I’d forgotten how easily I could raise my voice when I was in the mood. How nice it was to speak aloud and hear the crackle and snap in my voice.
I stepped into the study. It felt like a beige sterile box. No wonder the boys were bored. No wonder they all were. The place just needed some atmosphere, that was all. It needed to be messed up a bit.
The thought blew into my brain as easily as a leaf through a door. My hands curled into fists.
This is usually the time, I thought, flexing my fingers experimentally, that Mum or Dad would tell me to stop and go away and work on my feelings until I’d calmed down.
But they’re not here, are they?
MY LIMBS ACHED and fizzed, as if I’d been sitting on them for a long time and they wanted to come back to life.
Okay, time to concentrate, Frankie. First things first. What’s this room missing? What were Mum’s little touches?
Well, that’s easy. Paper. Mum always had loads, everywhere. Remember? Piles and piles of it. All in a mess.
A slight movement in the corner caught my eye. It was Medow, shifting from one foot to the other. Clutched to her chest was a bundle of those Treasure Trail fun sheets in her arms, the ones she always tried to give away to the younger children so they could ‘engage with the stories of the past’ and not ‘just rush around the cottage saying it was bor-ing’.
They’ll do.
Without thinking too much about it, I reached out and made a grab for them with my fingers. And then something incredible happened.
I touched them.
Even more miraculously, I pulled them out of her hands.
I didn’t know who was more surprised – me, for having picked up something successfully for the first time since the twenty-first century, or Medow, who gasped in confusion.
I felt a pang of remorse – I didn’t want to frighten her – but at the same time, these people needed to see what Mum’s room – what our life – had really been like. I snatched another handful from her trembling arms. To my delight, the second attempt was even easier than the first, and the paper came cleanly out of her embrace. She practically offered them up, in fact, with a small whimper, which I took to mean ‘Please, help yourself!’
What’s happening? I can do things again!
Elated, I shook the Treasure Trails about, like a raffle winner holding up her winning ticket. As the trail leaflets danced about in the air, Medow staggered backwards, one of the teenagers fainted and the other was sick on the floor. The two little boys whimpered.
‘Not so bored now, are you?’ I said, throwing the paper around the room, clapping and whooping as it landed in heaps on the desk and carpet. Mum’s study looked better already.
The old man looked concerned, coffee cup slack in his hand. ‘What’s happening?’ he said.
‘I’ll tell you what’s happening,’ I said, throwing the paper up in the air as giddily as an aunt throwing confetti at a wedding. ‘A historical re-enaction. Never mind those holograms, this is the real authentic Ripley experience. You lucky people!’
And I chucked another bundle of Treasure Trails into the air to celebrate. Unfortunately they hit the ceiling light, which made the lampshade swing violently about and throw eerie shadows around the room.
The teenager who hadn’t fainted fled the room.
Shakily, Medow began to punch some buttons on her walkie-talkie.
The two boys and their mother were moving, very slowly, in a huddle towards the door.
‘Don’t go!’ I yelled. ‘I’m just getting started!’
I ran to the door and grabbed its handle, shrieking with joy at the actual feel of it in my hand. Then I slammed the door shut with a satisfying bang, pulled the key out of the lock and threw it to the ground.
‘There – now you have to stay. I’ve got so much more to show you!’
Everyone in the room shrieked too, although they didn’t sound quite as joyful as me, and it looked as if one of the boys might have had an accident in his trousers, and I was sorry about that, but in all fairness, I was doing them a favour. If they left now, they’d miss the best bit.
Both boys started to cry.
I rolled my eyes. Talk about gratitude. This was going to be the learning experience of a lifetime, and they didn’t even know how to enjoy it? Why, only a few seconds ago, one of them had been complaining there hadn’t been enough to see!
‘You’re welcome,’ I said, then I went back to work.
A short while later, I surveyed the room, panting but elated. Everything looks so much better now.
This is what I’d done:
a. Yanked the curtains back. They should never have been closed in the first place – Mum had always liked to look out at the garden.
b. Ripped the blinds away from the window frame. I felt bad when I realised I’d broken them, but if you asked me it was a price worth paying – the study was lighter, which was how it had always been, back when we were alive.
c. Opened the window to let in some fresh air. Well, I say ‘opened’. When I’d realised it was bolted shut, I’d solved that problem creatively by throwing the laptop through the window, which had smashed almost all of the window completely. This was admittedly unfortunate. Still, now there was a nice summer breeze drifting in past the jagged stumps of glass. Mum would have liked that – she loved working with the window open. Said she could hear the blackbirds better that way.
d. But the icing on the cake was the coffee. I’d borrowed the old man’s cup of CuppaGrubba by easing it gently out of his hands. Then I’d flung it all around the paperwork and desk for that authentic coffee-stained vibe Mum always went for. I might have
