Read Online The Hiding Place by Trezza Azzopardi - Free Book Online

fireplace; Donny, his partner,
is attached to the other end. Marina and Rose jump together into one armchair, watch silently as the two men grunt and curse and scrape their way across the flags.
    My fucking toe, Don. Let up! Slipping, boy, watch now! The fireplace drops with a clang on the concrete, and the two men stand above the ringing and stare at it. Job done, Arthur Jackson wipes
his hand along his forehead. A tide of rusted orange melts slowly down his brow. He turns his blue eyes on Celesta.
    Hello there. You from across the road?
    Celesta tries to smile at him but can’t manage it: his voice is soft now, not at all what she expected. Tears leap behind her eyes.
    Come for tea? he says, patting her lightly as he shifts past her on the step. He moves into the house, followed by Donny. They make a big play of wiping their feet on the matting inside the
door; Arthur like a stallion about to charge, Donny’s hands pressed against doorframe as if he’s jumping into the Abyss. His boots are no cleaner at the end of this performance. Celesta
hears Arthur Jackson’s voice behind her, echoing in the bare hall.
    We’ve got guests then, Alice?
    Alice appears from the living room. There follows a tangle of whispers and gestures. The boy Donny loiters in the kitchen, twisting his rat face on Celesta, then back to Alice
and the story she is telling. Celesta squirms under scrutiny. She keeps her back to all of them, but Alice’s drone still reaches her, the words running up her spine:
    Out with some bloke . . . abandoned that child . . . God knows where he is . . . Celesta suddenly remembers Carlotta and Salvatore. She calls to her sisters to get their coats.
    ~  ~  ~
    They’ve put a thick gauze dressing on my hand – it reaches up to my armpit, nearly – and another sheath in layers across my face, each one thin as an
insect’s wing. Everything is nice under this: soft and dreamy. I wish my mother could have a bit of it; she is so stony and sharp and clear, sitting there on that plastic seat. She’s
holding my hand, what will become known as my ‘good hand’ – as if the other one was somehow wicked and got punished for it – and she’s listening, as much as
she’s able, to the doctor. I’ve lost a fair bit of hair too, but as there wasn’t much there to start with, no one seems bothered. They say a new baby’s hair falls out
anyway, a few weeks after it’s born. What’s left of mine will, that’s for certain.
    My mother looks round the ward: we’re all babies here, but she doesn’t care about any of the others, not even Luca, who is in the corridor wrestling with Eva’s gold locket. Eva
doesn’t have much feeling for small children yet (and certainly doesn’t know their strength: she will find a deep red score on her neck later, where Luca succeeded in ripping the chain
from her throat and stuffing it into her mouth).
    My mother’s eyes are like two stars in a frosty sky: it’s as if she can see the future. She looks through the soul of the doctor sitting on the corner of my bed, and decides to trust
him. He talks of third degree, skin grafts, plastic surgery.
    The outlook is favourable, he says to my mother. He has a white coat and a stethoscope, and his hair is neatly parted on the left. He looks like a boy she used to know. He puts his lovely long
hands over my mother’s veined fists.
    It’s amazing what they can do these days. These new prosthetics are marvellous, he says gently.
    My mother nods as if she knows what he’s talking about. She feels very weary. But I won’t die: that’s all that matters to her now.
    We just have to be careful about the shock, he continues.
    Oh, I’m alright, she says.
    He means the shock I’ve had, but he looks at her for a long time and considers the possibility that I’m not the only casualty.
    There’s not much you can do here, he says finally. Is there someone you can stay with tonight?
    I’ve got five other kids, says my mother.
    He