Hu-man Cannonball with us in the pool.

Thesmell of the powder and the cream mixed together was de-licious and sweet. Toby smeared butter on the handlesof taps, and mustard on the doorhandles. We sprayedthe lounge room with deodorant and flyspray, and thespooky mist settled on the furniture. We untuned theradio and lost the picture on the TV.

I ran down the stairs and across thegreen lawn, past pink concrete flamingos and white tyreswans, past coppery skinks sleeping on sunny rocks, pasthibiscus flowers scattered on the grass, and leaped overthe blue water, into my uncle’s arms

made my stomach swirl like the sea.

I nearly swallowed my wobbly tooth, my tongue andboth my ears as well.

my teetering fang

but the apartmentlooked like a doll’s house that had rolled down a street.Clothes flopped on the floor like exhausted ghosts, thedining chairs stood on their heads, the newspaper wastorn into a thousand pieces of confetti. The dresserdrawers hung out like tongues, the kitchen cupboardswere gasping mouths, the bathroom was completelyshell-shocked. Foamy faces grinned from the mirror; allthe pictures hung upside down

Toby opened a bedside drawer andfound money folded in a metal clip, and we argued aboutit in whispers. He wanted to sticky-tape the money to theceiling, but we didn’t have any sticky-tape; so we emptieda bottle of lemonade down the sink, put the money insidethe bottle and screwed the cap back on.

sometimes I need to hide myhead in a bucket

I don’t care to, eventhough my face will go Santa Fe pink

I used to wish I would never come down, that I couldstay in the sky forever. I wished the Christmas holidayswould not end, that we’d never make the long journeyback to the ordinary world. I wished that Santa Fe wasmy home, and that I could spend my life chasing skinksand picking frangipani and soaring through the air.

I remember my brother tumbling through the air, a tangleof arms and legs, the sky very blue behind him, the poolsparkling below

Toby and Itrailed them like ducklings

we liked theglittering pool at Santa Fe. We liked floating about onthe li-los that Father Christmas gave us each year

PINK as sunburn, PINK as Barbie’s lips. Being at Santa Fe waslike living in a ball of fairy floss

Living in thegarden were tiny black-and-copper skinks. On the lawnwere flamingos made of concrete, and curvy swans madefrom car tyres. Everything that didn’t already have a brightcolour of its own was painted pink

whose flowers looked like dresses for dolls

namesare changed to protect the innocent.

the kind thatmakes you want to hide your head in a bucket wheneversomeone mentions it.