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The laser tag venue was on an industrial estate – as fun children’s activities often were – on the outskirts of Oswestry, a short drive from the cabin resort. The idea to go there had come up when we woke to find it was raining and Emma had searched online for indoor activities.

‘Bowling?’

‘So boring,’ said Rose.

‘The cinema?’

‘Nothing on,’ Dylan protested.

‘Trampolining?’

‘I’m not a baby.’ Rose didn’t even crack a smile.

‘How about laser tag?’ Emma said eventually. ‘That might be fun. Ethan? What do you think?’

I had been distracted, hungover after polishing off a bottle of wine by myself and staying up to watch Netflix after everyone else had gone to bed, drunkenly falling asleep on the sofa. I had woken up in the morning to find that someone, presumably Emma, had draped a blanket over me.

‘Hmm?’ I said.

‘Laser tag? Do you fancy it?’

With my hangover, I couldn’t think of anything I’d like less than running around an indoor play area with laser-gun noises ringing in my ears. I would have preferred to lie on the couch all day and wallow.

Except that was pathetic, wasn’t it? Part of the reason for this trip was to remind Emma that we were a strong family unit, better together. And here she was, wanting us all to do something. Acting, I had to admit, as if her family was all she cared about.

Was she pretending? Thinking about it, I realised her prime motivation was likely trying to build bridges with Rose after all the tension of the past few days.

‘Maybe Keira would like to come,’ Emma suggested to Dylan, who immediately seemed excited about this idea.

‘Oh God,’ said Rose. ‘If she comes, her dumb little brother will have to come too.’

‘Has the real Rose been body-snatched?’ Dylan asked. ‘Or were you always this annoying?’

‘You’re the annoying one,’ Rose said, glaring at Dylan. ‘Keira isn’t even pretty. You’re just desperate.’

Dylan looked like he’d been slapped.

‘Oh my God.’ That was Emma. ‘Rose. Apologise to your brother.’

Rose narrowed her eyes, and I was certain she was going to swear at Emma. I was horrified but mesmerised – this behaviour was so unlike the Rose of old – and I braced myself for the fallout. But then Rose blinked and rubbed a hand across her face, and her expression completely changed. Became pleasant again.

‘I’m sorry, Dylan. I didn’t mean it.’

He stared at her for a second, shocked by the change, before finally saying, ‘Whatever.’

In the end, Theo and Angela decided they wanted to come along too. So here we were, the two families, pulling up outside what looked like a 1960s warehouse.

We went inside and the instructor, a broad-shouldered man called Dave who clearly loved his job, showed us how everything worked before handing out the guns and helmets, which he explained were necessary because the ceilings were low in places.

‘You’re lucky, you’ve got the whole place to yourselves,’ he said, taking us into the arena – a large space that had been turned into a kind of maze across two levels, with ramps and steps leading up to higher platforms, all decorated to look like something from a future war. There was a ‘control tower’ at the centre of the ground floor where Dave based himself, with a number of screens that would display our scores. The guns kept track of how many hits we achieved and received. At either end of the arena were two sheltered areas that Dave described as ‘camps’.

‘We’ll start with a team game. Family versus family. The Doves and the Gallaghers.’ He smiled at Theo and Angela. ‘Shame your surname isn’t Hawk, right?’ When they just nodded, he sighed and said to them, ‘If you go over to the camp at the other end of the arena, we can make a start.’

I crouched in the camp with Emma, Dylan and Rose. Emma looked weirdly sexy in her army helmet – did I have some kink I hadn’t previously known about? – and Dylan wore a look of rapt concentration. I’d observed him flirting with Keira in a way I’d never seen him do before, the two of them teasing each other about how they were going to get murdered. It was sweet. Dylan had never had a girlfriend before. He’d been on a couple of dates, but then we’d never heard about the girls again.

Rose seemed quite excited too, her filthy mood from earlier having evaporated, although I’d seen her bristling with irritation when Henry tried to talk to her. The poor kid gazed at her like she was the loveliest thing his eleven-year-old eyes had ever seen, but she just wasn’t interested, although I didn’t blame her for not finding his chat about how he and his friends ‘slayed at Fortnite’ appealing.

‘We ready, team?’ I asked. ‘Are the Doves going to show we’re not all about peace?’

Dylan groaned. ‘Dad, that’s so cringe.’

‘The Deadly Doves, that’s what we should call ourselves.’

‘No More Lovey-Dovey,’ suggested Emma.

Both kids made noises like they were being tortured.

‘Okay!’ called Dave from the control tower. ‘Let’s go.’ He pressed a button, a siren wailed, and we were off.

It was fun. A little stressful, running around the course, trying not to bang my head on the low ceilings. There was lots of dashing around, attempting to hide, the guns spluttering and beeping and the kids yelling at each other as the time ticked down. The problem for the Deadly Doves was that the Gallaghers were much better than us. They’d obviously done this before, and both adult Gallaghers and kids kept popping out and shooting me in the head, then vanishing before I could reciprocate. If this were a real battlefield, I’d have lasted five seconds. The only member of our family who was any good was Dylan, having poured thousands of hours of his life into playing first-person shooters on his Xbox. But I noticed he was reluctant to shoot Keira.

Rose noticed too.

‘Why are you letting your girlfriend off the hook?’ she asked during a timeout.

‘I’m not. And she’s not my girlfriend.’

‘She’s not going to hate you for shooting her. It’s the game . If you don’t try to kill her, she’ll have no respect for you.’

‘Where on earth is this coming from?’ Emma asked. She, like me, was sweaty and out of breath, her helmet askew, damp tendrils of hair sticking to her forehead.

