Chapter 11. In the graveyard

Nick and Richelle also went home. I think Nick had the same desire to go as quickly as possible from Brent and Simon. Well, I couldn't blame him.

Elmo and Liz went straight to the graveyard. I raced home to have lunch, and then ran to the gym before Brian came home. I was forbidden to go out except for school till Saturday, but I made up my mind that I couldn't be left behind because of Nick and Elmo's stupid journey.

Besides, I wanted to make a surprise for Sunny. I thought she would be glad if I came. So I came up to the gymnastics room, quietly slipped in and sat down on a bench. Sunny was doing bar works. She didn't notice me and went on doing somersaults. She always lost herself in gymnastics. It was a way into her private space. When she was doing gym exercises nothing else mattered.

She did the last somersault and gracefully jumped off the bar onto the floor. The coach approvingly patted her on the shoulder; some girls looked at her with envy in their eyes. Smiling, Sunny, turned around and noticed me. She waved at me, then made me a sign to wait for her and ran towards the change rooms.

Twenty minutes later we were sitting in a cafe, drinking juice and talking. At first we just chattered and giggled. Then Sunny made a serious face and said that we should seriously speak.

I also knew that, of course, but for some reason I wasn't prepared for that again. So I glanced at my watch and said that we should be hurry, because our turn to watch would come in twenty minutes. Sunny gave me a serious glance, then shrugged and stood up.

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Soon we were sitting behind a wide tombstone with Liz and Elmo. Nothing had happened during their watch. Elmo was very disappointed. He'd hoped that he would receive a big front-page story for the Pen. He even offered to sit there with Sunny and me.

Liz glanced at us meaningfully, and hauled Elmo away. I watched them till they disappeared out of sight. Sunny was silent. I didn't feel like speaking either. For a while we sat in full silence, barely glancing at each other. Then my leg became numb and I started fidgeting, trying to find a more convenient position.

For the first time in my entire life I felt uncomfortable being alone with her. I perfectly realized that we should have a serious talk and work everything out; that I should pull myself together and tell her everything I felt. But I just couldn't force myself to do that. Every time when I opened my mouth to say these fondest words, my tongue became numb. And it happened over and over again. I cracked jokes, hiding my embarrassment; Sunny laughed; and I ended up going home alone, cursing myself for my diffidence, clearly understanding that if I didn't tell her, someone else surely would. And then… I couldn't even imagine what would happen then.

I glanced at Sunny. She was sitting almost motionless, her legs crossed, and looking towards the headstone with the pigeon.

I wonder how she can sit so long without moving, I thought grimly, stretching and changing my legs again. My legs felt stiff and uncomfortable, my back started aching because of long sitting in an inconvenient position. In addition to that, it was getting dark and cold. I fidgeted again. Waiting was getting me down. Especially if I didn't quite know what we were waiting for.

'Listen, you're getting on my nerves,' finally Sunny whispered without even looking at me.

'My legs have gone to sleep,' I muttered. 'And I'm cold.'

'I'm also cold,' Sunny was far from sympathy.

I sighed and tried not to move. I managed to sit motionlessly for about ten minutes. Then I felt my nose starting running, and began feeling in my pockets for the handkerchief.

'What's wrong this time?' Sunny glanced sideways at me.

'My nose's running,' I grumbled. 'I need to pull out the handkerchief.'

'Hurry up while we're alone here,' she whispered, looking around.

My handkerchief was in the front pocket of my jeans. I had to stand upright to shove my hand into the pocket and pull out the handkerchief. When I stood up, my stiff legs began tingling and twitching. I rocked, made a step right, tripped over something, and quietly groaning, I fell flat on my face, hitting my shoulder against an edge of a gravestone.

'Sometimes Nick's right about your ability to fall everywhere,' Sunny snorted, trying hard not to burst out laughing. 'You can fall even on a level ground.'

'What the hell a level ground,' I muttered, rubbing my shoulder. 'There are stones everywhere. And this grass is so slippery here. It's a wonder I didn't break my neck.'

Sunny didn't listen to me. She was looking around. We still were alone in the graveyard. All visitors had gone away long time ago. Not far from us there were two wide headstones, and several broadleaf bushes right behind them.

'Go there. Quickly,' Sunny commanded. 'After your maneuvers the grass is so trampled down as if someone rode around on a tractor.

