Read Chapter 21: — LEO'S SUMMER

At ten, Leo came to spend an entire summer with Martin.

He arrived carrying a games console, three chargers and the conviction that the countryside had no purpose after Wi-Fi.

Within a week he had learned to ride Daniel's quad bike badly, identify a heron, package online orders and edit short videos better than anyone over thirty-five.

"Your captions are boring," he told Martin.

"I have managed multimillion-pound campaigns."

"Yeah, and yours went bankrupt."

Daniel laughed so hard he had to sit down.

Leo began filming workers for a series called Hands That Remember. He interviewed Edith about her mother, Pete about injury, George about returning to work and Callum about prison.

Martin objected to the last one.

"He's a child."

"I'm ten, not wallpaper," Leo said.

Callum handled the conversation better than Martin expected.

"I did something violent," he told Leo. "I went to prison. Coming home didn't make me good. It gave me a place to practise being better."

The video became their most watched clip.

Claire called.

"You let him interview a convicted offender?"

"With three adults present."

"Martin."

"Watch it first. Then shout."

She watched.

She did not shout.

By August Leo had stopped calling Willowbrook boring.

On his last night, he asked, "Could I live here when I'm older?"

Martin's chest tightened.

"You can live wherever your life takes you."

"That's not an answer."

"It's the answer I wish Dad had given me."

Leo frowned, then accepted it.

Martin had spent his youth trying to prove he could escape his village.

His son was growing up in a world where returning might be a choice rather than a defeat.