Counting Stars by David Almond Page A

distinguish that single yellow bird among so many.
    Outside, I felt his eyes upon me as I crouched in the lettuce bed.
    “Try to bring the big un round,” he said.
    “Aye,” I said.
    I felt his touch on my shoulder, heard his murmuring.
    “Good lad. Aye, good lad.”
    We waded into the chrysanthemums and cut a huge bunch of flowers. We wrapped them in newspaper, and he set me off, bearing these gifts to his only daughter.
    It was a short walk between the garden and the house. Narrow Windy Ridge, then Rectory Road with the broad verges and the overhanging trees, then the lane into our ring of houses. The street was covered with dust. Sunlight lay flat against the dark red walls, it glittered on the windows. The shadows cast were angular and black.
    “Where you goin’?”
    I looked around. Ken and Terry Hutchinson stood at their front door. I turned and walked on.
    “Where you been?”
    I said nothing, wanted nothing to do with them. It was Ken who was calling, the oldest. Ken strode around the neighborhood like a man and all the younger children knew, without understanding, the squalid rumors about him. I walked on until I heard them on the pavement behind.
    “Hey, Ken,” said Terry. “Look. Flowers!”
    “Aye. Flowers!” said Ken.
    Colin had told me never to run. I turned and Terry grabbed the parcel and spilt the flowers and the lettuce across the ground. I reached for him but Ken came to his side and with his black pointed boots he began to grind the flower heads to pulp. He kicked the lettuce and it burst and scattered onto the roadway.
    He pointed into my eyes.
    “Next time we speak, don’t bloody well ignore us. Right?”
    “There’s plenty left in the garden,” my mother said. “Don’t let that lot worry you.”
    When I went upstairs, Colin was still in bed. He told me to pass his jeans from the door. I threw them to him and sat on the window ledge. I flicked through a soccer magazine while he lay cursing and struggling to pull the narrow legs of the jeans across his heels.
    “Coming to the garden today?” I asked.
    He shrugged. He might. He went to the wardrobe and put on his yellow shirt and watched himself in the mirror. I started to tell him what had happened in the street. He turned. Nobody picked on his brother. Where had I seen them? I answered vaguely. It wasn’t revenge I wanted. If Colin came back with me now, we might meet them on the way, I said. But he turned to the mirror again, and said he might come later.
    “You go back,” he said. “We’ll fix the Hutchies later.”
    My grandfather took his pipe out of his mouth and spat at the earth. The Hutchies. Always a bad lot, and there were lettuces aplenty. He smiled and touched my cheek. Nothing to worry about.
    “He didn’t come, then,” he said.
    The morning passed quietly. I fed the hens. I wiped feathers and mud from their shells, placed them in cardboard trays in the greenhouse. Together, we watered and weeded a patch of leeks. The day grew warmer and he sent me to the shop for lemonade. We shared the bottle, wiping its rim before lifting it to our lips. I turned away smiling when I saw how the liquid drew sweat from the old man’s skin. It stood in droplets above his tightly fastened collar, ran in thin trickles from below his tightly fitting cap.
    When the distant factory sirens started to howl, I exclaimed at how quickly this morning had passed.
    “Aye,” he said. “Not long till you’re at that new school of yours.”
    “No,” I said, and I heard the sudden trembling in my voice.
    We parted at the gate.
    “See you this afternoon, then?” he said.
    I nodded.
    “Aye.”
    He turned toward the club across the fields, where as always he’d spend an hour or two with old friends. I set off for home with fresh flowers and a lettuce under my arm.
    A scorching afternoon had settled on the neighborhood. Children played in the gardens, on the verges, in the meager shadows of young trees. Front doors were wide open. Old