I have become skilled.

For starters let�s talk about dogs. When dogs die after being trapped inside you usually find them at the front or back door, or near the toilet if it hasn�t gone dry, or next to the water melted out of a freezer. I imagine them running between the two choices: water and escape, water and escape, until it�s too late.

Cats are usually by these too, or by the window if there isn�t a cat flap. But you can�t predict as well with cats, maybe because they had too much of their own mind back when they were still alive.

Being an explorer you get skilled at knowing.

I know what a cup of tea left for months looks like: dried muck. Bowls of fruit turn to furry glue. Cupboards jump with mice when you open them. Plants all die, apart from that one cactus we found, because trapped indoors was a good enough desert for it.

And dogs are more often found at doors, cats at windows. That�s the rule. Plus dogs smell worse than cats, though neither of them are very nice.

I say I�ve become skilled�� but the truth is everything has got more difficult. So I can�t wait here for ever for my friends to come back. Can�t keep imagining new friends out of thin air. Can�t keep hiding in the same old sleeping bag without noticing the bad stink of it.

Even with skill you can�t truly smell yourself. If you came home Mum, magicking yourself out of the wind in the bay, this is what I think you would smell:

Still, there�s the worry about smells you can�t know, and there�s no way to come wise on that. So this morning I went outside. I went holding onto doors, chairs, cardboard boxes. Rubbish piles. And I collected the yellow bits of gorse from the field at the end of the street, and brought them in and put them in saucers all around.

Now they shine like fires far away, like when the crofters set fire to the heather and you saw it at dusk.

My eyes go slow around the room. It�s half-bright from the skylight, even though we taped cereal boxes over the glass to keep out the sun. Here in the high north, now that it�s summer, our sun hardly goes away. Underneath the skylight is Elizabeth�s bed: still made, with the edges neat the way she liked. Her rules on the wall, her survival books in a tower. Alex�s drawings and toys scattered like he always kept them, like he got grabbed in the middle of one last fight. Which I suppose he did.

I can see the stain on the carpet. Red food dye. That mark tells where it started to go bad for us.

Then the clothes that Elizabeth got out but didn�t have enough room to take. Her toys, which made me uneasy, because she was meant to be the one in charge. So uneasy that I wrapped them away from seeing.

If anyone is listening: God, or Mum, or the devil: I should say that the only obstacle from taking the bad tablet is me. That�s not a pretty thought, right? Except I was too busy with other plans for escape to notice when the thought came. When it sneaked inside me.

You see, I did one bad thing. But that bad thing led to lots of others, which grew like a crowd of dogs when you�re holding warm food.

Now it hurts too much to think about. So I�ll think about this, instead: how Alex used to ask, �How many more sleeps?� How some mornings he�d wake up convinced he didn�t sleep at all. How he was sure he just went to bed and woke up and it was light. Nothing in-between.

How you used to give imaginary directions to someone driving a car over the sea to our island.

Turn southeast at Greenland. Down a bit from Iceland, up from Ireland, up and across a bit from England or Wales. Our island is one of the Western Isles�� not the Outer Hebrides, which is the wrong-sounding word that mainlanders use. (Nobody knows what Hebrides means�� not even our teacher, Mrs Leonard, who�s dead now, though you can still see her if you want to.)

Know what that means, Mum?

�Course you do�� you are up there with God, and can see it all. Only I dare you�� dare you to come down into the village, then go past the lifeguards� station, and on to the houses that look like someone coloured them in with white chalks.

Go ask her yourself. Go on.

This morning I noticed Elizabeth�s rainbow. She put water in a saucer on the windowsill, then a mirror in the water. I didn�t think it�d work, but then saw that it did.

It�s on the wall, beside the cereal boxes we taped over the big skylight. It wobbles a bit like the sea, disappears with the wind, comes back when the air is still. Just now it reminds me of a puddle with petrol spilt on it.

Elizabeth is still in bed. She�s looking towards me with her eyes open. I give her a wave but she looks like right through, like she�s thinking about the way things were before, which she usually is.

I hear a yowling noise from out on the street: one of the cats, or their kittens. They still roam around, for all days mainly, only now the bigger group is broken up into just a few stragglers who feed on rubbish like the gulls.

Saw two of the kittens taken by an eagle. The MacNeil brothers saw the rest go. Saw a crumple of fur and bones on the shore-walk next to the sculpture of the seal. The cats stayed in their house for a while after that, but I guess they got their courage working again.

Elizabeth gets up and begins to ribbon my hair without saying anything. Alex sits forward, rubs sleep from his eyes. His trousers are damp. Elizabeth gets him to stand and strips his sheets, tumbling them into a ball to be put in the garden.

Alex washes himself with a flannel then says, �You get up?� His voice is dry and croaky; Elizabeth recognises the warning signs so plonks a bowl of cereal in his lap and orders him to eat. She pours ten toty cartons of cream in a glass, adds yellow sterilised water, pours the lot on top and hey presto�� he�s got a normal breakfast.

Our clothes are already in three piles. Elizabeth puts on a CD�� Winnie the Pooh, which we listen to while getting dressed. Then she takes the balled-up sheets and puts them in the garden beside all the others.

Alex: �It�s only sweat. I just sweat the bed.�

Me: �Don�t worry about it.�

Alex: �I just have a weakness for sweating��

Me: �OK, I believe you.�

He�s scared of going to the toilet alone, so I take his hand and go with. The flies on the ceiling do their mad angry dance when the door opens and closes. The porch door�s stiff, not broken like the one to the kitchen.

Outside, there�s the smell of dewy grass and moss in the sun. I jump over the screeching fence, do my daily business. Alex is about to go by the door when I warn him to come away a good bit: �Stop being too close,� I hiss. �You�re always too close. Come over by the fence.�

He comes in by the fence, pees. He looks around�� to the street, to the bay, to the road going west and to Beinn Tangabhal, our big hill at the far end of town.

Alex: �Is it smoke?�

He�s pointing at the hill. It�s only cloud. I tell him.

