Sky Run by Alex Shearer Read Free Book Online Page A

was standing by the three stone mounds, as if engaging them in conversation. But what he was saying we could only imagine, or fail to imagine. For who knows what is really in another person’s heart? That was what Peggy told me.
    â€˜So what did we learn back there?’ she said, once we had put a good distance between Angus and ourselves.
    â€˜I don’t know, Peggy,’ I said. ‘Eh … we learned that his real name was Angus?’
    â€˜What else?’
    â€˜Eh … I don’t know.’
    â€˜Gemma?’
    â€˜Plenty,’ Gemma said.
    â€˜Tell me what you learned,’ Peggy said.
    â€˜Not to judge people on first appearances. That angry people are often upset and in pain inside. That you never really know about anyone, that your first impressions can be completely wrong. And that underneath everything we all have a lot in common, and we all suffer in the same way, and can all be happy in the same way.’
    Peggy smiled.
    â€˜That’s right.’ She nodded. ‘That’s right.’
    It was all a bit above my head, to be honest. All I felt I’d learned was that the troll’s name was Angus. But there you are.
    Taking advantage of the situation though, I said, ‘Peggy – if we’ve already learned so much about life, do we
have
to go to City Island? Couldn’t we just turn around and go back home?’
    â€˜Martin,’ she said. ‘You can learn about life anywhere. But if you want to learn about physics, chemistry, history, geography, economics, languages, algebra and quadratic equations, then you have to go to school.’
    â€˜I don’t know that I do want to learn about quadratic equations,’ I said. ‘I don’t know what they are but I can’t say I like the sound of them.’
    â€˜You’ll love them,’ she said. ‘Once you get started.’
    But I wasn’t so sure about that. I had this sense of vague unease. There was something about quadratic equations that didn’t sound very inviting.

5
cooking
    GEMMA SPEAKING NOW. HER TURN:
    Peggy said from the off that we had to get Martin to do the cooking. She said, back in the very old days, it was always girls who got stuck with the cooking, but Martin wasn’t going to know that, so we’d stick him with the cooking instead, right from the start.
    â€˜How is he going to know any different?’ Peggy had said. After all, there were just the three of us. It wasn’t as if he was going to pick up bad habits from elsewhere. The only other male of the species (as Peggy called them) within visiting distance was old Ben Harley. And he was stuck with the cooking too, and as far as he was concerned, it was cook or die. For who else was going to do it, as he was on his ownsome?
    When I say we stuck Martin with the cooking, that’s not strictly as bad as it sounds. All we did was get him to do his share. So that was accepted. We all had to help. Sometimes it was washing-up; sometimes it was cooking; sometimes it was keeping the place clean. You always got stuck with something. But when everyone else is getting stuck with something too, you don’t mind. It’s when you’re stuck with everything and everyone else is stuck with nothing – like Cinderella, who Peggy told us about – that’s when you feel aggrieved. It’s seeing those ugly sisters with their feet up on the coffee table and their bums on the sofa cushions all day long that gets you riled.
    All the stories we know come from Peggy – the Cinderellas and so forth. She’s got plenty that she can recite off by heart and there were books in the house, but not many, as they were hard to come by. There’s no visiting library boat out where Peggy lived; the only other literature you get there is what’s written in the clouds, or the future that’s scrawled across the palm of your hand – if you believe in that kind of thing, and I don’t,