There’s time to go and see Grampy on the way home from school. I take Susie’s satchel and pick up her hand to make her walk faster. Grampy’s house smells of kippers today. So do his hands. Grampy’s fingers are big and lumpy. There is dirt from gardening down behind his...
She’s alone in the house apart from Rook, yet from downstairs comes a noise she can’t quite place, a creak or an echo. She strains to listen. The sound is like a swollen door opening. She sits up, suddenly alert: it can only be Rook. Rook cawing from the hallway, his caw cracked and wavering, his...