‘Money. In 1940, it rained old rouble coins in the Soviet Union. Scientists believe that erosion had gradually exposed a treasure trove of coins. The wind had seized the treasure and rained it down.

‘In 1875, on two September evenings, large crystals of sugar came down. There was no explanation for the phe-nomenon. In addition, spiders, starlings, worms and jelly have also descended from the sky.’

Dad stops reading and looks at us again.

‘Jelly?’ Auntie Annu says.

‘Yep. Spiders, starlings, worms and jelly. There’s no proper explanation for those last few things.’

I feel like laughing. I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help it. I imagine what Mum would have looked like if it had been jelly that fell on her. Can you die of jelly? At least it sounds softer than a lump of ice the size of a football. I feel like laughing because I think Mum herself could have invented death by jelly. Aargh-blub-blub-blub: that’s how her jelly death rattle would have sounded. Unlucky Mum, inside the jelly, would have fallen silent, but the surface of the jelly would have kept on quivering.

‘Bloody hell, this is so hard,’ Auntie Annu says, and suddenly starts giggling.

Dad glances at Auntie, surprised, but then snorts himself.

‘What else can you say?’

And that’s when Dad laughs for the first time that summer.

We laugh together: at people, dying of jelly; at sticklebacks, whirling in the sky; at couples out walking by the sea, surprised by a falling door. At angels doing Bad Things without warning.

20

20

Oh, I’ve seen the way Dad glances at the sky sometimes. As if he’s checking something. He goes out of the door in the direction of the car, but after a couple of steps, he looks up. Just for a short while. Then he carries on. And sometimes, when the sun is behind the clouds and the light changes, he looks up to see what’s going on in the sky. But it’s just cloud.

As if he had only just now realized that above the garden there is always an empty sky. And beyond the sky, space, and in space, spaceships that can break.

The sky is an idea I can’t draw a line round. The sky is always open. It leaks, like Dad’s toes.

21

21

‘Hey, Dad! Come and have a look!’ I cry.

My feet are up against the trunk of the linden tree in the garden. My head is packed with blood, but I want to stay upside down until Dad sees me.

It’s surprisingly hard to do a handstand and shout at the same time.

Dad’s beard becomes hair, his hair becomes beard, and his ears spin on the spot. The wrong way round, Dad looks lighter, as if he had risen up into the air just a tiny bit. The sunglasses become funny, black cheeks.

‘Dad, the wrinkles on your forehead are a mouth!’