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Chapter 14

Kirsty said goodbye to Ben and Dawn and cycled home. She let herself into the house. She stood in the hall and let the door close gently behind her. The soft click of the latch was the only sound she could hear. It was strange – way too quiet. Before, when Dad was well, this would have been the noisiest time of day – everyone coming home and shouting hellos, telling stories about their day, and Dad, right in the middle of it all, laughing. Instead, it was just silent.

‘Hello?’ she said softly. Were Mum and Dad even in?

She heard a sound from upstairs. Burglars? Was she alone in the house with burglars? Her heartbeat speeded up as she crept to the bottom of the staircase.

‘Shh!’ It was Mum, hissing down from the landing. ‘Your dad’s sleeping.’

Kirsty felt her fear turn into something else. Anger. Dad was always sleeping! Why wouldn’t he get up? What was going on? And all Mum would say was ‘shh’. She was like a broken record. Well, Kirsty wasn’t going to shush.

She stomped into the front room. Her DVDs were arranged on the bottom shelf. There were lots of them, but her collection was nothing compared to Dad’s records. He had hundreds and hundreds of them stacked along the top shelves. The records hadn’t been touched in a long time though. Before he got so tired, Dad liked to rearrange his collection. He’d change it every week, sometimes putting it in alphabetical order, sometimes in date order, sometimes even according to the colour of the cover, so that the records looked like a rainbow stretching along the wall. Kirsty liked to copy him. Just now, both collections were arranged in order of favourites. Her favourite film, The Wizard of Oz, was first and Dad’s favourite album was first in his collection.

Kirsty took the record down from the shelf. There was dust on the cover. Each letter in the band’s name, Sex Pistols, was written in a different size, as though each letter had been torn from a newspaper. There had been a row once about that album. It had a rude title and Mum had said that Dad shouldn’t let Kirsty see it. Dad had said that Kirsty was his daughter too and she should know about the things he cared about. Dad had won.

No one had played it for a long time. Kirsty looked up at the ceiling. Dad’s bed was directly above her. Kirsty slid the record from its sleeve. It was sleek and black, the music printed on it in bumps and grooves that you could touch. She held it by the rim and looked at it. Dad knew all the lyrics to each song. He used to yell them as loud as he could, not caring that the neighbours would bang on the wall. He used to jump up and down to the music, not dancing, just throwing himself about like a mad thing.

Kirsty lifted the glass lid of the record player, then moved the stylus gently. The speakers hissed and crackled for a minute, then roared into life with the first tune. Drums thumped, a wild guitar joined in and then the singer, shouting each line until his voice seemed to be breaking. The speakers shuddered with the noise. Kirsty put down the sleeve and started dancing the way that Dad did, bounding into the air, shaking her hands and head, slamming back down to the floor. The whole room juddered with movement and music. Could Dad hear this? She didn’t know the words like Dad did, but she started yelling the ones she knew anyway. Was he listening? Would he come down and join in?

‘Kirsty!’ The door opened. Kirsty stopped dancing. Mum crossed the room and lifted the stylus off the record. The silence was shocking.

‘What are you doing?’ Mum hissed.

‘I was just listening to music.’

‘On full volume? When your dad’s trying to rest upstairs?’

Kirsty didn’t answer.

Mum frowned. ‘What were you thinking?’

‘I thought, I thought Dad might like it. He hasn’t listened to it in ages.’ Kirsty hung her head.

Mum sighed. A moment passed. Mum sat down on the sofa and patted the seat beside her. She wanted Kirsty to sit. So Kirsty sat. ‘Kirsty, it’s hard for your dad just now. You know that, don’t you? Your grandad was his dad.’

‘I know. But he’s been in his room for ever.’

Mum smiled, but it was a sad smile. ‘It does feel a bit like that, doesn’t it? But we have to give him time.’

‘How much time?’

‘Oh, Kirsty. You just have to be patient. I’m sure he’ll be right as rain soon. He just needs some peace and quiet. Give him space, OK?’

Kirsty nodded slowly. She stood up and lifted the record off the deck. She slipped it back in its cover. ‘Can I at least dust them?’ she asked.

Mum nodded. ‘OK. Dad would like that. I’ll get you a cloth.’

Kirsty put the album back on the shelf, in first place. In the horrible quiet, it felt as though she was hiding it away.