All the Colours of Paradise Read online

  On Friday when Perry Angel got to the number 5 bus stop, Mr Jenkins was waiting there. After his discussion with Nell, Mr Jenkins realised a new window of opportunity had opened right before his eyes. And that was why he had telephoned Miss Cherry.

  Perry was pleased to see his friend Jenkins. He was even more pleased when Jenkins came into his room.

  ‘Boys and girls,’ Miss Cherry said, ‘I’d like you to welcome Mr Jenkins. He’s volunteered to be my assistant. He’ll be here on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’

  Perry listened carefully. Those were the days he was going to be at school, too. Next, Miss Cherry said, ‘And he’ll be sitting right up front, next to Perry.’

  Jenkins looked important. He wore a shiny tin badge pinned to his checked shirt. It had his name printed on it and underneath his name, ‘Special Needs Integration Officer’. It didn’t take Perry long to figure out the real reason Jenkins was there. It was because he was Perry’s friend. And a friend is someone who loves you even when you do the wrong thing. But a friend is also someone who puts his finger under the word you are reading so you don’t lose your place, who will tell you the same thing eleven times over without getting mad, who reminds you about important things like eating lunch at the proper time, saying the words instead of just pointing and going to the toilet before it’s too late. A friend is also someone who reminds you about the things you must not do, like climb over fences and wait for the bus to go home in case your dog is waiting for you, when it is only playtime.

  Before home time, Miss Cherry reminded the children in her grade about the art show which was only two weeks away.

  ‘You can use pencils, paints, crayons, pastels or whatever you like. The picture can be made here at school, or at home, but it must be your own work. All the entries will be displayed in the courtyard beside the Colour Patch Café on the day of the fair. The winner will receive a trophy and have their entry displayed on the wall of the café. It costs one dollar to enter a picture, so you will need your parents’ permission. If you haven’t already done so, please give the note I sent home yesterday to your mother or father.’

  Jenkins did an excellent job on his first day at school. He even asked Miss Cherry for a Windows of Opportunity permission note and pinned it to Perry’s bag. Friends are orange with no black bits. Friends have heads with plenty of space inside for words as well as pictures. Friends have many fingers, like sunrays, to point to words and hold your hand. Sometimes friends stand near bus stops.

  9. Seven Hundred Paper Cranes

  On Friday afternoon, Layla was thinking about the way the Silk family made ordinary things seem extraordinary. Things like breakfast on Saturdays, which other people didn’t really seem to notice because they came around so often. Suddenly, Layla realised she hadn’t told her mother she’d been invited to stay that night at the Kingdom of Silk. The thought of missing out on a Saturday Breakfast at the Kingdom of Silk was more than she could bear.

  ‘Please, Mum, you know Saturday Breakfast is an OCCASION. I can’t miss out! And besides, I don’t need shoes to go to breakfast. No-one at the Kingdom of Silk wears shoes in summer, except on school days or if they’re being Superman.’

  A small, secret shiver zigzagged down Mrs Elliott’s spine when she thought of bare feet on dirt and grass where creepy, crawly things lived.

  ‘What do you mean it’s an OCCASION?’ she asked. ‘What can be so special about breakfast?’

  ‘Oh, Mum,’ sighed Layla. ‘I’ve told you before. They take it in turns to do the decorations and we eat in the garden under the Cox’s Orange Pippin. It’s Indigo’s turn this week and I just can’t miss out because she always does something really special. Indigo’s the best drawer, you remember, she’s got blue fingernails and wears feathers in her hair. She’s the one who got born just before Violet only we don’t call them twins because Annie says it’s not right to lump them together like they’re one person because they’re unique individuals.’

  ‘Well … I suppose we could go shopping in the afternoon, but not too late …’

  ‘Can’t we go on Monday after school? Griffin and I are going to do painting in the afternoon. We want to practise for Mr Kadri’s art show. It only costs a dollar to go in it and there’s a prize and you get your picture displayed and everything.’ That reminded Layla about the note she had brought home from school and she ran off to fetch it from her schoolbag, certain her mother would understand how important it was that she attend the breakfast and practise for the art show.

