My Brother's Shadow

My Brother's Shadow Read Online Free PDF

Book: My Brother's Shadow Read Online Free PDF
Author: Tom Avery
patterns on tiles, patterns on boxes—beautiful, intricate patterns, shapes and flowers and vines and letters, some in a soft flowing script, some square and printed.
    A man stood in front of a wall of tiles, speaking. A group of children sat in front of him, listening. We crouched behind, eavesdropping.
    â€œCan anyone spot the mistake in this one?” the man asked, pointing out an almost-cross-shaped tile.
    A girl near the front, a yellow bandanna holding her hair down, put her hand up and told him that one of the letters was missing a line.
    â€œYou see,” the man went on, “most Islamic artists will add a deliberate mistake to their work to make it imperfect. They believe thatonly God is perfect, and they show this in their art.”
    We wandered on, into the gallery.
    â€œThat’s like people, isn’t it?” I said to the boy.
    He stared back at me.
    â€œEveryone’s got something wrong. No one’s perfect.”
    We looked at a large vase, about half as tall as me. I was searching for the mistake.
    â€œJust, we’re the only ones brave enough to admit it.”
    I thought this might be true, even though I felt far from brave.
    The way back was much like the way there. It was much like it, the walking, the Tube. But it was also very different; I wasn’t afraid of Poppy or the other girls. Luzie smiled at me and I smiled back. And I noticed as I stared at the others, my classmates, they all had things wrong, just like me.
    When we got back into the playground and stood shivering, waiting for our parents, Jo was no longer by the flower beds, but a different face, just as welcome, said hello: a soft yellow star, the first daffodil.



GROWING
    After the school trip, my angel brother came down again.
    He sat on the end of my bed. He hadn’t sat before, just sort of hovered. I could see the wounds, thick streaks of red across his wrists, still glistening, wet, sticky. They made me think of jewels; rubies set in golden skin. I wondered how much a ruby that size would be worth.
    He looked where I was looking and pulled his sleeves down to cover the terrible chasms.
    â€œHey, Tiny,” he said.
    I said “Hey” back.
    Bright eyes glowed out from under a flat-brimmed cap. Moses cast them around the room, then fixed them back on me. “You’re growing,” he said.
    I didn’t feel like it. I hadn’t had new shoes or trousers in ages, not since the last time I’d seen him in the waking world. I told him so.
    â€œNo,” he said, pressing his hand against his chest. “In here, you’re growing.”
    I placed my own hand on my own chest. Inside, my heart beat and fluttered. We sat still a long time. I felt in the darkness the pulsing warmth of my body.
    â€œI’m growing?”
    â€œYou’re growing. And it’s good. You’ve got to grow,” the angel Moses said.
    Mr. Wills has been teaching us about similes and metaphors, when you compare something to something else that it’s like.
    Here’s a famous simile by William Wordsworth:
    I wandered lonely as a cloud
    That floats on high o’er vales and hills
    It’s good, isn’t it? The cloud, lonely, wandering, high, away from everything.
    When Mr. Wills told us about it I was staring out the window, inspecting the clouds, making it make sense.
    â€œYou’ve got to pay attention, Kaia!” he shouted at me. “This is important, you’ve got to focus.”
    I know
, I thought.
And I was
. But I didn’t say anything; I just stared back at the board as if that rectangle of white were where you could learn everything under the sun.
    Poppy and the clever table got to write simile poems about animals, describing the way they look, act, feel.
    We had a “fill in the blanks” worksheet. Stupid stuff like:
    The boy ran as fast as …
    A lion’s mane is like …
    The teacher was as fierce as …
    I hate doing stupid
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