The Other Side of the Light

Aron did want to. He even had a tin with him when he rang Grandma’s bell on Sunday afternoon.

‘No more hail,’ Mila said from the doorway.

‘That only happened once.’

He had brought a little cardboard fish too. A clothes peg made its mouth open. They sat at the small table. Aron put the fish among the breadcrumbs and made it snap twice.

‘When the fisherman catches him, he shouldn’t want to stay straight away,’ he said. ‘He could ask where he’s going.’

Mila pushed the breadboard aside. ‘The kitchen.’

‘Yes, but the fish doesn’t know that.’

He made the cardboard head look at the kettle, then at the empty corner. Mila stood a coaster on its edge for a window. The fish’s whole head stuck up above it.

‘Too high,’ said Aron.

‘The kitchen window’s higher.’

‘This is what I mean.’ He turned the fish so it could look sideways through the opening. ‘You need room to do things.’

Grandma put two glasses of squash on the table. She lifted the coaster window to set one down.

‘We’re working,’ said Mila.

‘Then drink while you work.’ Grandma fetched a little flat bundle from the linen cupboard. No blue ribbon. ‘And you wanted to see this.’

It was a piece of cloth that looked like a pot holder. Mila checked the edge straight away. It had its own hem all the way round. Nothing had been cut off.

Aron held a hand above it. ‘Does that one work too?’

‘No,’ said Grandma. ‘Not any more.’

She put it down. The old grey weave looked much like the small cloth in the cupboard. Mila gently pinched a corner. It felt thicker.

‘My mother left it on a windowsill after using it. There was still light inside. She put a flowerpot in front of it and forgot it was there.’

‘So you couldn’t just put it away in a cupboard?’ Aron asked.

‘The light has to go back, wherever you hide the cloth. By the time she found it the next morning, it was too late.’

Mila held the sample towards the window.

‘Not even one thread?’

Grandma shook her head. She left it on the table while she topped up their glasses. Aron swam the fish round it. Mila moved the coaster out of its way so the tail wouldn’t catch.

‘Can we try the kitchen tonight, then?’ he asked.

‘One at a time,’ said Grandma. ‘And first, I need to know where you want to stand.’

Mila drew a square on the table with her finger. Aron moved the fish away.

‘You’re not putting me behind the window just to make sound effects, are you?’

‘You can come into the room.’

‘Then I want some lines of my own.’

They slid a piece of paper between the glasses. Mila drew a table. Aron added an arrow labelled FISH. He didn’t draw a fisherman. They still had to work him out.

Towards evening, Grandma took the small cloth from the cupboard. The label and blue ribbon went into a fabric bag. She put the old, useless sample back in its own flat wrapping.

‘We need to see whether this gives your fish enough light,’ she told Aron. ‘We’re not using the big one every time we want to try something small.’

At the community hall, Mila spread the empty little cloth on a table beside the window. The moon was above the garden wall. Aron held the fish behind the cloth, his finger on the peg. They waited.

The cloth stayed grey.

Mila leaned towards the glass. The moon was right there. She put her hand between the cloth and the window, then took it away. Nothing changed.

‘Ordinary light comes through windows,’ said Aron.

Grandma nodded and pointed outside. ‘But that’s where you borrow it.’

Mila checked the clock. They had waited long enough for the fish to give its speech three times. They didn’t carry the table outside. Grandma took the little cloth to the clean groundsheet on the garden path and spread it under the open sky for the first time that evening.

After a while, the edge began to glow. Mila crouched beside it, keeping her shoes clear of the groundsheet.

‘It’s working.’

‘Borrow it outside,’ said Grandma. ‘Then you can use it indoors.’

Aron held his fish against his chest and worked the peg. In the silver light, the cardboard looked smoother. Its eye was still just a black dot drawn in felt tip.

After twenty minutes, they lifted the charged cloth. Inside, Aron held the fish a little way in front of it while Mila held up the light. He tried part of his scene. She thought the fish ought to swim the wrong way first. Aron tried it, but its tail vanished from the light.

‘You’ll have to move over,’ he said.

She took two steps sideways. A long mouth appeared on the wall. The fish snapped at the edge of the real table.

Mila laughed and forgot how she was holding the cloth. She caught one corner before it slipped past her fingers.

‘It’ll never stay still like that,’ said Aron.

‘We can hang it over that smooth wooden strip later.’

He nodded. ‘And I need a proper place to stand. Otherwise I’ll disappear halfway through a line.’

Then they carried the little cloth outside again. Aron put the label and ribbon safely on the bench. Grandma folded one corner loosely inwards.

‘Watch here.’

The edges faded. The rest of the cloth slowly turned grey. Beneath the folded corner, though, a thin strip of light remained.

Mila pointed. ‘There’s still some there.’

‘That layer isn’t open to the sky.’

Mila unfolded the corner herself. The hidden strip now shone upwards, uncovered. After a while, it faded too. She checked beneath the edge once, but there was no last bit of light hiding there.

Aron picked up the grey cloth. ‘And it won’t light up again now?’

‘Tomorrow evening,’ said Grandma. ‘That’s this loan finished.’

Mila folded the little cloth. Aron wound the ribbon round it, too tightly at first. When she looked at him, he loosened it and tucked the label under the bow.

‘We could do a play in that kitchen,’ he said. ‘But I don’t want a fish that only says how lovely everything is.’

Mila put the bundle in the bag. The big frame was waiting for them in the side room.

‘It doesn’t have to,’ she said.