Free Too Much Trouble by Tom Avery Page B

that he was the best thief of the day. Suddenly, he was right at thecentre of the gang, while I found myself on the edge.
    If there had been a list of who was in charge of the gang, after Mr Green, Jamal would have been at the top, with his friends just behind. Me and Terri would have been at the bottom.
    It wasn’t that I did anything wrong. I got on with everybody, I stole things as well as I could and I was nice to the right people. I think I was right at the bottom for three reasons. One, because stealing never came naturally to me like it did to Prince. Two, because Jamal took a dislike to me. And three, because I was friends with Terri.
    We continued our conversation about books on that second evening in the new, empty house that Mr Green had taken us to.
    I found Terri beside me, with a whisper in my ear. ‘Follow me.’ She took hold of my hand with two fingers and her thumb - her little, white hands pinching my dark skin. She led me out of the back door, to a bench at the bottom of the new house’s garden. None of the neighbours could see into this garden, so Mr Green had said that we could use it.
    â€˜So, your favourite Narnia book?’
    I had forgotten where our earlier conversation had stopped and I had to think back carefully.
    â€˜Erm,
The Horse and his Boy
, I think,’ I replied.
    â€˜Oh, that’s a good choice. I like
The Last Battle
.’
    For all the time I knew her, me and Terri’s conversations were often like that. She would start from wherever we’d been interrupted earlier in the day, or where we’d fallen asleep the night before. Her memory was amazing. She never forgot what we’d been talking about.
    Terri’s favourite things to talk about were books and stories, but we talked about other stuff too.
    â€˜I found this in the house,’ Terri said, holding up a book with a picture of a pig’s head on it. It was called
Lord of the Flies
. ‘Have you read this?’
    I took it off her and stared at the cover. It looked a bit scary. I had not read it and told Terri so.
    â€˜Shall we read it?’ she asked. ‘I’ll read some to you and then you can read to me. OK?’
    â€˜OK.’ I smiled at her.
    Terri read well. Her quiet voice made the characters come alive. She never stuttered or stumbled over words. I didn’t do as good a job as her, but she didn’t mind. She said that she loved listening as much as she loved reading. Maybe there had been someone who had read to her before.
    I never found that out though. Somehow, in allour hours reading and talking, me and Terri hardly ever talked about our families. We avoided the subject of our pasts, except to tell little stories about school and friends.
    She told me about her best friend, Manon. She told me more about Manon’s house and home than her own.
    Manon and Terri were writing a story together. It was for a school project but they carried it on after the project was finished. Terri did most of the writing and Manon did the pictures. Terri called the pictures illustrations.
    The story was about two friends who went to boarding school together. Terri told me it was like
Mallory Towers
, but I’d never heard of that.
    They used to do all of it at Manon’s house. When I asked why they couldn’t do it at Terri’s house, she mumbled something about her dad and then quickly changed the subject.
    A few weeks later, following days and days of playing the part of thieves and two more moves into new, empty houses, me and Terri finished
Lord of the Flies
. We decided that we didn’t really like it. It scared us, but we still finished it.
    As Terri closed the book for the last time sheasked me, ‘Do you think our lives will change?’
    â€˜What?’ I replied. I didn’t know what she meant.
    â€˜Do you think we’ll always be with Mr Green?’
    â€˜Erm, I don’t know. I guess not.’ I hadn’t thought about this. I was