The Listmaker Read Online Free Page B

city centre, Dad had made a joke about this area being full of wild hillbillies. He’d said that next time he caught up with them, the aunts would probably be wandering around barefoot with clay pipes wedged in their mouths.
    Aunt Dorothy just about fitted in already with her nicotine addiction! Dad and Piriel didn’t smoke, and neither did any of their friends; they wouldn’t be seen doing anything so uncool. I could see a thread of smoke spiralling up from further down the garden. Aunt Dorothy, who didn’t even seem to realise it was uncool, was sitting on a log just where the bush block began, lighting a cigarette from the stub of another. I hurtled down the rest of the path and made her put it out. There was never much point yelling messages at her from a distance. She always seemed to be enclosed in some kind of container, like those bottled sailing ships, and if you wanted to attract her attention, you had to get up close and sort of tap on the glass. It was hard to believe she was the sister of short, teapot-shaped Aunty Nat. Aunt Dorothy was tall and gawky and she hadn’t been anywhere near a hairdressing salon for years. Her hair was just scraped back into a knot and shed hairpins like pine needles all day long.
    â€˜Moving day was the date we all picked for you to give up that disgraceful habit once and for all,’ I said. ‘What happened to the patch?’
    â€˜It’s okay, I ripped the darn thing off first.’
    â€˜It’s
not
okay. You’re supposed to be a committed quitter now, with hours of clean air in your lungs.’
    â€˜I promise I’ll try again tomorrow.’
    â€˜It’s for your own good,’ I said, nudging her back towards the house. It was like taking a brontosaurus for a walk. On the way there she managed to collide with a branch, a garden tap, an old wheelbarrow and the barbecue. A couple of bricks fell off the barbecue, but it didn’t seem to matter very much. The whole thing was full of dead leaves from a huge tree that arched over the house like an extra green roof. The gutters were choked up with dead leaves, too, but instead of chopping that tree down, someone had stupidly built a seat all around its trunk. Aunty Nat, who’d come outside for one last gloat before going to bed, just said quaint little touches like that were what gave Avian Cottage its character.
    â€˜Here’s another quaint little touch,’ I said, handing her the bundle of scones. ‘Someone from next-door slung them over the fence at me, but you and Aunt Dosh are welcome to the lot. I don’t want any, thanks very much. There’s no way of telling how
clean
that tea-towel actually is.’
    â€˜Sarah, anyone would think germs have their own mafia with you as a personal target,’ Aunty Nat said. ‘This cloth is
perfectly
clean. It was very neighbourly of those people, and I hope you thanked them nicely. What with Dorothy being such a hermit and you acting so superior lately, it’s a wonder we have any mates at all.’
    â€˜I do
not
act superior …’ I began, but then stopped self-consciously, wondering if it was maybe true. Tara McCabe at school had called me a snob a couple of times. And once she’d snapped at me in the dining room, ‘We’re sick of hearing about your dad, Radcliffe! He’s probably just as stuck-up and boring as you are!’ At least that’s what I
think
she said. Tara had shocking table manners and often talked with her mouth full. Perhaps she’d just been jealous that day because the mail had come and Dad had sent me a wonderful new watch, even though it wasn’t my birthday or anything. Although Tara might have thought I’d been showing off, I was always more than willing to lend my things to her or anyone else. They could have even borrowed that new watch if they’d asked. (Dad must have forgotten he’d already sent me two duty-free watches on other trips