A freeze-frame moment, the air thick, and then in an eyeblink, she was there, grabbing an ear and pulling, before her hand moved swiftly to hold Matty by the neck. Her other hand was raised, about to swoop down, but instead it hovered for two seconds before coming by her side. ‘No. I do not. You are my child.’ Her face was very close, her voice low and strained and right there. Her jaw trembled. The smell of smoke and perfume. ‘He let you. He let you be like this. And he left you for me to deal with.’ She let loose a torrent of Italian, a hail of bullets, her grip remaining fierce.

Stay still. Let the words drift through. As soon as Mamma’s hand relaxed, just a little, Matty wriggled free and ran out of the room, down the stairs, and out of the house.

***

Matty sat at the curve of the Pond on the bank, up in the dark of the trees, even though it was cloudy. Long grass tickling both calves.

Still no Nicks. No golden-green back arching like a dolphin’s, no dig in the ribs. Hardly anyone was here now, at teatime. Just four people doing laps in the water, each on their own, and a man sitting not far away.

Matty’s neck hurt, a whole hour later. The shadow of Mamma’s hand. She’d wanted to hit Matty. It had been there, in her eyes for a moment.

Once, maybe in April or May, Dad had got a black eye. Not all the way round, but on one side. It went from dark blue to purple to yellow. He’d said it had been from walking into a street lamp – mimed the action and everything, a Laurel and Hardy move.

The wake of one swimmer ribboned behind him. A crow barked overhead.

That time when Matty had opened the bathroom door and found him there, crying. He’d been holding his arm – as if he was cold, it had seemed. But he might have been hurt.

All their arguments. Mamma throwing things.

Maybe she had hurt him really badly. Maybe more than that.

Perhaps Dad hadn’t killed himself. Perhaps someone else had. And not in the Pond at all.

‘Hello there.’ The man who had been further over in the shade was now standing a few feet away, holding his towel.

Matty looked out at the water. ‘Hello.’

The man lay his towel down and sat on it, quite close. ‘Not so warm today, is it?’ His knees were bulgy and very white.

‘No.’

The sun had turned the grass to a crackly, dull gold.

‘I know who you are,’ the man said, in a sing-song voice. Matty stared straight ahead, stomach suddenly stodgy. Did he mean that he knew Dad? Or—

‘You shouldn’t be here, you know.’