Neighbours
Authors: Colin Thompson
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Copyright Act 1968
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The Floods 1: Neighbours
ePub ISBN 9781864715736
Kindle ISBN 9781864716986
This work is fictitious. Any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental.
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First published by Random House Australia 2005
Copyright © Colin Thompson 2005
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia.
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National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication Entry
Thompson, Colin (Colin Edward).
Neighbours.
For children aged 8+.
ISBN 1 74166 073 4.
ISBN 978 1 74166 073 9.
I. Title. (Series: Thompson, Colin (Colin Edward) The Floods; 1).
A823.3
Illustrations by Colin Thompson
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At first glance, as long as you are at least a hundred metres away and see them from the back on a dark autumn evening when it's raining, the Floods look like any other family. There is a mum and a dad and some children. They all have two eyes, one head, two arms and two legs and hair on top of their heads â except Satanella, who has no arms but four legs and hair all over her body.
At second glance, especially if you're
less
than a hundred metres away and see them from the front, the Floods do not look like any other family. Mum and Dad and most of the children always wear black clothes. Even Satanella wears a black collar encrusted with black diamonds against her black fur. Only the
youngest, Betty, is different. Her hair is blonde and she wears ordinary, brightly coloured clothes and skips a lot.
The Floods are a family of witches and wizards, even Betty, although she looks almost normal. She likes looking different from the rest of them. It makes her feel special. It also lulls the world into a false sense of security. She is the only one of the Floods who people don't cross the road to avoid.
They even feel sorry for her and say, âLook at that sweet little girl having to live with those weird people, poor thing.'
It all started when Betty's mother, Mordonna, decided that six children who were witches or wizards was enough. Valla, Satanella, Merlinmary, Winchflat and the twins, Morbid and Silent, were each, in their own weird and scary way, the sort of children any witch or wizard parent would be very proud of.
Satanella, for example, is not the family pet â she's actually one of the children, but because of an unfortunate accident with a prawn and a faulty wand, she was turned into a fox terrier. Although
it's possible to reverse the spell, Satanella has actually grown to like being on all fours. Merlinmary also has hair all over her body
1
but she is not a dog, even though she does growl a lot and likes chasing sticks.
âI would like a little girl,' Mordonna said to her husband, Nerlin, after the twins were born. âA pretty little girl who wants to dress up dolls in nice frocks instead of turning them into frogs. I want a little girl who I can do cooking with and make cakes that taste like chocolate instead of bat's blood.'
âBut, sweetheart, we're wizards and witches,' said Nerlin. âTurning things into frogs and blood is what we do. Our families have done it since the dawn of time.'
âI know, and I adore frogs and blood,' said Mordonna, âand I love our six wonderfully talented, evil children who are as vile as your wildest dreams.
I just want one pretty little girl to do ordinary mummy and daughter things with.'
âBut you grow death-cap mushrooms with the twins and you sharpen the cat's teeth with Valla.'
âYes, yes, I know,' Mordonna replied, âand I love all those things, but what about knitting and painting pictures of flowers?'
âWhat's knitting?' said Nerlin, but Mordonna had made up her mind. She was going to have one more child and that child would be a normal, ordinary girl with no magical powers. And instead of being made in a laboratory using an ancient recipe book, a very big turbocharged wand and a set of shiny Jamie Oliver saucepans, like some of the other children had been, this new child would be made the same way as you and I were.
2
When Betty was born, she looked just like the pretty little girl Mordonna had dreamt of. Of course, being a wizard's child she was very advanced for her age, and by the time she was three she was helping
her mum make soufflés and had knitted a cardigan for her granny, Queen Scratchrot. (The queen, with several other friends and relations, is buried in the back garden and feels the cold on winter nights because most of her skin has rotted away.)
But no matter how ânormal' she looks, Betty still has magic inside her. It's just little things most people wouldn't notice â like when she reaches for a book way above her head and suddenly the book is there on the table. Or when a glass floats across the kitchen, fills itself
up at the tap, the water turning into cordial with two ice cubes and a straw, and then floats back into Betty's left hand.