�Cloud isn�t smoke then?�

I think about it, then decide I don�t know the answer. I�m pretty sure I used to know the answer. Or maybe he�s half asleep, and it�s a kid�s question.

He�s less bleary when we get back in. By now Elizabeth is doing her routine. She turns the two radios on. One has a dial which she circles all the way, going through the stations. The other has buttons. She takes her time, slowing on the dial at the places we marked with gold stars. Then she gives Alex his injection. He already has his jumper up ready, so it�s done quick.

She holds up his pen and looks in carefully at the glass window on the inside of it.

�Just half of this one left,� she says.

After this Elizabeth writes our shopping list: Sheets�� for 1 week. Breakfast. Batteries. Bags. Tins. Hearing a noise, she turns down the CD. We all listen. But it�s only coming from the street, a lot of yowling and screeching�� it�s from the House of Cats. She turns the CD up again.

We�ve finished the funny milk that doesn�t need a fridge, so I have cartons too, and they�re not bad. There�s apricot jam after this. We dip pink wafer biscuits in, rather than using our spoons and having to wash up. Then there�s digestive biscuits, toasted over the gas-burner flame, then hint-of-mint hot chocolate.

I comb Alex�s hair. He doesn�t like wiping his face, plus he always forgets to wash his hair, so I take him to the mirror to show him how it looks and the damage it does to his appearance.

I get the toothbrushes out, brush mine. �Dreamt I had a wobbly tooth last night,� I say, remembering.

Elizabeth is cleaning our cups in the bowl. �You missing any new ones? Or old ones, mean to say?�

I put a finger in to test: �All just the same.�

�Why do we brush our teeth again? Can anybody remember?�

�Oh not this again��

Alex wrinkles his face at our talk of teeth. He doesn�t like having his brushed. He had a sore tooth when it was still dark and stormy, and his face went big for a week. After that he lost four of his baby teeth, all at once. He cried a lot, and it took him ages to get better. Now he has a big gap in his top teeth, with no adult ones in yet.

Me: �Remember all the good reasons?�

Alex: �Elizabeth says gum disease means sickness going in the blood. Plus, if you swallow a tooth then you don�t get a coin.� He sighs and looks around for his clothes, which I know is just a delaying tactic.

I push down his chin, which doesn�t usually work but does today.

Me: �Firstly: chewing surfaces.�

The saying of this makes us stop. We both look at each other. Then we ignore ourselves.

It�s not a very good day for seeing far out to sea. I sometimes forget to keep watching.

This morning the rain was marching adults in my dream. Mum used to call that sort of thing �wishful thinking�. She never said if wishing worked.

Then there are other things: things you didn�t wish for. Like the Gaelic weather sticker at the end of my bed. It said, �Tha i grianach�. I had to tear it, right through the happy face of the sun underneath.

All around the ferry building I put cups. Some of the plastic ones blew over, so I put round smooth stones from the shoreline in to steady them better.

Then I waited. And waited. I saw the sky go bright in a place I�d never seen bright before. So what did that mean?

Did you think it was a good idea, Mum, or not?

After the light got halfway I could see my reflection in the water under the pier.

A girl with long hair. Looking like she had a beard: her hair down in straggles, covering her face.

A reminder of who we found after we saw the painted dogs.

�Looks like you�re facing your worst enemy,� I say to the girl. But she wins in the end by hiding herself in ripples.

Later, I went to put flowers on the sea, to remember my friends, but the tide got me, up to my waist. That was a slip-up. I have to be more careful nowadays.

I have to think of everything.

It�s too easy to make mistakes. Two days ago, when I was on watching duty, I accidentally looked at the sun with the telescope. Since then there�s been a black moon in the middle of what I�m seeing.

Even so, I�m a smarter kid for having it. I won�t make the same mistake twice. Because the more mistakes I make, the smarter I�ll get.

Still, the thing to worry about is this: how many mistakes is a person allowed? How many mistakes can a single person make and still be? There isn�t a rule, or none that Mum ever told me.

She�s telling me the answer to her riddle. It�s time to pay attention: everything else can wait.

Now I see her, and I bury down to the bottom of my sleeping bag as the sound of her starts to become real: �What goes around the world but stays in the corner?�

Mum�s wearing her red and blue post office jacket. She asks the question in English so we know it�s a riddle.

We pass by Mr MacKinnon�s blue-eyed collie, the one that�s always on guard. Then the phone box. Then the forest of fifteen trees, then Orasaigh, the island where the rats used to live. Floraidh MacInnes once told me that there was a storm and all the rats came ashore and ate the annoying cats, but she�s a liar, I never believed her.

�A shy man on a boat?� I answer.

�Works fine. I accept it works fine, but it�s not the answer I was looking for. Try again.�

It�s my work to get the bundles together. Mum�s fingers are inky from the packets. She whistles up for hills and down for dips. She keeps spare elastic bands in a coil around her wrist which make her hand go puffy.

�My stand-in is coming tomorrow,� she says. �He�s not been before. Early ferry, with any luck. Then that�s you and me are away on our Christmas shopping. How good is that?�

I give her the thumbs-up. It�s damp, but the heaters blast dryness. We go on the east road first, because most people live on that side of the island, then onto the north road.

My favourite postbox is the one which fills with sand in a west wind. It crackles inside like a shell.

Mum hands out biscuits to all the dogs that bark. She says that if we give enough biscuits to the barking dogs they�ll be too fat and soft in the head to chase us.

�Chan ith a sh�th ach an c�,� she says, testing me as we drive away from another one. �Your mother wants to know the English translation�� go ahead.�

�None but a dog eats his fill.�

�Apart from auld Eric in Cleit who wants to dig his ain grave with his teeth�� well done.�

Mum said she learnt everything at school but the old sayings; now she wants me to know them, too.

�Look, will you,� she says. �Washing out in the rain.�

The washing is Mrs Barron�s. Mum chaps on her door. Mrs Barron is OK. Mum gets permission to take in her sheets, and when she comes back she smells of mist. Mrs Barron has handed her a letter for posting. The letter has a lovely stamp: hummingbird, green and gold.

