Fairy reaching for a flower

Year six, the Christmas nativity was dropped for a midsummer play after the vicar fell out with the head. Donna was given the flower, a cardboard star of five petals on a bent wire, and I was the fairy, which meant a leotard, a coat hanger strapped to my back for wings, and tights my mum had dyed with cold tea. The wire flower was supposed to be held aloft on a broom handle by Mr Hollis, who lost it somewhere behind the curtain. So on the night I had to reach up for something that wasn't there, arm stretched, fingers open, for four minutes of Purcell while the tape deck kept stopping.

Donna finds me beside the trophy cabinet. She wears a lanyard that says ORGANISER and she is still cross about it. 'You never looked up,' she says. 'I was holding it right over your head the whole time.' I remember the hot lights, the sweat under the coat hanger, and the wire flower swaying just out of reach, and I remember deciding, at nine years old, that I didn't care.

Behind the glass, a row of tarnished silver cups catches the light. Donna lifts her hand and I lift mine, and for a moment we stand there reaching for nothing at all, the way we were taught, while Keith asks whether anyone wants to see the photos from Benidorm.