“Aches and pains, is it? Too big for his boots if you ask me. Trying to run before he can walk.”

Petey listened as his mum and Auntie Sharon talked about their brother. If Uncle Archie’s boots hurt him, they should buy him new ones, not expect him to walk in them. He probably tried to run to show his sisters he didn’t care what they said.

Next day they went to Uncle Archie’s new shop in the High Street. “Better than the market stall, eh Petey?” His uncle fastened his striped apron with tapes wrapped twice round his middle. His voice sounded strange as it bounced off the shiny wall-tiles.

“Where’s your boots, Uncle Archie?”

“Boots? No need for boots in the shop.” His uncle chuckled and ruffled Petey’s hair.

“Want to help me get ready, Petey? That alright with you, Sis?”

“I’ll make us some tea in the back,” answered his mum. “At least that’s one improvement on the stall – somewhere to make the tea.”

While his mum clattered about, Petey looked forward to the part he enjoyed most - watching his uncle lay out the fish. Uncle Archie said he’d make a fishmonger one day - a chip off the old block. Pete could tell from the way Uncle Archie laughed that it must be a good thing.

"So it’s goodbye whelks and jellied eels." His uncle opened the door of the big freezer behind the counter. “And it’s hello rainbow trout, hake and monkfish tails.” He winked at Petey. “Fried whitebait tonight, what d’you say?”

Petey knew bait was for catching fish,not for frying. Maybe it was another joke.

Petey smiled and took a deep breath of a smell that reminded him of the seaside -of sandcastles and rock pools. He watched as his uncle laid out the gleaming fish, then realised something was missing.

“You’ve forgotten the ice, Uncle Archie.” His uncle sometimes let him help spread the crunchy white beds for the fish, but today the fish were laid out on slabs of glass, with rows of green bristles between.

“No need for ice, Petey,” said his uncle, and pointed to pipes that ran through the thick panes.

"But it’s like an electric blanket, Uncle Archie. You said fish had to be cold.”

Uncle Archie explained that the pipes were like those in a fridge, so not to worry because the fish would keep nicely chilled. He asked Petey to straighten the green rows and set out two plastic lobsters on either side of the window space.

In the kitchen, Petey’s mum listened to their chatter as she lined up three mugs on the draining board.

“I'll give him goodbye whelks!” she muttered as she added sugar to the tea, then stirred so hard it slopped onto the draining board. “They were good enough for his dad, and his granddad before him.”

Then she thought of her husband, out with the trawlers somewhere. He wasn’t cut out to be a landlubber, he'd said. One day he’d come back and be proud of Petey, who had her stay-at-home genes and his dad’s affinity for fish.

She put down the mugs on the bright counter: Petey’s plastic one with the goldfish pattern, her own thick ceramic pink one and Archie’s birthday mug with the letters in blue: WORLD’S GREATEST UNCLE.

Suddenly, Pete’s mum gave her startled brother a kiss on the cheek and turned the shop door sign to OPEN.

“Drink your tea, Archie,” she said, then gave him a nudge and a big smile.

“You and your ‘akes and panes –there’ll be no stoppin’ you, now.”

Now why, she wondered, had Petey suddenly burst out laughing?