She hands the letter to me and I put it in the going-away postbag.

�Using up his collection,� Mum says. �Since Mr Barron died. Last year it was Jubilee editions. I�m forever telling her that it�s like tearing up ten pound notes�� but she has her ain mind.�

I let my fingers sift the letters in the bag. Some are smooth, others pebbly.

There�s a sheep scratching its arse on the last postbox before we get on the round back for home.

�Fine day for it,� Mum says, as she unlocks and empties the postbox beside the sheep. She�s mostly polite to animals in case they�re the departed returned.

When she gets back in the car I answer, �Stamp.�

Mum draws a tick in the air. �Full marks, a ghraidh! Around the world, yet stays in the corner. You got it perfect.�

�But that doesn�t work, Mam. What if you posted a coconut? Or any round thing, like a ball? There wouldn�t be corners then.�

�Seadh? When did you hear of anyone posting coconuts or footballs? Is that even likely?�

�It�s exactly where your riddle doesn�t work.�

The ribbon road shines with sun and rain. Eilean Mor shows through rags of cloud.

On the drive around to the south road Mum stops to ask the cows if they�ve ever heard the like of posting coconuts.

The cows look up for a bit, before going back to their usual grass-chewing.

It�s a clock which wakes me, which means I�m in trouble, as the alarms were meant to be turned off.

There�s a big mess in the room. I only notice it when it gets bad enough to hide nearly all the floor. There�s dirty clothes belonging to Alex: hanging in fankles from the pram we brought in last night. I think the pram was from a game he was playing: another game where he fell asleep and had to be lifted to bed.

We began shopping for clocks to keep time. Best of all is the radio-clock which Calum Ian found, which even tells the day of the week and the date. Still though, it doesn�t remind you of what dates are important, or the dates you might forget. Alex couldn�t remember his birthday: was it the 11th or 12th of March? Then when the lambs came nobody knew if that meant it was Easter, or spring.

We found a diary in the post office which gave us the date of Easter. But what about spring? Then Duncan noticed we�d passed a day called British Summer Time Begins. That told us it was summer, and that we were already in it. But where had spring gone?

I looked in the library, but there wasn�t any useful books on it, not even in Space & Time.

Elizabeth is writing a new sign. She adds to the bottom of it then pins it between our beds, next to the posters for Health and Wellbeing and Food Groups and How We Grow.

Alex stands in front, reading slowly with his finger.

Alex and I stare at the rules, wondering who�s to blame. I decide that the rules fit most for him�� apart from the mushroom soup and vinegar and alarms bit, and the bit about dog shit, which was anyway a mistake.

Me: �All we needed to do was check our feet. And paper plates, they get mushy after a while.�

Alex: �A minute after you put me to bed I�m asleep and the torch stays on all by itself.�

Me: �All flavours of soup stink.�

Alex: �Would we get a dog? If we had a stray dog we wouldn�t need to waste a single drop of food.�

Me: �You can�t trust dogs to watch your food. Anyway, Alex always stands in dog shit. It�s disgusting.�

Alex: �You�re a dog shit.�

Me: �You�re the king of dog shits.�

Elizabeth: �Stop it, both of you! OK? All I want is for you to help me a bit more, that�s all.�

We go back to staring at the rules. Most hark back to something that�s happened. It�s hard to get everything right all of the time. Still, Alex does need to be reminded about matches. That�s a big fascination of his.

We get up, get dressed, do the routine: radios (fizzing noise), teeth (gums fine). I put batteries in the portable TV/DVD player. Snowstorm. Alex takes his injection without fuss this morning, then we have our breakfast. Today for a treat it�s creamed rice, which I used to hate but now love, especially with jam. Then when we�re done Elizabeth goes through the cupboards, making notes of anything we need. I have a suspicion of what she�s going to say before she comes out with it.

Elizabeth: �There�s a big issue I kept off the rules. It would be great if you�d help.�

Alex�s eyes swing up from sucking his sleeve.

�It would really help if you�d come New Shopping. Even if you end up staying outside, it doesn�t matter. It�d just be a help to have the company.�

Alex switches from sucking his sleeve to the neck of his T-shirt. The drool on his clothes makes him stink like a dog�s bone. I tell him to pack it in.

Elizabeth: �I�d appreciate it.�

Alex: �What about Duncan, and Calum Ian? Can they not be your sidekicks?�

Elizabeth: �Maybe they�ve decided to do their own shopping? I didn�t even ask. All I know is I can�t do ours all by myself.�

We think about it. Alex looks very doubting. He plays a blasting game with the lightsaber I made him out of yellow card and tinfoil.

Alex: �There is actually a black lightsaber.�

He says this when he�s trying to put you off. Usually the conversation goes: There is a black lightsaber�� No there isn�t�� Yes there is�� No there can�t be because light is not black�� Yes there is cos I saw it in my Star Wars Clone Wars Encyclopaedia. And black light is radiation. So there. This is what he says when he�s trying to pull the wool over.

Me: �Can we do something fun first?�

Elizabeth: �Like�?�

Me: �Can we go to the rocks and chuck bottles?�

Elizabeth: �We don�t just chuck bottles: we send messages. There has to be a purpose to everything.�

Alex: �Why?�

Elizabeth: �Because we lost our adults. Because we�re alone. So we do all we can, every minute of every day, to get help. Agreed?�

It isn�t always nice when she spells it out. Anyway, school�s cancelled. To make the agreement proper I head up to Elizabeth�s rule list and add underneath:

This settles the business for the three of us. Then we shake on it so nobody can go back on their word.

Mum�� are you still listening?

This is the story of how I got to be here. But it isn�t an easy story for me, because it hasn�t ended yet.

It�s become a war against giving in. Against forgetting.

For knowing how to survive.

As I told you already, I did a bad thing. So now you know what the bad thing was.

So now I need to tell you, please listen, that I was only trying to make amends. But is that the right word�� are there bad amends as well as good amends?

Revenge is the wrong word.

Like Duncan said: I was trying to make us equals.

