I stood in the doorway，watching my older brother carefully putting clothes into his bag．I coughed uneasily．Finally  1   that I Was there，Rocky turned toward me with a sad smile.

   “I’m leaving tomorrow．”He said．

   “I know．”My  2  was almost a whisper(低声)．I was angry at myself for being so weak, but I Wasn’t about to cry．

    “My  3  is early，so there is still enough time to come to the airport，”he said．Seeing the  4   look on my face，he quickly added，“I promise(答应)1 won’t leave without saying goodbye．”

    I tried to say  5  ，but didn’t．It’s always better to keep quite if you’re about to cry． “You promised you wouldn’t cry，”he said to me，thinking that I was close to tears(流泪)．

    I remember the day he taught me how to ride a bike．  6   I thought he was always right behind me，holding the seat to keep me from   7  ．I was happy with this，but he knew he couldn’t hold me up all my life． He told me that one day he would have to let go．

    His coughing stopped my thinking．What was left to say? How could I say  8  to the person who taught me everything?

    The next morning I  9  looked at my alarm clock, and I realized he had left

10  ago．We never even said goodbye．

    Goodbye，Rocky! Although he may have been many miles away，I knew he heard me，even if it was only an answer in his heart．

1．A．forgetting    B．realizing     C．watching    D．learning

2．A．voice         B．sound         C．noise       D．word

3．A．ship          B．flight        C．train       D．bus

4．A．surprised     B．excited       C．sad         D．happy

5．A．anything      B．everything    C．something   D．nothing

6．A．At 1ast       B．From now on   C．At first    D．So far

7．A．riding        B．running       C．walking     D．falling

8．A．goodbye       B．hello         C．yes         D．sorry

9．A．gave up       B．stood up       C．looked up  D．woke up

10．A．minutes       B．hours          C．days       D．weeks

　　In our house, there are lots of comic(滑稽的) books. Some are on the table in the living room. Some are under my bed. Some are under Neal's bed.

　　Neal is my brother. He is seven, two years younger than I am.

　　Every Saturday we do our work first. Then mother lets each of us buy a comic book about animals or children.

　　We can hardly wait to get home to read them! We lie on the floor between our bed. Everything is very quiet then－until we burst out laughing. Mom calls our laughs “explosions”. I guess they sound that way to her.

　　Yesterday I heard Mrs. Easton ask Mom, “Do you really LET your boys read comic books? I must say I am surprised!” Mom said,“Of course I let them!” Then she said, “That is, I let them read comics about animals and children. Not all comic books are bad. Some are very good.”

　　“I wonder why children like comic books?” Mrs. Easton asked.

　　Mom laughed. “I really don't know,” she answered. “But we know they do!”

　　Well, no one asked me. But I could tell Mrs. Easton and mother why we like comics!

　　The ones Neal and I read are funny. The people and the animals in them are smart. They are not goody-goody (虚假的), the way they are in some stories.

　　Comic books are something like space ships. They take Neal and me to the planet Mars or to a rabbit's house. They bring us old friends and new friends. Donald and Mickey and Bugs and Elmer seem like real people to us!

　　We like comic books most of all because we never know what will happen next. In some books, you can always tell what's going to happen.

1．The stories in the comic books often make the two brothers very sad and angry.

2．The two brothers won't get new comic books before they finish doing their work every Saturday.

3．All the grown-ups know clearly why children like reading comic books.

4．The stories in comic books can take children to places they have wanted to and help them meet a lot of friends.

5．The two brothers like comic books best of all because they can always guess what will happen next.