No one would ever imagine a delivery like this Deliveries usually come in a van They’re brought by a guy who needs Mum or Dad to sign a digipad to show they’ve received them Deliveries are often heavy boxes Mum’s wine cardboard envelopes books sometimes for us or oddly shaped padded bags filters for Dad’s wastewater system Deliveries do not come late on a school night They don’t come in a normal car that then speeds away And they don’t cry
The doorbell ding-dongs waking me up Pixie barks I hear a rush of tyres and then the front door bangs Weird It’s really late But I can hear Mum and Dad talking softly so I relax and drop back to sleep I hear crying At least I think I do Maybe I’m dreaming I come back up through the layers of sleep like a massive bounce-up on the trampoline It 7
feels like I’m actually moving and I sit up as I wake I turn on my bedside lamp the orange one Dad bought me that clips to the headboard of my bed I can still hear the crying and I’m definitely not dreaming now I reverse-flip so my head is at the door-end of my bed the door I have luckily left open a smidge I can hear voices and even catch a word here and there But then Harry presses his intercom buzzer and I can’t hear anything else The problem with the intercom is that Harry designed it and he has the master box of course In his room And if he’s buzzing me the buzzing will only stop if I hit my receive button or if he stops pressing which of course he never does So I can’t ignore it I can’t ignore him And the sound’s so rude and buzzy Sometimes I press receive and don’t speak just to stop the noise 8