This is what happens when there isn�t anyone else to talk to. You begin to forget things. Even though I�m meant to be young with a hungry brain, I always forget. So I added another rule to my longer and longer list:

And I was glad, because it gave me something to do, something new to think about besides the bad I�d done.

So I practised, and when it didn�t work at first I got scared I might have to learn every single word over.

But words are like tides: they come back. All you have to do is wait for them to roll in again.

There are two times I remember where the new world was beginning but I didn�t know it yet.

The first was in my class at school. Mrs Leonard was acting busily�� we had a visitor coming, and she was trying to put up the classroom Christmas decorations before he arrived.

�Five minutes ago I strung up that tinsel,� she�s saying. �Now it�s come undone. Is it ever possible to buy anything that functions on this island?�

After she says this Mrs Leonard thins her mouth, which means she�s either thinking, or concerned. If she�s concerned it�s best to let her get on with it; if she�s thinking then her next thought will come along in a minute, so say nothing.

�Ah children, our visitor has come.�

This morning he looks ordinary: no tie, jeans like any dad. Mrs Leonard shakes his hand and goes pure beetroot in the face like she did when the priest chose her for his dance at the end of the produce festival.

�Children,� she puts her hands together in a church, �I�d like you to give a warm welcome to Dr Schofield, who has come along today to give us a talk on the very important work he does for our community.�

Dr Schofield waves like a film star�� which he isn�t�� then goes to stand at the whiteboard.

Duncan MacNeil puts up his hand: but he�s too early, Mrs Leonard makes her watch it buster face at him.

Dr Schofield lifts the silver box he brought�� it�s suitcase-sized�� onto the desk in front. Then he points to the middle of himself and says, �Eeshh�� Meeeshh Brian. Tha MI ag ION-sach Gaelic.�

Everyone looks at Mrs Leonard to see if she understood a word of it. My bet is she�s still waiting for the sound of his words to clump together like us�� then she says,

�The doctor is telling you his first name: Brian. And he says he�s learning Gaelic.� To Dr Schofield she says, �I thought that was impeccably well put. Is fhe�rr G�idhlig bhriste na G�idhlig sa chiste�� it is better to have the Gaelic broken than dead, yes?�

I don�t agree. I thought he was very bad.

Dr Schofield waits for us to settle down then says, �You�ll know me from the surgery, or from the cottage hospital. Some of you I have seen: yes, some of you in this room. Coughs, colds, cuts needing glued or stitched. Broken arms, pulled elbows. Sore ears. Sore throats.�

We look around for who it might be.

�Don�t worry, you don�t have to tell,� he says. �And I would never tell. That�s my duty of confidentiality. I would never talk or tell anyone else about your medical problems. Unless you asked me to do so.�

All quiet.

Margaret-Anne: �What about our mums?�

�So�� well yes, I suppose being the age you are, yes, apart from your mums.�

Kieran: �What about the priest?�

�Not the priest.�

�I thought Father MacGill knew everything that happened?�

�He doesn�t know about your sore throats.�

We look at Kieran�� duh.

Dr Schofield puts his hands down on the silver box.

�Now, I wonder if you�re curious about this. No? Does anybody know what I�ve got in here?�

Nobody does.

He gets us to gather in a half-circle up at the front. Using a quiet part-evil voice he says, �In this box I have a person. True. I keep them locked up inside until I feel kind enough to let them out. Do you want to see the person?�

His eyes look mad enough for it to be true.

He unclips the lock. There�s an ouhhh as we peer at the dark insides�� there�s a face! Blonde hair!

But then he lifts out: a big doll. Man or woman? Plastic yellow hair, shit-brown tracksuit, white cheap trainers.

Straightens the legs. Puts the doll on the floor.

�Say hello to Annie,� he says. �Now can anyone tell me what we use Annie for?�

Everybody�s hand up�� it�s Duncan�s reaches highest.

�Yes, Duncan?�

�Dad has to do first aid, for on his boat. He says that fire is the biggest worry at sea. But he said your doll is for practising the kiss of life.�

It�s stupid to be laughing at this, but everybody does.

�That�s absolutely correct Duncan. And as Rona�s serious face tells us�� the kiss of life, or what we now call rescue breathing, has nothing to do with passion�� and everything to do with the business of saving a life. Would anybody like a demonstration of how we do that?�

We nod for yes.

�Part of what we do is train for the worst. Annie�s role is in teaching us how to save lives. She�s probably one of the most important members of our team. Certainly, she has better hair than me�� look.�

For showing this he takes the plastic yellow hair off the doll�� it comes off in one blob like scrambled egg�� and puts it on his head.

He just looks weird. Nobody laughs. We all turn around to the teacher to see if we should be laughing. She doesn�t know either.

�Drop the hair joke,� Dr Schofield says.

In the next bit he tells us about his ABC�� Airway, Breathing, Circulation�� and Mrs Leonard gives in exchange our ABC, which is the first three trees of the Gaelic alphabet�� Ailm for Elm, Beith for Birch, Coll for Hazel. It�s a good share, though we have his learnt before he learns ours.

He�s at the start of showing us the recovery position�� which is easy, it�s only lying on your side�� when his phone goes.

�Work mobile,� he says. �Just a moment.�

We have to return to our seats, while he sticks his finger in his ear to listen more easily.

�Hullo.�

Mrs Leonard makes her be patient face at us.

�Where?�

It�s funny�� a big doll on the floor, him there talking.

�Sorry?�

I�m tapping Anne-Marie on the arm to tell her about the big stupid doll and him talking. Mrs Leonard�s mouth goes into a thin slit to warn me�� Behave.

�This a hoax, you think?�

He listens, nodding even though the other person can�t see him, then he says to Mrs Leonard�� �Look, I will maybe just take this call outside if that�s all right.�

Then he leaves us.

We get bored waiting. Mrs Leonard leaves the doll where it is; she even has to step over it on her way around to the whiteboard.

It�s weird�� like a dead person in the room, which no one�s even bothering about.

