Wildlife Read Online Free PDF Page A

hope.”
    “You’ve got a secret weapon that no other girl has.”
    “What?” If she means the stupid billboard, I can hardly lug that with me everywhere I go.
    She’s smiling. “Your best friend is me.”

10
    Blink
    Emollient
    Blink
    Architect
    Blink
    Refulgent
    Blink
    Overnight
    Blink
    Permeable
    Blink
    Dandelion
    Blink
    Immutable
    Nine-letter words.
    It’s a puzzle in the newspaper every day: how many words can you make from nine jumbled letters in a three-by-three grid, and what is the word that uses all nine letters? And that’s how long it ever takes Michael to see the nine-letter word: exactly one blink.
    The only time I saw him pause was over
jugulated
(two blinks) and he said, It’s the only thing it can be, but I’ve never seen it used. And come on, I mean, whoa, Neddy!Because what gets me is that
this
surprised him: that he hadn’t seen it. I would’ve been surprised if I
had
ever seen it. I will be surprised if I
do
ever see it used. I don’t expect I
will
ever see it. Except in a word puzzle.
    He says it’s all about how quickly you read, because we skate and slide over letters all the time and read many words, whole matrices of letters, in a blink. But I think it’s also about how much you read, and what sort of vocabulary you have in the first place, because, honestly, how many people in the entire world do you know who will ever need to use the word
jugulated
in their entire lives? Not many. Fewer than ten is my guess.
    Nine,
maybe
.
    And I’m trying not to worry that he’s sitting alone on the bus, down in front, right near the teachers.

11
    monday 8 october
    Bus did not crash.
    Sat with quiet girl called don’t remember don’t care. Drove past a vast lake in which trees were drowning, not waving.
    *     *     *
    Camp. Looks just like brochure.
    The sign says CROWTHORNE GRAMMAR, MT. FAIRWEATHER CAMPUS, REPORT TO RECEPTION .
    Architect-designed faux-utilitarian; probably truly utilitarian as well. What I mean is: functional, but also concerned with appearing to be functional, or in other words, show-off functional.
    Smells like heartbreak. Lemon-scented gum trees and eucalyptus.
    Food in mouth chomp chomp chomp. No recollection of what I ate. Food warmer du jour.
    Colder, much colder here than in the city.
    When I see the blues of further mountains…
I see it for you, too, Fred.
    When I see a girl look with secret longing at the handsome boy…
    There is some sort of buzzbuzzbuzz around the tall girl, Sibylla. Is she famous for something? Do I care?
    There is so much too much written about grief.
    Grief counseling is a thriving industry as well as a personal little hell to get through. It is probably immune from global financial vicissitudes. Like the food industry, maybe.
    Grief settles comfortably into any host; it is an ever-mutating, vigorous organism with an ever-renewing customer base. It generates a never-ending hunger, a never-ending ache, an unassuageable pain to new hearts, brains, guts every minute, every day, every year.
    It is the razor-edge of a loose tooth shrieking to be pressed again and again into the soft pink sore gum.
    It’s a one-way tunnel with no proof of another exit.
    It is something to be got through. Got over. It is something to hide behind. So wide I can’t… so low I can’t get… so high I can’t… So… it is something to squeeze the lungs, to fill the tear ducts and feed the dark hours that used to be for sleeping. Must not drown in it. Be crushed by its dark weight. Must not swamp me. Must not overcome me. Must work through it, face up to it, must pummel it like putty into something with which the wound can be dressed, spit and chew and press, the heart can be healed, a shield, a salve. It is a place to hide, to howl, to touch private memories like shy birds, like flicking shadows that must not
must not
disappear.
    So where does my big bad sad fit here? Where to put it, in this sunny designer room with six bunks and five strange girls, plus