Artichoke Hearts Read Free Page B

know what’s inside.
    For as long as I can remember Nana has always worn this silver bracelet. It’s a delicate silver chain with just one charm on it, in the shape of what I always thought was a flower, but now
I look closer I see that it’s actually some kind of vegetable.
    ‘What is it?’ I ask Nana, inspecting it closer.
    ‘An artichoke. Uma! Haven’t you ever cooked up an artichoke for them?’ Nana calls out to Mum.
    ‘Probably not!’ Mum calls back wearily.
    The artichoke charm is the size of the nail on my little finger. It has layers and layers of silver leaves, painted at their tips with green enamel. Each leaf gets smaller and more delicate
until it reaches the centre . . . a tiny blood-red heart. I look down at Nana’s bare wrist, where this charm bracelet has always lain against her skin, until today that is.
    ‘This hand is past adornment,’ she sighs, lifting her bony wrist up to the light and staring at it as if she doesn’t recognize it as her own.
    I walk into the bathroom to get changed and I lean hard against the door so Krish doesn’t barge in. There is no lock; Nana doesn’t believe in them. There are lots of things my nana
believes in or doesn’t believe in.
    I look in the mirror. The skirt is too pretty but it’ll be all right with jeans underneath and some Converse, I suppose. I fumble to close the catch on Nana’s bracelet, but
it’s tricky to hold it together and seal the clasp at the same time.
    ‘I can’t do up the bracelet,’ I tell Nana, coming out of the bathroom.
    ‘Ah! You’re a vision,’ she whispers, swirling me around.
    I hold my wrist out for her to fasten the clasp.
    ‘No, no, no, no!’
    At first I don’t understand why she’s got herself worked up into such a state, but then she holds the two pieces of broken chain apart, one in each hand, as the artichoke heart rolls
on to the floor.
    ‘Isn’t that typical? I’ve worn this bracelet forever, and it has to go and break, today of all days.’
    The charm rolls towards Laila. Her beady eyes are following its path across the wooden floor as her crab-like fingers reach out to grab it, but I get there first so, of course, she sends up one
of her blood-curdling screams.
    ‘Never mind, you can always replace the chain,’ Nana sighs, sliding the charm back into the little purse. ‘It’s the heart that matters.’
    She’s upset. I can tell she’s upset and trying to hide it. It matters to her that the chain is broken, and it matters to me, and you can tell by the way no one knows what to do or
say next that somehow all this means more than it should. Birthdays are like that, aren’t they? Too much pressure.
    Aunty Abi draws the curtains. We’re in the half dark now. It’s a bit embarrassing but I have to admit the flickering candles still make me breathless with
excitement. Everyone sings ‘Happy Birthday’. It’s one of those ‘Happy Birthdays’ where people start off slightly after each other and in a different pitch. Krish sings
‘crushed tomatoes and poo’, as usual, but the rest of them plough on, willing a harmony that never quite happens in our family . . . it’s a relief when they get to the final
‘you’.
    Aunty Abi, who is brilliant at baking, has made me a heart-shaped cake with pink icing (of course!) and white marshmallows on the top. Mum can’t bake because she doesn’t use weighing
scales and she’s not precise enough. But Aunty Abi’s cakes always look so pretty – prettier than you could buy in a posh cake shop – and they taste even better.
    Before I have the chance to get a closer look, Laila dives at the marshmallows, burning her podgy fingers on the candles and sending up an outrageous screech as Mum pulls her clenched fist away.
There is no way she’s going to let go of those marshmallows. Now that the spongy sweet goo is safely stored in her hamster cheeks, she scrunches her eyes closed tight and wills it to melt on
her tongue.
    I blow out my candles in