�OK,� says Mrs Leonard. �Dr Schofield has obviously been detained with something important, so let�s get back to the work we were doing with symmetry and shapes. Who wants to give us all the first example?�

Duncan spent a week at our home: getting his energy back, growing strength enough again to walk around. His face went from red, to scabbed, to saggy. He stayed with us until two mornings ago, when Elizabeth wanted him to get dressed. Duncan preferred his pyjamas: said he would put his clothes on if he could sleep in them from now on. Elizabeth said no way. That started an argument: and when Elizabeth put up new rules about getting along and give and take, the MacNeil brothers left us.

Calum Ian never mentioned what I did to his camera: and Duncan seemed to forget I ever told him. So after they left I decided that everything was OK: but that I would still try to make up to them by sharing my food, and not minding if they stole mine or didn�t share in return.

Now we�re back in school, in the P5 classroom for Duncan�s first day. This room works because it�s not anyone�s old class. Also, it has a picture-roll going around the walls with the Gaelic letters on. My favourite is B, for Beith, which is birch. My least favourite is H, for heather, Ur, because that isn�t even a tree, it�s a bush.

Part of the ceiling got broken. Elizabeth says it�s because slates come off and no one fixes them. But at least the windows are fine. I�ve learnt that once a window�s gone everything starts to come to pieces.

�Facts and opinions,� Elizabeth is saying. �Does anyone know the difference?�

We�re looking through our folders: the stuff our teachers were keeping back to show the parents. I found mine in Mrs Leonard�s cupboard. We spent too long already staring at the things we used to care about, and looking for the signatures of our parents at the bottom of the assessment sheets�� so Elizabeth changed topic.

Alex: �That is too hard to know.�

Calum Ian: �It�s easy. Facts are real, see? They can only be one thing. They�re top trumps to opinions every time. Opinions aren�t as high up as facts.�

Elizabeth: �Examples?�

We each have a turn. FACT�� the giant tortoise can live to over 150 years of age. But OPINION�� hippos are pretty. FACT�� koalas usually sleep during the day. But OPINION�� everyone should clean their ears. This last one, put forward by Alex, gets us into bother, because no one can decide if it�s a FACT or an OPINION.

Alex: �Mum used to clean my ears on the edge of the corner of the towel. That�s a fact.�

Calum Ian: �My dad said you don�t need to do it. Opinion.�

Me: �It smells bad but is useful. Fact.�

Elizabeth: �Maybe it can be both fact and opinion?�

Calum Ian: �No way. It can�t be both.�

Me: �What about God and Santa?�

Calum Ian: �God�s a fact. Santa�s an opinion that you only get with babies. So who�s a little baby?�

I don�t want to say that I am. Neither does Alex. He just looks at the dirt on the floor.

�Maybe Santa can be both?� Elizabeth says, as usual offering an answer to help us agree. �Here�s a fact: if you believe in something then it might just be true. If you don�t: well, that�s only your opinion.�

Alex: �What about zombies?�

Elizabeth: �The rule doesn�t apply for zombies.�

Just for cheek we find lots of other exceptions to mess with Elizabeth�s rule: like ghosts, werewolves and mermaids.

She gets grumpy and says to forget it.

�Is heaven a fact or opinion?� Alex asks. �Because if Mum isn�t still moving, she must not be breathing. I�m quite bothered if heaven is not a fact.�

Calum Ian: �Don�t worry, Bonus Features. If she�s not in heaven then she�s in hell.�

When Alex looks upset by this Elizabeth squeezes his hand. For distraction she asks instead if anyone wants to remember. When nobody volunteers she says, �Duncan did it last time, for the group. That was very brave of him. If there isn�t a person who definitely wants to go, then maybe I should?�

No one tells her not to.

Alex: �Please don�t remember any bad bits.�

�OK,� she says, and stands at the front of the class, folding her fingers like Canon MacAllan used to do.

�I remember,� she says, looking nervous. �First I remember that Mum had green eyes. She had kind hands. Ach! How can hands be kind? Bloody crazy of me.�

It didn�t sound crazy till she said it.

�Before we arrived, Dad looked up the island in his map-book. It was away right far off the edge! I could never believe that�� I mean, going to a place that far away.�

�You were the one far from us,� Calum Ian says.

Elizabeth points his way as if to say: fair enough.

�Mum called it a Big Step. When we got here: best of all she loved the beaches. She liked it when I saw the seals on Curachan. And she was really pleased that I liked the school.� She winds her hands around to show it�s where we are. �Specially as you can do projects. This first badge here�� see? I got that because I did the tuck-shop kitty. This one, because I learnt about wind turbines and hydro schemes and helped plant the wildlife garden.�

She passes around her two badges. The first one says BANKER. The second, ECO-STUDENT. When she sees that no one is writing down her memories for her, she stops to write them down for herself.

�Never minded winter,� she goes on. �Christmas! Only Dad didn�t like winter so much. He wanted to get back to Bristol, because it was less windy, less rainy there. But me and Mum had other ideas. He said, �We�ll see out two years.� Pretty soon we�d been here three.�

�Dad always said you could tell the incomers,� Calum Ian grumbles. �They only last one winter.�

Me: �Weren�t you even listening? Didn�t you turn up your ears? She said it was three already.�

Calum Ian: �I can say what I want, Gloic.�

Me: �You were speaking stupid.�

This becomes an argument. When we begin to shout loud at one another Duncan gets up, and goes to the fiddle cupboard and takes out a fiddle.

It�s out of tune, so he scratches it like there�s a monster coming. We all stop talking. We start laughing instead, until it�s a funny sort of riot.

Duncan looks surprised to have made us laugh. He makes more monster noises, until it�s past funny, then tunes up the fiddle proper.

When it sounds right he plays �Puff the Magic Dragon�, slow and sad.

I used to laugh at the kiss-face Duncan made when playing, but now I don�t.

He plays through twice then stops. Then he cuffs the strings and plucks them without any tune or song.

