Animal Kingdom by Stephen Sewell

out the kitchen window, his head full of snakes, and when J caught sight of him it took his breath away; he knew there’d be shit to pay. You just had to look at him to see the hate. Someone was going to cop it and cop it bad.
    Smurf could see what was happening to her boys. It was like a chemical reaction she’d seen happening too many times before. She’d need to be alert over the days and weeks ahead as she watched these new compounds form and try to take hold of her boys. With luck, they’d all step away from this stronger and wiser. But it could go the other way, and poison them all.
    Life is a challenge, she knew that, and this was the biggest challenge she’d had for a long time and the biggest the boys had ever had. Would they be up to it? Who knew? But it was what life had dealt them, and they had to face it.
    Baz was dead.

SIX
    The tired-looking woman sitting in the glow of the computer screen helping her son with his homework was quiet and focused. ‘No, just look,’ she was saying. ‘Which one’s the hypotenuse?’
    At the sound of the garden door sliding open, Alicia looked across from the screen and saw Nicky coming in, followed by her boyfriend. He seemed a nice boy, but Alicia wasn’t sure about his family.
    â€˜Mum, is it okay if J stays here for a while?’ Nicky asked.
    Alicia hated these negotiations more than she could say and longed for the day her daughter would just grow up.
    â€˜It can’t happen, Nick,’ Alicia said wearily as Nicky’s little brother looked uncomprehendingly at her. ‘You’re at school; you’re in Year Twelve.’
    Life hadn’t been easy for Nicky, Alicia knew that: she knew Nicky had suffered when Alicia’s first marriage had broken up and Nicky’s father had moved out, suffered when Alicia had remarried and had her second child with Gus. Alicia had tried to be understanding, tried to be a caring, thought ful mother, but this was too much. She was not going to allow her daughter’s boyfriend to move in; it didn’t matter what she threatened.
    â€˜He really needs somewhere, Mum; there’s things going on.’
    J was standing there like a shag on a rock, his future being discussed in front of him without anyone really being that interested in consulting him. Still, that was life. He’d had social workers, Child Service officers, busybodies of one sort or another sticking their noses into his business for as long as he could remember. Mostly they were nice people, kind even, but all he’d ever really wanted was to be left alone with his mum.
    No, that wasn’t entirely true. What he’d wanted was something like what Nicky had. Somewhere warm and quiet that didn’t have a great hole blown in the side of it. A home, that’s what he wanted, a place where you could hide and feel safe. But instead of that, the disorder of his world was about to spill into theirs.
    â€˜What things?’ Alicia asked, glancing curiously at J.
    â€˜Things,’ Nicky said resentfully, as if it was none of her mother’s business. ‘I don’t know. It’d just be for a while.’
    It had been Nicky’s idea that J should move in with her after she found out about Baz’s killing and saw what a madhouse the Cody household had descended into. But J had found ways of living in madhouses before. He wasn’t in a hurry to move, and so didn’t know why Nicky was pushing her mother so hard about it.
    â€˜You’re still at school,’ Alicia said, trying to make Nicky see her point. ‘You’re probably going to make a mess of it as it is. And you shouldn’t be asking me this right in front of J.’
    â€˜Why?’ Nicky shot back. ‘Because you don’t want him to see what a bitch you are?’
    There was no give in her daughter; she was all attitude.
    â€˜Hey, come on,’ Gus said, looking up from where he was making