She ignored him as was her way, or didn’t hear him, and the crackling trail of flame was heading towards the loaded sparklet.

His mother put the basket down; she had pulled the first sheet out of it to hang on the line when the explosion happened.

Explosion was the word.

The noise was deafening, the metal did indeed shatter and fly everywhere, most of it towards the sheet, but some buried into his mother’s leg. Neither of them could hear anything as the noise had left them in a ringing mime show. Completely deafened ears. His mother, he could tell was screaming, by the shape of her mouth and body; he was in shock. About, he thought, to cry but was not sure what the appropriate emotion or action was when you have nearly blown up your mother.

The first thing was to see the extent of the damage to her leg. She was hopping on the other leg. As far as he could see, there were several pieces of sparklet embedded in her flesh, and blood; there was bleeding; he hoped, in a moment of startling banality, that tweezers could purpose the extraction.

At least that was his thinking.

The silence was still deafening, the ears continued to scream with a sound generated only by them: but his mother was calmer, assessing the extent of her damage, still not knowing what had caused it. He was fourteen; the divorce was in process; his father had already moved permanently to Los Angeles.

That night between him and his mother had taken place over a year previously.

*

He sat with ringing ears and wondered if he had really tried to kill his mother.

No of course not, she wasn’t there when he lit the fuse.

But had he not waited until he saw her carrying the washing in the basket from the house and then put the match to the gunpowder?

No, he had not done that.

No, for sure, in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ he was not crazy. Where did that religious fervour come from?

*

He was beaten by his mother with a wooden spoon.

Three dining chairs were piled onto him as he sat in the green and brown striped Parker Knoll chair; then these were tied down with string. He had no desire to move even if he could because he would be beaten again.

Ever was still smallish and was yet to experience the viral pneumonia that would nearly kill him and keep him bedridden for months. It was during this illness, an illness that hit him when he was fifteen, that he grew.

Not in proportion, as his body grew but his legs stayed short. He emerged months later from his bed six inches taller; six inches taller in his body. His legs later caught up by a couple of inches but he looked a weird one for a while.

A scrawny, out-of-proportion weird one.