Neighbours by Colin Thompson

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 – 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 theyoungest, 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, ‘Look 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 – 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. Althoughit’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.
    â€˜I would like a little girl,’ Mordonna said to her husband, Nerlin, after the twins were born. ‘A 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.’
    â€˜But, sweetheart, we’re wizards and witches,’ said Nerlin. ‘Turning things into frogs and blood is what we do. Our families have done it since the dawn of time.’
    â€˜I know, and I adore frogs and blood,’ said Mordonna, ‘and 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.’
    â€˜But you grow death-cap mushrooms with the twins and you sharpen the cat’s teeth with Valla.’
    â€˜Yes, yes, I know,’ Mordonna replied, ‘and I love all those things, but what about knitting and painting pictures of flowers?’
    â€˜What’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 helpingher 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 ‘normal’ she looks, Betty