Through the Cracks Read Online Free PDF Page B

Jerry howled the moment the gates were closed. Adam guessed they usually got to go shopping. He’d never heard them howl like that before. Or maybe, locked in the backroom, the sound hadn’t reached him. Adam’s father’s car was parked in the street. It was a blue station wagon that could fit birdcages in the back and carry bags of seed. Once or twice, when very young, Adam had been allowed to play inside the vehicle. Now and then his father drove the car into the yard, unloaded seed, took caged birds away or brought new birds home. There were chicken feathers on the seats and scattered on the floor. The temperature in the car made the air hard to breathe. Adam closed the door and burned the backs of his legs on the vinyl seat. He perched on the edge with his knees against the dash. His father wound down the window. Adam watched and then did the same on his side. The boys bouncing the ball were on the footpath up ahead. They looked over their shoulders. One of them made the sound of a chicken. Both boys laughed. They were near enough to call out to, but it didn’t make them seem any closer. To Adam it felt as though there might as well have still been a fence between him and the boys. Everything remained far away. Adam’s gaze skimmed the fronts of the houses, the wide driveways, the short green lawns and colourful gardens. Tree branches arched over the road. Huge stretch of sky above that. Adam gripped his knees. The car sped up. Air blew in through the window. Things passed fast. He forced himself to look. The picture didn’t change. The world was tall, it was spread out, long and deep, filled to the brim, there were people in it, colour sprang forward, sun glinted off leaves and windows and off the moving cars, yet the world was a single thing, one big place. And Adam didn’t feel like he was in it. Was it just like his father had always said? There was no place for Adam. He didn’t belong.

‘M r Vander, you’ve taken a fall or something?’
    The butcher came out from behind the counter. He was wearing a white apron stained with blood. He wiped his hands on a tea towel tucked into his apron strings.
    ‘Are you okay?’
    ‘A bit of heart trouble, I took a tumble.’
    ‘That’s no good, sorry to hear it. Is that why you’ve got a helper with you today? G’day, young fella, you’re a good lad to help out.’
    The man’s eyes were so brown they looked black. There was a steel rod hanging from his belt, resting down his thigh. The other man behind the counter was dark-eyed too. He was whistling along to a song on the radio.
    ‘Come and sit down, Mr Vander.’
    The butcher brought forward one of the chairs lined up against the wall. He placed it in the middle of the long section of the shop where other people were waiting.
    ‘Hot day to be out if you’re not feeling well. What would you like? We’ll get your order quickly, let you get back home.’
    Both men wrapped the meat. There were mirrors on the walls. Adam could see himself from different angles. He looked at the other customers. They didn’t look at him – not even when he tried to catch their eye – they looked into the cabinet at the meats.
    In the next shop they knew Adam’s father too. They also saw that he was sick. He told them the same story.
    There were trolleys and wire baskets. His father took a basket and passed it to Adam. Foods advertised on TV were on the shelves. The store was a strange temperature, not warm, not cool. No smell. Adam’s shoes were rubbing on his heels. His father filled the basket. A woman with a baby walked along the same part of the shop as them. She jiggled the boy on her hip and talked to him as she put things in her trolley. She wheeled the trolley one-handed and asked the boy to point at things.
    ‘Where’s purple?’
    The child pointed to a packet on the shelf. ‘There.’
    ‘That’s green.’
    ‘There.’
    ‘No, that’s pink.’
    ‘There!’
    The woman stopped and took a packet from the shelf.