  Layla woke on Saturday morning to the sound of voices drifting lazily through the open louvres of the window in the sleep-out. She shook Griffin awake and then helped Perry put on his Superman costume before they ran down the long, echoing hallway and burst through the door into the kitchen. Nell was loading a tray with tumblers for Scarlet to take to the table.

  ‘Off you go!’ she said. ‘Indigo’s just about finished her decorations and everyone else is outside!’

  ‘Indigo thinks the world was made just so she can decorate it,’ said Scarlet grumpily. Getting up early on Saturdays didn’t agree with her now she was almost fifteen.

  Nell laughed. ‘Well, wasn’t it?’

  Indigo’s world was sensational. Hanging from the stooping boughs of the apple tree were hundreds of tiny blue and purple paper cranes. Even the tiniest puff of wind made them sway gently to and fro. From a distance they looked like butterflies.

  ‘I didn’t know you could do origami,’ said Saffron.

  ‘That’s because she’s a person of deep mystery,’ said Violet. ‘There’s a lot of things no-one knows about Indigo.’

  ‘It must have taken you ages,’ said Griffin. ‘How many are there?’

  ‘Exactly seven hundred,’ said Indigo. ‘I folded ten a day, seventy a week for ten weeks. They’re made from old wallpaper we peeled off our bedroom walls before we painted them.’

  ‘What about hanging them up?’ asked Saffron. ‘It must have taken forever.’

  ‘She was out here with a torch before the sun came up!’ laughed Ben.

  ‘Nope, I just stuck a paper clip through each one as I made it. Then all I had to do was hook the paper clips on to twigs. It was easy because the branches are so low.’

  ‘Why is all the food so weird?’ asked Scarlet, and the others turned to see what was on the table. There were bunches of blue-black grapes, ripe purple plums and passionfruit. The scones Indigo had coaxed Nell to make the day before were spread with blueberry jam and topped with cream and even the hard-boiled eggs had been dyed many shades of blue.

  ‘It’s just blue,’ said Violet, ‘not weird.’

  ‘Don’t you get it?’ asked Indigo. ‘It’s the indigo and violet theme.’ She sounded disappointed. ‘See, even the drinks are colour-coordinated.’

  ‘Oh, Indi, of course we get it,’ said Violet. ‘Scarlet’s still half-asleep, but I think it’s beautiful. Have a glass of grape juice to wake you up, Scarlet, or some blue lemonade.’

  ‘Sorry, Indigo, it really does look great, just a bit unusual, that’s all,’ said Scarlet. ‘Where did you get the blue lemonade from?’

  ‘I just put a few drops of food colouring into ordinary lemonade,’ answered Indigo.

  ‘Scarlet’s only jealous because she can’t think up such good ideas,’ said Saffron.

  ‘I’ve got an even better one for next weekend, just wait till you see it!’ said Indigo. Superman noticed the deep mystery in her voice and so did Scarlet. She wrinkled her forehead and asked, ‘What do you mean, next weekend? Isn’t it Amber’s turn?’

  ‘Yes, no, I mean, it’s the art show, you know, Mr Kadri’s Window of Opportunity. I’m going to enter!’

  It seemed Mr Kadri’s excitement had rubbed off on everyone. Layla licked the blueberry jam from her fingers and sighed contentedly. ‘I think I might do a still life,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘And I might call it Breakfast at the Kingdom of Silk. Can you leave some grapes on the table please, Indigo, and a jug? I’ll nee
d to look at them for my still life.’

  After breakfast, Superman was so full of blue food and drink he couldn’t fly, so he lay down in the shade and watched Indigo’s seven hundred pretty paper birds twirling hither-and-thither, this-way-and-that.

  Blue is the colour of Saturday Breakfast at the Kingdom of Silk, and the colour of Layla’s eyes. There are seven shades of blue in a tin of seventy-two pencils. Seven is tall with a veranda to keep it dry and it is blue. Seven hundred is blue, flying is blue and so is Indigo. You can call a dog Blue, but it is not really blue. A dog is furry and warm with no sharp corners.

  Blue was really Griffin’s dog, but Griffin was very proud of the way Blue understood that Perry needed a little extra looking after. He lay down beside Perry and said, ‘I think I might make a picture of a griffin. That’s my namesake. A namesake is something that’s got the same name as you.’

