The doctor drifts into the corridor, lured away by the importance of his call. Mouse calls Pin across. Opens the cupboard door, trust now brimming his heart.
‘Wow,’ his friend whispers, running his hand over all the words like a jockey appreciating a horse.
‘You can read it all when we’re long gone from here. Will you look after it for me?’
‘Of course.’
‘My dad told me to do it,’ Mouse says. ‘He said that telling the truth gives you this weird kind of calmness among all the craziness. It’s been like my daily glass of whisky, I guess.’ They both laugh. ‘Now there’s just one more thing I’ve got to do.’ He slips inside. ‘To finish it off. I just need a moment.’
This. (Hang on. Soli’s yelling out. "What, sister dear?’ ‘Thank you, Mr.’ ‘For what?’ ‘For being so grown up. For helping out. You write that down.’ Well, if I must, I must.)
Whistling away in there, and your heart is filled with it.
Now where I was I? Oh yeah. Imagine this. I’m running down to the beach at Salt Cottage and stripping off and getting sand all over me and cleaning myself with it and RUBBING THIS WHOLE EPISODE OUT. Kaput. And then I’ll just be quiet for a bit. No words. I want to lose talk for a while, and all the writing, and just stand there and let the sea and the sun and the wind blow it clean out of me. And rest. God yeah, that. Ahead feels like this big empty house that’s warm with light and waiting and ready to be filled up. It’s CLOSE! YIPPEE!!
So to this. The photo of their football, the last thing left from the memory box. Curling on its bit of toothpaste and Mouse wants it with him, wherever they’re off to next, so much. He hovers his fingers over it, can hardly bear to touch, hovers, can’t quite abandon it.
No. I’ll leave it. For you. For us.
These things are happening. CAN ANYONE HEAR US?
Love does not dominate; it cultivates.