Читать книгу Fire Damage: A gripping thriller that will keep you hooked - Kate Medina, Kate Medina - Страница 21

Downstairs Mummy and Daddy were arguing – he could hear their raised voices. Wendy had put him to bed, put him in his woolly sheep pyjamas and dressing gown, put socks on his feet. Keep you warm. Told him that Mummy and Daddy were tired tonight, stressed. Be a good boy. Go to sleep.

He had gone to sleep, like Wendy had asked him, but the shouting had woken him. He liked Wendy, felt safe when she was here. Now she was gone. He had seen her from his bedroom window, hurrying to her car, head down, glancing around her as she walked. He had heard her engine puttering out of the drive.

It was only him, Mummy and Daddy in the house. Him upstairs alone, and their raised voices coming up through the floor.

Daddy was shouting: I don’t want people interfering in our lives.

Sitting up in bed, he looked towards the window. Wendy hadn’t pulled the curtains all the way across – they didn’t join in the middle. A sliver of moonlight cut through the gap, glinting across his room like a knife. He wanted them closed, wanted the knife gone. But he didn’t want to go near the window, to pull them closed himself. He was scared of what might be outside the glass. He had seen the light in the garden, flashing close to the house, had asked Wendy about the light. Light? I didn’t see a light. You must have imagined it. Go to sleep now, like a good boy.

Sami swallowed. A lump was stuck in his throat and it wouldn’t go up or down. Inching silently to the end of his bed, dragging his torch with him, he slid on to the floor. He sat for a second, panting, his chest tight with fear. Was he alone? The darkness in his bedroom seemed to be moving.

On hands and knees, he crawled silently into the corner, squeezing himself behind the toy buckets, curling himself into a tiny ball. He could see nothing but the smooth coloured plastic of the buckets. Red. Blue. Yellow. Green. He couldn’t see the void of darkness beyond; the darkness couldn’t find him.

Mummy and Daddy were arguing. He pressed his hands over his ears, could still hear them.

Mummy was shouting. Daddy was angry.

He wanted to curl up in Mummy’s arms, like he used to before Mummy got sad.

Quietly, he tugged Baby Isabel out of the dolls’ toy bucket, shrunk back into the corner, clutching her tight to his chest.

‘The boy is bad,’ he whispered into Baby Isabel’s ear. ‘The girl … the girl is good. The boy is bad.’

He felt for his torch. It was next to him. Having it there made him feel safer. He wanted to switch it on, but he was too frightened to move again.

‘The bad girl has got out of bed.’ His lips moved silently against Baby Isabel’s ear. ‘Stay in bed. Don’t get out. Bad girl.’

He breathed in – a deep, sucking breath – trying to make his heart stop drumming in his chest. The noise of his heart was too loud. Someone would hear. The darkness would hear. Shadowman would hear. Pressing his hand to his chest, he tried to hold his heart to stop it from thumping. He couldn’t. Jamming his eyes shut, he started to cry.

Daddy was shouting. Mummy was sobbing.

He had to switch his torch on, had to keep himself safe.

‘Go away, Shadowman,’ he whispered. ‘Go away, Shadowman, goway, Shadowman, goway, goway, goway.’ Chanting under his breath, clutching Baby Isabel tight with one hand, he swung the beam of his torch back and forth across the room with the other. ‘Stay in bed. Gowayshadowman, goway, goway, goway.’