12

Adrian rolled free of the sofa’s grip, resting for a moment with his head in his hands until the noise of the siren faded. A dream or an echo from earlier when an ambulance came shuddering to a stop outside the caravan, bringing with it all of his worst fears, his guilt and his grief.

It was dark outside but not yet midnight; Agnes hadn’t returned and she was never late, not since Ruth lectured her on the dangers of causing more worry for everyone. Adrian had delivered a lecture of his own, he remembered with a cringe. He’d only half known what he was saying, something about staying away from Blackthorn Ashes. She’d been pushing him, poking into the murky reaches of his memory in the hope of helping him stay present. He didn’t blame her; they were each trying to cope in their own way. Ruth pushed everything down below the surface. Agnes tried to bring it back up. Adrian didn’t know what Christie was doing to cope and he wasn’t sure he wanted to; his son had been a closed book to him for weeks.

He stood, walking the short distance to the caravan’s front door. It opened soundlessly, letting in the smell of butane and burnt toast. He put his hand across his nose reflexively. He’d been smelling burning for weeks, since before the evacuation. When he shut his eyes, he saw flames and smoke. No fires had broken out – the faulty alarms weren’t made to detect smoke – but when he shut his eyes he saw Blackthorn Ashes in flames, Indigo Park eaten by fire, gas canisters erupting, plastic windows warping and melting. His family burning. We’re burning. With shame, with rage . . .

‘Adrian?’

Ruth was in her pyjamas, sleep softening one side of her face.

‘Go back to bed,’ he told her.

‘What is it?’ She lifted a hand to scrub the softness from her cheek. ‘What’s happened?’

‘Nothing. I just needed some air.’

Her face changed as he stood watching, becoming the rigid mask she’d worn since the night of the storm when the ambulance came for Barry’s kids. The sight of it sparked a flare of fury – his wife, the doer, standing knee-deep in the death of his dreams without ever once, even for a second, losing her composure.

‘Is Agnes back?’ she asked.

‘Not yet. Soon, I expect.’ He shut the door, driving his resentment down. God knows, it wasn’t her fault he’d failed. ‘Christie’s sleeping?’

‘Or on his phone.’ Ruth stayed where she was.

Did she feel it too, the awful sense of normality creeping back in? No, not normality, that wasn’t possible. This was like looking through someone else’s holiday photos sent to you in error. All the ingredients were there, the familiar apparatus of family life: caravan hired for the summer, tins in the cupboards, boots by the door in case of rain. But it wasn’t the weather or the caravan that was wrong. It was them.

‘Do you remember that night?’ he asked Ruth. ‘The night of the storm.’

‘No.’ She shook her head.

‘No, you don’t remember?’

‘No, we’re not doing this.’ She moved towards him warningly. ‘Get some sleep.’

‘I remember.’ He raised his voice. ‘Barry telling me he couldn’t believe the kids slept through it—’ His voice cracked in half. ‘Even the baby . . .’

‘Be quiet. You’ll wake Christie.’

Panic clawed at his throat. ‘We should talk to him.’ He couldn’t live like this, knowing and not knowing, keeping quiet at all costs, any cost. ‘We should talk to him about Emma.’

‘Shhh . . .’ Ruth’s lips were against his mouth. ‘Adrian . . .’

She kissed him until he was quiet, her body pressed against his from knee to neck, closer than she’d been in months. He could smell the cheap shampoo she’d used and a trace of her old expensive lipstick. He stiffened in spite of himself but it wasn’t arousal, not in any usual sense. It was fear. As aphrodisiac, or simply as fear.

‘Please. Let it go. We’re a family. Your job is to protect this family. Your family.’

She kissed him again, making sure he couldn’t respond even if he wanted to. He didn’t want to. She’d killed the panic in him, driven it back down. She was good at that.

Behind them, the caravan door opened and then shut. Ruth broke the kiss and stepped away, disappearing into the bedroom.

‘Dad?’ Agnes clicked a switch and the room blazed with light.

‘Hi, love.’

‘Are you okay?’ She was pale, her eyes huge in her face. ‘You look—’

‘Couldn’t sleep.’ He worked the ache from his jaw with his fingers. ‘You’re late.’

‘Not much.’ She stripped off her jacket, hung it up.

Something had happened out there. He saw it in the way she moved, as if every part of her was tender, aching like his jaw. The thought came too fast for him to stop it: this family’s made of secrets.

‘Be careful,’ he warned Agnes.

‘Of what?’ Those big eyes, watching him.

‘Christie.’ He swallowed, tasting bile. ‘He’s sleeping. Your mum doesn’t want him waking.’

‘Okay.’ She pulled her hands inside her sleeves, making herself smaller. ‘I’ll be careful.’

Just a boy, Ruth had said, your son. Your family.

Adrian watched his daughter cross the room in the direction of her brother. When he shut his eyes, the smoke was there and the fire too, roaring and red at its heart.