Lemonade Sky Read Free

which I made up for her, but she spat it out, saying it was watery.
    “Just think yourself lucky you’ve got anything at all,” scolded Tizz. “ We haven’t got anything.”
    Only tea bags, and we both hate tea. ’Specially without milk. We had to keep the milk to go with the cereal. There was just enough for Tizz and Sammy, but then we couldn’t find any sugar, so that got Sammy going again.
    “I can’t eat Krispies without sugar!”
    Tizz said, “Oh, for goodness’ sake!” She picked up the marmalade jar, spooned out a dollop and dumped it on top of Sammy’s bowl.
    “There! Stir that in.”
    “It’s marm’lade,” whined Sammy. “I don’t like marm’lade!”
    “Just get on with it,” snarled Tizz.
    Sniffling, Sammy did so.
    There were five slices of bread in the bin, but they were all hard, so I had to toast them.
    “You have two,” said Tizz, “cos you didn’t have any cereal.”
    And now there wasn’t any marmalade left, which meant I had to eat toast and marge, which is horrible, but there was only a scraping of butter and I let Sammy have that cos she won’t eat marge at any price.
    “Call this normal?” said Tizz, pulling a face.
    “We’ll go up the road,” I said. “After breakfast. We’ll buy stuff.”
    “What with?”
    “Money!” chortled Sammy. I guess she thought it was a joke.
    “Yeah, right,” said Tizz. “Money.”
    I jumped up. “Let’s look first and check what’s in the cupboard.” There might just be enough to keep us going.
    I pulled out everything I could find and stacked it up on the table. There wasn’t very much. A tin of baked beans, a tin of spaghetti, two tins of tomato soup, a tin of sausages and a tin of pilchards.
    We sat there, staring at them.
    “That’s not going to last ten days,” said Tizz. “Not even if we just have one tin a day. Between us.”
    Sammy was looking worried. “Why’s it got to last ten days?” Her lip wobbled. “When’s Mum coming back?”
    “Soon,” I said, “soon! But just in case – I mean, just in case she’s away for ten days–”
    Ten days, like last time. Sammy’s face crumpled.
    “Where is she? Where’s she gone?”
    “See, we’re not actually sure,” I said. I said it as gently as I could, but there wasn’t any point in lying to her. “You know how sometimes Mum gets a bit, like… excitable? Like when she’s having one of her big happies?”
    Sammy nodded, doubtfully, and stuck her thumb in her mouth.
    “It can make her do things she wouldn’t normally do. Like—”
    “Disappearing,” said Tizz.
    “But it’s all right,” I said, quickly. “She’ll come back! It’s just that we have to take care of ourselves while she’s not here.
    “And not tell anyone that she’s gone!”
    I said, “Yes, we’ve not got to tell anybody. Not anybody. ”
    That was the mistake we’d made last time. We’d been living over the other side of town, then, in an upstairs flat, and we’d been so scared when Mum went off that we’d told the lady in the flat next to ours, and she’d rung the Social Services people, and they’d come and taken us away. Even when Mum had turned up again they wouldn’t let us go back to her. It had been months before they said she was well enough to take responsibility for us. And all that time me and Tizz had been in a children’s home and Sammy had been with foster parents. That had been the worst part, being split up. We weren’t going to let that happen again.
    We’d still been quite little, then. Too young to look after ourselves. But I was twelve now, and Tizz was ten, and nobody, but nobody, was going to come and take us away!
    “I don’t suppose you remember last time?” said Tizz.
    Slowly, Sammy shook her head.
    “She was only a baby,” I said. “But now she’s big – she’s nearly six! She can be trusted to keep a secret. Can’t you?”
    Sammy said, “What secret?”
    “About Mum not being here. We don’t want people knowing, cos if they know