Free The Slightly Bruised Glory of Cedar B. Hartley by Martine Murray Page A

photos of each other and then printing them up. One boy rushes over to the teacher, beaming. He’s done a silly portrait of her. She laughs at him just as if she’s one of the kids. Then she leans over a quiet boy and helps him colour something on the computer. This boy is the only one who doesn’t look excited or interested, even though he’s somehow focused and determined. I feel a bit sad, watching him, because he doesn’t seem to care.
    I’m standing there, shyly watching, because I can see straightaway that I’m the odd one out. I hadn’t expected kids. Kids can be scarier than adults, because they’re not polite; they say exactly what they think. So I’m not sure what to do.
    I’d heard people talk about refugees, but I never had a picture in my mind that went with the word ‘refugee’. So it was a word without a face; a word that got talked about and dealt with by other people. But once a word gets a body and a face that speaks, then it begins to be real to you and you begin to have feelings for it. Once I saw those kids, leaning over the table and helping each other out and laughing, I understood that word with my heart, not just my head, and it made me see that the closer you get to something the more it will mean to you, and then the more it will matter to you, and then the larger your life will become for having to reach out like a big embracing arm to hold it all.
    I’m watching a tiny girl whose hair coils in little fuzzy knots on her head. When I smile at her she laughs and then runs away, and I laugh too.
    â€˜Come and meet Inisiya, she’s about your age,’ says Aunt Squeezy, pulling me towards the corner where a girl sits at the computer. Inisiya’s dressed in jeans and a green zip-up sloppy-jo, and her long black shiny hair is tied back in a ponytail. I feel shy and wonder if she really wants to meet me, but Aunt Squeezy is already talking to her.
    â€˜Inisiya, Eliza needs you to translate. And I want to introduce you to my niece, Cedar. Inisiya’s from Afghanistan.’
    Inisiya pushes her chair back and turns around. She has large dark eyes which blink as she smiles at us. I recognise her immediately. She’s the skinny girl who got out of the Abutula’s van. I don’t know if she recognises me. She simply says, ‘Hi.’ Then I say, ‘Hi.’ She stands up and asks Aunt Squeezy if Eliza needs her now, and then she wanders out to help. But I know then and there that we must have been meant to meet, and that I will find a way to talk to her. Already I can’t wait to tell Caramella.

Chapter 15
    When Mum comes home that night, she plonks herself down on the couch next to me. I’m watching The Simpsons , but it’s a repeat so I don’t mind her interrupting. At first it seems she has come in to talk about volunteering.
    â€˜So, how was the Learning Network? Did you enjoy it?’
    â€˜I did, actually.’ I have to admit it, even though I hate to let her know that she was right about it being good for me. But I don’t give her too much. She presses me for more, of course.
    â€˜Well, tell me, what did you do?’
    â€˜Oh, mainly I was just meant to talk to kids who need help with their English.’
    â€˜Ah,’ she says, and by the look on her face I can tell her attention is drifting. I wonder then if this could be the right moment to bring up the audition. You have to pick the absolute optimum moment when asking for something that you know is going to be a very enormous ask. If you ask too early, it’s like opening the oven door on a cake and making it sag. I decide first to enthuse a bit about my new position in the world as a volunteer; puff up the moment with examples of me as her wonderful, deserving child.
    â€˜I met this great little boy called Sali from Sudan in Africa. He has the most beautiful laugh. His dad is driving cabs here. Also, there’s this older