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‘No, actually, I don’t,’ Nina said stiltedly, turning her face back to the fire, aware of the sudden tension in the body next to her. Suddenly, the euphoria of the evening drained abruptly away and she was anxious to leave. ‘It’s getting late. I’m tired…I think I’ll go back to the house,’ she muttered, scrambling to her feet and blocking out the chorus of voices as she offered a falsely casual goodnight and hurried away.
The farther Nina got from the glow of the bonfire the colder she felt and she wrapped her arms around herself to conserve her body heat as her sneakers swished through the frigid sand. Suddenly, a blanket dropped over her shoulders and Ryan was there, striding silently alongside her with Zorro a panting shadow at his heels.
‘You didn’t have to leave, as well,’ she ventured guiltily. Kicking out the embers and burying them in sand was part of the fun of having a bonfire.
‘I did if I wanted to be with you,’ he said. ‘Although it’s a shame to miss the—’
There was a booming detonation behind them and Nina whirled around with a small scream.
‘—fireworks,’ Ryan finished as an incandescent white light shot into the sky, followed by successive balls of exploding white sparks emitting high-pitched screams. Zorro, far from being upset by the cacophony, immediately dashed back to the excitement. ‘Chas said they were left over from last year’s Guy Fawkes—’
He suddenly noticed Nina crouched on the sand, shaking, her face buried against her knees, her hands pressed over her ears.
‘Nina—what’s wrong?’
He had to kneel down beside her to hear her reedy reply.
‘I don’t—I hate fireworks. I’m sorry, I know it’s silly, but I just can’t bear them.’
‘It’s all right, we’re well away from them. They can’t hurt you—’
‘I know that, I know that. I just…the noise, the smoke of them, it makes me feel sick. I don’t know why—’ She cringed as there was another bang.
‘Don’t you?’ His arm came around her, pulling her into his side so that she could bury her tear-stained face in his chest, crushing her shuddering body to his as if he could absorb her paralysing fear. ‘Don’t you, Nina?’ he asked with fierce urgency that reached to the core of her being.
‘I…no…yes…yes…my mother,’ she gasped against his pounding heart. ‘Since she died in that explosion…I’ve hated Guy Fawkes…hated seeing all those flashes, like the one that killed Mummy and Laurie.’
‘Your mother?’ She felt his heart slow for a fraction of a second, then accelerate even faster. ‘But you didn’t see the flash, Nina,’ he reminded her. ‘You said you were playing next door at the neighbours’.’
‘But…no…’ She lifted her face, a ghostly glimmer in the darkness, illuminated by pulsating flashes of colour from the far end of the beach. ‘No…’ Her stunned wet eyes sought his, her hands curling into his black sweater. ‘No, no—I wasn’t. Isn’t that odd? I—I didn’t remember it until now, but I wasn’t next door. I was only supposed to be. It was my sixth birthday and Mummy was going to ice the cake she’d made me. She told me to go outside and play on the seesaw, but I didn’t think it was fair that Laurie was allowed to see and not me, so I crept back. I was peeping in the crack of the kitchen door when, when—oh, God, I saw it happen…I saw it happen!’ She shuddered, welcoming his suffocating grip.
‘There was a big flash—I was knocked over. The door, I think it came off…and there was smoke in there and sparks from the ceiling and everything was broken and Mummy and Laurie weren’t there any more, so I ran next door to get on the seesaw so Mummy wouldn’t know I’d been bad…because maybe it happened because I was bad!
‘I just rocked and rocked on that seesaw until Mrs Petley saw me and took me inside, and the fire engines came and then Gran and Gramps, and nobody ever asked what I’d seen because they all just assumed I’d been in the Petleys’ garden. It was even in the papers—and it was always what Gran told people. I grew up thinking it was true. But it wasn’t. And all this time I repressed it. God.’ The childish agony was in her voice. ‘I remember being so scared everyone would think it was my fault….’
