Very quietly, Prin sits up. She can’t see any of what’s happening below her – she’d have to stick her head right over the edge to look and then whoever was down there would see her, and then, boy, would she be in big, big trouble. Instead she focuses on the tree branches that make criss-crossing silhouettes against the sky and stretches both of her ears to listen.

For a while there’s almost nothing but silence, just a tiny kissing sound, a tiny crackle and sounds of breathing.

Then she hears the patio door scrape open again, and her Daddy’s voice saying, ‘Susan.’

Prin draws her knees up to her chest and wraps her bare arms around them. It sounds a little bit mean the way he says it. He’s speaking the way he does when he’s telling Prin off.

Now Prin hears another voice. It must be Mum’s but it doesn’t really sound like her. It’s a low stream of words, sort of mumbled, when normally Mum speaks quite slowly and clearly. She’s so mumbly that Prin can only make out little bits and pieces: … my sister… do that … horrible.

Then comes Daddy’s voice again, even harder this time: ‘Susan.’

Now there’s a silence; complete silence this time. Then the stream of words becomes something else, turns into another sound, a very awful sound to Prin’s ears, one that makes her stomach grow uh-oh cold despite the heat, like it’s chock-full of sticky ice cream again. The smell of cigarettes is stronger than ever now too, and it makes Prin feel sick. She really feels as if she might throw up, like when she had that stomach bug last winter.

Now Prin almost doesn’t care if they hear her. She just wants to get back inside. She slides off the roof, back onto the lip below her window, pulls herself up and back inside. Over by the bedroom wall, Jane is sitting upright in bed, awake now. She gives Prin quite a fright as she comes in. Her round face is as pale as a moon.

‘What is it?’ she whispers. ‘What’s happened?’

Prin shuts the window behind her, cutting off the cool breeze from outside, trapping herself and Jane back into the heat. She gets back into her bed, her feet dropping crumbs of grit into the sheets, and pulls the stifling covers back over her.

She lies on her back, eyes wide open to the ceiling. ‘Nothing,’ she tells Jane. ‘You’re supposed to be asleep.’

And it must be nothing because there’s no tears in this house!

So Prin lies there and closes her eyes and refuses to listen to the voice in her head that tells her:

Mum was crying.

Chapter 17