The Boy Who Was Afraid of Fireworks

In the town of Crestwood, where the November air was cold enough to turn your breath into little clouds and the smell of autumn leaves was everywhere, there lived a boy named Daniel. Daniel was seven years old, had freckles across his nose, wore a green anorak with a broken zip that his mum kept meaning to fix, and was absolutely, completely, and utterly terrified of fireworks.

He had been terrified of them for as long as he could remember. It was not the colours he minded. The colours were actually quite beautiful, he was willing to admit that. Great bursts of gold and red and green and white blooming across the sky like flowers opening in fast forward. He could appreciate the colours perfectly well from inside the house, with the curtains mostly closed and a cushion nearby just in case.

It was the noise.

The bangs were the problem. Not the soft whoosh of a rocket going up, which was actually rather peaceful. Not the crackle of a sparkler, which was gentle and friendly and smelled interesting. It was the sudden, enormous, chest-thumping BANG that came without warning, that shook the windows and bounced off the rooftops and rolled across the whole town like thunder deciding to visit at very short notice. Every single time, even when Daniel knew one was coming, even when he was counting down and bracing himself and gripping the sofa cushion with both hands, the bang still made him jump so hard he nearly left his own skin.

His older sister Harriet thought this was funny, which was not helpful. His dad said he would grow out of it, which may have been true but was not useful right now. His mum, who understood him best, always let him stay inside on Bonfire Night with hot chocolate and a film, which was kind and good of her but also meant that Daniel had never, not once in his seven years, actually stood outside and watched a proper firework display.

This year, however, Daniel's best friend Theo had other ideas.

Theo was eight, small and compact and fizzing with energy at all times, like a firework himself in many ways. He lived three doors down and had been Daniel's best friend since the age of two, when they had met at a toddler group and immediately got into an argument over a plastic dinosaur, which had somehow resulted in them being inseparable ever since.

Theo arrived at Daniel's front door on the fifth of November at half past five, wearing his thickest coat, a bobble hat in the colours of his football team, and an expression of friendly determination.

"You're coming to the display this year," he said.

"I'm not," said Daniel.

"You are," said Theo. "I have a plan."

Daniel looked at him suspiciously. Theo's plans were unpredictable. Some of them were excellent. Some of them had resulted in Daniel spending an afternoon stuck in a tree. "What sort of plan?" he asked carefully.

Theo held up a pair of bright orange ear defenders, the chunky kind that completely covered your ears. "My dad uses these when he mows the lawn. I asked if I could borrow them. He said yes. You wear these and the bangs will be much quieter. Like, still there, but not scary loud."

Daniel looked at the ear defenders. They were quite large and would probably make him look slightly ridiculous. But they were also very thick and very padded and covered the ears completely.

"Also," said Theo, reaching into his coat pocket and producing a slightly squashed bag of marshmallows, "I have these. For the bonfire. You toast them on sticks."

Daniel considered this information.

"And," said Theo, his final argument, delivered with the confidence of someone who had saved the best for last, "Mr Kowalski from number fourteen is bringing his telescope so we can look at the moon properly afterwards."

Daniel was extremely interested in the moon. He had a poster of the solar system on his bedroom ceiling and fell asleep looking at it every night. A telescope was a very significant offer.

"All right," said Daniel. "But I'm keeping the ear defenders on the whole time."

"Absolutely," said Theo. "Non-negotiable."

Daniel put on his warmest coat, his thickest scarf, and his wellington boots. His mum helped him fit the ear defenders over his woolly hat, checked they were snug, and kissed him on the forehead. She looked at him with the particular expression she had that meant she was proud of him for doing something hard.

The display was being held in the big park at the centre of Crestwood, the same park where Daniel and Theo played football on weekends and caught tadpoles in the pond every spring. Daniel knew every corner of the park, which helped. It was easier to be somewhere frightening when you also knew it was somewhere ordinary.

They arrived to find the park already full of people in thick coats and woolly hats, their faces bright in the orange glow of the enormous bonfire that crackled and roared in the centre of the field. The bonfire was magnificent, a great tower of wood and pallets and old furniture stacked taller than a house, sending sparks spiralling up into the black November sky like tiny orange stars deciding to go home.

