Saving Sky Read Online Free PDF

kid by the collar of his oversized parka and gave it a yank.
    â€œAnd here’s something else. I not only don’t care and don’t like you, I don’t trust you either. I think maybe this kid is just dying to join the martyr’s brigade—” He suddenly realized he’d made a joke, so he stopped for a few seconds to snort over it and look around to make sure everybody got it before he went on. “So, ’scuse me, but I want to see what he’s got on under that jacket.”
    â€œYeah!” someone shouted from the crowd.
    â€œ Leave! Him! Alone! ”
    It was Mouse, yelling at the top of her voice.
    Goat-Man turned and glared at her, his brow furrowed, danger on his face.
    â€œYou telling me what to do?”
    â€œYeah. Leave him alone. You’re mean !”
    Sky grabbed her sister’s arm and whispered in her ear, “Shut up , Mouse! He could squash you like a bug. Mom’s getting help, remember?”
    â€œBut he is ,” Mouse said, not yelling anymore but still perfectly audible.
    â€œI said shut up !” Sky hissed.
    Goat-Man stood for a couple of beats, unsure whether to squash Mouse like a bug or not. The father took advantage of the moment to move his cart out of the line and send his wife and daughter away with it. They were still retreating when Goat-Man returned his attention to the boy. He began tugging at the parka, trying to rip the thing open with his bare hands.
    â€œI’ll do it! I’ll do it!” the boy said, reaching for the zipper.
    â€œGet your blanking hands away!” Goat-Man snapped.
    The father was trying to get to his son, but the line of carts had closed off the space between them. “Please, stop!” he pleaded, trying to squeeze through. “He’s only a boy.”
    A large woman placed herself pointedly in his way, turning her back to him—arms crossed—and refusing to budge. The father tapped her gently on the shoulder, still determined to be polite.
    â€œPlease, madam, will you let me by ?”
    Suddenly the woman swung a fleshy arm around and knocked him to the floor. The crowd stepped back and gazed down in wonder. Nobody tried to help him.
    Mouse was howling again, and people in the crowd were yelling at her to stop. Sky was frantic. She didn’t know what to do. She put her hand over her sister’s mouth, but Mouse twisted away.
    So there they were—Mouse shrieking and Sky sobbing—when Ana finally appeared, accompanied by a beefy security guard.
    â€œMake way, make way!” he barked, and the crowd parted.
    Ana scooped her daughters into a protective hug. “I’m sorry it took so long,” she said. “I’m so sorry!”
    â€œBut Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!” Mouse kept wailing.
    â€œI know, I know,” Ana said. “It’s all right now. This man’s going to help.”
    â€œWhat’s going on here?” the guard demanded of no one in particular—as if it wasn’t perfectly clear. The father, his nose bloody, was hauling himself up off the floor. Goat-Man still had the kid by the collar. The boy’s jacket was open—the zipper ruined and the lining torn—revealing nothing more threatening than a skinny kid in a T-shirt.
    â€œWhat’s going on here is this ,” Goat-Man said, inflating his chest, trying to look even bigger than he was. “We don’t want no blanking Ay-rabs in here. You shouldn’t allow it.”
    The crowd buzzed with assent. They didn’t want no blanking Ay-rabs in there either.
    â€œWe are legal citizens of this country,” the father said. “We have done nothing wrong. I have explained all this.”
    â€œLet me see your ID,” the guard said. Only he wasn’t talking to Goat-Man but to the boy. “You, too,” he barked at the father.
    The look of surprise on the father’s face, and the way he seemed so determined to be civilized and rational in