And from the speakers set up on both sides, the super high-pitched voice of a mouse exclaimed: ‘And-a-one-and-a-two-and-a-three, hit it!’
The song started, a steady drum and the climbing melody sung by a squeaky mouse, until a whole chorus of other mice joined in.
Ravi was laughing now, and crying, and something in between the two. And somewhere, behind them, someone started clapping in time to the song.
Now a few more.
Pip watched over her shoulder as the clapping caught, passing up and down as it swelled through the swaying crowd. The sound was thunderous and happy.
People started singing along with the shrill mice, and – as they realized it was just the same few lyrics repeated – others joined in, struggling to hit those impossibly high notes.
Ravi turned to her, mouthing the words, and she mouthed them back.
Mohan walked down the steps, the page in his hand replaced with a Chinese lantern. The district councillor carried another down, passing it to Jason and Dawn Bell. Pip let Ravi go as he joined his mum and dad. Ravi was handed the small box of matches. The first one he struck was blown into a thin line of smoke by the wind. He tried again, sheltering the flame with his cupped hands, holding it under the lantern’s wick until it caught.
The Singhs waited a few seconds for the fire to grow, filling the lantern with hot air. They each had two hands on the wire rim at the bottom, and when they were ready, when they were finally ready, they straightened up, arms above their heads, and let go.
The lantern sailed up above the pavilion, juddering in the breeze. Pip craned her neck to watch it go, its yellow-orange flicker setting the darkness around it on fire. A moment later, Andie’s lantern crossed into view too, mounting the night as it chased Sal across the endless sky.
Pip didn’t look away. Her neck strained, sending stabs of pain down her spine but she refused to look away. Not until those golden lanterns were little more than specks, nestling among the stars. And even beyond that.
SATURDAY
Four
Pip tried to fight them off, her sinking eyelids. She felt fuzzy around the edges, ill-defined, like sleep had already taken her, but no . . . she really should get up off the sofa and do some revision. Really.
She was lying on the red sofa in the living room, in Josh’s Place apparently, as he kept intermittently reminding her. He was on the rug, rearranging Lego while Toy Story played in the background. Her parents must still be out in the garden; her dad had enthusiastically told her this morning that they were painting the new garden shed today. Well, there wasn’t much her dad wasn’t enthusiastic about. But the only thing Pip could think of was the stalk of the solitary sunflower planted near there, over their dead dog’s grave. It hadn’t yet bloomed.
Pip checked her phone. It was 5:11 p.m. and there was a text waiting on the screen from Cara, and two missed calls from Connor twenty minutes ago; she must have actually fallen asleep for a bit. She swiped to open Cara’s message: Urgh, been throwing up literally all day and Grandma keeps tutting. NEVER AGAIN. Thank you so much for coming to get me xx
Cara’s previous text, when you scrolled up, had been sent at 00:04 last night: Polpp whertf ui i I traifng finds anfulpw ggind hekp me safd. Pip had called her immediately, whispering from her bed, but Cara was so drunk she couldn’t speak in full sentences, not even half sentences or quarter, broken up by cries or hiccups. It took some time to understand where she was: a calamity party. She must have gone there after the memorial. It took even longer to coax out whose house the party was at: ‘Stephen-Thompson’s-I-think.’ And where that was: ‘Hi-Highmoor somewhere . . .’
Pip knew Ant and Lauren were at that party too; they should have been looking out for Cara. But, of course, Ant and Lauren were probably too preoccupied with each other. And that wasn’t even what worried Pip most. ‘Did you pour your own drinks?’ she’d asked. ‘You didn’t accept a drink from someone, did you?’ So Pip had climbed out of bed and into her car, to ‘Highmoor somewhere’ to find Cara and take her home. She didn’t get back into bed until gone half one.
And today hadn’t even been quiet to make up for it. She’d taken Josh to football this morning, standing in a cold field to watch the game, then Ravi came over at lunch to record another update on the Max Hastings trial. Afterwards, Pip had edited and uploaded the mini episode, updated her website and replied to emails. So she’d sat down on the sofa for two minutes, in Josh’s Place, just to rest her eyes. But two had somehow become twenty-two, sneaking up on her.
She stretched out her neck and reached for her phone to text Connor, when the doorbell went.
‘For goodness sake,’ Pip said, getting up. One of her legs was still asleep and she stumbled over it, into the hallway. ‘How many bloody Amazon deliveries does one man need?’ Her dad had a serious next-day delivery addiction.
She undid the chain – a new rule in their house – and pulled open the door.
‘Pip!’
It wasn’t the Amazon delivery guy.
‘Oh, Connor, hey,’ she said, fully opening the door. ‘I was literally just texting you back. What’s up?’
It was only then that she noticed his eyes: the way they somehow looked both far-off yet urgent, too much white showing above and below the blue. And though Connor had a pink-cheeked, freckle-faced complexion, his face was flushed red, a line of sweat trickling down his temple.
‘Are you OK?’
He took a deep breath. ‘No, I’m not.’ His words cracked at the edges.
‘What’s wrong . . . do you want to come in?’ Pip stepped back to clear the threshold.
‘Th-thank you,’ Connor said, stepping past as Pip shut and locked the door. His T-shirt was sticking to his back, damp and bunched up.
‘Here.’ Pip led him into the kitchen and pointed him into one of the stools, her trainers discarded beneath it. ‘Do you want some water?’ She didn’t wait for him to answer, filling up one of the clean glasses on the draining board and placing it in front of him with a thud that made him flinch. ‘Did you run here?’
‘Yeah.’ Connor picked up the glass with two hands and took a large gulp that spilled over his chin. ‘Sorry. I tried to call you and you didn’t answer and I didn’t know what to do other than just come here. And then I thought you might be at Ravi’s instead.’
‘That’s OK. I’m right here,’ Pip said, sliding up into the seat opposite him. His eyes still looked strange and Pip’s heart reacted, kicking around her chest. ‘What is it? What do you need to speak to me about?’ She gripped the edges of her stool. ‘Has . . . has something happened?’
‘Yes,’ Connor said, wiping his chin on his wrist. He parted his lips and his jaw hung open and close, chewing the air like he was practising the words before he said them.
‘Connor, what?’
‘It’s my brother,’ he said. ‘He . . . he’s missing.’
Five
Pip watched Connor’s fingers as they slipped down the glass.
‘Jamie’s missing?’ she said.
‘Yes.’ Connor stared at her.
‘When?’ she asked. ‘When did you last see him?’
‘At the memorial.’ Connor paused to take another sip of water. ‘I last saw him at the memorial, just before it started. He never came home.’