With the ear defenders on, the roar of the bonfire was muffled to a deep, comfortable rumble that Daniel found he rather liked. It felt like the sound of something warm and safe.

Theo's parents spread a blanket on the ground and they all sat together, close to the bonfire but not so close as to be too hot. Theo's little sister Rosa, who was four and afraid of absolutely nothing, immediately began collecting fallen leaves and throwing them into the air.

Theo produced two sticks and they threaded marshmallows onto the ends and held them towards the bonfire. The marshmallows turned golden and then brown and then slightly black at the edges, which was exactly right, and tasted of warm sugar and smoke and something that had no name but was essentially the taste of Bonfire Night itself.

"Good?" said Theo.

"Very good," said Daniel, his mouth full.

At seven o'clock, the fireworks began.

Daniel heard the first one only faintly through the ear defenders, a dull thump followed by a rush of sound that he felt more in his chest than heard in his ears. He looked up instinctively.

Above the park, a great chrysanthemum of silver light opened slowly against the black sky, each point of light trailing downwards in a long, graceful arc before fading. It was, Daniel thought, extremely beautiful. Like a flower made of stars lasting just long enough to be real before dissolving back into the dark.

Another went up. This one was gold, exploding in a wide circle that rained down in long threads of light. Then a red one, sharp and bright. Then three in quick succession, green and white and purple, overlapping in the sky like the rings on a pond when you throw in three stones at once.

With the bangs softened to manageable thumps, Daniel found he could look at the fireworks properly for the first time in his life. He had never noticed before how each one was different. Some spread wide and faded slowly. Some burst in tight bright clusters. Some crackled as they fell, sending out little secondary sparks that popped and fizzed on their way down. One went up and seemed to hesitate at the top of its arc before opening into a perfect weeping willow shape of golden light that hung in the sky for a long, breathless moment.

"That one," said Daniel, pointing.

"Amazing," Theo agreed.

Rosa had stopped throwing leaves and was sitting very still with her mouth open, staring upwards. Even she, who was afraid of nothing, seemed to understand that this required proper attention.

The display went on for twenty minutes. Daniel watched every single second of it. He watched with the focused, careful attention he usually reserved for things he was truly interested in, the moon and the planets and the way weather worked. He noticed patterns in the colours. He noticed that the biggest bangs produced the widest bursts. He noticed that the smoke from each firework drifted east on the gentle wind, carrying the smell of gunpowder across the park.

When the last firework went up, a huge cascading fountain of gold and silver that seemed to fill half the sky and lasted longer than any of the others, the crowd around them let out a long, warm cheer. Daniel clapped, still wearing his ear defenders, which muffled his own applause and made it sound like he was clapping inside a pillow, which he thought was quite funny.

Theo looked at him. "Well?"

Daniel pulled the ear defenders down around his neck and breathed the cold November air, which smelled of bonfire smoke and damp grass and spent fireworks. Above them the sky was empty again, just the ordinary dark with its ordinary stars.

"I liked the willow one best," said Daniel. "The gold one that hung in the sky."

Theo grinned. "Me too."

After the display, Mr Kowalski from number fourteen set up his telescope near the park gate, and a small crowd gathered around it. Daniel waited patiently for his turn, and when he finally pressed his eye to the eyepiece and saw the moon, close and clear and full of craters, ancient and enormous and impossibly beautiful, he forgot all about fireworks entirely for a long and wonderful moment.

On the walk home, Daniel was quiet in the comfortable way of someone who has a great deal to think about. His mum was waiting at the door when they got back, a mug of hot chocolate ready. She looked at his face and smiled.

"How was it?" she asked.

Daniel unwound his scarf and thought about gold willow trees made of light, and toasted marshmallows, and the moon seen up close for the first time.

"I want to go again next year," he said. "But I'm keeping the ear defenders."

His mum laughed and handed him his hot chocolate.

That night, Daniel lay in bed looking up at his solar system poster. Outside, somewhere across the town, a last stray firework went off, a soft distant thump followed by silence.

Daniel listened to it fade away.

Then he closed his eyes, and slept.

*The End.*