  The mythical creature which was part lion and part eagle was carved into the wooden cover of Griffin’s Naming Day Book where it would stay forever and not fly away. Perry had touched its wooden feathers, wooden beak, fur and claws.

  ‘You could do a picture of a peregrine falcon,’ said Griffin, ‘that’s your namesake.’ Perry remembered the picture of the falcon in Griffin’s bird book. Sometimes when he had his Superman costume on and when he was not full of blue breakfast he felt a bit like a bird, but other times he didn’t know what or who he felt like. Then Blue, who was really reddish-pink with white dots and was furry and warm with no sharp corners, came and licked Perry on the face, and laughter is the colour of watermelon.

  ‘What are you going to draw, Perry?’ asked Layla as she spread sheets of butcher’s paper over the table. ‘There aren’t many days left. The judging is next Saturday. You can sit up here with Griffin and me if you want to.’

  Perry sat beside Layla and watched as she drew grapes and jugs of blue water and Griffin drew his namesake. He thought about his own pictures he kept in the suitcase under his bed. They weren’t like Griffin’s or Layla’s.

  After a while, Perry and Blue went down to the studio to see what Annie was doing. She said she was painting a portrait. People were her favourite things to paint. She said everyone had their own style and their own favourite things they liked to paint. Indigo’s style was deep mystery. Perry didn’t know if he had a style or, if he did, what it was. All he knew was that he liked drawing pictures.

  10. The Door to Paradise

  In the poem that is painted on the door of the house at the Kingdom of Silk is a line which says: a time for loving and a time for hating. Layla was puzzled by that line. She thought it was wrong to hate, but on Wednesday she discovered it wasn’t.

  The bus was running late, which was unusual for Mr Davis. The first bell had rung and most of the children had gone inside, but Layla was still on the monkey bars. She and Griffin were waiting for Perry to arrive. Layla was up to her thirteenth crossing without stopping and wondering what the world record for monkey-bar crossings was, when they heard the bus. It pulled up at number 5 stop when Layla was almost to the end of the rungs for the fifteenth time.

  ‘Quick, let’s go and meet Perry,’ said Griffin, running towards the gate. The lollipop lady held her red sign up and blew her whistle and Perry started walking. He was carrying his drawing book under one arm. It was almost as big as he was.

  ‘Just a minute,’ puffed Layla. There might still be time to do her personal best if only her tired arms would last the distance. She was halfway through her sixteenth lap when Perry neared the kerb. What happened next whizzed by in a blur.

  First Griffin called out to Layla, ‘Hurry up!’

  At the same time Perry stepped up on to the footpath, his drawing pad fell to the ground. Layla saw three teenagers walking by. They were strangers. She dropped down from the middle of the monkey bars. Griffin was almost at the gate. Perry knelt down to pick up his pad. He’d brought it to show Miss Cherry the picture of being held in someone else’s arms. Layla couldn’t remember running, but suddenly she was at the gate beside Griffin. The lollipop lady was across the street with her back to the school, loading her signs into a car. One of the strangers stopped beside Perry who was sitting on the kerb trying to brush the dirt off his picture.

  ‘What’s up, kid?’ the boy said and his two friends gathered around.

  ‘It fell down,’ said Perry.

  ‘What is it?’ asked another of the boys.

  Perry Angel could dance the Spanish Fandango and catch the bus to school. He knew the numbers on all the bus stops and that one shiny dollar will buy you two tickets and a ride to the Colour Patch Café. He knew a buddy was the same thing as a friend. Sometimes Perry Angel had to be told eleven times over how to do something, but he was far more like everyone else than he was different. He felt hot, cold, thirsty, tired, excited, happy and sometimes sad. But when the strangers asked him what he had drawn, Perry couldn’t think of the right words to tell them about the feeling of being held in someone else’s arms. So he showed them his picture, which was now streaked with dirt.

  ‘Looks a bit like a dog’s breakfast to me,’ said the first boy and the others laughed.

  ‘It is not a dog’s breakfast!’ shouted Layla, bursting through the gate and taking Perry’s hand in hers. ‘Come on, Perry, don’t take any notice. They’re just bullies.’

