The Hum of the Sun by Kirsten Miller

The Hum of the Sun by Kirsten Miller

Author:Kirsten Miller
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780795708350
Publisher: Kwela
Published: 2018-03-14T16:00:00+00:00


32.

The puppy squirmed, soft, with wide eyes set too far apart. The skin be­tween his eyes and on his forehead folded and wrinkled in a perpetual frown. His feet splayed broad, legs too long for the body that wriggled above them. The girl bent down on one knee. She held the hound’s head in her hands, their mutual gaze steady with love, dependence, understanding and companionship.

The floor of the hallway was paved in quarried stone, the walls washed a light ochre. Zuko stood beside Ash, the small boy’s hands resting at his sides. Ash had never seen his brother so quiet, so little interested in the quality of air or the drum of the walls or the way the sound moved from his mouth in a hum, in a test of the acoustics of the sur­rounding space.

Patterns of light and dark played at Ash’s peripheral vision. His heart thudded unnecessarily in his chest. A surge of nausea rose to his throat. The girl moved forward, into the cavity of the hall. “Here we are,” she said. As she passed him, he caught the fullness of her scent – dried perspiration and the dust of the earth and manure and animals, the exhaust of the tractor and the sweat of horses. Also commitment and trying and dedication and hard work. He breathed too deeply. The puppy danced at her feet. She moved to the wall and hooked her keys onto the peg there. She took off her hat and shook her head to air her hair from the confinement. As she flung the hat onto an arm of the hat stand, Ash’s knees went weak and his heart thumped and darkness took over the interplay of his peripheral vision. He sank like a sandbag to the floor.



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