House of Windows Read Free

correct answer, rather than having it appear, miraculous and fully formed, in their heads.
    Chin propped on the heel of his hand, he let his eyes blur on the chart of formulae. He jumped when his phone beeped.
    Dad:
    Heading out soon. Catch you before bed? Sorry later than expected. Is router set up?
    Nick pushed himself to his feet and scowled his way into the sitting room. ‘So much for the birthday pizza,’ he told the mess of boxes, or maybe he only thought the words: he was so used to no one being there to hear that sometimes he wasn’t sure what he said aloud and what stayed in his head.
    The road outside grew dark, then orange with the glow of the streetlights. The overgrown shrubs in the tiny front garden became alien: leathery and shiny, highlighted with poisonous stripes of reflected colour. Even though it felt like conceding defeat to admit that it was dark – that his birthday was almost over, no chance of rescuing it now – he put on the kitchen light, then both of the living-room lights, then the hall light, and the light over the front door, and still the house felt huge and strange and empty; even with the stereoblasting out cheery cheesy pop music, it was full of echoes and shadows.
    He trudged upstairs for a jumper, took out the brand-new blue cashmere. Then he remembered Michael’s look of puzzled surprise as he’d watched Nick unwrap it that morning, forgetting for a moment to pretend that he was the one who’d picked it out, rather than Secretary Sandy.
    His favourite jumper was at the bottom of his box of A-level textbooks. Worn and disreputable, with holes under the arms, it no longer smelled of his grandmother, but there was something in the texture of the weave that felt happy: the echo of a memory so far down in his soul it was all emotion, a burst of colour and warmth, adrift from time and place. The smell of fresh lemon cake and jam pastries. Flour on his nose, batter smeared into his clothes. Laughter, and games, and walks in the woods. Great Adventures to the nearest town to buy books. Soft warm enormous towels after a bath. Story after story before sleep.
    Her photo smiled from his bedside table. He turned the frame so that the glass reflected the light, hiding the picture.
    By the time he’d taken the brand-new duvets, pillows and bed linen out of their packaging and made his bed, then Michael’s, the house was starting to feel more familiar: there was something homey about the way he hadn’t stretched the fitted bottom sheets enough, so the mattresses showed where the fabric wouldn’t pull down to the bedframe. He already remembered which part of the floor in his new room squeaked, and which step made the most noise on eachstaircase. His books were on the bookcase. His clothes in the chest of drawers.
    And it’s not like I had any real friends back in London to miss , he was telling his desk lamp when there was a scratching at the front door.
    His father blinked in surprise when he pulled it open. ‘I didn’t think you’d still be awake.’ Michael pasted on a smile a moment too late to render the words glad.
    ‘Coffee?’ Nick called over his shoulder as he led the way to the kitchen. Birthday cake, if you’ve remembered one? he mumbled into the cupboard. ‘Are you off early tomorrow?’
    ‘No, I’m good to go down to College with you, like we said. Anyway, how’s everything here? You should use the household card if we need any pots and pans, stuff like that.’
    Nick sighed. ‘I guess I should learn how to cook spaghetti at least.’
    ‘Well, we’ve made boiled eggs before,’ his father said. ‘I seem to remember your mother saying that roasting a chicken and potatoes was just putting everything in the oven until it was brown but not black. Think we could manage that.’ The words puffed out in jolly staccato bursts: a ‘ho ho ho’ of overwrought cheer.
    ‘I don’t remember her cooking. Not with Roger,’ Nick said softly.
    Michael’s face fell. ‘She had a