  ‘Come on then, Miss Smarty Pants, tell us what it is.’

  Layla grabbed Perry’s pad and dragged him towards the gate where Griffin waited anxiously. He wanted to be brave like Layla, but should he run and fetch a teacher or stay with his friends? Suddenly he shouted something his daddy had once told him. ‘Just because you don’t understand something doesn’t mean it’s no good!’

  Layla’s legs trembled and her heart leaped in her chest like a frog in a sock. She slammed the gate shut behind herself and Perry and yelled, ‘This is Perry’s way of expressing his feelings!’

  ‘So that’s how ya feel, kid, like a big purple hairy thing? Huh, no wonder you can’t draw for peanuts.’

  It was over in seconds. The teenagers continued on their way, laughing, and no-one but Perry, Griffin and Layla had heard what they said. Then the second bell rang and the children hurried inside.

  It was silent reading time in Layla and Griffin’s classroom. Layla opened The Guinness Book of Records to the page about the world’s longest scarf, but she didn’t read it. She could only think about what had happened before the bell rang. She had done two wrong things. She had talked to strangers and gone outside the school grounds. But she knew she had to tell Miss Cherry because of Perry Angel.

  At first playtime, she waited by the door for Griffin and asked him if he would come with her.

  Miss Cherry listened carefully. She asked exactly what the strangers had said and done and what Griffin and Layla had said and done. Then she stood up and stared out the window for a while.

  When she turned around she said, ‘Thank you both very much for telling me what happened. Perry’s a lucky boy to have friends like you who love him so much and hate anything that’s cruel, untrue or unfair.’

  Layla understood then, what the line in the painted poem meant. ‘But hating wrong things doesn’t stop them from happening,’ she burst out, ’and what if Perry won’t draw any more because of what they said? Nell says it’s his way of expressing himself. It’s his favourite thing next to being Superman.’

  ‘Learning isn’t only about reading and writing. For Perry, language is the hardest thing. But I have a feeling that he understands some things better than other people do.’

  ‘What sort of things?’ asked Layla.

  Miss Cherry wanted to say that she thought Perry knew how to find the door to Paradise. She wanted to tell them he had learned its key could be a box of pencils, a tube of paint, a brush or a sheet of clean, white paper and that once you’ve been through it, there’s nothing that can stop you going there again and again and again. But she didn’t, because she was grown up and a school teacher, and Paradise
was not on the curriculum. Instead she said, ‘Like how to be happy when things around you aren’t so good. And that’s a very important thing.’

  11. Tales of a Teapot

  On Monday night the moon and all the stars shone down and Layla stayed up late. Miss Cherry had called in to make sure Layla was all right and to explain to her parents what had happened. Layla sat on the couch between her mother and father, and Miss Cherry sat on the philosophising chair. Layla had her pyjamas on and her new sneakers that were a bit too big because her mother had bought them without Layla trying them on first. The lamp was turned down low and, while the adults talked, Layla concentrated on her glow-in-the-dark shoelaces. In the dim light Mrs Elliott couldn’t see all the jobs that needed doing; like washing the dishes and vacuuming the plush-pile carpet and ironing all the interesting wrinkles out of the clothes. So she concentrated too, on making sure Layla knew how proud they were of her for taking such good care of Perry Angel.

  Then Mr Elliott said, ‘We know you’re upset about what those boys said, Layla, but the best thing we can do for Perry is show him that nothing has changed.’

  ‘But it has, hasn’t it?’

  ‘Words are just words, Layla, and they can only change things if we let them.’

  Layla thought that was one of her daddy’s best philosophies ever and so did Miss Cherry.

  When she reached the Kingdom of Silk, Miss Cherry paused before she knocked, and she read the words of the poem on the door, and they reminded her that some things never change.

  Inside the house Nell took a canister marked rice from the mantelpiece, scooped out two spoonfuls of tea-leaves, tipped them into her old brown teapot and carried it to the kettle. Then she filled it with boiling water, put a rainbow-coloured cosy on the pot to keep it warm and turned the pot three times clockwise and three times anti-clockwise, which is the magic formula for brewing magnificent tea. The teapot spout was chipped and the inside was stained, but the tea was hot and strong and good.