The Taming of Lilah May Read Online Free Page A

stop laughing.
    â€˜Your face!’ I say. ‘Get real! I was only walking along a wall.’
    Adam’s smile of relief fades to a glower.
    â€˜You stupid idiot,’ he says. ‘If you’d fallen, you could have broken your back, yeah?’
    I lie on my stomach and laugh into the grass. Bits of it go in my mouth, but I don’t much care.
    Adam hauls me up and we leave the cemetery and head for home.
    He refuses to speak another word until we get to the gate outside my house.
    Then he glares down at me through his floppy fringe, and says:
    â€˜You’re not the only person who’s got issues, you know. Get over yourself, Lilah May.’

CHAPTER THREE
    I go round to Bindi’s house the next day to tell her about my date with Adam.
    Bindi’s house is like this Temple of Delights. It’s about as different from my house as you can imagine.
    She lives with her very large Asian family in a chaotic modern house on the other side of town from us. She’s got five little sisters and one little brother and two insane, chattering and multi-tasking parents who are forever throwing their arms up in the air and shrugging their shoulders as they talk me into the ground.
    I love going over to Bindi’s house.
    Her mum, Reeta, is an amazing cook and the house always smells of onions and savoury meat and hot, heavy, exotic spices. The kitchen is about a hundred degrees at any time of the year and there’s always some sort of family crisis going on, but it’s all warm and close and loving, just like a family should be.
    Except that mine isn’t.
    Not any longer.

    I’m up in Bindi’s bedroom and we’re supposed to be doing homework.
    Asian Network Radio is blaring out and Bindi’s weaving a long shiny ribbon into my hair, and she’s put one of those red dot things right in the centre of my forehead to make me into some sort of demented goddess or something. I don’t really know what she’s doing, and nobody else would ever survive trying to make me look girly, but Bindi gets away with it because she’s my best friend, and the thought of upsetting her would be a bit like the thought of hitting a soft, big-eyed puppy very hard.
    So I don’t. I sit as still as I can while she finishes my transformation into an Asian princess, and then I try on a few of her saris and spin around in front of the mirror to make her laugh.
    Actually, I look quite good. My colouring’s dark anyway and the dark red lipstick she’s forced me to wear suits my skin tone. I’ve got heavy black eyeliner around my bottom lashes – I always wear that, even at school. The teachers have given up trying to expel me for it, and now they just raise their eyebrows and shake their heads whenever I pound down the school corridors, all attitude and black make-up.
    â€˜Aha,’ Bindi is saying, with a satisfied smile. ‘There. You can come and live with us now.’
    I give her a rueful grin. ‘I wish,’ I say.
    In fact, I’d probably be driven mental by having to live with about fifteen people in one house. But I love the fact that Bindi’s family are so open and kind and that when I visit, they just sort of weave me into the fabric of the household, like I’m a missing thread that’s turned up in the sewing basket.
    As if to illustrate my thoughts, two of her little sisters come into the bedroom and dive onto my lap, where they fiddle with my hair and bracelets.
    I like pretending that they’re my sisters.
    Siblings are a bit thin on the ground in our house at the moment.
    My smile must have faded, because Bindi shoos her sisters out of the room.
    â€˜I’d quite like to live here with you, actually,’ I say. I guess I’m hoping she’ll say, ‘Oh, OK then,’ and I’ll just be given a camp bed to put on the floor here and never have to go home again.
    Bindi frowns.
    â€˜It’s not always quite the paradise