Page 39 - LonnyQuicke

its slide and blown across her face.
After that there’s the Tower of London, St Paul’s
Cathedral, the Trevi Fountain, the Acropolis.
The last four photographs are of Farstoke – one at each gate. All taken on the same day, I reckon. It’s bright. Sunny. A clear sky. She’s wearing the same clothes in all four. That raspberry scarf still wrapped round her neck, even though it wasn’t cold from the
look of it.
First one’s the Northgate. Stag on top, my mother
underneath. Smiling. Her T-shirt’s dark green, with four white capital letters across the front. LIFE.
I looked for it once – the LIFE T-shirt. I looked for her coat too, and her black woolly hat, and her gloves, and her scarf. Searched through Dad’s wardrobe. I found the hat and the gloves, the exact same ones. I held them against my cheeks, breathed them in. But they just smelled old and dusty. I left them in the wardrobe.
Crock! Crock! Crock-a-crock!
Dixon?
What’s he crowing about?
Trying to impress the hens, I s’pose.
I turn over the page.
Eastgate. The hang-shouldered wolf. My mother
looks up at it. Pulls a pretend-scared face.
Crock! Croooooock!
Oh, be quiet, Dixon. Stop showing off. Next page is the Westgate.
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