Excerpt of Willow Run by Patricia Reilly Giff
(Page 2 of 2)
Printer Friendly Excerpt
My arm went down to my side. "That's not true. You know that's--"
"Anywhere else, something would happen to him. Worse than jail," Mikey
said. "Worse than anything. And
to you, too."
Why was he saying this? Maybe because I'd told the lifeguard at the beach that
he was out too far.
But maybe not. He'd always been mean.
Or maybe that was what people really thought, that Grandpa was a spy, that I . .
.
Somewhere down the block I heard a door slam. The two of them slipped past me
along the side of the
house. When they were halfway down the driveway I plunked the stone after them,
hitting the pail of
paint.
"Crummy aim," Muscle Man said, and Mikey called, "Heil
Hitler."
"Watch out, next time--" and then I broke off because it looked as if
they were going to come back after
me.
I darted around back, but now I heard them marching up the street yelling,
"Heil, heil," with that same
accent.
I went up to Grandpa's window and put my finger on the painted swastika. It was
thick and still shiny
wet, and I could feel that my cheeks were wet, too.
Grandpa was the biggest pest in the whole world, calling me Margaret every two
minutes instead of Meggie, whispering during movies so I couldn't even hear what was going on,
saying bah whenever he
didn't agree with me.
So why was I crying?
Excerpted from Willow
Run by Patricia Reilly Giff Copyright © 2005 by Patricia Reilly Giff.
Excerpted by permission of Wendy Lamb Books, a division of Random House, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted
without permission in writing from the publisher.
