By Any Other Name Read Free Page B

there something wrong with her?
Well done! Round of applause for you all, and a fat ring doughnut with sugar sprinkles for being the bright sparks . .
.
    ‘Eeee . . . eeee . . . eeee . . .’ Katie bounces on her heels as we get closer still. Mum smiles, vague and placid. She’s better at this than me. I’m still bubbling with
anger as the rest of the stupid queue start to get it. They glance down, then turn away. They turn towards anything, look at anything rather than us. I glare at all of them, even though they
won’t know it because they’re not watching us now. I glare at every single one in turn.
    I guess the awkward thing about Katie is that she looks completely normal and she’s just young enough to pass for being badly behaved at first, especially when she has a tantrum. This is
how it usually goes: stares, frowns; sometimes they say things to each other; sometimes they even say things to us in the case of the really rude ones. To be honest, the rude ones are easier to
deal with because you can look at them with contempt and say, ‘Actually she’s autistic,’ and then watch them squirm. Mostly they don’t say anything though, but stand there
and look disgusted. Either way, the result is the same. They duck their eyes down, ashamed of what they were thinking before they knew she has autism, and then they turn away. That’s how
ninety-nine per cent of people react around Katie.
    Then there’s the other one per cent. The ones who hate. Who believe they’re so much better than her that they have the right to shout insults or throw things. They make me so mad
that I can’t speak and the breath chokes inside my lungs just thinking about them.
    The woman directly in front turns to face us. She’s older than Mum with smartly cut grey hair and she winks at Katie. ‘I like doughnuts too.’
    ‘Eeee!’ Katie says in delight.
    I don’t know why my sister makes these noises because she can speak perfectly well when she wants. I guess she must like the sound.
    Mum’s looking at the woman with a half-smiling, half-wary expression. And the woman looks back at her with a question in her eyes –
What’s wrong with her?
    Suddenly I hate, hate,
hate
the stranger for that. Even though she’s the one being nice when the others aren’t. Even though she’s right and there is something wrong with
Katie. I hate her for being able to understand what Katie can’t and never will. I hate her for being normal when Katie isn’t. And I hate her for not having to live the way we do now,
memoryless and past-less. And of course, that’s to do with Katie not being normal too. Because if she had been normal she would never have noticed what she did and we wouldn’t
–
    It all boils up in my throat and I know I’m on the verge of screaming, so I hurry out of the baker’s and across the road to look in the window of the gift shop opposite. I’m
still shaking when Mum comes out. Katie’s chewing on her doughnut. Waiting is another of those things she can’t understand, no matter how hard we try to teach her.
    ‘OK?’ Mum asks.
    ‘Yeah, just got . . . you know . . .’
    She nods. ‘But one good thing about being in a village is that they’ll all know who she is soon and they’ll stop staring.’
    I know she’s right, but the hate is still lodged in my throat like unchewed bread.
    Later that afternoon, I’m hanging out in my room trying to sort out where to put my stuff when Dad calls up, ‘Holly, she’s here!’
    I want to pretend I haven’t heard but Dad will only come up if I do so I abandon the pile of shoes and trudge down the stairs.
    ‘Hi, Holly.’ There’s a woman with a fakely bright smile sitting in the kitchen. ‘Here to see how you’re settling in.’
    One of the witness protection mob who’s been assigned to check up on us here. I prefer our guy from home. OK, I’ve not even met this woman properly, but I still prefer our guy from
home. It’s one of those knee-jerk things – as