‘Rose has been watching relationship videos on YouTube,’ Dylan said. ‘What about you and Henry? You’ve hardly landed a shot on him. Or is that just because you’re rubbish?’

‘Please, both of you.’ I put myself between them. ‘Let’s not argue again.’

‘Henry’s so annoying,’ Rose said.

Dylan smirked. ‘There’s a thin line between love and hate.’

‘Shut up !’

A few minutes later, Rose got Henry in a corner and blasted him with every piece of virtual ammo she had.

Maybe it’s good for her , I thought, watching her as she squeezed the trigger over and over and Henry cowered before her. Help her get some of that aggression out. Do what her hormones are telling her to do. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for Henry, though, watching him finally duck and weave away after Rose temporarily ran out of shots.

I turned to see Angela watching, shaking her head before remembering the game and aiming her gun at me.

By the time the final game of the hour-long session arrived, I was shattered. I’d banged my head a dozen times and my clothes were soaked with sweat. I was suffering with my hangover too, and in dire need of water. But I was enjoying myself. We were doing something together, as a family. And as a couple too. Emma had called out a warning when Theo was about to snipe at me from one of the raised areas, and we’d exchanged a grin after Emma shot our adversary.

‘The last game is a battle royale,’ Dave declared. ‘Every person for him- or herself. Let’s see who’s the top player out of all of you.’

He explained that, once you took three shots, you were out.

I was eliminated by Dylan pretty early. I retreated to our camp and sat waiting for the rest of them. Theo, Angela and Emma soon joined me. Our kids were far better than us. Then Dylan, surprisingly, was eliminated, leaving just Rose, Henry and Keira.

‘If Rose wins, she’s going to be a nightmare,’ said Dylan. ‘She’ll never stop going on about it.’

‘She’s not like that,’ Emma said, with little conviction.

‘Huh. Not before this summer. But since she’s been hanging out with Fiona ...’ He trailed off.

Angela was listening with interest. ‘Is Fiona a new friend? A bad influence, perhaps?’

‘She’s our childminder,’ I said. ‘Well, of sorts.’

‘Our next-door neighbour,’ Dylan said. ‘She’s weird.’

‘What makes you say that?’ I asked, surprised. In that same moment, I saw myself and Fiona hugging. Almost kissing. I was glad I was already flushed from all the exercise.

Dylan didn’t get the chance to answer, because somewhere close by there was a loud thud and a child screamed. All of us adults jumped up and ran towards the noise, Angela and Theo leading. Dave came rushing down from the control tower too, and was the first to reach the scene.

Henry lay on the ground, clutching his upper arm and wincing with pain. His helmet had come off, and tears ran from the corners of his eyes down towards his ears. His gun was nowhere to be seen.

Angela and Theo rushed over to him, throwing themselves down beside him. Dave was saying, ‘He’s okay, nothing broken, I told all of you to be careful and not to come running down the ramps.’

‘I . . . didn’t,’ Henry hissed.

‘Where does it hurt, darling?’ Angela asked, checking him over while Dave went on about how they’d all signed a legal disclaimer. ‘Oh, shut up, Dave,’ she said, just as Rose and Keira appeared from around the corner, both holding their guns down by their sides. Rose, I noticed, had two guns, presumably hers and Henry’s. Keira headed straight over to her dad and said something into his ear which made him frown.

I couldn’t take my eyes off Rose. She looked like she was fighting to suppress a smile, the muscles at the edges of her lips twitching. She set Henry’s gun on the floor but kept hold of her own.

‘He’s okay,’ Angela said, helping Henry into a sitting position. ‘He doesn’t appear to have broken anything.’

Theo crouched beside him. ‘Tell us what happened, son.’

Henry shook his head, but he looked at Rose, his lower lip quivering. ‘I fell down the ramp.’ His voice was very high. ‘It was my fault.’

Keira made a disgusted noise.

‘Did you see something different?’ Angela said to her. ‘Keira? What happened?’

Keira recounted what she’d seen. ‘Henry was up in the crow’s nest.’ That was a point on the higher platform, over in the corner. The Gallaghers had commandeered it and used it to snipe from when they were playing as a team. ‘Rose was up there too, talking to him. I didn’t see what happened next because I assumed they were forming an alliance, so I went and hid.’

‘Were you forming an alliance?’ I said to Rose.

She folded her arms. ‘I was telling him to surrender.’

‘And then what happened?’ Emma asked, going over so she was standing close to Rose, protecting her from the glares of Theo, Angela and Keira.

‘Tell them, Henry,’ said Rose.

I saw it then. He wasn’t merely afraid of her. He was terrified. He swallowed and stuttered as he tried to get the words out. ‘I ... I didn’t want to surrender, so I – so I jumped out of the crow’s nest and ran down the ramp, but I slipped and fell down.’

‘See?’ said Emma. ‘An accident.’ She turned to Dave. ‘I’m amazed you don’t have more of them in this place.’

‘I’ll have you know that we have been ranked the safest laser tag place in ...’

No one was listening to him. We were all watching Angela help her limping son out of the arena, Theo and Keira walking behind them. Outside, we went back to our cars in silence, except for Keira, who approached Dylan and whispered something to him which made him look at Rose as if she were a stranger.

I got behind the wheel as everyone else climbed in. I couldn’t get the image out of my head: the terror on Henry’s face. It conjured an echo from years ago. An incident at nursery and a streak in my daughter that I had thought was long gone.

Driving back from the laser tag, with my family sitting in silence in the car, I felt deeply unsettled.

I looked in the rear-view mirror at Rose on the back seat. At first glance, her face was blank, her expression neutral. But then I looked again. There was something else there, just beneath the surface. Something similar to what I’d seen after Albie had his accident. A glimmer of joy.

Of satisfaction at a job well done.