‘Not this time. I just saw her.’

‘But you know her?’

It was too hard to explain. Nod, a small one. The bike was still out there. The bag.

‘I wanted to be a mermaid like Scout,’ Sheanna said. ‘I wanted to learn how to be dangerous.’ She hadn’t seemed to grasp that it was odd for them to know each other.

‘Like …’ He seemed to try and digest the words. ‘OK.’ He shook his head. ‘Sheanna, how many times have we said not to go past the gate?’

Bolt. Matty needed to bolt, quickly, because he was here, and it made no sense. ‘I don’t …’ The words seemed very faraway. ‘I don’t get it. Who are you?’

They both looked up, thinking the question was for them. Maybe it was.

‘You know who I am, dummy,’ Sheanna said.

‘You … you can’t be.’ Sadness, coming like a black tide. ‘You can’t.’ She wasn’t just a girl. She was his daughter.

Sheanna looked at Joe. ‘Huh?’

‘Matty.’ Named again. He sounded more like the old Joe, just for a second. ‘What—’ He lowered his voice, as if he didn’t want someone in a neighbouring room to hear. ‘What are you doing here?’

Heart, still at crush-depth. ‘Looking for you.’ The words were pushed out, suddenly, breaths surging up, fast. An uncontrollable, quicksilver energy, racing outwards. Matty began to tremble.

‘All right. Tea. We’ll … get you some tea, OK?’ He didn’t know how to speak. His words weren’t the old ones. Not quite.

Matty curled up in a chair, knees to nose, soaking into the fabric. Hardly daring to look around. There were CDs in two slim bookcases. Big boxes of toys at the bottom of a shelf, one Barbie hanging out, half-stripped, matted hair over her face. Pictures on the walls with tinsel round them, a kid’s collage of leaves in a frame. A Christmas tree, heavy with baubles, in the corner.

Hot chocolate for Sheanna, who was sitting up again. A purple plastic mug with a pink teaspoon in it. She’d been put in front of the fire.

‘Will you change?’ he said. Tea placed at the edge of the red-tiled fireplace – strong, reddish-brown, the way he used to make his own in London. ‘You’ll be freezing now.’ He sounded hoarse. Voice as faded as the rest of him.

Matty started to shake again.

‘Just a blanket, then.’

He came back with another blanket, placed carefully on one arm of the chair.

‘Do you have any crisps?’ The words were coming out crumbled, useless.

‘Crisps?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I’ll find you some crisps.’

But as he turned, a hollow, sulphurous feeling began to swell, squeezing itself upwards. ‘I think I’m going to be sick.’