The kettle bubbled, shook, and clicked off. Mamma didn’t move. She was probably deciding to have wine instead.

Matty’s eyes remained fixed on the turtles. Jump. If she wouldn’t say anything about Dad, then there was no point in saying anything at all. Jump. Jump. Wait.

Mamma seemed to watch for ages. ‘You are going to get your hair cut.’ No more nice normal mum.

All this time, and she’d still never properly said anything about Dad. All this time. ‘Don’t want to.’

‘Why not? You would embarrass your mother?’

‘No.’ The man on the other side wasn’t there to pick the parcel up. Wait. Jump.

‘You look ridiculous.’

It wasn’t long. Just – a bit unruly, like bramble bushes in your eyes. ‘I like it.’ Jump.

‘You are going to a new school. You are not a child any more.’ She took in a long, jagged breath. Matty glanced up. ‘Things have to change.’ Her eyes steeled, and her voice, too. ‘You will get it cut before school starts. You know you look—’

‘Where is he?’

She took a breath, as if she was going to say something more about hairdressers, but just stood there with her lips apart. A bus roared past outside. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Is he in heaven or hell?’

Mamma leant forward, and her sentence was chopped up. ‘I. Don’t. Know.’

She left the room, and Matty watched as the boy missed a turtle and sank abruptly to the bottom, bubbles coming out of his mouth.

***

‘Want some?’

Nicks looked at the Orangina bottle, half-full. ‘What is it?’

They were sitting among the leaves of the tall trees by the Not Allowed Pond, having already been in.

‘Not Orangina.’

Over the last three days, Matty had laid low. If Mamma was around, it was a quick dash to the bathroom, or in bed pretending to be asleep, or out, as swiftly as possible. That way she couldn’t bring up haircuts, or clothes, or anything else. That morning, Matty had taken the remains of two wine bottles that Mamma had left, one on the floor of the pantry and one in the fridge, and poured them into an empty bottle. She hadn’t seemed to notice, because she was always getting a new one.

Nicks took the bottle and smelt it. The liquid was a rosy pink colour and fizzed a little bit. ‘Smells like disgusting wank.’ He handed it back, and started singing the odd words he’d been singing earlier on, binoree o binoree.

Matty had thought Nicks would have smoked and drunk and everything by now but in a lot of ways, he was like a baby. He didn’t know anything, even though he was taller and older. He scowled again as Matty tipped the bottle up and drank.

Things have to change, Mamma had said, meaning Matty had to grow up. Well, this was growing up.