And then Kenny told me all the dirty words he knew. It made us laugh, but not enough to warm us up. Half of the words weren’t even real. Stuff like “splonger” and “bozzle”. I don’t know if this Milo kid had said it for a joke, or if someone had told him that nonsense and he just passed it on.

The best was when Kenny said, “A sod, do you know what that is?”

“Not really,” I replied.

“It’s one of the worst words there is,” Kenny told me. “Even saying it gets you a million years in hell. A sod is a man who digs up dead bodies to have it off with.”

“I’m not sure it is, Kenny,” I said, spluttering.

“It is! And a daft sod is one who forgets his spade.”

And then I laughed so hard I cried, and snot came out of my nose. The tears and snot were warm for a moment on my skin, and then cold, cold.

“You, you’re a daft sod,” I said.

Kenny shoved me, and I was laughing too much to keep my balance and I fell over. Tina got excited for the first time in ages and barked and scampered around.

I hit the ground and felt the snow under me, and under the snow the hardness of the frozen earth. Then I realised just how much trouble we were in.

I stood up and brushed off the snow. I think Kenny was expecting me to push him back, so he was laughing but keeping his distance. Then Kenny saw my face, and he stopped laughing.

“We better get off this hill, Kenny,” I said. “Or we’ll catch our bloody deaths.”

One

One

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It was meant to be a stroll, a laugh.

A lark.

It was our dad’s idea. Kenny had been bored and excited at the same time for a while now, and that made him act up a lot. Sometimes he sulked, not saying anything for hours. He’d stare at the rain running down the windows as if he was watching the telly. And then something would set him off and he’d go manic. He’d punch the cushions on the settee or shout out random stuff in the street or scramble to the top of the climbing frame in the park and howl like a wolf. That made the kids playing there laugh, but it freaked out the mums and dads and child‑minders smoking on the broken benches.

Kenny was bored because it was the Easter holidays and none of his mates were around. He went to a special school, and the kids travelled there from all over the place. None of them lived near us.