Children of Exile Read Online Free

silent.
    No—the younger children around me were starting to whimper and whine.
    â€œNo,” Bobo said quite suddenly, and it occurred to me that this could be his answer to my question way back at our house: Ready for our big adventure?
    I wanted to tell him, Oh, me neither, Bobo. Let’s you and me just stay here. Let’s not go anywhere. Let’s not have anything change.
    I saw that my Fred-daddy was trying to lift Bobo off his shoulders and Bobo was digging in his heels, tightening his grip.
    â€œHere, Bobo,” I said, reaching for him as I switched my knapsack to one side. “I bet Fred-daddy’s back is getting tired. Why don’t you ride your sister-horsy for a while instead?”
    Bobo looked back and forth between our Fred-daddy and me. He stuck out his lower lip.
    â€œStand on my own,” Bobo demanded, distrust in his voice.
    Our Fred-daddy put Bobo down on his own two feet. Bobo immediately dived for our Fred-daddy’s legs and coiled his arms around Fred-daddy’s knees.
    Part of me wanted to do the exact same thing.
    Fred-mama crouched down beside Bobo.
    â€œYou’re a big boy,” she said. It sounded like she was holding back tears. Could Bobo hear that in her voice too?
    â€œWe’ve raised you to be strong and true and kind to others,” Fred-mama went on. She patted Bobo’s back. “You have to think about your parents, about how much they’ve missed you, about how happy they’ll be to see you again. You have to be kind to them.”
    It sounded like Fred-mama was having a hard time thinking about being kind to our real parents.
    â€œCome with us,” Bobo wailed, his face against Fred-daddy’sleg. “ Some of the Freds are going home with us.”
    I waited for Fred-mama or Fred-daddy to deny this, but they didn’t.
    Now, how did Bobo know that? I wondered.
    â€œIt’s only the Freds who meet certain criteria,” Fred-daddy said helplessly. “The ones whose children are particularly . . .”
    â€œVulnerable,” Fred-mama finished for him. Her face twisted with more misery than I had ever seen on anyone’s face.
    Normally, our Fred-parents would have defined a big word like that for Bobo, but neither of them attempted that now.
    â€œThe fact that Fred-mama and I aren’t allowed to go—that just means the people in charge know that you and Rosi are strong and capable,” Fred-daddy added. “And you have each other.”
    â€œDon’t want to be strong,” Bobo wailed, still clutching Fred-daddy’s leg. “Want to stay with you!”
    I wanted to cry with him. I wanted to throw myself to the ground and pound my fists on the dirt and scream at the top of my lungs. I wanted to act like a five-year-old too. Maybe even a baby.
    You can’t , I told myself. You and Edwy are the oldest kids in Fredtown . You have to set a good example.
    I glanced around, suddenly curious to see how Edwy was dealing with all this. He was probably standing a cold, careless distance away from his Fred-parents; he was probably slouching and shrugging and rolling his eyes.
    I couldn’t see Edwy or his Fred-parents anywhere nearby, and the crowd was packed too tightly to see very far out. And now the commotion was overwhelming. All the adults must have started their good-byes at the same time as my Fred-parents, because just about every kid I could see was screaming and crying and wailing and desperately hugging.
    And yet somehow, above all that noise, I could hear another sound: an airplane engine zooming closer and closer. I looked up, fixing my eyes on one dark speck in the blue, blue sky. The speck grew bigger and bigger; it transformed from a speck into an evil winged creature. Then it dropped from the sky and rocketed across the runway toward all of us kids and Freds. The engine noise became overpowering; it drowned out the screams, the cries, the weeping.
    Then the plane