�I�m going to be world champion on the fiddle,� he says. �For Mum. For Dad. That�s my ambition. Then I�ll come back and teach all the new young kids.�

�Remember Mr Patterson?� Elizabeth asks. �He was our fiddle teacher.�

We all think of him. I thought he smelt funny. Mum said his smell was the water of life.

�I remember him at the summer concert,� Calum Ian says. �All the parents were in. It�s crazy: thinking about all the mums and dads. Just sitting there.�

Duncan puts his fiddle away. He goes back to his seat. Elizabeth goes quiet as she writes out her memories, then pins her badges back onto her jumper.

�I�m remembering next.�

It�s Calum Ian. He does a fake bow then goes to the front. Elizabeth looks pleased: she quickly tears him a new sheet of paper, and gets ready with her pen to write down every last detail of his experiences.

It takes him ages. Finally he says, �So they�re dead. They�ve all died. Or where the fuck are they? I�ve realised that Dad�s maybe in hospital. That�s why he can�t get to us, right? He got sick, he could�ve lost his strength, or lost his memory? Maybe if� if he fell off his boat, when he got to the mainland� could�ve bumped his head. That�s what happens with a bump, your memory goes until it comes back weeks later.�

He begins to breathe fast, like he�s running. He opens his mouth, puffs out. Then he says, �Want memories? Right. A big thing I remember is the first house we shopped in. Uncle Frank�s. Who wants to talk about that? Aye? OK, me then. His front door was shut. So we opened it and his dog Mo ran past.�

Duncan is saying no. Alex pulls up his jumper and holds it against his ears.

�Well, it�s a fucking memory, isn�t it? That�s what we�re doing, you should listen.� He kicks up a torn bit of floor then says, �My one true memory, write it! The dog had been eating him. She never hurt anybody, not before. But she had to eat him, to survive. Write it down, quick! It goes in the book. Before we all forget.�

Elizabeth isn�t writing.

Calum Ian shrugs and goes back to his seat.

Alex is still too scared to uncover his ears, or take his head from the desk-top.

Nobody wants to talk.

I turn around to look at Calum Ian. He�s like a drawing where the eyes don�t want to be angry or sad but both. I watch him, only because I�m nervous, and not for being sympathetic.

�Stop looking at me, Gloic,� he says.

I turn back away.

Calum Ian�s chair scrapes. He stomps to the front. Now he�s glaring at me.

�Had a camera,� he says. �With the last pictures ever of Mum and my sister Flora in it. Some of my best memories were there. Only now I�ve lost them.�

He�s looking at me. My hands have gone cold, but my face feels red hot.

�Sorry,� Elizabeth says. �I don�t understand. Where did you leave the camera?�

�Left it in the sea.�

�You left it� how in the sea?�

�I threw it in the sea.�

�Why?�

Calum Ian keeps looking very definitely at me. Then he clicks his fingers at Duncan.

�Out of here, Sidekick. A-mach � seo!�

But Duncan doesn�t want to go. He stays in his seat, until Calum Ian has to grab the neck of his jumper to pull him up and away.

When you�re alone mist and rain only makes it feel worse. You can�t see where the sky stops and the sea starts.

Every house, every postbox could be the shadow of someone standing still.

It gets me nervous: so I pull the curtains and go into my sleeping bag and begin to count from where I left off�

Seven thousand and one� two, three�

I remember how Mum used to take a breath in when she was listening. The Gael�s Breath, she called it. She did it when other adults were talking: a gasp to say: I�m still paying attention. Like she had to drink as well as hear what they were saying.

Now when I close my eyes she�s there.

She�s doing her talk to the stand-in postman. I go down deep into my bag, down to the crumbs and sweet wrappers and old socks at the bottom, covering up my ears so I can hear her, only her�

�You�ve the name given by the registrar,� she�s saying. �Likely a Protestant from the mainland, olden days. Mary for Mairi, James for Seamus and so on. Official letters will bear these names. If the letter�s sent local it might have a familiar name�� with reference to the father, mother. Seumas N�ill�� Neil�s James, for example. This helps to distinguish him from all the other Jamie MacNeils.�

Mike, the stand-in postman, is trying to write everything down. He has red hair, brown freckles on his hands which are a blur as he tries to write all she says down exact.

�Just as likely the envelope may bear a nickname. This could relate to appearance, work, habit, even something the person did as a child. For example: I am Mairi a� Phosst�� Mary the Postwoman. Ailean C�caire�� Alan the Cook. My daughter here, Rona Aonranach�� Rona on her own. Likes her ain company does this one.�

Mike the stand-in chooses one letter from all the bundles yet to be sorted.

�Doo-tang MacLeod. What is this word Doo-tang?�

Mum wrinkles her nose. �Unluckily that�s not a perfect example. It doesn�t mean anything at all.�

�Oh?�

�No, it�s a nonsense word.�

Mike, frowning, writes down: nonsense word.

�So, names covered, we will move on to addresses. As everybody knows everyone there are no house numbers. Equally, no house names. There are some streets numbered, sure�� but not many. Accordingly, even if you do find numbers they are often not in the right order. The sequence might be obscure: order of construction, left or right of that wee stream, even peculiar to that street. Perhaps no one knows why some of the numbers are the way they are. To sum up: it isn�t always clear-cut.�

�Of course��

�Also, do not assume that a street exists in one piece. Our forbears liked to name things according to the contours of workable land. For our purpose this means that a village or street may have two halves�� two strands�� existing either side of a hill or watercourse. You have to imagine following the doors underground. Consider the lie of the land and not what the map wishes to tell you.�

�Not the map.�

�Lastly, our letterboxes are often sealed against the wind. In which case you will need a key, available by application from the householder in advance.�

His pen stops moving.

Mum hands over her postbag. �I should say it took me ten years to fathom the intricacies of all the doors. Sure I imagine you�ll have it licked by noon.�

He looks at Mum. Back at his notes. At Mum.

�In case you don�t��� she goes into her bag�� �here are some laminate cards that I made giving the names, nicknames, numbers and the lie of all the streets, so you can�t go wrong. Each village set out on a new card.�

He shakes Mum�s hand.

