The Night Rainbow A Novel - By Claire King Page 0,49

But I don’t want to upset Claude and Merlin. So I decide to disappear myself.

Did you know, if you wave your hands really, really fast, they stop being seen? They are going so fast they are invisible. I wonder if this would work with a whole person. I stand up and I start to wave my hands, my arms, jiggle my head, faster and faster. I start to run, faster, faster through the long grass away from Claude and back towards Maman but I hope that I can just disappear somewhere along the way.

Margot and I sit at the kitchen table. I didn’t disappear on the way home, and eventually I got out of puff from the fast running so we stopped to pick flowers. We have brought back pockets full of daisies and clover for Maman, and we are arranging them around the edge of a plate. She can eat her supper off it when she wakes up. We are too hungry to wait, though, so we sit at the table eating the bread, which is quite hard, but we have put both kinds of jam on it and so it’s sort of crunchy-sticky good. I am spooning on some more jam – because that is the best part – but not looking what I am doing. I am just letting my eyes move around the kitchen, through the dusty light and the cool dark shadows, over the dirty floors at the bottom and the spotty tomato clothes above our heads. It is because I am doing this instead of looking at the jam that I see the little checked curtain twitch. The curtain is drawn across the part under the sink where Maman keeps cleaning things. We are not supposed to touch them, but sometimes, if I have spilled something, I can get a cloth and something which has flowers on the front but makes my eyes water and I can clean it up before she knows. But cleaning products are not supposed to move and make curtains twitch. I jump up, scraping the bench on the tiles, and the curtain twitches again. Something small and dark rushes fast as lightning along the wall.

It makes me jump, but then I see it properly just as it slips through the crack between the wall and the pantry door. A little brown mouse, with whiskers and a tail and everything.

Let’s catch it! says Margot. We can keep it as a pet.

Do you remember the scorpion? I say. Sometimes, Margot, you can be very irresponsible.

But mice don’t sting, she says.

What would we feed it on?

We could try bread, says Margot.

So I break off a piece of my bread and jam and put it down next to the pantry. I hope Maman won’t notice, I say.

Just then, Maman starts to scream. My insides turn somersaults. I think that perhaps this is what it feels like for Maman when the baby is doing exercises. I think this very quickly because mostly I am scared that Maman is screaming. Then I think she is in the kitchen watching me and is cross that I am feeding the mouse. But then she screams again.

Amaury! Amaury! Her voice is upstairs and loud and frightened.

My heart thuds. She’s shouting for Papa, I whisper.

I know, says Margot.

Do you think she’s forgotten that he’s dead? I say.

I doubt that, says Margot.

Maybe it’s a different Amaury she wants, I say.

Or a nightmare, says Margot.

Yes, that could be it, I say.

Amaury! Maman shouts again.

We should go and help her, says Margot.

I’m scared.

We’ll hold hands, come on.

So we climb the stairs, holding hands, and tiptoe down the corridor. We go over the creak, and quietly push open the bedroom door.

Maman is curled on her side in a pile of pillows, her hair is sweaty and pushed back off her face. Her face is wet but I don’t know if it is crying or sweat. The fan is turned off and the air feels wet like bath-time in winter. Maman’s eyes are screwed tight, one fist pressed up against her forehead and the other arm wrapped round her belly.

Amaury! she shouts again, making us jump.

I want to run away, but Margot pulls me by the hand close to the bed. Maman’s belly is rolling in waves like the sea.

Maman, I whisper.

No! she groans.

Maman, it’s me, Pea. Papa’s dead.

No!

Maman?

You need to speak up, says Margot.

Maman! I say in my loudest voice that is not shouting, and I grab her hand and squeeze it tight.

Then

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