Trying to look natural, we rounded the bushes. The graveyard ended here; there was a line of trees and a fence behind the bushes, which separated the graveyard from other places. So I don't think someone would decide to go there. This place turned out to be an ideal place for watching. No one could see us behind these bushes with wide leaves from the graveyard, and no one could see us from behind. But we perfectly could see the gravestone with the marble pigeon through leaves and branches.

It was getting dark. There was no one around, except us. The tombstones rose up in the twilight, lighted by the moonlight like in a horror film. The silence around us was frightening. There was no sound. No wind. Even leaves on the trees didn't move. A dark, heavy cloud covered the sky to the horizon, making the evening even darker.

Neither Sunny, nor I said anything to each other, afraid to break this silence. From time to time I glanced at the grave. The marble pigeon eerily glimmered in the darkness like a ghost.

Suddenly sharp shouts broke the silence. Sunny and I jumped and stared at each other in horror.

'It's a raven,' Sunny whispered in my ear.

'I heard these birds foretell a coming death,' I murmured.

'There's nothing to foretell,' Sunny whispered back, 'there're only decedents here.'

'Please, don't tell about decedents,' I pleaded. 'It's spooky enough without them.'

The soul-chilling shouts ceased. Because of the dark, heavy cloud and trees around us, the graveyard was almost dark. I glanced at my watch. Nick and Elmo were to come in about an hour. Their turn was last for today. I rubbed my still aching shoulder.

'I'm going to get a huge bruise,' I muttered.

Sunny grinned and picked a dry leaf out of my hair. 'Everything will be okay with you,' she whispered, and sniggering, tousled my hair.

It produced a great impression on me. Without thinking what I was doing, I bent down and kissed her. I still don't know how I did that. It just happened. I slightly touched her lips with mine, waiting how she would react. Sunny was a tae-kwon-do black belt and I didn't feel like learning her rage if she didn't like what I'd done.

But Sunny didn't seem to mind. That is she froze for a moment, surprised, but then she answered. She leant closer to me. My heart started pounding like a drum when I realized that she also wanted it. I put my hands on her waist, pulling her closer to me and kissed her again, stronger this time.

We forgot about everything; we forgot where we were and why we'd come there. At that moment there were only Sunny and me in the whole world.

I lowered my hands on her waist. I kissed her lips, her face, her neck. Her hands were somewhere on my back underneath the T-shirt. She caressed my back, my hair, and I felt as though it was just a dream. Just a dream which I'd seen so many times.

I don't know how long we had been kissing, sitting among those bushes and trees. It seemed to me that the time had stopped for us, and I liked it. But all of a sudden Sunny disengaged herself from my arms and glanced deep into my eyes. I breathed out and stuck my nose into her hair, squeezing her in my hands. She clung closer to me, more endearing and at the same time more earnest. I felt her heart beating fast and it made my own heart beating even faster.

Sunny pulled herself away from me and started to adjust her clothes and hair. 'It's not the right place, Tom,' she said quietly. 'We're in the graveyard after all.'

'No, we are not,' I objected, pointing at the line of old trees and bushes in front of us, which separated the graveyard from everything else. 'We're behind the graveyard.'

'All the same,' Sunny glanced at me and smiled. My soul was singing with happiness when I saw this smile. There was so much tenderness and… love in this smile, that I was about to go mad with happiness.

I sat up and pulled her towards me. We sat together, leaning back against a tree trunk, my hands were circled around Sunny, squeezing her hands. It was almost full darkness around us. We sat in silence. We didn't feel like speaking. Everything was clear between us without words. We just sat together, looking at the stars in the sky.

It was quite late. I knew that a mighty row was waiting for me at home. Brian had told me to go straight home after school, and he'd be furious when I finally turned up. But not for anything in the world I would go home and miss this night with Sunny. After all it would be just another quarrel with Brian. It could wait. Sunny couldn't. I decided to let things slide. Come what may. I don't care what will happen; all what I care about is what's happening now.

'It seems to me that they are going to meet at night after all,' I whispered after awhile, breathing in the wonderful subtle scent of her hair. 'So many efforts for nothing. You know, I'm afraid even to imagine what will happen when I come home.'

'I can understand,' Sunny said with sympathy. 'I…' she broke off and squeezed my hand tighter.

