My Name Is Leon by Kit de Waal

Author:Kit de Waal
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

27

Leon has swollen glands, so he has to miss a whole week of school. Sylvia says he has to tidy his room properly and help her take the weeds out of the front garden. He has to clean his school shoes. He has to help her rearrange the airing cupboard. He has to sweep the path and finally he has to go to the supermarket to help her carry some of the stuff for her street party. She buys lots of tins of salmon and bottles of juice and the bags are so heavy they cut into Leon’s fingers.

Sylvia pulls a cart that is full to the top with tea bags and jars of coffee, bags of sugar and trifle mix.

“We’re starting early. A little bit here and there and, on the day, we won’t have so much to get. It’s only six weeks now.”

But Leon just wants to go to the allotments, go to his shed, and make it nice. Get it ready. He has taken a tea towel from Sylvia’s kitchen and a little hand broom from under the sink. He has got some tape for the hole in the window and lots of other things. And he needs to get a padlock, because Mr. Devlin has a padlock and Tufty has a padlock and they do things properly. So after he has done all his jobs, he puts his backpack on and goes to the front door.

“Oi,” says Sylvia. “Where you going?”

“On my bike.”

“Where on your bike?”

“The big gardens.”

“You mean the park?”

“Yes,” he says quickly, “the park with the railings.”

She looks at him for a while, then she lights a cigarette.

“What’s in the bag?”

“Nothing.”

“Like what? Give me an example of ‘nothing,’ Leon.”

“Like a ball in case I see any of my friends.”

“Two hours,” she says and he races out the door.

It rained in the morning and it rained the day before so the road is slippery and black. He gets off his bike at the allotment gates in case Mr. Devlin is there and wheels it in. Mr. Devlin is kneeling down with a trowel. He raises it as Leon goes by. Tufty is standing with Castro with the ginger hair but as he waves at Leon his face changes. Leon looks behind. A group of men are walking into the allotment behind Leon. They ­haven’t come to look at the plants and they’re not wearing the right clothes for gardening. They have their hands in their pockets and one of them is kicking stones. They walk straight toward him and they look angry. Leon knows that they have come to take him away for stealing.

The Zebra warned him. Sylvia must have complained to her. He thinks about all the things he has stolen and what he will say. He tries to think of clever answers but all the time he wants to go to the toilet and he can’t move. Sylvia has sent them to lock him up. The men are close now. Leon drops his bike.

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