Free A Year of Marvellous Ways by Sarah Winman

off fireworks. Kids, probably. Just need some air.
    I’ll come with you, she said.
    He crouched down by the electric fire and looked for his shoes. He noticed her pyjamas were now in a pile on the floor, and he caught her nakedness in the shine of the metal surround. He watched her pull on dark blue slacks and the grey cable-knit sweater that he’d left draped on her bed-frame.
    Missy coughed. Freddy stood up and buttoned his shirt.
    You can stop looking now, she said, smiling, as she began to line her lips with red. You’re blushing Freddy Drake. Yeah you are. Come on, let’s go. Bring the rest of that bottle and don’t make a noise.
    She picked up her coat and torch and headed towards the door. Freddy took a slug of brandy before following her into the dark. He felt done in. Head and heart together.
    A mizzle of rain played in the November sky. They sat on the roof, huddled and daunted like kids on the run, the bottle of brandy passing from mouth to mouth, taking his words to her lips, his warmth to her cool. Roof tops and chimneys strung out ahead, irregular and familiar to the east, an occasional break where the wind gathered and swirled with the restless ghosts of a family cut short. A rocket shot into the air and exploded. White stars falling.
    People are trying to fucking sleep down ’ere! A lone voice echoed across the brickwork. Freddy buttoned up his coat, anything to mask the pounding in his chest. Missy leant into him and she smelt good.
    I used to come up here during the war. I’d only say it to you, Freddy, but it was beautiful. Isn’t that crazy? The fires all along there, like a burning sunrise, over there out by the docks, and you could smell ’em, too. Wind in the right direction you could smell burning sugar, even cheese once. Planes overhead dodging crisscross lights, guns pounding, I tell you, Freddy, it was the movies and Christmas all in one. Once I sat up here with my friend Jeanie and it was a test of faith, well that’s what she said, us blind drunk on knocked-off spirits, out of our wits really, but alive. So bloody alive. And I felt lucky. Like everything I’d ever dreamt of was within reach. That I was being saved for something. The all-clear would sound, and I’d never felt such a thrill. And nothing touched me. Not really. Jeanie used to say I was a cat with nine lives.
    Got any left? asked Freddy.
    Dunno, said Missy. Be nice to think there was a couple left, and she grinned, and he looked at her and he was that twelve-year-old kid again – confused and eager with jump leads stretching from his balls to his heart.
    I was there, you know, that night, said Missy, softly.
    What night? What you talking about?
    At the Café de Paris. The night it happened.
    Jesus, Missy.
    I was dancing. Well away from the band, strangely enough for me, and the band was playing Oh, Johnny! Oh, Johnny! How you can love! Oh, Johnny! Oh, Johnny! Heavens above! And then it went silent. Everything slowed down, d’you know what I mean? Just smiling faces and this sort of blurred movment and the sweetest silence. And then a blue flash. That’s what I remember. Beautiful blue. And then I woke on the floor with a body on top of me and saw sheet music fluttering down like snow, and fragments of glass like stars. And then the screaming began. Parts of bodies and limbs everywhere. A woman wandering about, dazed and still singing “Oh, Johnny! Oh, Johnny!” All I got was a cut to my head. I did my best to help. My dress was already ripped so I ripped it some more and made tourniquets. And I cleaned people’s wounds with champagne. I often wondered what they must of thought, lying there dying, listening to the sound of champagne corks popping. It wasn’t right really, was it? Not that. I never cried, Freddy. Still haven’t. Jeanie reckoned I was a hard cow, but the way I see it you can’t cry for everyone and I’d done my crying before the war. Punctured me ear drum, that’s all. So I’m a bit deaf. Won’t