The houses in this town were very different from the ones back at Jacob's village. While his were low risen, and spaced out; like all the buildings here, the houses were tightly packed together, smaller, and were piled on top of the other in a tall stack. Jacksons hose was third in this particular stack so we had to climb a narrow set of concrete staircase to reach his front door.
Jackson's brother was nineteen and worked as a mechanic fixing the few machines that were left in the outer towns. He answered the door and let us all in but didn't question why there were three extra teenage boys in his house before school was scheduled to end.
"Reece, we're gonna use the new TV dad got, ok?"
Reece nodded absent-mindedly while disappearing into a room in the back.
The living room was cramped with different old-world objects like the tv- half of which had their innards exposed and looked trashed. Wires were everywhere, on the floor, the sofa, and cupboards, any available space was occupied with some sort of old device someone had attempted to fix. But in the center of the room stood was I presumed was the TV. Looking like an oversized computer screen; the back had been taken off and it too appeared to be gutted like everything else in the room.
"Does any of this stuff actually work?" Quin asked doubtfully.
Jackson shrugged, "some of it does. Don't ask me what though. Dad doesn't even know what half of this stuff does, yet he won't stop collecting the damn things. Drives my mum crazy…" he starts fiddling with the device, muttering to himself.
The device buzzed, and the screen lit up with grey fuzz.
"Is it meant to do that?" Jacob asked.
He pondered, "I'm not sure." He hit the device with the palm of his hand.
"hey! What are you doing?!" Jacob grabed his hand before he hit it a second time.
He shrugged, "seen my dad do it. Might be some sort of technique to get it going?"
"You sure your dad wasn't just losing his temper?" he asked.
"Dunno… but it seems like he ain't fixed it yet." He sunk to the floor, defeated. "there's meant to be a picture and sound. Not this rubbish!"
"Don't worry about it. He's only had it for a couple of days, right? Then he could get it fixed later."
"That's true." He nodded. "So, what do you want to do now?" he asked.
"I think I should probably get going. Thalia's gonna be pissed as it is."
"What about you two?" he addressed me and Quin.
"I'll better go as well." I answer.
"I'll stay for a bit."
"Ok then, see you two tomorrow then!" he waved us good-bye at his front door, as we descended the concrete stairs and disappeared into the street.
I stuck close to Jacob, as I had no idea how to get back, but like someone who been here his whole life, he navigated with ease. We arrived back at school just as the last bus was leaving, we hopped on, but had to stand as all the seat were taken. And if I thought the journey was rough while sitting down, it was nothing compared to trying to remain standing while the bus launched us about in different directions.
We were the last stop; first it had half a dozen stops in the outskirts of town, then a couple in the next town over, before looping back and taking us home.