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By Root 441 0

have been bad bad. I could tell from the terror in Mum’s eyes. Having retrieved Bernardo after all these years, she thought he was about to be snatched away again. Was it the tumour? Were they going to cut him open and take it out? She was beside herself, and getting any information out of her was impossible. And I couldn’t get Dad to explain anything to me either. He was too busy wrapping himself around Mum, turning into a human firewall, trying to shield her from all the things that have to be decided and signed and approved before your child goes into surgery. Shield her from the possibility of grief. Shield her from the people too.

Mum and Dad knew practically everyone at the hospital, of course. Doctors and nurses and orderlies were constantly stopping to talk to us.

‘Oh, is this your daughter?’

‘So sorry to hear about what happened to your son.’

‘Poor you, is there anything we can do?’

Nobody would leave us alone.

So in the end we went home. It would be hours before they let Bernardo out of the operating theatre, and anyway, it was two in the morning and we needed to get some sleep. As if.

When we got home, I rushed upstairs and looked wildly around my room. The wishing stone. It was lying on Bernardo’s bed.

I picked it up and knelt with the stone clutched to my heart. Please. Please. Make Bernardo better. If ever there was a time to believe in miracles, this was it. Please heal the tumour.

Then I knelt there for a long time. Willing the wish to come true.

But of course nothing happened.

Wishes don’t come true.

Bernardo turning into a giant.

Getting my wish to play with the Souls.

It was all stupid coincidence, wasn’t it?

I dragged myself to my feet, feeling foolish.

The stone lay cold and useless in the palm of my hand. I was such an idiot.

I ran downstairs, pulled open the front door, and threw it into the rubbish bin by the front gate.

When I came back into the house, Mum and Dad were standing like statues in front of the answering machine in the living room. Its lights blinked furiously, like landing lights on a runway.

Ten messages, the digital counter said. Clearly, the lines from the Philippines had unblocked while we were at the hospital and here, at last, was news.

But they just stood there, staring.

Dad put his arm around Mum.

‘Go on, you have to find out,’ he whispered gently.

Mum cringed.

I climbed onto the sofa, hugging my knees. I waited, my heart in my throat.

Mum pressed the button and screwed her eyes shut as if something was about to hit her.

‘First message,’ the brash metallic voice said. Beep!

‘Hello, hello? Mary Ann? Can you hear me?’

It was Auntie Sofia.

Auntie Sofia told Mum that up and down Montalban, the earthquake had pounded villages to extinction. The land was reduced to rubble as far as the eye could see. Everywhere, too, death had swept away men, women and children. The Philippines wept for hundreds.

San Andres itself was flattened. It was as if a giant foot had descended from above and stamped on the village.

And yet San Andres was hailed as the great miracle of the earthquake. Because though not a single house was left standing and the dome of its idiosyncratic stadium had collapsed into itself like a boiled egg tapped too hard by a spoon, in San Andres lives had been spared.

Only one person was found to be missing.

‘Who is it? Is it someone we know?’ Mum had cried. And when Auntie answered, I knew right away that all that stuff about San Andres being a miracle had been a kindness. Auntie had been preparing Mum for some really bad news.

‘Jabby? Oh no, no, no.’ And Mum put her head down on the table and began to sob. Dad bowed his head and awkwardly patted her shoulders.

I stared into space. Bernardo loved Jabby like a brother and now he was gone. How were we going to tell him what happened? How were we—

That was when I heard it ringing. It was the theme from Star Wars. Bernardo’s ring tone.

It was behind the fridge for some reason. I had to lie on my tummy and reach through a curtain of cobwebs to retrieve it. How did it get there?

Twenty missed