Page 3 of Second Story

That won’t work. I had to leave to take care of Lenny before she ever had a chance to visit me in placement.

“Or someone who has supervised you recently in the workplace.” He squints. “Your application mentions a mobile library service, yes? Ask your boss there. If you can tell me one more story convincing me you understand the impact of childhood trauma and connect me with someone credible who can promise that you’re a safe pair of hands in practice as well as on paper...”

He once more taps that mosaic tiling, and then makes a promise.

“...I’ll make you welcome in a heartbeat.”

Almost a week later,I come back to Cornwall a day earlier than Luke Lawson wanted. Or a night earlier to be truthful, and I don’t travel alone.

I wish I could say I’d brought someone to vouch for me on this midnight journey. My brother can’t do that, but Lenny is the closest I’ve got to a trauma expert. I’m still pretty sure Glynn Harber’s headmaster won’t take a barely seven-year-old’s word as proof to hire me, but at least I’ve got the perfect second story to score me the job—that book Lenny’s first welfare worker gave him is on the bench seat between us, and the moon lights its title.

Every Scar Tells a Story.

I also have another incentive for scoring this job. My brother reminds me of that when he stirs in his sleep and whimpers like when I arrived at school to collect him earlier today and found him scared shitless by a school-gate knife fight.

Thank fuck he’s safe.

That doesn’t stop me from having a silent panic under a full moon and a star-filled sky so different from London’s light pollution.

What if he hadn’t been?

My old van lets out a death rattle, and Lenny wakes in a panic of his own, instantly on high alert. His eyes are so like our mother’s, wide and frightened like the last time I saw her.

“It’s okay, Len.”

It isn’t, his bruised doe eyes tell me.

I spin a quick story to distract him. “Honestly, it is okay, because that rattling sound? It was the van telling me all about Cornwall. About how safe it is here. Did you hear it?”

He nods slowly, wide eyes silvered by the moon and suspicious instead of their usual trusting amber. They shine, and so does the cape of the action figure he clutches as if expecting someone might snatch his Silver Manfrom him. No surprise when everything else he values has been stolen. Now his gaze isn’t only watchful, it’s worried.

I can guess why even if he won’t voice it, and now that he’s awake enough to really listen, I stop telling stories.

“Those men weren’t after you with their knives.”

His mouth opens, full lips parting, but nothing comes out, so I keep going.

“And you aren’t the reason the police have shut down your school for a few days. If you’re worried they’ll come after you too, you can stop right now. No one is going to hurt or arrest you.”

Lenny shrinks in his seat, maybe picturing the blade that really shut down his school.

A fucking machete.

“Someone probably didn’t pay their dealer, that’s all, Len. All of that blood will be gone when school reopens.”

I hope to hell that I haven’t been premature by packing our shit and running, but I’m not sure I’ve been entirely truthful about what Lenny witnessed.

What if it was actually a warning for Mum to keep her mouth shut?

“Look.” I point ahead, more than ready to swerve that subject. “You ever see this many stars?”

He peers up, then shakes his head, eyes widening for a much better reason, and I fill the cab of this old van with another story, this time about constellations. Miles later, his eyes are closed again. Lenny sleeps the rest of the way as I skim the edge of rugged moorland where granite giants rest like he does. Those Cornish tors are painted by moonlight. So is the beachside car park I pull into a few miles later when a dashboard warning light flickers. I turn off the engine to let it cool while I take a moment to stare.

The ocean is as silver as the moon, as sparkling as every single one of those stars, and I’m tempted to wake Lenny until I notice I’m not alone in staring skyward.

A man down on the sand does some stargazing too, and I can’t keep in a sigh at what Cornwall could also hold as well as safety for my brother.

Look at the size of those shoulders.

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