Little Egypt (Salt Modern Fiction) Read Online Free Page A
Author: Lesley Glaister
other bird soon followed, sending a squitter of droppings down onto the parquet and shrieking until at last it found its mate and they huddled together amongst the startled tinkling of the crystals, crooning and preening.
They were way out of reach up there and they could have the ballroom to themselves – they’d only need seed and water. Cleo and the kittens would never catch them and nor would Osi.
Thinking she caught a glimpse of movement in a mirror, Isis turned to catch her own white face, her hair in its awful childish pudding-basin cut, her face a plain, pale pudding too. She tore her eyes away, went out quick and shut the door.
I HAVEN’T SET EYES on my brother for years. But I know there’s something wrong because the bucket system’s broken down. I will go up today. I’ve said it before, but today I really will. Those broken stairs – it’s like contemplating Everest. But really it’s the fear that stops me; I’ll admit it.
Yes, I admit it. I’m scared of what I’ll find.
The bucket system came about when we stopped talking, which was, I believe, 1992. Ten years! Gone like a flicker. Before that we used to eat together and have some sort of stunted conversation. Even in his heyday (did he have one? Did either of us?), Osi was never any good as company, not like a real person in the world. He’s not a real person in the world. He hasn’t left the house for decades or been seen by a single soul. The only person to whom he counts as anything is Mr Shuttle, the solicitor, for whom he exists as an occasional ragged wobble of ink on a dotted line. Mr Shuttle knows nothing and cares less about us. We are a task on his list of tasks, faceless. He pays his bill himself from our investments – easy money, I should say. Our scant and intermittent communication is conducted perfectly well by Royal Mail.
Ten years ago he wrote to advise me that in order to remain solvent, we would have to sell another parcel of land, informing us that he’d had what he called ‘feelers’ from the U-Save Consortium.
It was Grandpa himself who set the ball rolling by selling the land off to the railway board, before we were even born – around the turn of the last century, I believe. And then, in the 20’s, Victor sold the nut grove for the A road. And later we sold off the meadow, and after that parcels of land for the dual carriageway, which cut the estate in two. Those arrangements kept us in funds for years. Then U-Save bought the meadow on the other side of the road to build their supermarket with car park and petrol station. I saw no objection myself, and in fact it was a bonus, making shopping so much easier. But Osi refused to sign the contract, would only stick his fingers in his ears and hum like a demented hornet when I tried to tell him that we had no choice. So, of course, I had to forge his signature in order to sell the meadow, which is now my lovely spanking great big shop.
Osi has never set foot inside U-Save; and even when we still spoke, he maintained a ridiculous pretence that it wasn’t there. But how I love it!
If it weren’t for U-Save I would be stark staring mad by now.
Once he’d removed his fingers from his lugs and saw from his window that the bulldozers were ripping up the land, Osi sealed his lips to me forever, rarely even venturing down the stairs again. But there was absolutely nothing else I could have done. What else did he think we were to live on, the stupid, stubborn bugger?
Isn’t bulldozers a lovely word?
Since U-Save arrived, my life has been arranged like this: each day I push my trolley across the bridge to lose myself in that sweet brightness, the million choices that there are. The store is open 24/7, as they term it, and in the middle of the night, if I can’t sleep, I go across the bridge and wander in the aisles, counting things. In Home Laundry for instance – I have counted 54 ways you can wash your clothes. There’s liquid and there’s powder and there’s
They were way out of reach up there and they could have the ballroom to themselves – they’d only need seed and water. Cleo and the kittens would never catch them and nor would Osi.
Thinking she caught a glimpse of movement in a mirror, Isis turned to catch her own white face, her hair in its awful childish pudding-basin cut, her face a plain, pale pudding too. She tore her eyes away, went out quick and shut the door.
I HAVEN’T SET EYES on my brother for years. But I know there’s something wrong because the bucket system’s broken down. I will go up today. I’ve said it before, but today I really will. Those broken stairs – it’s like contemplating Everest. But really it’s the fear that stops me; I’ll admit it.
Yes, I admit it. I’m scared of what I’ll find.
The bucket system came about when we stopped talking, which was, I believe, 1992. Ten years! Gone like a flicker. Before that we used to eat together and have some sort of stunted conversation. Even in his heyday (did he have one? Did either of us?), Osi was never any good as company, not like a real person in the world. He’s not a real person in the world. He hasn’t left the house for decades or been seen by a single soul. The only person to whom he counts as anything is Mr Shuttle, the solicitor, for whom he exists as an occasional ragged wobble of ink on a dotted line. Mr Shuttle knows nothing and cares less about us. We are a task on his list of tasks, faceless. He pays his bill himself from our investments – easy money, I should say. Our scant and intermittent communication is conducted perfectly well by Royal Mail.
Ten years ago he wrote to advise me that in order to remain solvent, we would have to sell another parcel of land, informing us that he’d had what he called ‘feelers’ from the U-Save Consortium.
It was Grandpa himself who set the ball rolling by selling the land off to the railway board, before we were even born – around the turn of the last century, I believe. And then, in the 20’s, Victor sold the nut grove for the A road. And later we sold off the meadow, and after that parcels of land for the dual carriageway, which cut the estate in two. Those arrangements kept us in funds for years. Then U-Save bought the meadow on the other side of the road to build their supermarket with car park and petrol station. I saw no objection myself, and in fact it was a bonus, making shopping so much easier. But Osi refused to sign the contract, would only stick his fingers in his ears and hum like a demented hornet when I tried to tell him that we had no choice. So, of course, I had to forge his signature in order to sell the meadow, which is now my lovely spanking great big shop.
Osi has never set foot inside U-Save; and even when we still spoke, he maintained a ridiculous pretence that it wasn’t there. But how I love it!
If it weren’t for U-Save I would be stark staring mad by now.
Once he’d removed his fingers from his lugs and saw from his window that the bulldozers were ripping up the land, Osi sealed his lips to me forever, rarely even venturing down the stairs again. But there was absolutely nothing else I could have done. What else did he think we were to live on, the stupid, stubborn bugger?
Isn’t bulldozers a lovely word?
Since U-Save arrived, my life has been arranged like this: each day I push my trolley across the bridge to lose myself in that sweet brightness, the million choices that there are. The store is open 24/7, as they term it, and in the middle of the night, if I can’t sleep, I go across the bridge and wander in the aisles, counting things. In Home Laundry for instance – I have counted 54 ways you can wash your clothes. There’s liquid and there’s powder and there’s
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