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contacted a psychologist, who suggested that music might help. So I bought a disc player and some CDs, and took them to the hospital. One of the albums was by Milton Summer, and one song in particular—‘Laughter in the air’—really helped her. She would play it over and over. That’s when the fascination began—I suppose you could call it a crush. I encouraged it, because it stopped her thinking about her troubles and she began to get better. Two months later, she came home; physically OK, but still with lots of scars in her mind. She kept having visions of the crash. I don’t know how accurate they were, but she would see the boys’ faces just before the crash, and they were always laughing at her.’
    By then I couldn’t look at Vicky any more. I tried to remember if I’d laughed at Stephanie at any stage. I hoped not.
    ‘Slowly the bad dreams came less often, but she still wasn’t the happy girl she once was. Then I met Alan at the reunion. For me it was wonderful time. I told Steph about it, and when she found out that he lived near Milton Summer she was ecstatic. For the past four months she’s been preparing for this visit. I supported her because I could see she was becoming her normal, old self again. Today was going to be one of the highlights of her life. And I think it was, until…
    She didn’t have to finish the sentence, for I’d already finished it in my mind: until I almost finished what that other stupid teenager had started. I felt so bad I wanted the bed to open up and swallow me.
    Vicky could see my distress and put her hand on my arm. ‘I don’t blame you, Jake. I learnt when Mike was killed that blaming people doesn’t change things, it only makes you bitter. I think it would have been better if Alan had told you about us a long time ago. He only told you last night, didn’t he?’
    I nodded.
    She nodded back. ‘Yes, he could have handled thatbetter. But we can’t go back and change things. That’s something else I know only too well.’ She sighed deeply. ‘We can only try and put things right. I don’t know what’s going to happen now. At this moment Steph wants to get as far away from this place as possible and never come back. Maybe that’s what will happen. She’s got a rough time ahead of her, which means I have, too. But I’d like to think that we could still make this work. That the four of us could join together and form a family.’ She looked directly into my eyes. ‘Maybe you’re the one who can make it happen. Give it some thought, Jake, and see if you can think of something.’
    She squeezed my arm for a moment, before standing and moving to the door. ‘Bye, Jake. Take care. And I really do hope that we’ll meet again sometime.’
    In the morning when I got up, they’d gone.

Chapter 5
    Life around Hauruanui moved on. For most of the residents, the visit of Vicky and Stephanie caused little change, although I’m sure they noticed that things weren’t quite the same at Wrightson’s garage. Those who called in for fuel or repairs must have noticed that Dad no longer joked with them or strung them along with outlandish quotes for minor repairs. All the sparkle had gone out of him. The most obvious change was that he stopped going to the pub on a Saturday night. When they asked about it, he said he’d too much work to do. Yet I knew that wasn’t true: we had less work than ever, mainly because Dad had stopped updating the website.
    I was in my last term at primary school, and, if I had my way, it would be my last term at school ever, as I intended to do high school by correspondence. It should have been a fun time for me, but the events of that weekend were always in the back of my mind. I didn’t mope around the place the way Dad did, but almost every day I’d get a twinge of conscience, especially when I went in the workshop and saw the jeep sitting there unused.
    We never talked about that weekend. Maybe we should have. Maybe we should have had a