‘He does not,’ Lauren says. Disagreeing is almost fun.

‘Does.’

‘Not as much as me. Jameson, do tricks.’

Jameson looks at her, then sniffs busily along the forest ground again.

‘No, he can do it. Jameson. Give me your paw.’ She holds her palm up. ‘I want Jameson to be a show dog. We can compete together. Maybe go on Britain’s Got Talent.’

‘Army dogs aren’t show dogs.’

‘He’s not an army dog.’ She shakes her head to herself, as if she’s older than Billy, not younger.

The snow deadens sound between the trees. Billy is now a general, ordering Lauren on a special reconnaissance mission and teaching her how to fire a gun.

‘I know how to fire a gun. My dad has one, a real one,’ Lauren says. ‘He showed me how to use it.’

‘No, he didn’t.’ He rolls his eyes.

‘Did.’

‘Go and bring it out next time and give me a shot.’

‘Maybe,’ Lauren says, more to the trees than to Billy. The bones of her toes feel like shards of ice. She notices another buzzard sitting on a branch further away in the oncoming twilight. ‘I like the snow,’ she says. ‘Everything so still.’ Snow is hopeful to her.

Billy is breaking a large branch apart and doesn’t hear. ‘It wasn’t this cold in Paris. It was nice.’

‘Do you ever stop wearing that hat?’ she asks, pointing at his Aberdeen FC beanie. She remembers two years ago when his uncle gave it to him for Christmas.

‘Not in church,’ he says.

‘No, I bet you love it so much you sleep in it.’

She tries to grab it off his head and he pushes her away, gently but defensively. ‘You’re not an Aberdeen supporter,’ he says, half smiling. ‘You don’t get to touch it.’

‘Whatever, pal,’ she says, knowing it will irritate him, and walks away to collect more stray twigs to twist around the den. They hardly ever sit in the hut, but Billy has suggested that maybe one night they’ll camp there, in the summer.