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'You don't half fancy yourself, don't you?' said Gillian.

'If I do, then I have to go to the back of a very long queue. Behind you two, for a start.'

He had a big smile, but crooked front teeth.

'Dream on, Flash.'

'Can't blame a fella for trying. What school do you go to?'

'Coal Hill,' I said, without thinking.

The lads laughed, and Gillian gave me a dangerous look.

'Jailbait,' said Zack. 'Thought as much. Good night, ladies. See you around ... in a couple of years.'

Zack and his friends trooped into the Pump, leaving us standing outside in the cold.

Gillian gave up standing tall and glared electric fury at me.

'I'm sorry,' I said. 'I didn't think.'

When angry, Gillian's 'older' disguise slipped. She seemed like an infant on the verge of a tantrum, face purplish in the dark.

'What do you look like, Forehead'?' she said, putting a thumb on my lips and smearing. 'A sad clown.'

'I'm sorry,' I said again, hearing myself whine.

Gillian walked off without saying anything else.

I assume that this is the end of my short career as a beat girl.

Later –

Trudging from The Pump down Totter's Lane to Foreman's Yard, I was miserable. Grown-up shoes weren't suitable for the iced-over pavement, which made it hard to keep a balance. The sound of music (something rocking) and conviviality from the pub just emphasised how shut out I was. Now, I was even shut out from Gillian's little gang of weirdoes. I knew she'd make John side with her. I had become the outsiders' outsider.

I heard a whispering, crackling sound unlike a human voice.

It made me cold inside. It took a few moments for me to realise I was afraid.

Usually, I get annoyed, not scared.

There was no one out on the street. Only a few lights on behind curtains.

The whispering again.

I looked around. Several of the street-lamps were dark.

Icicle stalactites hung from them. I wondered if what I'd heard was the wind in the icicles.

I'm sensitive. I admit it.

Sometimes, I can feel things others can't.

I knew I wasn't alone on the street. And the other presence wasn't a person. Not being a proper person myself, I can recognise things with intelligence that aren't human.

I was being watched. By eyes in the ice.

I tried to walk faster, but slipped, losing a shoe. My stockinged foot touched frozen pavement and a cold shock shot up my leg. I wobbled, but didn't fall over.

My worst fear: the Truant Officer has come to take us Home!

I was in a panic, for Grandfather. I thought I knew what the Masters would do to him.

After our trial, I wouldn't be allowed to remember him or he me. It would be as if we weren't related. No, it would be more than that: we wouldn't be related. The whole of time and space would shift, so that we both still had lives, but separate and different, lived by the Rules.

The gates of Foreman's Yard were open. The blue light shone on the top of the Box.

My panic passed. I knew we hadn't been found.

But there was still a new presence in Totter's Lane. An intellect vast, cold and ... unsympathetic?

I picked up my shoe and hobbled into the junkyard.

Sunday, March 31st, 1963

I stayed home, in my room.

Home is the Box.

It's not just a Box. It's also a Ship. It might well be a Ship inside a Box. The thing is that the Inside is an Outside. It's outside everything.

You wouldn't understand. I can set down the Physics, filling in the rest of this diary with diagrams, but you still wouldn't understand.

Trust me.

Of course, you're probably me. In the future, grown-up, reading back on what you were like when you were my age. Will the white fog have lifted?

Grandfather still has missing parts in his mind and memory. Whenever people ask his name, he gets out of saying it. Lately, he gets out of being in situations where people might ask his name.

I should know Grandfather's name, but I don't.

It's as if he had a name once but it was taken away, not just from him but from everyone.

I used to think I was unique.

But