Chapter 7 Chapter VII

did you see herBarkley asked Nate as he went upstairs, and Halliday was right behind them. That was my eldest sister. No.Knight said. She was out for a while, but is now home.Come on, let's compete who can run faster! Two little boys and a puppy scrambled up the winding stairs. I forbade myself to think about Barkley, for fear he might see me in the mirror, or on the glass bottle cap.Like everyone in my family, I just wanted to protect him.He is still young, I said to Fernie, and she replied: Can't you see us when you are young?Where do you think children's imaginary friends come from?

The two little boys ran to my parents' bedroom and sat down under a framed tombstone rubbing.The authentic rubbings come from a cemetery in London. My mother once told Lindsay and me that she met an old woman when she and her father were honeymooning in London. She and her father wanted to hang something special on the wall at home. They turned tombstones.By the time I was in my early teens, most of the rubbings at home were sent to the basement, and the walls were replaced with brightly colored realistic paintings, which were said to stimulate children to learn.But Lindsey and I still love tombstone rubbings, and the one hanging above Buckley and Knight is our favourite.

Lindsay and I often lay under this rubbing, I pretending to be the knight in the painting, Harold as the loyal dog crouching at the knight's feet, and Lindsay as his beloved wife who survived.No matter how solemn and solemn the atmosphere was at the beginning, we must have laughed together in the end.Linxi told me, who was lying on the ground and pretending to be dead, that she still had to live on as a wife, and that she couldn't stay by the side of a dead man for the rest of her life.As she talked, Linxi would definitely mention her new lover, who was either the butcher who gave her a good piece of pork, or the blacksmith who helped her make hooks, you are dead, knight, she said: I have to live Woolen cloth.

Last night Suzy came to see me and gave me a kiss.Buckley said. She didn't! she has! Really? real. did you tell your mother It was a secret, Buckley said: Susie said she didn't want to talk to anyone else yet.Do you want to see something else? OK.Knight said. They got up and ran to the other side of the room, leaving Halladi to doze off under the rubbings. Come, come in and have a look.Buckley said. They walked into my room and Lindsey took the photo I took for my mom. Lindsey thought about it for a while, and finally came back to get the Hippy︱Dippy Says Love badge. This is Suzie's room.Knight said.

Buckley raised his finger to his lips, a gesture my mother made every time she asked us to be quiet, and my younger brother had seen his mother do this, and now he did the same, signaling Nate not to speak.He bent down, put his little belly on the ground, told Nate to do the same, and they crawled on the ground like Halliday, slowly crawled over the folding ornaments hanging beside my bed, and came to me to hide things. secret location. There is a board under the box spring that covers the entire mattress and there is a small hole in the board through which I stuff things I don't want others to see, between the board and the mattress.I have to watch out for Halladi running into my room, otherwise he will scratch and grab things, and things will fall out in the end.This happened after I disappeared for a day.

My parents searched my room carefully, hoping to find some clues. After they left, they forgot to close the door. Halladi ran in and took out the twig I hid.My stash was strewn under the bed, one of which only Buckley and Nate could identify.Buckley unwrapped his father's old handkerchief, which contained a bloodstained twig. Buckley accidentally swallowed the twig a year ago when he and Nate were playing in the backyard where the two of them piled rocks up to the sky. There was an old oak tree in the yard. Buckley found a twig under the tree and put it in his mouth like a cigarette. I sat on the roof outside the window of my room with Clarissa painted on one side. Toenail polish, while flipping through fashion magazines, eyes still staring at Barkley from time to time.

I was always assigned to take care of my younger brother. My parents thought that Linxi was not old enough. What’s more, Linxi’s intelligence was budding. She should try her best. We couldn’t hinder her growth. One hundred and thirty colored crayons were used to draw the eyes of flies on the drawing paper, and it fell to me to look after Buckley. It was not too hot outside that day, and it was summer again, so I decided to do maintenance at home.After taking a shower and shampooing, I was steaming all over my body, so I sat on the roof to let the air dry while I slowly painted my pedicures.

︱A fly landed on the nail polish applicator, I put on two coats of toenail polish, listened to Little Nate's provocative words, and squinted to observe the flies that landed in front of me.Lindsey was in the house coloring the eyes of the flies, and I stared at the eyes to see if I could make out the different parts.The breeze blew gently, brushing the raw edge of my trousers against my thighs. Suzy!Suzy!Knight yelled. I looked down and saw Barkley on the ground. Every time I talk about saving lives with Harley, I always use what happened that day as an example. I believe that life can be saved, but Harley thinks it is impossible.I quickly got up and climbed over the window. I stepped on the sewing bench by the window with one foot, and carefully stepped on the ground with the other foot. After both feet touched the ground, I immediately ran to the stairs like an athlete. We weren't allowed to slide down the banister, and now I slid down the banister very quickly, called out to Lindsey, and ran out into the backyard.I went through the screen door in the backyard, jumped over the fence of the dog house, and made my way to the oak tree.

Buckley was choked up and trembling all over. I carried him into the garage, followed closely by Nate. In the garage was parked my father's favorite car, a Mazda. I had seen my parents drive, and my mother had demonstrated how to start the engine and brake. I know Dad put the car keys under a useless flower pot, I put Buckley in the back seat, took the key out of the flower pot, and drove all the way to the hospital, although the emergency brake of the car was burned out by me. Nobody seemed to care. If she hadn't made it to the hospital, the doctor later told her mother: "Your little boy is finished."

Because I saved my younger brother's life, my grandma said that I would live a long life.Alas, grandma's predictions are always wrong. Wow.Knight was amazed, he picked up the twig, and couldn't believe that the bright red blood turned black after a long time. Very punctual.Barkley said he still feels a little scared thinking about that moment.He was in so much pain, the big bed in the hospital was surrounded by adults, and everyone had serious expressions.After that incident, he only saw the same serious expressions of adults on another occasion.The difference was that in the hospital, everyone was very nervous at first, but afterward it was all right. There was a light of relief in the eyes of the adults, and their warm and kind eyes surrounded him.Now his parents' eyes were dull, and the light in their eyes seemed to disappear without a trace.

Feeling dizzy, I trudged back to the balcony of the square.It was getting late, I looked up, and suddenly saw a big house opposite me that I had never entered. I read "James and the Giant Peach" (James and the Giant Peach) when I was a child, and the building in front of me looks like the house of the protagonist's aunt in the book: a Victorian building, huge, dark, with a lookout on the roof. I originally thought that there were a row of women standing on the observation deck, pointing at me, but after I gradually became familiar with the dark surroundings, I realized that there were not women standing on the observation deck, but rows of crows. Every crow holds a twig in its beak.I turned and walked home, and the crows on the lookout tower flew high and followed me all the way.Did the younger brother really see me?Or is this just a beautiful lie of a little boy?