what the nightmare was about, and he wasn’t sure he ever would.
“That’s okay.” Pete nodded to himself. “I have bad dreams too, you know? Quite often, in fact. But I actually think it’s all right to have them.”
“How can it be all right?”
“Because sometimes really bad things happen to us, and we don’t like to think about them, so they get buried really deep in our heads.”
“Like earworms?”
“I suppose so, yes. But they have to come out eventually. And bad dreams can be our brain’s way of dealing with that. Breaking it all down into smaller and smaller pieces, until eventually there’s nothing left anymore.”
Jake considered that. The nightmare had been even more frightening than ever, so it felt more like his mind was building something up rather than breaking it down. But then, it always ended at the same point, before he could properly remember seeing Mummy lying on the floor. Maybe Pete was right. Perhaps his own mind was so scared that it had to build itself up for that sight before it could begin to break it down.
“I know it doesn’t make it any easier,” Pete said. “But you know what? A nightmare can never, ever hurt you. There’s nothing to be scared of.”
“I know that,” Jake said. “But I still want my daddy.”
“He’ll be back soon, I’m sure.”
“I need him now.” With the return of the nightmare, along with the little girl’s warning earlier, Jake was more sure than ever that something was wrong. “Can you call him and get him to come home?”
Pete was silent for a moment.
“Please?” Jake said. “He won’t mind.”
“I know he won’t.”
Pete took out his cell phone, and Jake watched anxiously as he swiped through, pressed the screen, and then held it up to his ear.
Downstairs, the front door opened.
“Ah.” Pete canceled the call. “I guess that’s okay, then. Will you be all right up here for a minute while I go down and get him?”
No, Jake thought, I won’t. He didn’t want to spend another second up here in the darkness by himself. But at least Daddy was home now, and he felt a flood of relief at that.
“Okay.”
Pete stood up and walked out of the room, and Jake heard his footsteps going back down the stairs, and then him calling out Daddy’s name.
Jake stared at the wedge of illuminated hallway beyond the bedroom door, listening carefully. For a few seconds there was nothing but silence. But then he heard something he couldn’t identify. Movement of some kind, as though furniture were being shifted about. And people talking, only with sounds instead of words, like when you were trying really hard to do something and the effort made you make a noise.
Another loud sound. Something heavy falling over.
And then silence again.
Jake thought about calling out for Daddy, but for some reason his heart was thudding hard in his chest again, as hard as it had been when he’d first woken up from the nightmare, and the silence was ringing so much that it felt like he was back inside it, back in their old living room.
He stared at the empty hallway, waiting.
A few seconds later, there was a new sound. Footsteps on the stairs again. Someone was coming up, but they were moving slowly and carefully, as though they were scared of the silence too.
And then someone whispered his name.
Fifty-two
“I’m sure everything’s fine.”
Hurrying along behind me, Karen tried to make it sound breezy. And no doubt she was right; I was almost certainly overreacting—walking so quickly that she was struggling to keep up. She had come with me without us discussing it, but if she hadn’t, I might even have been running right now. Because, while she was right, and there was most likely nothing to worry about, I still felt it in my heart. The certainty that something was terribly wrong.
I took out my phone and tried my father again. He had called me at the pub, but it had cut off before I’d had a chance to answer. Which meant that something must have happened. But when I’d tried to call him back, he hadn’t picked up.
The phone rang and rang now.
He still wasn’t picking up.
“Fuck.”
I canceled the call as we reached the bottom of my street. Maybe he’d dialed by accident, or changed his mind about needing to talk to me. But I remembered how deferential he’d been earlier on, and how quietly pleased he’d seemed to be allowed to look after Jake and be allowed into