Her mum sits up, pressing a hand to the small of her back. ‘I’m afraid so. I’ll call her later and see if she’s up for a short visit one day next week. I know you miss her and she misses you too. Are you bored?’
Sophie shrugs. ‘Sort of.’
Her mum pulls an I-told-you-so face. ‘Hopefully you’ll think twice before letting Matthew watch scary films with you. Why don’t you go play together for a while? Get the games out of the cupboard?’
Sophie thinks for a moment. Game of Life is her favourite, but Matthew always gets upset when heloses and she ends up making rubbish decisions so he can win. ‘Can we make fairy cakes?’
‘You and Matthew?’
‘Yeah. We’ll do the mixing and tell you when they’re ready to go in the oven.’
‘And you’ll help Matthew? No taking over. Show him what to do and give him a chance.’
‘I know. I will.’
Her mum smiles. ‘OK then. But you’re tidying it up too.’
‘Deal.’
Sophie heads downstairs to the living room. Matthew’s Lego is spread across the floor in a jumble of primary-coloured bricks, and there’s a big house-like structure in the middle, which is actually pretty cool. Her old baby dolls are stacked up beside it and she wonders what game he’s playing.
Maybe after they’ve made cakes they can play with the Lego together, Sophie thinks, feeling bad about the film. She should have turned it off the moment he got scared. Matthew is really sensitive. He still cries at night if her dad turns his light off before he’s asleep, and he still wets the bed.
‘Matthew?’
Sophie heads into the kitchen, expecting to find him colouring at the table, but he’s not. The back door is open and there’s cold air blowing through the house.
‘Matthew?’ she calls again when she reaches the back door.
She sees him then, sitting on the lawn with his back to the house, legs crossed like he’s sitting in assembly. He’s not wearing a coat and must be freezing. She calls his name a third time, but either the wind snatches her voice or he isn’t listening. He does that a lot – shuts outthe world, like he can switch his ears off and not hear things.
Sophie shoves her feet into her trainers and hurries outside. The wind pushes against her, cold like a fridge. As she draws nearer she can see little swirls of smoke blowing out from something in front of Matthew.
‘Matthew, what are you doing?’
He doesn’t move or flinch. Sophie keeps walking until she’s almost standing over him and can see the source of the smoke. It’s a fire, like a mini bonfire, with sticks and screwed up bits of paper. There’s writing on the paper and Sophie can see a photograph of a shark. He’s burning his book about sharks, she realizes with a sudden panic. Starting a fire is really wrong. Matthew must know that. Is she going to get in trouble for this too?
The front door bangs, the noise bouncing out to them. Her dad’s voice bellows, ‘Hello?’
Sophie grabs Matthew’s arm and tries to pull him up but he won’t budge, he won’t even look at her. ‘Matthew?’ she hisses. ‘Dad’s home. You’re going to get in trouble. Please get up now. Mum and Dad will really argue if they see this.’
Her throat hurts like she’s ill, but she’s not. She wants to cry. She wants to run up to her bedroom and pretend she doesn’t know Matthew is out here.
A gust of wind pushes her again. It hits the fire too and Sophie hopes it will blow it out. Instead the flames leap up, like they’re trying to chase the wind. One of the sticks in the stack moves and the flames jump closer to Matthew. It doesn’t look so little any more.
‘Why is the back door open with the heating on?’ her dad shouts out to them.
She turns, panic gripping hold of her. Her dad’sface is red and his eyes look weird. ‘Matthew started a fire,’ she says quickly. ‘I was trying to stop him.’
Her dad swears and runs towards them. ‘Get away from that, Matthew. It’s going to burn you.’ He tucks his arms around Matthew’s waist before scooping him up. Matthew lets out a piercing scream and kicks out with his legs.
‘Stop it, Matthew,’ her dad shouts, dropping him to the ground as Matthew’s foot lands between her dad’s legs. Her dad yells in pain and at the same time his hand flies through the air, smacking Matthew on the leg.
A weird silence falls over them. Matthew stops screaming, but he pants as he stares hard at her dad.
Then Sophie’s mum appears, rushing straight to Matthew and cradling him in her arms. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she screams at Sophie’s dad as he stomps on the flames until they’re gone.
‘He set a fire. Look at this mess. What if he’d done this inside, eh? The whole house would be up in flames by now.’
