Storm

outside, admiring that noisy new lawnmower. I ran to my bedroom window – vaguely aware I hadn’t closed my curtains last night, weird – and looked outside.
But Dad wasn’t in our garden, mowing the lawn.
Instead it was three helicopters making that roaring sound, slicing through a sky the colour of wet slate. Their beam lights flickered across the clouds.
I ran into Mum and Dad’s bedroom. Empty.
I went into Birdie’s bedroom. Empty.
I drew closer to her wonky, sea-facing window. The view outside was different. The sea looked like an overcrowded bath, filled with damaged toys. There were buildings in the sea. I saw the roof of Birdie’s primary school. At least seven white caravans were in there too, moving up and down in the waves. Here and there were red and yellow boats, snapped in half like crayons broken by a petulant child.
I hurried downstairs, my gait lopsided from running with one shredded trainer and one bare foot.
‘Mum? Dad? BIRDIE?’
I yelled for them in the kitchen, the sitting room and Mum’s study. But they didn’t come.
After searching the cottage three times, I had to face facts.
They’re not here. They’re missing.
I’ll tell you something else that was missing. Their winter jackets and wellies – they weren’t in the porch. My parka was also missing. The one I’d put on yesterday.
Had they gone out for a walk before school? Without me, but with my parka? WHY?
And how quiet it was. Mornings at home were usually noisy, pop songs blaring out from the radio competing with Birdie shouting that she couldn’t find her book bag, and the ancient coffee machine grinding through its first cycle of the day. But this morning, our house was more like an empty beach than a home. A beach at the end of the day – footprints washed clean by the tide, human existence rubbed away.
Then someone knocked on the front door.
Phew.
I skidded on the floorboards in my rush to get there, and then stopped. Why were they knocking anyway? They had keys.
‘Hello?’ boomed Mum.
‘Anyone there?’ roared Dad.
‘Anyone hurt?’ said a third deep voice.
They did not sound like themselves at all.
Unsure, I took a few steps away, in the direction of the staircase, and then sank down on to its bottom step. I wrapped my arms around myself. The door went RATTLE RATTLE and a few seconds later broke apart in a pile of large wooden splinters and a tall man who was definitely Not Dad pushed his way through its remains.
Behind him came a woman who was definitely Not Mum and a shorter man who was definitely Not Birdie. These Nots wore padded waterproof trousers, the ones that make a swishy noise when you move, big fluorescent jackets and hard hats with the words Coastal Rescue on them. I felt a mixture of relief and fear. They didn’t look like thieving murderers. On the other hand, they had just kicked our door in.
The three of them stood, gathered before me. The grey light that filled the unlit hallway cast shadows on their faces, making it harder for me to see their eyes. I shivered slightly.
‘Hello?’ said the woman.
‘Hello,’ I said.
‘Anyone here?’ she said, throwing anxious, quick glances around the hallway.
‘I’m here,’ I said from my step. ‘But my parents and sister aren’t. Can you help me find them?’
‘Okay,’ said the woman firmly, and I gave her a grateful smile. ‘There’s a car in the drive, so it’s possible the residents are still at home. I spotted a child’s bicycle in the garden so we could be searching for minors. It’s possible they can’t get to the door, so they may be injured. Let’s find some visual ID so we know who we’re looking for.’
The two men nodded.
‘Right,’ said the woman. ‘Ed, find the fuse box and switch everything off.’
‘Got it,’ said Not Dad, the tall man.
The woman turned to the shorter man. ‘Let’s check downstairs first.’
‘But I’ve looked everywhere,’ I said. ‘Three times at least. They’re definitely not here.’
In spite of that, they hurried off in the direction of the sitting room.
They’re double-checking, I thought, getting up from my step to follow them. That’s nice, I suppose.
Off we went.

ME AND THE three strangers regarded the jumble of blankets and cushions on the sofa, the overturned mugs on the floor, Dad’s newspaper sprawled out on the carpet. I stood awkwardly in the doorway, hoping they couldn’t smell the wee on me.
‘I have already checked in here,’ I reminded them, as gently as I could.
The man and woman said nothing.
Would it hurt them to reply? I mean, what happened to basic manners?
On the other hand, grown-ups could get that way when they were concentrating. It was like the sound of children’s voices stopped their brains from working properly, so they’d demand silence when confronted with a knotty problem.
This happened quite often at school, and whenever our parents were trying to drive to a new campsite and had forgotten a map again. What I was dealing with here was a case of Grown-ups Needing Total Quiet for Their Thinking Time.
The fairy lights on the Christmas tree went dark.
The tall man appeared in the sitting room. ‘Circuit’s off,’ he said. He walked up to the fireplace in his heavy black boots and began to rifle through the Christmas cards.
Hold on a minute!
On top of being ignored by the other two, this was too much. My throat went all scratchy. ‘Those are private.’
His hand paused for a moment. ‘Did you hear that?’ he said.
The three of them went very still, as if straining to catch a far-off sound.
‘Very funny,’ I muttered. ‘Point taken.’
Again, this was nothing new. What I was experiencing here was that old chestnut, Let’s Pretend Our Ears Don’t Work to Teach a Child Some Manners. It was boring, it wasn’t funny, but it was clearly rather popular among the elderly.
‘No,’ said the woman, ‘but check the kitchen.’
Two of them ran off while I stared at the man nosing around our mantelpiece. There were deep shadows under