At least it would help pass the time before the coming weekend. As usual for a Monday morning, I did my duty in the sports cupboard. I expected Sam Mason to come along and begin the term by abusing me in some way. Perhaps he would even accuse me of stealing his fossils. Yet he never turned up, and nor was he in our room when class began. Normally I would rejoice at his absence, but this time I was worried. At least when he was at school I knew where he was. I couldn’t help but think that his absence might have something to do with the canyon. The boring what-I-did-during-the-holidays speeches took the first hour. These would go on for half the week. It was sad that so many kids had such boring holidays that they had to exaggerate or make things up. I didn’t exaggerate, quite the opposite. I made sure my speech was the most boring of them all. Someday, I hoped to be able to tell them the truth. Mason was away again on the Tuesday. That morning it was Mits’s turn to give his speech, and he did use exaggeration, heaps and heaps of it.
