The Great Fire

We all went to Great Aunt B's birthday party. She lives in London. She is very, very old. Someone said she was 80 but no one is that old.

Lots of my cousins were there. They are all much taller than me. I was easily the smallest. I tell them apart by their shoes.

The Queen didn't come. I thought she lived in London. She must have been busy. Maybe she was mowing her lawn. It was a dry day.

We played in the garden. British Bulldogs. It was scary at times. My cousins are big. I managed to catch a few of them. I got caught a lot. Now and then I ran so fast I made it to the end of the garden. I thought of Harry. He might have made it to the end. But not as often as me.

The real scary bit was cake time. Cake time isn't normally scary. It's the best time of the day. Today was different. The cake was a big smartie cake. Chocolate covered with more candles than I have ever seen. All the candles were lit. There were a lot of flames. We sang happy birthday. I sang as well. B went to blow out the candles. She blew out one. It relit. She blew out another. It relit. The flames got bigger. She blew again and again but none went out. Other aunties went to help. No one could blow the candles out. The flames got even bigger. M tried to pick the candles off the cake. The flames bit her fingers.

I was very worried. The candles were starting to burn the smarties. Then an Aunt grabbed a wet tea towel. She threw it on the flames. It must have dried the candles. When she picked up the towel there was only smoke. The flames had left. The cake looked sad. It was wet. The smarties were changing colour. Water was dripping over the chocolate.

I thought the cake had died. But it hadn't. Once it was dried we all had a piece. It tasted nice.

We drove back home. Leaving London behind. It has had a fire before. Some time ago. There were no tea towels then. They must have lost a lot of smartie cakes.