Faith shakes her head. ‘Put it back for now. Mum will want to check it if it’s not properly finished.’
‘But it’s yucky!’
‘I said she’d want to check it. I didn’t say it’d make sense,’ Faith says. ‘There’s only one thing for it – we’ll have to break into the emergency rations.’
Heather jumps down from the boxes, smiling. ‘Cool! I know where Mummy keeps them!’ She goes to the drawer by the back door and opens it. Inside are hundreds and hundreds of tiny packets – sugar, salt, pepper, salad cream, vinegar – just about anything you can find in a café or a restaurant. Mum always puts loads in her handbag when they go out to eat (which is getting to be more and more, with the top of the oven being broken) because she says it’s part of what they pay for when they pay for the food, and you never know when they’ll come in handy. When Heather got up this morning, she didn’t know today was going to be that day. It’s kind of exciting!
She reaches into the drawer, feeling the sachets slide through her fingers, enjoying the shifting colours as she searches for the ketchup ones. It’s kind of like looking for buried treasure. By the time Faith gets the nuggets and chips out of the oven Heather has six sachets clutched in each hand. Faith serves up their food and carries the plates through to the living room. They have to squish up together to fit into the space on the end of the sofa, but they don’t mind. At least this way they can watch cartoons while they eat.
The best bit is opening up the little packets and squeezing out the ketchup from the inside. It feels like they’re being fancy. There are still two or three each left over when they’ve finished eating.
Faith grins at Heather as she rips open another one. ‘Look, Heather! It’s like blood.’ She says the last bit in a creepy voice that makes Heather’s spine feel all tickly, and when Faith presses on the packet so the ketchup oozes out, she does a laugh that goes mwah-hah-hah! and makes Heather giggle, so Heather tears open one of her packets and does the same.
After that they can’t stop. They both keep ripping and mwah-hah-hah-ing until they’re laughing so hard they’re in danger of missing their plates and decorating their legs instead.
But then the air in the room goes instantly cold. Heather and Faith freeze.
‘Girls! What on earth do you think you’re doing?’
Heather drops her last unsqueezed ketchup packet onto her plate, where it lands in the big blob of pretend blood she’s been collecting.
‘Just eating our tea,’ Faith says. ‘I cooked chips and nuggets for me and Heather.’
Heather’s mother hasn’t got time to be impressed by that; she’s too busy staring at the twisted and torn wrappers littering the girls’ plates. ‘Where did you get those?’ she says, and her voice sounds all quiet and quivery.
‘From the ’mergency draw,’ Heather says helpfully. ‘The other ketchup was fluffy.’
Their mother’s expression changes to the one she wears when she’s trying to explain something and keep her temper at the same time. ‘Those… those… They’re not for you to use! They’re to be kept there. Just in case.’
‘But it was “just in case”, Mummy!’ Heather explains.
Their mother shakes her head, closes her eyes. ‘You don’t understand.’ And then her eyes snap open again and she looks at Heather. ‘How many did you take? How many?’
‘I… I…’
‘How many, Heather!’ She’s shouting now and Heather can’t seem to make the counting bit of her brain work.
Faith stands up. ‘Don’t shout at her! It’s not her fault. I told her to get them. And there were twelve, okay? Just twelve. And there are hundreds left in there!’
Their mother runs down the hall. The sisters put their plates down on the sofa and follow. Inside the kitchen, their mother wrenches the drawer open. The packets rustle and slide over each other as she sticks her hands inside and moves them around, counting softly.
She goes still and lifts her head up. ‘Right. Girls, get your coats on. We’re going to the Harvester for tea.’
The girls look at each other, big grins on their faces. That’s really fancy! But then Faith stops smiling. ‘But we’ve just eaten our tea,’ she says, looking confused.
‘Don’t get cheeky with me, young lady!’ Mum yells. ‘I need to get a dozen more and then it’ll all be okay again. You did say it was twelve, right?’
They both nod, but neither moves, and then their mother’s expression stops being hard and angry and she starts to look as if she’s about to cry.
‘Sorry, girls. Sorry, my babies.’
She comes and puts her arms round them and pulls them to her, one in each arm. ‘I tell you what, you don’t need to eat more tea – just dessert. How about that? An absolutely giant ice-cream sundae if you like. With sprinkles! And I can pick up more sachets to replace the ones we’re missing.’
She lets go of the girls, and all three of them are excited now.
‘Is Daddy coming?’ Heather asks.
‘No, poppet. He’s working late again tonight.’
Faith sighs. ‘He’s always working late,’ she grumbles.
Their mother’s eyes get that shiny look again, but then she smiles and says, ‘All the more for us, then! Go on, go and get your coats!’
Heather starts to run towards the piles near the front door. She thinks that’s where she left hers, but then the doorbell goes and everyone freezes. Both sisters turn and look at their mother. She puts her finger to her lips and motions for them to come towards her. Quietly. It’s hard to do, because everything underneath their feet is crunchy, but they’ve had plenty of practice.
‘Hello?’ a voice calls through the front door. ‘Mrs Lucas?’ The man knocks loudly. Heather starts to feel scared.
Her mother points at the next room, near the big table that’s always full of all her important papers. There’s a space down the side and both girls instinctively head for it and crouch there.
The letterbox clatters. The man must be peeping through it. ‘Mrs Lucas? I’m just here to read the electric meter… Are you there?’
But Mrs Lucas doesn’t answer him. Instead, she runs to where her daughters are hiding and squats down beside them, holding them tight. As they all close their eyes and wait for the man to go away, Heather realizes there probably isn’t going to be any ice-cream sundae tonight after all, and probably no chocolate sprinkles either.
NOW
It’s much later in the afternoon when Heather gets back to her flat after visiting her old house in Bickley. She goes into town for a cappuccino, sits outside her favourite café and watches the people march up and down the pedestrianized section of the High Street.
This is a mistake.
Because eventually she joins them, and then Mothercare pulls her inside, and by the time she’s feeding pound coins into the parking machine in The Glades shopping centre a squashy toy giraffe is tucked securely in the side pocket of her bag.
She’s really glad to get back to her flat, her sanctuary. She stows her contraband in the forbidden drawer and hurries into the