A Matter of Life and Death or Something Read Online Free PDF Page B

was barely even cheesy at all because Simon only puts half the cheese package in. After supper Simon said he had to go meet someone for coffee, which was weird, because it was almost nighttime, but I didn’t ask him who he was meeting or why, mostly because I had a huge amount of things to think about and I was just excited to be the man of the house.
    Hours later I was working on a list at my desk and Simon opened my door.
    â€œStorytime yet?” he asked.
    I didn’t hear our squeaky car come back and I hadn’t even noticed my window get dark. I must have been listing for years.
    â€œFive minutes?” I said.
    â€œSure thing, boss. Get ready for bed.”
    I was getting a little old for storytime, but I could tell that Simon was not. He always wanted to read to me. Mostly it was pretty annoying, him always wanting to read to me, but that night I thought maybe it would be OK. I don’t know why.
    I went to the bathroom mirror and watched the Arthur behind it. I practised a few faces for a second: an angry one, a surprise party one, a fat fish one, a heartbroken one, a squinty but focused one, a cyclopsed one. I thought about trying a Phil one, but didn’t know how and I was too nervous, so I didn’t. Then I took my green toothbrush out of the medicine cabinet on the wall next to the mirror. I rinsed the toothbrush with scalding water for fifteen seconds and all the germs living in it burned up. I took my toothpaste and squeezed a blob of it out of the tube and onto my toothbrush. Right as I started to brush, a reflection of Simon appeared in the mirror over Reflection Arthur’s right shoulder and at the same time the actual Simon was behind my actual left shoulder.
    â€œAnything good in there today?” Simon and his reflection asked at the same time, leaning on door frames.
    â€œIm ma teef?” I said, looking at Simon’s reflection’s eyes, and almost spitting out green foam everywhere.
    The Simons laughed.
    â€œNo, in the woods. Anything good?”
    â€œNa,” I said, still brushing, “nuffing ard all.”
    â€œSame old?”
    I spit into the sink and turned the tap on.
    â€œNo. I mean, yes.”
    As I was rinsing off my toothbrush Simon started doing this extremely annoying thing he does where he takes his thumb and finger and flicks the top of my head, not to hurt my head, but to move pieces of my hair around. I filled up a glass of water for rinsing my mouth, and he just kept flicking tufts of my hair around while I did it. I looked at his reflection’s eyes.
    â€œStop it,” I said.
    He messed up my entire hairdo for a second with his hand, like he brushed it all around and then stopped. I drank my little glass of water quickly, then took the black plastic comb from inside the medicine cabinet and slowly and carefully started combing my hair, practising frowns.
    â€œIf you want to know about it,” I said, “I heard a gun shot because someone was probably shooting ducks like they always do.”
    â€œOh, wow,” Simon said. “They’re really getting an early start. I don’t even think that’s legal.”
    I dragged the comb down the right side of my head and the left side of my reflection’s head, to part my hair where I always do.
    â€œMaybe there’s just a lot of people wanting duck hats this year. Maybe the mayor ordered this one special guy to shoot just one for him, so he could have the very first hat of—”
    â€œWhat?” Simon said.
    â€œThe very first hat of the year?”
    â€œDucks don’t get made into hats, chief.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œDucks get eaten. And sometimes made into pillows and jackets.”
    I thought about how a duck might taste, with all that grease soaked into it from its raincoat, and I figured it would be disgusting. Then I thought about how uncomfortable it would be, really, to sleep with your head on a duck, or to try to fit your arms