I stared through the leaves at the grave with the marble pigeon and shivered. A tall, dark human figure appeared near the grave without any sound. The figure froze near the tombstone. It made no sound. Not a single stick cracked or a pebble shifted beneath its feet. Nothing broke the silence of the graveyard. Sunny and I crouched motionless, afraid that the dark figure would spot us.

Sunny pressed close to me. 'Don't be afraid,' I whispered in her ear, doing my best not to shake with fear.

The stranger was standing near the grave. He didn't move, just slowly looked around. It lasted for about a minute. Then he lifted his left hand and touched the claw of the marble pigeon. There was a grating sound. The marble pigeon came to life. Its wings started moving, its beak curved like that of some birds of prey. And then it started turning to the place where Sunny and I were sitting.

My heart sank down into my shoes; I was about to shout, but Sunny managed to tightly clamp her hand over my mouth.

'It's all right,' she whispered. 'It's not a ghost, it's just a mechanism.'

By that time I'd already also realized it and felt awfully foolish, annoyed that I'd been frightened like a little kid. I was glad that it was dark and Sunny couldn't see my burning face. Sunny nudged me gently by the elbow, attracting my attention. I concentrated on the grave. The pedestal with the marble pigeon had moved aside, creating a small hollow in the headstone. The stranger, in whom we recognized John, the pigeon fancier, was putting little plastic packets into a hollow-out section.

A perfect place for a secret place, I thought admiringly. No matter what he was hiding there, no one would ever think to look for it here in the graveyard.

John looked around again, put the marble pigeon on its place and walked away, looking like a casual visitor.

'Now I understood everything,' Sunny whispered. So did I. They hid something in this grave.

We stayed where we were for several minutes in case John or someone else were hanging around, then crawled out of the bushes and cautiously reached the grave. I put my fingers on the pigeon's claw as John had done earlier, and having found a small knobble, I pressed it. The pedestal with the pigeon obediently went aside, opening a deep cavity in the tombstone, where little plastic packets were lying.

Sunny pushed her fingers inside the hole, pulled out one of the packets and stabbed it with her fingernail. There were little, grey stones inside.

'And that's all?' I drawled in disappointment. I expected it would be something more interesting than just plain stones.

'Maybe they're valuable,' Sunny said doubtfully.

At that moment I heard stealthy movements behind my back. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed two shadow figures in the darkness. Sunny abruptly turned round and swung up her leg, kicking one of the figures. It yelped in a familiar voice.

'Hey! Stop that!'

'Shh,' another voice whispered. 'It's just us.'

I breathed out with relief. It was Nick and Elmo.

'Sunny! You hit me on the shoulder!' Elmo was complaining. 'Ooh, that hurts!

'Sorry,' Sunny grinned guiltily.

'Did they come?' Nick asked impatiently.

Sunny and I told them everything what we'd seen. Nick and Elmo of course wanted to look at the stones with their own eyes. I showed them how to open and close the hollowed-out section at the top of the gravestone. Then Nick took a handful of stones from the plastic packet, Sunny had pulled out from the gravestone, and started examining them under the torch light.

'Hey! I saw the same stone in my yard,' Elmo exclaimed, taking one stone and bringing it to his eyes for a closer look.

'What?' the rest of us stared at him.

'Yeah,' Elmo twisted the stone in his hands, inspecting it from every side. 'Exactly the same. I found it where Shadow caught that pigeon.'

'Do you think that that pigeon lost it when Shadow seized him?' Sunny said doubtfully. 'Do you think these stones are valuable?'

'Very valuable,' Nick whispered excitedly. Now our eyes were fixed on him. He looked back at us. 'Don't you see?' he went on, his eyes sparkling in the torch light. 'It's uncut diamonds.'

'Oh, yeah, sure,' I snorted.

'I'm telling you, it's diamonds,' Nick insisted. 'I often see gemstones, cut and uncut, when Mr Terzis works at home. I think Sunny's right. Pigeons carry uncut stones to John and obviously for some reason he hides them here. Very smart scheme.'

'Hey, listen,' I said, looking around nervously. 'If it's diamonds, we'd better go away from here before someone come to take them. Otherwise we can stay in this graveyard forever.'

The others nodded. Looking around, we carefully wound between graves, heading for the gates of the graveyard. And then we ran straight to the police.