August or Forever by Ona Gritz

Author:Ona Gritz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Regal House Publishing
Published: 2023-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

17

The countryside here is beautiful,” Alison says on the way home. “It reminds me a bit of Lancashire. But yours is a lighter green. I suppose that’s because you get less rain.”

The last thing I want to talk to my sister about is the weather. I consider describing The Baseball Incident as a warning against Robbie. But if I’m going to bring up little sisters taking things that don’t belong to them, I should confess about the necklace and I’m not quite ready to do that.

I sigh. What I’d really like right now is to be by myself for a few minutes. It’s so strange. All I’ve wanted for so long is to have my sister with me. I guess I’m just used to taking a moment here and there each day when I can be alone with my thoughts. It calms me.

But then, so does being in the woods, and I suppose there’s no reason Alison can’t go twice in one day.

“Brilliant,” she says when I suggest it.

We walk to the clearing where Alison and I stretch out in the grass and listen to the birds. Meanwhile, I try to think of ways to talk to Alison about staying.

“So, umm, you know how Dad works at my school?”

“Yeah.” Alison faces me and props her head up on her hand. “What’s that like? Does he treat you differently from his other students?”

I flash back to an afternoon last year when he slipped and called me Noodle in front of my classmates. For about a week afterwards, kids kept calling me Spaghetti-Head. That was one time I wasn’t thrilled to have Dad at school, but I don’t tell Alison this.

“Of course it’s great when families get to spend time with each other,” I say.

Alison nods and I study her face, waiting for her to realize that she can be with us too.

“Well, now that my art teacher left…”

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that, sis.”

“You have?” My heart revs. Maybe she is considering the job!

“There’s such freedom in your drawings,” Alison tells me. “That’s something you want to hold onto, no matter who your next teacher is.”

I nod and try to focus on what she’s saying, even though it’s not what I’d hoped.

“We artists can get really caught up worrying about what others will think of our work before we even finish it,” she goes on. “To me, the trick is letting go of all that and recalling how to play, like a child. If you remember to do your art because you find it fun, you’ll be ahead of a lot of people.”

I think of The Sister Book. Part of why I didn’t want to give it to Alison was that I thought she’d find it babyish. But if I understand what she’s saying, she’ll see that as a good thing.

“Do you mind waiting while I run back to the house and grab something?”

As I rush home through the trees, it feels as though the birds on their branches are cheering me on.

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