He never used it again. The language of losers he called it. Whatever was bugging him in his dreams was powerful enough to turn back the clock for Sam and pull that long-abandoned language out of his past and into his mouth. It made Katie uneasy, although right now she couldn’t say why.

In half an hour she would go and collect Jess from Mrs Chaney, but now she could use a coffee and some time to herself. In the tiny kitchen, she switched the TV and the coffee machine on at the same plug. The local cable station was talking about the blast. Two ski patrollers killed, half the mountain gone above the Corkscrew tunnels, the railway blocked by rubble and ice. It was also a mystery. Some nervous reporter in a big anorak was standing in the car park beside Ledmore Creek stuttering that so far they could find no explanation for the size or violence of the blast but that theories included a pocket of methane gas detonated by chance.

Behind him blue lights flashed and people walked about pointing aimlessly. Katie poured herself a coffee, smiling at the ineptitude of local news, but deep down she was still worried why Sam had measured his length on the path not at the precise moment that pocket of methane had gone up, but moments later when they looked up at the smoke. The doc said it could have been the shock-waves if Sam was already feeling lightheaded from an encroaching infection. Katie didn’t think so. Shock waves don’t take that long, and Sam sure didn’t look like he was coming down with anything other than usual early morning grouchiness.

Katie had stomached enough of goddamn blasts and blackouts for one day. She switched off her worries, switched channels and sat down at the table to catch half an hour of a Green Acres re-run.

When Gerry turned up at the door, the snow was falling so thickly Katie could barely make him out. The snowman on the doorstep handed a conical shape to Katie and said, ‘Peace offering.’

She smiled, took the flowers already frosted with snow, and pulled Gerry in by the elbow.

Gerry shook himself like a dog in the kitchen. ‘Christ. This is going to make the ski company wet themselves.’

Katie already had the coffee machine back on. ‘Yeah. And not a whisper of it on the forecast. I want my money back from the weather channel. Grab a seat.’

Gerry installed himself at the kitchen table. ‘I heard from Billy at school. Is Sam okay?’

‘Yeah. He’s fine. We don’t know what all that fainting was about. Probably saw the hockey scores.’

She turned her back on Gerry and fished out a couple of mugs from the dishwasher.

‘Listen Katie … about the other night …’

‘Forget it, Gerry. It’s no big deal.’