Читать книгу The Night Flyer's Handbook 2-Book Bundle - Philippa Dowding - Страница 19

I make it through the rest of the day without so much as a hover. I decide it’s good that someone else knows what’s happening to me. Knowing that Jez knows really helps. She can be my anchor. If I start taking off, she can pull me back to the ground.

I make it through the rest of the day without so much as a hover. I decide it’s good that someone else knows what’s happening to me. Knowing that Jez knows really helps. She can be my anchor. If I start taking off, she can pull me back to the ground.

It’s kind of like that, anyway. She’s always the sensible one. Like I said, she’s the motherly type, making sure everyone has a sweater and a snack on school trips. Or putting us all to sleep with night-night songs at sleepovers when we were little. Or being the one to call home if one of us is sick or hurt or worried.

I can definitely count on Jez. It makes whatever is happening to me just a little easier to handle.

After school, Jez and I wander along our main street. She doesn’t seem to want to talk much; besides, the Chrissies are with us. I have to walk them home and make their dinner on Fridays, since Mom works late. Mom always gives me a little extra money so I can buy us all a treat (Jez included) on Fridays. We head to The Float Boat, which is the name of the candy store in our town. They make ice cream floats in glasses shaped like boats. Which I guess explains the name.

It’s a great place, and you get hit with a sugar smell as soon as you walk in, like every single candy that was ever in there left a little bit of itself behind. Just to tempt you and remind you how delicious it was.

As I stand in front of the store, I get this weird feeling. Float Boat. That’s me. I’m a float boat. That’s me exactly. Except I’m hardly candy-filled and delicious. I decide then and there that I will think of myself as the “float boat” from now on. It makes me smile.

We walk in. The Chrissies run to the jars filled with jelly beans, like they always do. They never vary much, those two.

There is a whole wall filled with jars of different

flavoured jelly beans. Mandarin, lemon, licorice, mint, chocolate, watermelon, vanilla, all the standard flavours. Then all the weird ones that don’t associate with any flavour exactly, like midnight sky and winter dream.

What does a “midnight sky” jelly bean taste like, I wonder? But I’ve never been curious enough to try one. I don’t really like jelly beans. I’m more of a chocolate kind of person.

My brother and sister do, though. Every week, the C2s get their jelly bean fix. Christine is very thoroughly going from jar to jar every Friday. Even if the next jar, the jar of the week, is some terrible jelly bean flavour like liverwurst or green pepper (if those exist), she has to take a bag.

Christopher is exactly the opposite. He either picks the same jelly beans every week (he went for an entire year just eating lemon-lime, for instance) or he closes his eyes and points. Whatever jar he points at, he has to try. These days he just grabs different flavours and mixes them up in the same bag (which is fine, since they are all the same price).

This drives his twin sister crazy. She is Miss Jar-a-Week Organized. He is Mr. Any-Jar-Will-Do Random. They are an interesting combination, those two.

As they pick their jelly beans, Jez and I walk up to the counter. Mrs. Forest is standing there with her huge glistening arms and her striped red apron. She is about the biggest lady I’ve ever seen.

I should tell you a little about Mr. and Mrs. Forest. They own The Float Boat. They are great to us kids. They always remember your birthday and give you extra ice cream if you’re in the store that day. Or somehow they know when you aren’t having a great day, and they sneak you a little treat you weren’t expecting, like your favourite gum drop or something. For me, it’s always a Hershey’s Kiss.

They don’t have any kids of their own, which I think makes them sad. But they sure see enough of everyone else’s kids, so it isn’t like they don’t get to be around any, or anything. I guess if you love kids but can’t have any of your own, opening up a candy shop makes a lot of sense.

The kids come to you by the boatload. The floatload.

“Hi, Mrs. Forest,” I say. Jez wanders over to the gum balls, daintily picking out a small bag of cinnamon-flavoured ones.

“Hello, Gwennie. Are you ready for a float?” Mrs. Forest says. Then I swear she winks at me.

Now, in a store called The Float Boat, you’d think that’s not such an unusual question. It probably wouldn’t be for any other kid, any kid other than me.

See, the thing is, I hate floats. I always have. I’ve hated them since the first time I spat one out all over the counter in front of Mr. and Mrs. Forest. I was about four years old, and my dad took me in there and made me try one. And it was hate at first taste. I decided then and there that ice cream and soda had no right to be together in the same glass.

For many years after that, Mrs. Forest would wink at me whenever I was with a bunch of kids and everyone was ordering floats. She’d look over at me and say, “But no float for Miss Gwennie Golden!”

So this was a bit puzzling to me, that suddenly Mrs. Forest was offering me a float.

Especially given the events of the past two days.

Did she want me to spit it out all over the counter? Was she having a quiet day or something and felt the need to clean up a mess of spat-up float?

Since I hesitate, she can sense I’m puzzled. She laughs a little and says quietly, so just I can hear her, “No, no, Miss Gwennie Golden doesn’t like floats, does she? But floating, that’s a different story.”

I snap my head up and look her right in the eye. My face must look really dark and angry, because she raises her eyebrows and whistles.

“Don’t get mad, girl. Just come see me when you need me. I’ll be here.”

Honestly, that’s just about the most confusing thing she could say to me. Why would I need to talk to the local candy store owner? What does she know about me? She clearly said “floating.”

I want to talk to her then and there. But at that very moment Jez, Christine, and Christopher all come up to me. I could tell the twins to go look at something so I can talk more to Mrs. Forest, but I can’t get rid of Jez, too. I’ll just have to wait to ask her what she meant.

Floating. It’s pretty clear that she knows more about me than I do. Just like Mr. McGillies this morning. What’s going on with the grownups in this town? She smiles at me and rings up the candy. I pay for everything, and we leave the store. But not before Mrs. Forest calls out to us, “Remember, Gwendolyn. I’m right here.”

I nod but frown. I don’t say anything, but I’m thinking a lot of things.

Mostly: Okay, Mrs. Forest. You’re right there. You’ve always been right there, as long as I can remember. What’s so important about you being right there now?

We’re all the way home before I realize I’m the only one who didn’t buy any candy. It’s the first time ever that I left that store empty-handed, but I’m starting to think maybe I’m getting a little old for candy.