The Witch Read Online Free

led to some garbage cans and a high gate to the alley, padlocked. The wind was shrill and cold. Kerry rubbed at his eyes. I sucked on the collar of my coat for warmth. What were we supposed to do? Not just, what were we supposed to do in the cold yard, but for the whole of a day, or many days, in Mrs. Wojo’s house?
    After a while she called us back inside. We took off our shoes at the door, and then we washed our hands in the bathroom. She sat us down at the kitchen table and brought out two glassesof milk and two plates with sandwiches cut into quarters. Kerry and I tried them. They were filled with a thin, fishy paste, and we put them back down again.
    â€œWhat’s the matter with you?” Mrs. Wojo demanded. She was watching us from the doorway, smoking a cigarette and tapping the ashes into the lid of a jelly jar. “What do we got here, picky eaters?”
    â€œI don’t like it,” I said. I didn’t see any reason not to say so. I was that young. Kerry kept looking at his plate. He was scared for me.
    â€œIt’s tuna fish. Don’t tell me you don’t like tuna fish.”
    I didn’t know what to say to that. The tuna we had at home was mixed with mayonnaise and sweet pickle relish. This wasn’t the same. “How about milk?” Mrs. Wojo said. “You all right with milk?”
    â€œI like chocolate milk.”
    â€œDo you now,” Mrs. Wojo said, agreeably. She reached the end of her cigarette, put it out in the jar lid, and set the lid on the kitchen counter. “Well, when you’re old enough to get a job and earn money, then you can go buy chocolate milk. If you don’t want to eat, that’s your business. You look like you could miss a few meals and not suffer. You, now—” She stood behind Kerry and patted at his arms and shoulders. “You could use a little fattening up.”
    She turned and rummaged around in a cupboard. “Let’s try, ah, peanut butter. A little good old PB and J.”
    We watched while she hauled out the peanut butter and jelly, spread slabs of them on bread, cut the sandwich into four pieces, and replaced Kerry’s tuna fish with this new plate. Kerry and I looked at her, waiting. “Where’s mine?” I asked.
    â€œYour what? Your lunch? Sitting right in front of you. If you don’t want to eat it, I can’t make you.”
    The telephone rang then. Mrs. Wojo gave us an annoyed look, as if we were the ones interrupting her, and went out into the hall to answer it. Kerry shoved his plate at me. I took half the sandwich and shoved it back. I crammed it into my mouth and Kerry started in on his half. We heard Mrs. Wojo on the phone, her voice delighted and flirty. She said goodbye, in her fake, pleasant voice, and hung up. I wasn’t quick enough, my cheeks still bulging with bread when she came back in. I froze, awaiting my punishment.
    â€œThat’s better,” she said to Kerry. “You need to make a habit of cleaning your plate. Get some size on you. As for you, Missy.” She nodded in my direction. “If you don’t like lunch, maybe you’ll have a better appetite for supper.”
    Kerry and I traded looks, and I got the rest of the sandwich down as fast as I could.
    It was a piece of luck to discover Mrs. Wojo’s weakness right away—namely, she couldn’t see five feet in front of her face.
    After lunch we were sent upstairs for naps. “We don’t take naps,” I said, but quietly, under my breath.
    â€œWhat’s that?”
    Mrs. Wojo swung around to face us. She wore capri pants that showed her red, knobby ankles, and a shirt with a pattern of pineapples. I fixed my eyes on them, pineapple pineapple pineapple pineapple, so as not to look at her. “Nothing,” I said.
    â€œDo you two know why you’re here?” We didn’t answer. “Do you?”
    We said we did not. “It’s because you have unfit