The Sister Surprise by Abigail Mann (book series for 10 year olds .txt) 📕

lads, they always rib me if I can’t keep up shot for shot.’ He puts a hand over his mouth, pausing on the spot. An owl hoots from above, but I can’t remember if this is a good omen or a bad one. Instead of belching, he swallows and rubs his eyes with the palms of his hand. Thank you, my little owl friend.

‘I’m good,’ he slurs.

‘You sure?’ I ask, glancing back to the doors to see if it’s necessary to enlist support. Kian nods, closes his eyes, and tips forward to prop himself up against the wall, his hand beside my head. He’s well within my personal space, but just as I’m about to slip under his arm, I notice a trickle of blood on his forehead.

‘You’re bleeding,’ I say.

‘Nah,’ he says dismissively.

‘You are! What happened?’ I say, reaching up. I push his head to one side, exposing a two-inch cut along his hairline.

‘Scythe fell off the wall in the barn this afternoon. My fault.’

‘Have you tried to stick yourself back together?’ I say.

‘Yeah. No time to go to the doctors,’ he says, smiling stupidly. ‘Superglue.’

‘That’s not meant for your head!’

He opens his eyes, but his gaze is unfocused and hazy. As I step away, Kian loses balance, falling in the same direction, which results in him headbutting my cheek.

‘For fuck’s sake! Ouch!’

‘My tooth!’ cries Kian, clutching his mouth.

‘It landed on my cheek! Fucking hell!’ I clutch my nose and rub my face to divert the pain, my palm covered in balmy pink. Oh, blusher. You were good whilst you lasted.

‘Have I walked into something?’ says a voice from the direction of the graveyard. Kian squats by my feet and heaves by the drainpipe.

‘Moira! You’re here! Where’s your tartan ceilidh skirt?’

Moira steps in front of an ornate tomb criss-crossed with ivy, dramatically lit from the disco lights thrown from the church hall windows. Her face is pale, eyes puffy and pink. I take my hand away from my cheek and take a step towards her, but she tenses.

‘What happened?’ I ask.

‘What happened?’ she says in a tone I’ve not heard her use before. ‘Shouldn’t you tell me? Or am I really the last person in the world who knows that you’re my sister?’

Chapter 32

‘It was meant to be tonight. I was going to tell you tonight.’

Moira doesn’t look angry. Instead, she glances from Kian to me, her eyes wide with confusion. I wince from the after-effects of Kian’s drunken headbutt, but other than saying ‘sorry’ in between heaves, he’s too preoccupied to lend his attention elsewhere.

‘Were you?’ says Moira, biting her lip. She twists the wrist strap of her jacket in her hands, not wanting to meet my eye. I feel entirely sober, more so than I ever have done in my life. It’s like my insides have shrivelled up, gone black, and been plucked out with a cocktail stick.

‘It looks like you and Kian have had a proper laugh tonight. Can’t say it’s been so fun for me.’

‘No, that’s not what this is. Moira, honestly, I planned to talk to you about it tonight. It was supposed to be nice. Special, even. I know how much you love ceilidhs, so I was going to tell you here, honestly.’

‘Can someone tell me what this big secret is?’ says Kian, looking over his shoulder at us like Gollum squatting beside The One Ring.

‘No … yes. Later, I need to—’ I stutter.

‘Ava’s my half-sister,’ says Moira. She walks towards me. John spots her from inside the hall and gestures for her to go in, but she shakes her head and looks up at the branch of a pine tree, blinking.

‘What?’ says Kian, dropping back onto his heels.

‘Moira, I asked Jacqui where you were and she wouldn’t say. I would have come over to the house if I’d known that you found out like this.’

‘Ah, you spoke to Mum? Is she the one you refer to as the … hang on a minute, I took a screenshot.’ Oh, shit. No, no, no. ‘“The Hilltop Sasquatch of Kilroch”? Because I can’t think of anyone else who was on the cliff the day you almost drove the quad bike onto the rocks.’

Moira’s face is lit by the backlight of her phone, her hair in rat-tail tendrils from the rain. She scrolls with her thumb, eyes scanning the screen. I simultaneously want to hug her and kick the phone out of her hands.

‘I sent the diaries in, but that part is not me. I didn’t use those words; someone else did. I’m going to fix it. I’m so sorry.’

‘Did you or didn’t you come up here to write about us?’

‘I did. But I didn’t have an agenda,’ I explain. ‘I know that sounds bad, but – shit. This isn’t coming out properly. Moira, I came up here to meet you. As soon as I got to know the village, it felt … grubby to write about everyone in that way, especially you. What I wrote isn’t what ended up on that website. Duncan – my boss – he edited it without telling me. But I’m going to fix it. When I get back to London, I’m going to sort everything out. I’m sorry. This was meant to be a celebration. I didn’t mean for you to see it.’

‘What do you mean, “you didn’t mean for me to see it”? Do you think we’re all so thick here in Kilroch that we can’t figure out how to open a web page?’ says Moira.

‘No, that’s not what I meant. I know I should have said something straightaway. I know that, OK? But I wanted to do it properly. Those articles are awful, I’ll be the first to admit that. My colleagues at Snooper … they don’t understand everyone here. I know they come under my name, but they aren’t my thoughts.’

She bites her lip and shifts from one foot to the other. Her body language isn’t bitter, but protective; wide-eyed, forlorn, shoulders round like she’s