Silent Children by Ramsey Campbell Read Free Book Online Page A

noticed watching him and his mother—when an orange-uniformed assistant some years older than he was and with a good deal more acne to show for it accosted him. "Where you prowling off with that, mate?"
    "Just to unload it at home," Ian's mother said. "We'll bring it straight back."
    "The other boy lets us," Ian said.
    The assistant ignored him. "Where's your house?"
    "Just in Jericho Close."
    "Jericho Close."
    "That's what she said. What's your problem?"
    "I've got none with most of it."
    "Don't have one with our house either," Ian said. "It's our house."
    Delight not too unlike contempt dawned on the assistant's face. "Thought you were them. The manager won't want you taking that there."
    "Think we're going to bring a body back in it?"
    "Shut that, saying bollocks like that. You're as bad as—"
    "Forget it, Ian. Leave it now. Excuse me," Ian's mother said, and stepped between the assistant and the trolley. "We'll do without. We can manage."
    Ian grabbed the two heaviest carrier bags and pretended they needed no effort while the assistant was watching. By the time the five-minute walk home had lasted ten minutes, the increasingly flimsy handles were cutting into his fingers. He did his best not to let his mother see the trouble he was having, but when at last the kitchen table took the weight she caught his hands and turned them over to wince at them, then kissed them. "I'm sorry I made you do that," she said.
    He only looked at her, which made her say "I wonder what you'd think of a notion I've had."
    "Don't know."
    "If you aren't in favour no pretending, promise?" She waited for him to shrug before she began loading the refrigerator. "How do you think you might feel about having somebody else in the house?"
    "Who?"
    "Nobody just yet. Only it struck me we've a bedroom going spare and I wanted to know what you'd say to the idea of a lodger."
    "Don't know."
    "Just the idea. Nobody's going to be moving in unless we both approve of them. Do you want time to think about it? You could tell me tomorrow when you come home from Hilene's, or whenever you decide. I don't want to put pressure on you about it."
    "You're not."
    "I wouldn't advertise it round here. I thought of putting a notice in my and Melinda's window."
    "Go on then."
    "You think?" Much more neutrally she said "Will you be telling your father?"
    "Don't you want me to?"
    "Up to you," she said, and saw that he wasn't convinced. "Let's see if it happens and then he can know, do you think?"
    "If you want."
    "It doesn't always have to be what I want," she said, so wistfully that he was preparing to mumble "It isn't" when a car door slammed outside the house.
    His mother one shut the freezer, which emitted a frosty breath, and ducked into the front room to glance through the window. "Must have heard us," she amused herself by saying. "Here they are."
    Here was another one of the games his parents played, she meant or ought to mean. He wasn't going to ask who had turned up with his father. He stayed in the kitchen and fed himself a drink of sharp sour grapefruit juice from the carton while she waited for the bell to ring before opening the door and straightening her mouth to greet his father, who responded by throwing his head back an inch and pushing the upper lip of his broad square face over the lower. All this performed, Ian's mother said "He isn't quite ready. He's been helping me shop."
    "They're good at that when they don't have to dig in their own pockets, aren't they?" Ian's father seemed to wish he hadn't said that, because he added hurriedly "We're early, I expect. Whenever you're set, big feller."
    Perhaps Ian's mother didn't like being talked past, because she drew almost imperceptibly aside. "Will Charlotte come in for a glass of something?"
    "I think she's best left in the car if we don't want hysterics."
    "That must be hard on you," Ian's mother said with, he suspected, as much delight as sympathy. "What sort of crisis do eight-year-olds have these