Seven-year-old Elijah was a clever little boy. Not only did he have his mummy and daddy firmly wrapped around his little finger, he’d soon got the hang of rowing a boat too, quickly realising that he could send his parents into even more of a spin than usual with just the little boat’s right oar. It was all such tremendous fun – skimming the surface of the water with the paddle so a mini wave could form, and then if he changed the angle just a teeny bit, the water could travel the length of the oar and soak his mummy (eliciting a plaintively ineffectual, ‘Oh, Elijah!’); banging the top of the water so that the noise was hollow and eerie, water spraying everywhere like an aquatic firework while his dad yelled, ‘Stop that, you little bu—’ before just about restraining himself; or, perhaps best of all, simply digging the oar vertically into the water, so that the boat started to rotate and his dad would start ranting that they weren’t bloomin’ well going anywhere.
‘Elijah, just stop that,’ said his dad, for the hundredth time. ‘Otherwise I’ll take that oar off you and I’ll row the ruddy thing on my own. Look, we’re heading right for the bank now – be careful or we’ll flippin’ well hit it.’
‘Sorry, Daddy,’ said Elijah, as he lifted up the oar and drove it towards the bottom, exactly as his father had just told him not to. His dad roared at him and Elijah grinned happily, desired outcome achieved, and then he shoved it in again, just for fun. As the oar stabbed down into the tea-coloured water for perhaps the fifth unapproved time, Elijah felt it hit something, and in his young brain he assumed quite sensibly that it was the bank or even the bottom. But when he looked over the side he saw through the murk long trailing hair tangled like weeds, and one hollow eye gaping at him hopelessly, and a flash of colour, and although when they finally got back to shore he was eventually bought an ice cream, his parents never did get him his milkshake, and as he grew older his behaviour worsened if anything, and he never, ever stopped seeing that image.