�I was scared for a minute there.�

Mum does her straight smile. �By the way, that was also a joke about the letterboxes being sealed.�

�Ah. And a right good one.�

It took us a day to pluck up the courage to leave. With our school lessons, and shopping, and our homes, we�d made a bit of life that felt normal. So now the thought of going away: to the places we don�t know, past the safe edge of our village, makes everyone worry for what we�ll find now that we�re forced to go and see.

We�re nearly ready to leave�� when Alex goes missing.

I find him hiding under his bed, in the thick of a mess of dusty toys. Only he�s not playing: he�s just looking up, at the wooden boards holding up the mattress he sleeps on.

�Wonder what it�s like to die,� he says.

I try to reach him, but he just shuffles further in.

�Don�t know,� I answer. �Never did it. Not even when everybody else did.�

�I think it�s like your DS. When you take out the game, and the screen freezes. It�s like that in real life. Your eyes keep seeing their last thing for ever.�

It�s strange�� like another idea of his, that lava is just beneath the pavement. This one sounds half-true.

Me: �What if you saw a bit of dog shit then you died? You�d see dog shit for ever.�

His eyes warm up to an almost-smile. �Or if you saw a fat man with a fat arse?�

Me: �A famous person farting in the bath.�

Alex: �The Queen?�

Me: �Good choice. You have to be careful what to see.�

Alex: �Our mums and dads?�

Me: �Best choice. You just have to get the choice right, see? Then everything�s OK.�

We bunch together in the gap by the beds. I see the broken rim of Alex�s bedside cabinet. There�s still a red smudge on his carpet from the spilled food dye.

Alex must be looking at this too, because he says: �I get unwell without my injections.�

He lets me link my arm in his. �We�re going to get some. We could be at your home by tonight even.�

His eyes go bright when I mention home. But the brightness of them goes out just as quick, so I�m left noticing how dirty around his mouth is.

�Do we have to go to my old house?�

�You don�t want to?�

I remind him we need to look for insulin. He gathers up a ball of dust and says, �Don�t think my mum and dad are alive. And you know what else? I worry really about finding them when we get to my old home.�

He comes out, brushing off his trousers. Then he brushes his hands, as if he�s showing that we settled the business. Still, he looks unsure.

�What if you stayed seeing a bad thing?�

�You worrying again?�

He kicks the wooden stump of our bunk beds. �To see a bad thing for ever�� that would be the same as going to hell wouldn�t it?�

I want to argue against this�� but Alex only smiles, the way adults did when they were just pretending to agree�� and we have to be leaving anyway.

Mum�s van is where it always is. Like every other car there�s bird shit and cat shit over it, and the tyres have gone flat.

She must�ve stopped using the car, because she wouldn�t have let standards slip so far. She liked to keep things clean, shipshape.

Mike the stand-in postman left Mum�s laminate maps in the van before he left us.

He went back to Oban, so we didn�t get to go to Glasgow, and we didn�t get shopping for Christmas. At the time I thought this was the worst thing to happen, but now it�s become small beside all the other stuff.

The van door�s stiff and creaks loud. There�s still letters, undelivered. Old elastic bands on the floor. The seat has Mum�s smell, sadly gone quiet now. I find a scrunchy on the floor which smells so much of her I can�t stand it.

Calum Ian and Elizabeth whistle at the laminate maps as if they�re treasure, which I suppose they are.

I try to tell Elizabeth that Alex got sad�� but she shushes me. While they get busy puzzling the streets and places I whisper an ask in Elizabeth�s ear.

�All right, but be quick about it,� she says.

To the edge of the dunes, God. Layers of the world.

Sometimes bones stick out: of sheep, rabbits.

Don MacPhail put cars in the sand dunes to stop the island from blowing away.

�Come see my traffic jam,� he said to me once, when I met him with Mum on the beach.

He surprised us with steering wheels, engines, seats in sand. His collie dog ran ahead, tail circling the wind.

The island�� always moving, he said. Like a giant that hasn�t decided yet where it wants to be.

And now, from up here, I can see most of it.

The hill gets me sweating. The grass gone-yellow, tough so it scratches my legs. Bits of bog-cotton wafting. Then, keeping away, small birds, not seagulls, with wings so thin they might be made of paper.

I look away out to sea. No boats. Just islands, black with shadows on one side, gold the other.

There�s the tanker, or trawler. It�s too square-long to be an island, too brown. I don�t like to look at it for very long in case there�s ghosts on deck.

Then I think I see something that�s not an island.

My arms know it first. My arms are moving, even before my heart or my head catch up. It�s a boat. Not an island, or a wreck, it�s too white. Surely it�s a boat with the sun on it, with the shine of sun coming and going?

I shout, shout until my voice gives up. The paper-wing birds go up, circle me high in the sky.

Then the shine tells me something different.

It�s only a buoy. Guarding the entrance to the bay. And worse: I�ve seen it before. It did the same thing to me before.

Next morning, for the first time, Alex misses his insulin. We watch as he eats his favourite breakfast�� wafer biscuits with jam, dried apricots with juice�� to see if he�ll start to become unwell or act strange.

All that happens is he gets fed up of all our staring, and takes his food off to a different room.

Nobody talks about what Calum Ian did with the dart. When it�s time to go he packs quiet and separate from the rest of us, talking only to Duncan and Alex.

His rucksack looks as heavy as it did before; and the smell on it is still strong with petrol.

When we start off on the road again he�s exactly the same as yesterday: holding back, always being last, watching. But now Elizabeth has slowed, too: though for why, to annoy him or to outdo him, I can�t tell.

Alex�s house is a mile up the road. It has a red roof, a garden around. There�s a trampoline blown on its side, jammed under a fence. His old bike is there, but rusted so much that we can�t turn the wheels or the steering.

We spray our perfume-hankies. Alex stays at the gate, nervously chewing his sleeve.

�Please don�t be spraying petrol,� he says, putting his hands together in prayer in front of Calum Ian.

Calum Ian just waves him away.

