Free All Sorts of Possible by Rupert Wallis

shall I?’ Mason tousled Daniel’s father’s hair. ‘You’ve got a good son there. Isn’t that right, Daniel?
You’re a good lad, aren’t you? Do what you’re told.’
    Daniel looked from Mason’s grin to his father’s soft white face. ‘Yeah,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m a good lad.’
    Mason nodded. And then his voice dropped. ‘Stay away from Lawson’s house. There’s no need for you to go back there now.’ He kept staring until Daniel nodded that he had
understood. ‘Good lad.’ And Mason clapped his hands and laughed. ‘See!’ he shouted at Daniel’s father. ‘I told you!’

26
    His aunt was sitting in the kitchen with a cup of tea. The sink was a bright tub of chrome. Daniel could smell the bleach. There were lilies on the old oak table, sitting in a
tall green vase he had never seen before.
    It was like coming back to her house not his.
    ‘We’re going to have to get you another cellphone,’ she said, pulling the sleeve of her cardigan down over her watch. ‘I was getting worried. You’ve been out all
day.’
    ‘Me and Bennett lost track of time.’
    ‘Well, I’m glad you’ve got someone you can speak to. I’d worry if you didn’t.’
    Daniel stayed sitting at the table as she prepared supper because he did not want to be alone. He watched as she went round the kitchen, never going to the wrong cupboard or drawer for anything,
which made it seem even more like her house. They talked about her work in California. She said she had her own start-up that could tick along without her so she could be in Cambridge for the whole
of the rest of the summer holidays if necessary.
    ‘What’s it like there?’ asked Daniel as they sat down to eat.
    ‘Maybe you’ll come see for yourself one day.’
    Daniel kept asking as many questions as he could think up about her life on the other side of the world because, whenever there was a lull in the conversation, he imagined Mason peering in
through the window, grinning at him, or Lawson lying on the floor beside him, the bloody stump of his arm raised.
    ‘What’s wrong,’ asked his aunt when she noticed Daniel staring at his empty plate yet again.
    ‘Nothing. I’m just tired.’ He pinched a lily petal between his fingers and felt how smooth and delicate it was. ‘We’ve never had flowers before,’ he said.
    His aunt just smiled and nodded and then she cleared her throat. ‘I had a call from the hospital today, updating me on your father. There’s been no change. But then I suppose you
know that. The charge nurse said you went to see him. She said you looked so sad sitting there on your own.’
    Daniel nodded, remembering how Mason had whispered something to the nurse at her station to make her laugh before handing over a fold of twenty-pound notes and telling her he wasn’t really
there. It made a lock click shut in his stomach, trapping everything about Mason inside him.
    ‘Daniel, did you really see your friend today? I’m only asking because I don’t want to think you can’t be here with me, that you’re uncomfortable with me being
around.’
    Daniel put his hands flat on the table to help himself breathe. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see Bennett. I’m sorry I lied.’
    ‘So what did you do all day?’
    ‘I just mooched around town,’ he said quietly, his toes flexing so tight inside his trainers he thought the seams might pop.
    ‘On your own?’
    Daniel nodded.
    Before she could ask anything else, the phone rang and Daniel sprang up to answer it and listened for a moment, and then shouted down the line in a rage that it was nothing to do with miracles
at all, that he had been cursed instead, before slamming the receiver back down in its cradle.
    ‘I’m having the number changed,’ said his aunt. ‘They just keep ringing.’ She poured another glass of red wine and took a sip. Cleared her throat. ‘Daniel, it
doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. Let people believe what they want about what happened.