Chapter 10: The Warden

"Damian. Wake up."

Damian made a noise and pulled him closer.

"The warden's back."

Damian's eyes snapped open.

"What?"

"He's in the car park. Get up."

They had about two minutes.

Noah rolled off the bed and grabbed Damian's boxers off the floor and threw them at him.

He found his own shorts under Damian's pillow.

Damian was hopping around on one leg trying to get his foot through the right hole.

"My bed," Noah said. "Help me."

"I can't push a bed on one foot!"

"Then sit on it and lean."

Damian sat on the end of Noah's mattress and shoved backwards with his good leg while Noah hauled the frame from the other end.

The legs screamed across the lino.

Downstairs they heard the front door open.

They got Noah's bed back against the wall.

It wasn't straight.

Noah kicked the corner.

It still wasn't straight.

The sheets were everywhere.

Damian's boxers were on inside out.

"Your shirt," Damian hissed.

Noah grabbed the grey hoodie off the chair and pulled it over his head.

Footsteps came up the stairs.

Slow ones. A man in his sixties after a long drive.

Noah threw himself onto his bed and picked up a book.

Damian lay back on his pillow and put his arm over his eyes.

There was a knock.

"Boys? You decent?"

"Yeah," Noah called.

The door opened.

The warden stood there in his old checked shirt with his reading glasses pushed up on his head.

He looked tired and grey around the mouth.

He looked at Damian.

He looked at Noah in a hoodie in thirty-degree heat.

He looked at the sheets dragged halfway across the floor.

Noah's heart stopped.

"Bloody heat," the warden said. "Can't sleep in it either, can you."

"No," Noah said.

"Not a wink," said Damian.

The warden came in and looked around.

He looked at the clean floor where the rubbish used to be.