Black Rabbit Summer Read Online Free PDF

had in there.
    It was hard to imagine.
    His parents had never been up to much. They were cold people, ugly-minded, uncaring… the kind of parents that make you appreciate your own.
    I stared at the house for a moment, trying to picture what happened behind those brick walls, but all I could see was a formless haze of dull grey mist. Cold ugly voices, resentment, hidden feelings.
    I sensed something then – a soundless movement – and when I looked down at my feet I saw Black Rabbit flopping past me and hopping back into his hutch.
    He didn’t look at me.
He didn’t twitch his nose at me.
His voice didn’t whisper inside my head…
Be careful.
Don’t go.
… and even if it did, I didn’t hear it.
    I didn’t know it then, but as I left Raymond’s garden that day and started walking back home, I’d just made the biggest mistake of my life.

Three
    The next day, Saturday, was one of those days when you wake up in the morning, too hot to sleep, and you feel so sweaty and breathless that all you want to do is throw off the duvet and lie there naked, hoping in vain for a breath of cooling air to drift in through the open window…
    But it never comes.
    There’s no cool air out there, just a blazing white sun and a burned-blue sky and a heat so heavy you can see it.
    After I’d finally managed to peel myself off the bed and shuffle wearily into the bathroom, I took a cold shower, dressed in a T-shirt and shorts, and went downstairs. A fan was blowing in the kitchen, and all the windows were open, but the house was still uncomfortably hot. I went outside and found Mum sitting on a kitchen chair, sipping tea and smoking a cigarette. She was wearing shorts and a T-shirt too, and although she looked really good in them – kind of baggy and scruffily cool – she also looked pretty tired and worn out.
    ‘I thought you’d given up smoking,’ I said to her, nodding at the cigarette in her hand.
    She smiled at me. ‘I have.’
    ‘Doesn’t look like it.’
    ‘It’s just the one… I needed it.’
    ‘Yeah, well,’ I said, ‘you’d better not let Dad catch you.’
    ‘He’s still asleep.’
    ‘What time did he get in?’
    She shrugged. ‘I don’t know… a few hours ago. Around eight, I suppose.’
    ‘When’s he got to go back?’
    ‘This afternoon.’
    She took a long drag on her cigarette and gazed down the garden. Her smile had gone now, and she had a worried-about-Dad look in her eyes. She was always worried about Dad, especially when he was working nights.
    My dad’s a police officer – a detective sergeant in the CID – and it’s hard for Mum sometimes. It’s hard for both of us, really. Even when Dad isn’t working late or doing nights, neither of us gets to see him that much. There’s always something keeping him busy – overtime, paperwork, courses, training. I don’t really mind not seeing him too much. I mean, I don’t like it, but I’m used to it. I’ve grown up with it, just as I’ve grown up with and got used to all the other crap that goes with being the son of a police officer – the suspicions, the wariness, the stupid jokes. It’s not that I don’t like Dad being a policeman, because I do. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a pretty cool thing to do. It’s just that sometimes I wish he had a more normal job. An ordinary job. Nine to five, Monday to Friday. No weekend overtime, no worried Mum, no tired-out Dad.
    I looked at Mum now, and I knew she didn’t really care too much about the long hours and the overtime and the fact that Dad was tired all the time. The only thing she was really worried about – the only thing she’d ever been worried about– was that every time Dad left for work, there was always a chance he wouldn’t come home.
    She put out her cigarette and smiled at me. ‘Everything all right?’
    I smiled back. ‘Yeah.’
    ‘Good. How’s Raymond? You went to see him yesterday, didn’t you?’
    ‘Yeah, he’s all right. You know… same old Raymond.