    There’s a car, prowling around the city. It’s orange and big, and it makes the heavy, brooding sound cars like that make. It roars around the streets, though it always stops at red lights, stop signs, and all that kind of thing. Cut to somewhere else —
    Rube and I are walking, out of our front gate, supposedly to watch Steve play football, even though it’s about two o’clock in the morning. It’s cold. You know, that kindof sickly cold. Cold that somehow breathes. It plows into our mouths, blunt and hurtful. A question.
    Rube: “You ever think about beatin’ up the old man?”
    “Our old man?”
    “Sure.”

    “I don’t know — don’t you reckon it’d be fun?” “No, I don’t.”
    At that, we return to silence, walking. Our feet drag over the path as a few stray cars stroll by. Taxis come past and swerve all over the road, a garbage truck struggles past us, overweight. The orange car rolls past, growling.
    “Tossers,” I say to Rube.
    “Definitely.”
    As he says it, the car takes off and we hear it draw away, then come back on a side street behind us. Cut to somewhere else —
    Rube and I are standing at the corner of Marshall and Carlisle streets. Rube crouches down as the closing statements of a car call closer. He crouches down, holding the give-way sign we stole between his legs. The pole there is empty when I look at it. It’s just an empty pole embedded in cement.
    Arrival.
    The orange car comes up Marshall Street, almost devouring its own speed, gathering it greedily. When it gets to us it’s flying. No sign.
    No sign.
    It speeds past us, and as my eyes smash shut, there is an almighty clenching sound of metal wrapping into metal, a shriek, and a delayed downpour of broken glass.
    Rube crouches.
    I stand, eyes still shut.
    Murmuring silence.
    It’s everywhere.
    My eyes open and we walk.
    Rube drops the sign, stands, and we walk in a slow, shuddering panic down to the cars that look to have bitten into each other in attack.
    Inside, the people look swallowed.
    They are dead and bleeding and mangled.
    They’re dead.
    “They’re dead!” I call across to Rube, but nothing comes out of my mouth. No sound. No voice.
    Then a dead body comes to life.
    The eyes in it punch out at me and when the person cries out, the sound in my ears is unbearable. It sends me to the ground, squashing my hands to the side of my head.

CHAPTER 8
     
    When I went to the Conlons’ place the next morning with Dad, it’s true, my heart beat so hard, or big, as I originally put it, that it kind of hurt. It pumped something into my throat, causing me to salivatquestions.
    What would I say?
    How would I act when I saw her?
    Nice?
    Calm?
    Indifferent?
    That shy and sensitive style that had never worked for me in the past? I had no idea.
    In the van on the way over, I thought I was going to choke or suffocate or something. Such was the feeling this girl had planted