Read My Name Is Leon for Free Online

still asleep. He must be asleep because he’s not crying. Leon is in a soft, warm bed and there are black-and-white soccer balls on his quilt. Wooden airplanes hang off the ceiling and turn in a cool breeze from the open window. Even the curtains have got a soccer-ball pattern on them. The wallpaper is made up of lots of soldiers in red army jackets with black rifles and, best of all, Jake isn’t crying. The smell of food is so strong it pulls Leon downstairs. He can hear the lady singing a nursery song and Jake is laughing. He can hear plates and knives and forks clattering against each other. He tiptoes to the door of the kitchen and listens outside but the lady must have heard him.
    â€œIn you come, sleepyhead. Bacon sandwich with ketchup. All you can eat.”
    Leon sits at the yellow kitchen table and the lady puts a massive bacon sandwich on the plate and cuts it in half. Then she plonks the ketchup bottle down next to him and says, “Dig in, sweetheart.”
    Jake is wearing a bib with a dinosaur on it. He looks clean and fresh sitting in a high chair by the window and the lady goes over to him and starts pointing at things in the front garden.
    â€œBird,” she says. “Bird. Lovely little bird.”
    She keeps talking to Jake and he’s trying to talk back, so Leon can eat his sandwich in peace. It tastes like the best thing in the world with soft bread and lots of meat and the sauce that drips on to the plate and he’s got an enormous glass of orange juice that tastes sweeter than Coke and he has a bite of the salty meat and a swig of the sweet orange juice and he keeps doing it until everything is gone.
    Then the lady just puts another sandwich on his plate.
    â€œGrowing boy like you. Bet you can’t eat all of that.”
    But Leon does, with another glass of orange juice, though during the second sandwich he pays attention to the lady and what she is saying. He is waiting for her to ask questions about his mom.
    â€œNow, not everyone would be able to see the resemblance between you two,” she says, folding her arms over her big chest, “but Maureen can.” She smiles and points to her forehead. “That’s me, Maureen, and I’ve got an eye for kids.”
    Leon licks the sauce off his fingers and looks around. Maureen’s house smells of sweets and toast and when she stands near the kitchen window with the sun behind her, her fuzzy red hairstyle looks like a flaming halo. She’s got arms like a boxer and a massive belly like Father Christmas. On the kitchen wall there is a giant wooden spoon and it says “Best Mom” and next to that there is a painting of Jesus with all his disciples and he’s showing them the blood on his hands.
    â€œSo you’re nine,” says Maureen, taking his plate and filling his glass up with orange juice again.
    Leon nods.
    â€œAnd he’s nearly five months.”
    Leon nods.
    â€œAnd you’re the quiet one.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œBut he’s the boss.”
    She smiles, so Leon smiles back.
    â€œI get the picture,” she says. “Bet he’s had you up and down like a yo-yo. He’d be giving you orders if he could speak, wouldn’t he?”
    She goes over to Jake and gives him a plastic mixing spoon. Jake starts banging the tray on his high chair. Leon and Maureen put their hands over their ears.
    â€œHave I made a mistake?” she says and Leon laughs.
    â€œSo what’s his routine then?” she asks and she sits down opposite him at the yellow table. She picks up a pad and a pencil and writes “Jake” at the top of the page.
    â€œYou tell me what he likes and doesn’t like, so I don’t get it wrong.”
    â€œHe gets up too early,” says Leon.
    She writes it down.
    â€œAnd if I’m having something to eat and he wants it, he has to have a bit but only if it’s good for him because sometimes it’s chewing