Read Online Samphire Song by Jill Hucklesby - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Jill Hucklesby
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my face. His breath smells of chocolate hoops and marshmallows. He must have had breakfast already.
‘It’s Saturday. I don’t need to be there until nine.’ I plunge my face back into my pillow. This is too much for Ed. He jumps on top of my duvet and starts bouncing. My bed lurches and squeaks in protest.
‘Mum said last night that we’ve got to make the sarnies, LAZY BONES,’ he shouts. I think there must have been a lot of additives in the chocolate hoops.
Resistance is pointless. I put my hands up insurrender. My mattress heaves a sigh of relief as the onslaught stops.
‘Remind me why it’s a good thing to have a little brother,’ I say, wriggling out from under his weight, swinging my legs over the side of my bed and on to my purple rug.
‘Cos I’m a bibble bobble diggle doggle magic woggle super blooper CHAMPION OF THE WORLD!’ he answers, trying to do a shoulder-stand on my rumpled bedding and collapsing in giggles.
I shake my head. Ed’s antics are too much at this time of the morning. I’m used to getting up on my own, at my own pace. Peace and quiet. The sound of my bike tyres on the wet lane on the way to the stables. Samphire’s song when he hears me approaching. The other horses, murmuring, and the scraping of hooves on loose-box floors.
I’m often the first to arrive. It’s my favourite time of day, just me and all the animals adjusting to the new morning, shaking off the haze of sleep. I tell Samphireabout the lessons I’m enduring at school. He munches his breakfast and noses his bucket around, immune to the horrors of English essays and French verbs. I wish I could swap places with him sometimes. He would end up in the Head’s office in no time, though, and not just for pooing in the classroom. His report would read: ‘headstrong, boisterous, noisy, inattentive, a nightmare to teach. However, he is very good at running and will be an asset to the cross-country team.’
As I pass Mum’s open door, I glance in and see that she’s still asleep, her hair spread out in a halo around her head. It’s a nice image; Mum the angel. My memory suddenly produces another image, of Dad next to her, limbs spread untidily, bare chest protruding from the duvet (he only ever slept in his boxer shorts). We used to creep into the room, Ed and I, right up to the bed, and burrow between them, nestling into the warmth between their bodies.
‘Permission to board, Squadron Leader,’ Ed would say. It was a phrase he learned very young, when hewas negotiating the potty and then the loo. He and Dad would salute each other before and after every manoeuvre.
‘Permission granted,’ Dad would reply, sleepily, half-peering at us through long, dark lashes. ‘But no wriggling, or I’ll push the pilot eject button.’
Pilot eject is not working. Repeat, pilot eject is not working
. . . Dad’s last words, recorded by the control deck on the aircraft carrier HMS
Cronos
, patrolling the blue waters of the Gulf. Oh, memory, why do you do this? My heart suddenly beats in my chest so insistently I hear myself gasp a little. I need to focus on something else quickly to avoid the dizzy spell that usually follows. I wiggle my fingers and toes fast and hard and feel the tingle of a blood-rush. It seems to have worked. I find myself breathing out slowly.
I blink twice and the vision of Mum and Dad together vanishes. I see only Mum, breathing softly, curled into soft folds of white linen on one side of the king-size bed, the book she has been reading still open,next to her, where Dad should be. As if she senses me, her eyes open and she gives me a little wave.
‘Trot on, Whinny,’ instructs Ed, his hands on my lower back.
‘Don’t push it,’ I warn him. I’m regretting saying today would be a good day for Ed to try aerobatics with his plane and for the three of us to eat lunch on the beach. For one thing, it’s October. Ed assured me all week that today would be fine, according to the predictions on the
‘It’s Saturday. I don’t need to be there until nine.’ I plunge my face back into my pillow. This is too much for Ed. He jumps on top of my duvet and starts bouncing. My bed lurches and squeaks in protest.
‘Mum said last night that we’ve got to make the sarnies, LAZY BONES,’ he shouts. I think there must have been a lot of additives in the chocolate hoops.
Resistance is pointless. I put my hands up insurrender. My mattress heaves a sigh of relief as the onslaught stops.
‘Remind me why it’s a good thing to have a little brother,’ I say, wriggling out from under his weight, swinging my legs over the side of my bed and on to my purple rug.
‘Cos I’m a bibble bobble diggle doggle magic woggle super blooper CHAMPION OF THE WORLD!’ he answers, trying to do a shoulder-stand on my rumpled bedding and collapsing in giggles.
I shake my head. Ed’s antics are too much at this time of the morning. I’m used to getting up on my own, at my own pace. Peace and quiet. The sound of my bike tyres on the wet lane on the way to the stables. Samphire’s song when he hears me approaching. The other horses, murmuring, and the scraping of hooves on loose-box floors.
I’m often the first to arrive. It’s my favourite time of day, just me and all the animals adjusting to the new morning, shaking off the haze of sleep. I tell Samphireabout the lessons I’m enduring at school. He munches his breakfast and noses his bucket around, immune to the horrors of English essays and French verbs. I wish I could swap places with him sometimes. He would end up in the Head’s office in no time, though, and not just for pooing in the classroom. His report would read: ‘headstrong, boisterous, noisy, inattentive, a nightmare to teach. However, he is very good at running and will be an asset to the cross-country team.’
As I pass Mum’s open door, I glance in and see that she’s still asleep, her hair spread out in a halo around her head. It’s a nice image; Mum the angel. My memory suddenly produces another image, of Dad next to her, limbs spread untidily, bare chest protruding from the duvet (he only ever slept in his boxer shorts). We used to creep into the room, Ed and I, right up to the bed, and burrow between them, nestling into the warmth between their bodies.
‘Permission to board, Squadron Leader,’ Ed would say. It was a phrase he learned very young, when hewas negotiating the potty and then the loo. He and Dad would salute each other before and after every manoeuvre.
‘Permission granted,’ Dad would reply, sleepily, half-peering at us through long, dark lashes. ‘But no wriggling, or I’ll push the pilot eject button.’
Pilot eject is not working. Repeat, pilot eject is not working
. . . Dad’s last words, recorded by the control deck on the aircraft carrier HMS
Cronos
, patrolling the blue waters of the Gulf. Oh, memory, why do you do this? My heart suddenly beats in my chest so insistently I hear myself gasp a little. I need to focus on something else quickly to avoid the dizzy spell that usually follows. I wiggle my fingers and toes fast and hard and feel the tingle of a blood-rush. It seems to have worked. I find myself breathing out slowly.
I blink twice and the vision of Mum and Dad together vanishes. I see only Mum, breathing softly, curled into soft folds of white linen on one side of the king-size bed, the book she has been reading still open,next to her, where Dad should be. As if she senses me, her eyes open and she gives me a little wave.
‘Trot on, Whinny,’ instructs Ed, his hands on my lower back.
‘Don’t push it,’ I warn him. I’m regretting saying today would be a good day for Ed to try aerobatics with his plane and for the three of us to eat lunch on the beach. For one thing, it’s October. Ed assured me all week that today would be fine, according to the predictions on the
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