Reservoir 13: WINNER OF THE 2017 COSTA NOVEL AWARD. Jon McGregor

Liam blew into the fire again. Whatever, he said. Your mum gets it back to front. Lynsey came back first and she wouldn’t look either of them in the eye. She pushed Liam out of the way and got the fire going properly. She kept touching her lips. Sophie was gone for longer and when she came back the two girls walked away quickly, holding hands. Deepak came through the trees and crouched by the fire and in the wavering light his eyes were dazed. The other two were looking at him. He grinned. You’re not getting any off me so think on, he said, laughing as they both rolled him over on the ground. In the morning the embers were still smoking when the removal lorry arrived.

      In October the missing girl’s mother was seen up at the Hunter place, loading a van with boxes and bags, including two large sacks of what Jess Hunter later told people were all the sympathy cards she’d been sent. The understanding was that she might not be seen again. There was embracing on the driveway with Jess and Stuart Hunter, and with Jane Hughes who had come along to see her off. The man who was with her started the engine of the small white van and they bumped their way down the track. The gate opened automatically as they approached, and they were out of sight before it jerked slowly closed and clanged against the frame. Jane Hughes talked to the Hunters for a few minutes more before driving down the track herself. On her way through the village she called in to see Jackson. Maisie had told her neither of them held much truck with praying. Jane had said she quite understood but she’d like to pop round all the same, and now she was in the kitchen, asking Maisie to call her Jane instead of Vicar, while they waited for the kettle to boil. She didn’t say much, and instead let Maisie talk on about the running of the farm and the work her sons were doing and the plans they had for extending one of the buildings. Jane had the impression she was nervous about something. In a pause she asked how Jackson was doing. He won’t see you, Maisie said. He doesn’t want to see you. Jane told her that was fine, she quite understood. He’s angry about things I think, Maisie said. He’s angry but he’s got no one to blame. Jane said she could understand that. And how are you doing? she asked Maisie. We’re getting by, Maisie said. We’ll manage. We’re getting some help. The boys were putting the ram out with the ewes for tupping. The ram wore a raddle and the ewes soon had swathes of colour across their backs. There was a racket in the field as the business went on. The mornings got darker again and in their flat above the converted stables Su Cooper was often up before dawn with the twins, lying them screaming on their playmats while she held the kettle under a tap and shoved the heel of her hand into her mouth to keep from screaming herself. She knew she should be stronger than this but some mornings she felt completely alone. Her parents were too far away. Her friends were too far away. She had no one in this village, no one she could count on. At night there were badgers fighting in the beech wood. The travellers moved out of the old quarry down by the main road, and although they took most of their rubbish with them they left a couple of broken-down cars behind. They were both burnt out within the week. Mischief Night came around and was busier than the year before, although nothing compared to what it once was. Irene stood in the square and watched the youngsters spraying each other with shaving-foam and asked Martin if she’d ever told him that as a lad her late husband had once managed to hide an entire dairy herd on Mischief Night. Animals were considered out of line after that, she said, proudly. Martin said he wasn’t sure but he thought the story sounded familiar. The clocks went back and the nights overtook the short days.

      In November the Cooper twins had their first birthday. The flat above the stables was too small for more than half a dozen people, so the party was held in the function room at the Gladstone. It was the first event held there since the police had stopped using it for press conferences, but Tony put up so many balloons and streamers that it was easy to forget those scenes: the rows of chairs, the police officers, the huge mounted photographs of the missing girl. The twins weren’t walking yet, but were full of noise and thrived on the attention. They sat up on decorated high chairs at the head of a long table, and welcomed the food that kept coming their way. Su’s parents were there, and some cousins from Manchester, and a dozen people from the village who Cooper had particularly wanted to ask for the sake of all the support they’d shown. It had been a long year. They were both exhausted. He didn’t think it should be possible to survive on such little sleep, but they had. And the boys were so beautiful. He couldn’t quite absorb the fact of their being his sons. Even when they threw their drinks on the floor, or cried when the birthday cakes were brought out, he was desperately proud of them. Of their appetite for life, and for change; of the way their brains and their personalities seemed to expand by the minute. And this wasn’t supposed to have happened to him. He’d accepted that it wouldn’t. He’d reached fifty with only two failed and distant relationships to show for it, and he’d trained himself to tolerate another way of life: friendships and acquaintances and independence. He’d taught himself to value the freedom to travel, to move around, to go out or stay in as the fancy took him. He hadn’t travelled, in fact. Had always put it off, had never even owned a passport. But the opportunity was there. Being alone didn’t need to mean being lonely. He’d managed to convince himself of this. And then Su. He didn’t understand how it had happened. After a week she’d said they should have children, and when he’d laughed she’d told him no one was getting any younger. After a month she’d said they should marry, and taken him to Manchester to meet her parents. And he’d just kept saying yes. It had been such a simple pleasure, to keep saying yes. And for all those years when it seemed like they might not have children after all, he’d kept saying yes: yes, let’s try this; yes, let’s spend those savings; yes, this is worth another try. It had been difficult but they’d come through it together. The hard work of raising the boys was almost a reward. Su was going back to work soon, but the BBC had said she could start part-time and do some of that from home, so it felt as though they would manage. She was desperate to get back to work, some kind of work, he knew. He watched as she lifted Han Lee out of his high chair for the photos, and called him over to lift out Lu Sam. They stood close together, holding their boys, her family crowded around them while the photos were taken and everyone told them to smile.

      Jones the caretaker lived with his sister at the end of the unmade lane by the allotments, next to the old Tucker place. His age was uncertain but he’d worked at the school for thirty years. His sister was younger, and was never seen. She was understood to be troubled in some way. Most of the parents in the village had known him when they were at school. He had his own way of doing things, which pre-dated the other staff. There were locks in the school for which he had the only keys. The other staff were senior to him but he wouldn’t be told and he worked to his own timetable. He had clear boundaries and some of these were known. The boilerhouse doubled as his staffroom and no one else went in. Through the doorway occasionally an armchair was seen; a radio, a kettle, a stack of fishing magazines. But the door was almost always closed. The boiler itself was often breaking down. In the middle of December it broke down again and Mrs Simpson went looking for Jones. She found him on the steep wooded bank behind the school, climbing up through the elder and hazel with a rubbish sack. He was reeling in a faded line of police cordon tape which was snagged through the trees. It took him some time and she watched. Two years already and it seemed like no time at all. He saw her and he climbed up the bank. Must have blown in from the lane, he said. Folk are careless. She peered at the coiled tape, and nodded. Boiler? he asked. I’m afraid so, she said. There’s been no heat at all this morning. He headed over towards the bins and she walked with him. Inlets are probably clogged again, he said. Everything else all right? Yes, yes. Fine. He took out a pouch of tobacco and rolled a cigarette. She looked as though she had more to say. He nodded up at a bank of clouds over the moor, thickening. Weather, he said, and walked on. Mr Jones, she called after him. Will you let me get someone in? He stopped. It’s a decent boiler, he said. I’ll sort it. A goldcrest moved through the tall firs at the far end of the playground, picking quickly at the insects feeding between the needles. From the hills behind the allotments a thick band of rain was moving in. The reservoirs were a flat metallic grey. There was carol singing in the church with candles and children from the school playing their recorders and opening their mouths wide to sing. Be near me, Lord Jesus. The church was full. I ask thee to stay.

      Richard Clark came home between Christmas and New Year, after his sisters had left, and on New Year’s Eve he was seen going for a walk with Cathy Harris. They’d known each other at school, but had barely been in touch for years. They’d been as good as engaged, in fact, until he