The Wall

89

Thembinkosi raised his head and looked through the splintered door. Where the window had been… All that remained were a few remnants of the wooden frame. He carefully stood up. Nobody outside was looking into the room. Instead, he heard people moving around the front door.

“We have to get out of here.” Nozipho was looking out of her half of the wardrobe. “They’ll do the same thing to us.”

“Yes. But where?”

Someone was slamming into the front door. They heard a cracking sound. They didn’t have much time to figure out a solution. Nozipho’s voice was right against his ear. “I know where…”

“Where?”

“There’s only one place!”

“No!” Thembinkosi cried. “No!”

“Yes. Take your shoes off.”

“Why?”

Crash. The front door was starting to give way.

“Let me try,” a voice outside insisted.

“Do it. Take them off.”

Nozipho was already holding her shoes and standing in her socks in High Voice’s blood. She stepped over him and onto the bed where she began to put her sneakers back on.

Thembinkosi loosened the ties on his leather shoes, yanked them off, and copied Nozipho’s movements. On the bed, he stuck his blood-soaked stockinged feet back into his shoes.

“Jump!” Nozipho said.

When he hesitated, she gave him a little push.

The door was splintering under someone’s shoulder.

Thembinkosi leaped over Deep Voice and landed in the hallway. His feet made a squishing sound in his shoes.

“One more time,” came from outside.

Nozipho spread the bullet-tattered bedspread out so their bloody footprints were out of sight, then she also jumped.

“Go!” she urged as she wiped away a drop of blood that had spurted out from Thembinkosi’s shoe. “Go!” She now shoved him hard.

The front door broke apart. Someone tumbled into the lounge. Nozipho quietly opened the door to the garage, pushing Thembinkosi inside. She shut the door and hurried over to the freezer. She held the lid up and waited.

When Thembinkosi didn’t react immediately, she said: “We don’t have a choice.”

“And don’t even think that you’ll be lying on top of me,” she added a second later.