A Small Free Kiss in the Dark by Glenda Millard Page A

I never left Max and Billy by themselves for a second. I had to be there when Billy told Max we were leaving. I wanted to hear the words so I’d know if it was just Billy and me going or all three of us. Max didn’t argue when Billy said we’d have to find another place to stay, and he didn’t cry when Billy told him his mother might not come. He just kept on drawing and said, ‘Mummy always came for me before.’
    Billy said we needed another tactic. That’s when I knew we were taking Max along. ‘We’ve got to get his mind off his mother.’
    ‘Why don’t we think of some places we could go?’ I said. ‘Things Max would like to see.’
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘Trains? He loves trains. He’s got heaps of pictures in his book. We could take him to the station for a visit, to get him used to being away from here.’
    Most of the people who were there when we first came to the library had gone. Every day more people left. Sometimes others came, but not many. I finally got the nerve to tell Billy what I’d done, but I let him think I only did it to keep the books safe, like the Friends of the Library. He didn’t say if what I’d done was right or wrong, but he found me a suitcase with wheels to put the books in.
    On the day we planned to take Max to look at the trains I got the books out of their hiding-place and put them in my case. Then I went to say goodbye to Cecily. Even though Billy never said so, I had a feeling we wouldn’t be coming back.
    ‘Come with us, Cecily. We’re like sitting ducks up here,’ I said, repeating the words I’d overheard that morning.
    She laughed softly and shook her head. ‘Don’t worry about me, Skip, where I’m going, nothing can hurt me.’
    I gave her the end of the dried sausage that I’d been saving for emergencies. Her lips curved and her eyes sparkled under her soaring eyebrows and she put her bony arms around me. They felt like wings, and I remembered someone telling me once that you turn into an angel when you die. I wondered if Cecily knew the rules for praying. I wanted to ask her if you could reverse a prayer or if you had to be a good person before God would take any notice. But I couldn’t because there was a lump in my throat, and in my head was a picture of Cecily flying away. I closed my eyes and she whispered something into my hair.
    ‘Remember, Skip,’ she said, ‘that home is where your winter coat is.’
    I didn’t understand right away what she meant. But her words soaked through my skull like warm oil, behind my eyes, down my spine and into the empty space inside me.
    There was one last thing I wanted to do before we left. I went outside and drew a picture of Michaela on a patch of broken footpath. It was the first time I’d drawn anything since the flowers and cross I did for Bradley Clark when I thought he was Billy. I’d never done a portrait. For Michaela’s face I drew a pond. I drew irises for her eyes, and for her lips I did a small pink rosebud lying on its side. Then I went inside and told Billy I was ready.
    But Max wasn’t. He wanted to see the trains but he was afraid his mother might come while he was gone. He screamed and kicked and cried and bit Billy on the hand. I promised him a ride on my suitcase with wheels, but he wouldn’t shut up. Billy and me didn’t know what to do. Then Cecily and the knitting lady came to see what was going on.
    ‘I’ll watch out for your mum,’ Cecily told Max. She closed her eyes and stroked his head and said the words over and over like a magic spell. Max’s muscles relaxed and his face faded from red to pink, like the sun was going down under his skin, and at last he stopped crying. He lay still and the knitting lady, who didn’t like noise and never even talked to us before, leant over and gave him something. It was a pair of striped mittens with button eyes and stitched-on smiles.
    There was a 7-Eleven store on the corner, across the road from the station. We went shopping there before we