Something’s happened to the back garden.
It isn’t there any more.
Mum’s vegetable patch, the lawn, the pond: all gone, and instead, there’s a square of blocks, squidged together with cementy glue. It looks like a giant two-year-old’s been let loose with a Battenberg cake and butter icing, except it’s big, really big. It takes up the whole space.
My heart practically stops.
‘Dad?’ I say. ‘What’s that?’
He takes a chair out of the boot of the car. A really old, Ancient Egyptian chair, painted in golds and turquoises. I last saw it in the museum on Saturday.
‘Something your mother’s building.’
I follow him through the front door.
The hall is red. Blood red. A border of wobbly fish and birds now lies just above the skirting board, and my great-grandmother’s portrait has been replaced by a badly painted snake. Underfoot, the carpets have gone; instead someone’s emptied damp sand onto the chipboard and I don’t really want to go any further, but I can’t stay in the hall forever. I push open the door to the sitting room.
Marcus is sitting there, shooting aliens on the television screen and shouting at his friends online. He’s still in his school uniform.
‘Marcus?’ I ask.
Pwew
Pwew
‘Yeah,’ says Marcus, destroying a virtual wall.
‘Have you looked outside?’
Marcus shrugs while his avatar climbs into a virtual quad bike and crashes into a virtual tree. ‘Yeah, but no one’s told me to tidy my room for a week, so it can only be good.’
I go through to the kitchen. Mum’s wearing her best cocktail dress and mixing cement on the kitchen floor.
‘Hello, Sam, love,’ she says, smiling. ‘How’s school?’
‘Fine, Mum,’ I say, helping myself to a biscuit. ‘Mum – are you OK?’
Mum looks up at me, smiling. ‘Never better. Having the time of my life,’ she says. ‘Why?’
‘Because…’ I wave my arms over the mess. ‘Because of all this.’
Mum shrugs. ‘I’m fine, but thanks for asking.’
I go back into the sitting room. Something moves in the corner. It’s Finn and the cat. Or at least, I think it’s the cat.
Finn’s kneeling on a heap of sheets, torn into strips, and something’s wriggling in the middle.
‘Meeerreoooow.’ It is the cat.
‘Shh, puss cat,’ says Finn, grabbing a length of sheet. ‘Stay still.’
‘Finn, what are you doing?’ I ask.
‘Keeping the cat warm.’
‘I think Smudge is fine how she is,’ I say, pulling away a strip of cloth.
‘No – she needs wrapping, like the teddies.’
‘The teddies? I ask. ‘What have you done to them?’
‘They’re ready to cross the River Nile,’ says Finn happily.
‘Where are they, Finn?’
‘Over there.’ He points towards the study door.
Feeling sick, I tiptoe past the flailing cat and push open the door to the study. Lined up inside, arranged across the printer and the keyboard, are a series of shapes. They’re wrapped in an assortment of materials from loo paper to socks. Mostly there’s nothing sticking out, but I recognise Finn’s favourite teddy, because his two blue plastic eyes shine out from behind the bandages.
My heart stops again.
‘Weird, aren’t they,’ says Marcus, shooting another alien. ‘Creeeeeeepy, ooooooooooohhh.’
‘I think they’re lovely,’ says Mum. ‘Well done, Finn. What a clever boy.’