"Is everyone home, guys?"

"Yes, Dad," moaned Sarah, picking up a large piece of chocolate from the kitchen surface and tossing it into her mouth. "You know, it is 7 pm, wouldn't we all be at home?"

"Dad was just checking, Sarah," intervened Norah, smoothing her jacket. "Right, I'm uhh, I'm going to the clinic now, I'll be back a bit later."

"Sweetie?"

"Yes, Mom?"

"Good luck."

Norah smiled and made her way out of the door, as Kate watched her sadly. She had known Norah was pregnant of course, but somehow it had only just hit her that this really was the end of an era.

"You OK?" chipped in Mark, snapping Kate out of her little dream world.

"Sure."

With that, the door slammed shut the second time since Norah had gone.

"Who was that?"

"Charlie probably," Jessica replied, in a bored voice.

"Uhh, no, I'm here," called Charlie. Tom turned.

"Well who is it then?"

At that moment, Mike appeared in the doorway.

"Mike?"

"Don't start having a go at me, Mom."

"I wasn't going to, but… I want to know where you were."

"Leave it! I was just having a walk!"

"For three hours?" retorted Jake.

"FUCK OFF!" Mike screeched.

"Mike, will you PLEASE mind how you speak, and tell me what the hell is going on?"

Mike threw his father a murderous look, and tore back out of the door. Jake started to go after him.

"Leave him," said Kim quietly, stopping Jake with her arm, "I think he just wants to be left alone for a bit."

Kate bit her lip.

"Are you OK, Mom? I mean, you look kinda worried."

"Yeah, Nigel, I'm fine. I'm just concerned. Kids, um, has Mike seemed a little, tense to you lately?"

Cue quite a few shrugs.

"He's been kinda quiet," replied Jessica.

"I think maybe he's been a bit depressed, he's been a total little sod lately. Moaning and complaining and spending too much time on his own…"

"Really?" Kate enquired, her troubled expression now undeniable. "Oh… oh God, I hadn't even noticed. D'you think something's wrong, Tom?"

"I dunno, but I think someone should go after him." Tom answered, unlacing his trainers. "Take your mother's coat to the cupboard, Kyle." Kyle did so, with a vague mumble of complaint.

Mark shook his head.

"Leave it for a bit, he's probably only gone around the block. He'll be back being an idiot in here after no time."

At quarter past eight, Kate put her head around Kim's door.

"Is Mike anywhere?" Kim asked her mother.

Kate's mouth opened.

"You mean he's not back yet?"

Kim nervously searched herself for an image that Mike was curled up on the sofa, right as they spoke. She couldn't conjure it.

"I'll go look for him," she said hurriedly, leaping up off her bed before Kate could stop her.

As Kate explained where Kim had gone to the others, Kim pulled her coat over herself as she walked out of the front drive.

"Mike, are you here? Miii-iiike?"

Kim called out into the darkness. There was no reply.

"Little moron," she cursed, running a hand through her hair and walking more briskly around the lightless street. At the end of it, she called again.

"Mike? If you're here, would you just PLEASE come home? Mom's starting to get worried. And so am I."

No reply, yet again. Angrily, Kim started to jog along the rest of the road, glancing into the roads that turned off from it. No sign.

At last, as she glimpsed into Werlen Drive, she saw a small male figure, gently illuminated by a light inside a house.

"Mike?" He didn't answer. A little nervous, she ran over to him. It was indeed Mike.

"Mike?"

"What?" he retorted quietly, yet snappily.

"I've been looking everywhere for you."

"So?"

"Mike! I was worried! Everyone was!"

Mike started to walk away from her, further out of the Cul-De-Sac, approaching the bigger road.

"Where are you going?"

No reply. Exasperated, not to mention a little disconcerted, Kim ran over to her brother and grabbed his shoulder, swivelling him to look at her. Gazing at his face, she took a step back, nervous. His eyes were glazed over, like something out of a film, and he kept on and on blinking.

"What the hell? Mike, stop it, you're scaring me."

"Leave it," replied Mike, breathlessly. He staggered left out of Werlen Street. Kim, paralysed with confusion and shock and cold, stood still a second. Mike was gone.

"Come back, wouldya? Mike?"

Stepping left into the road, Kim witnessed the scene she would never forget. Mike was on the ground, shaking all over.

"Oh shit, oh shit shit shit," she moaned, tearfully, realising what was going on. "You're having a fit, Mike," she called, her voice wobbly. "Get out of the road! GET OUT OF THE ROAD!"

"Kim?" called two familiar voices from behind her. It was Sarah and Jake. Kim turned back to them as Jake began to babble.

"We were looking for you everywhere, what were you – Mike? What the fuck are you doing?" Mike was still shuddering violently, but was attempting to move out of the road a little. He was sitting up, shuffling his elbows and trying to alternate his weight between them. There were tears pouring from his eyes – still as glazed over as crystal - and his face was perfectly expressionless. It was an unsettling picture.

"We gotta move him," whimpered Kim, moving towards Mike, ashamed she had left it so long. Suddenly, came Sarah's voice, one single, yet ultimately powerful syllable, that would ring in Kim's mind for many years to come.

"CAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!" ……………..

None of them had really payed much heed to that all too famous actuality – that in a life or death moment, everything goes into slow motion. Nobody does, do they? One can only really appreciate when it actually happens. And Lord, did it happen.

The moment Sarah's scream ceased to be an actual scream, and at that became a sort of indistinct echo, her and Jake's immediate human instinct was to jump out of the way. The car was going at at least 30 miles an hour, and normally, had they been, say, standing on the paving stones down a big street, 30 miles an hour would have seemed almost sluggish for a passing car to be going at.

Things are very different when you are standing directly in front of that car.

Jake and Sarah flew sideways, back onto the pavement, shaking and drenched in a cold sweat. As this happened, Kim's mind turned to slime, and her knees became as weak as they ever had without actually giving way. The car was breaking as quickly as it had veered around the corner, the driver had naturally seen that a few feet ahead, there were 4 children in the middle of the road. The screeching noise didn't disturb Kim, a million thoughts were racing through her head, drowning it out. Perhaps it could be said that things were going more slowly for her than the others. She tugged at Mike, pulled him with all her might, but he didn't budge. Too confused and distressed to be scared, she stood still, her hand still gripping Mike's unresponsive hand.

"MOOOOOOVE!" screamed Sarah, tears surging down her cheeks. Jake simply stood rooted to the spot, his eyes as wide as saucers and a deathly, a nauseating feeling in his stomach.

Kim saw the headlights of the car coming towards her. Gradually, gradually, gradually. Finally, when the great glare of them could move no closer, her thoughts cut out, human instinct took over, and she tumbled to the side, out of the way.

The last thing she heard clearly, before she began to scream uncontrollably onto the tarmac, was the most heart-stopping noise she could ever have envisioned.

THUMP.