The house�� has no smell. Calum Ian goes right in, takes off his hanky. He breathes deep. Then he comes back and claps Alex on the back like he�s a competition winner.

�It�s all right.�

After this, ahead of schedule, Duncan takes out his spray-paint and sprays a gold G on the door.

�I�m the luckiest kid,� Alex says.

In the hallway it only smells of coldness. His house reminds me of my old home, with its stairs, shoe rack, curtains. There�s a pair of Highland dancing shoes with red laces on the floor, which Alex says belonged to his big sister, Clare. I forgot or never knew in the first place he had a big sister. He was only ever Alex to me.

The living room has black leather chairs. There�s a scrunched yellow duvet on the longest sofa. On the floor, a mess of plastic aprons, masks, towels. Some of the towels have dirty bits on them, which seems to get Alex ashamed, because he kicks them into a corner.

We get on guard for finding something bad, but Alex says it was like this before: the same mess.

�The masks were dumb,� he says. �They made my face go hot and my nose itchy.�

�What�� you prefer being dead?� Duncan asks.

�Lots of dead people are still wearing them,� Alex answers.

There�s a pile of Alex�s old DVDs on the floor. He looks through them, though we�ve found most of his favourites in other people�s homes. Elizabeth, meanwhile, looks in the kitchen for injection things. She opens the drawers as softly and as kindly as she can, for respect.

In one drawer, in a plastic box, she finds bandages, antiseptic creams. In another: tissues, candles, kids� plasters with brave faces on them.

No insulin.

I stay in the living room beside Alex. He stares at the sofa, at the scrunched duvet. Then says, �This was where Mum was sick.� He pulls back the duvet and calls out in surprise. �See I just found it, look! There�s her plate with the jam sandwich I made her!�

Duncan goes ahead to look. The sandwich isn�t a sandwich. It�s a shrivelled crisp of green-grey mould.

�She never ate it,� Alex says.

�No wonder,� Duncan laughs, trying a joke, then seeing that the not-eating is a subject Alex is sad about.

�If only I�d made a better job,� he says. �She might�ve had it and got her strength. She might�ve got better.�

Duncan forgets his joke. He puts an arm over Alex�s back instead. Alex says, �Auntie Jane was crying about us being in here, but she was too strict, wasn�t she?�

�Strict? For what?�

�For going away. When the men came they wouldn�t let me go with Mum. I told them I wouldn�t get sick, that I didn�t have a cold all summer. I said �Cross my heart, hope to die; stick a needle in my eye.� I even kicked the edge of the rug, but it was no use.�

�They took your mum��

�So I stayed with Auntie Jane. Only she was too scared to inject me. After that I don�t remember.�

We cover the sandwich up. Alex pats the duvet like it�s a favourite friend, then frowns, calls himself eejit.

How does an alone kid keep alive? I think this when I think of Mairi. For starters, she kept her count of days. For second, she knew the idea of having friends: dolls to stand in for real people. She even painted the dogs, maybe because that was like giving them clothes, and clothes equals human.

But still: alone, she forgot how to talk. Which is why I�ve started to say aloud all the adverts and films I could ever remember.

It gave us trouble, in the end, Mairi not talking.

The other question: how does an alone kid keep safe? She was the best at that. Now I want to shake her hand and tell her how well she did.

Today, I made it a theme for the �Plans and Activities� jotter I started�

I can�t find more inspiration. Asking the blank page never works, so I put my jotter away.

There�s only a short memory, today. I get to the bottom of the sleeping bag to find it: deep down, back beside the biscuit crumbs and empty wrappers.

To the time when we definitely began to know that the world would for ever be different.

We�re at the supermarket. And the big strangeness is that everyone�s wearing a mask: all the shoppers, the lady on the till, even the man minding the door, letting one person in at a time, for one going out.

And the lights are off�� apart from the light in one bit of the freezer section. There�s the sound and the stink of a generator�� set up in the car park, with cables coming in just to keep that one freezer working.

I want to go to the playpark by the store and play with the other kids, but Mum tells me to stick close by her.

When it�s our turn to go in I hear Mum swear: �Fuck; they emptied the place.�

There is one long queue of people, going from the fridges, past the freezers, back to us.

The man on the till is only letting shoppers buy ten pounds� worth. The people keep arguing with him for more, but he won�t allow it.

But it might not matter for us, because the shelves of the store are nearly all empty anyway.

Mum jangles her keys. She keeps looking around at the door, then the people taking food in front of us.

For shopping the rules have changed: you�re only allowed to take when you reach twenty places from the front of the queue. And that�s miles.

My eyes get used to seeing Mairi, which makes me remember bits of who she was. She was a flower at the Easter concert: growing big when the teacher fed her sunbeams from a torch. She was fidgety and busy at dancing. I saw her once shouting on her brother.

Now she has this new life; the same life as us. Where it�s being alive that counts, and where nobody makes concerts or holds classes for learning to dance.

And where it�s more normal to have scars on your face than not.

We wait on Elizabeth, to see what she�ll do, but she doesn�t act clever. She tries all types of knowing how a person might be safe: using her books, talking out the problem, asking the sky. Asking us.

It�s Alex who comes up with the idea of asking about her brother, so Elizabeth does that.

Mairi rubs the dirt on the palms of her hands into black strings, then wipes it free. After this she reaches in her pocket and takes out a crumpled drawstring purse.

She empties it on our barrier line of stones.

There�s five shells, some glass beads. Another key fob. Feathers. Plus a picture of her brother.

The colour in it got faded, the picture criss-crossed where she folded it too many times.

�That�s from before,� Elizabeth says. �Mairi, it�s great you�ve got a picture from before. But we need to know what he looked like after.�

Mairi doesn�t make a sign of hearing: instead just puts the collection back in her purse, all except the feather, which she watches for the way the wind ruffles it.

Me: �We could dig her brother out.�

�Sure. We dig him out, look at the skin on his face. Because it�s easy to spot the scars on the rotten bony skeletons we see in houses. Great idea! The best yet. Well you can be the one to do that.�

Her voice goes hard, much harder than true kindness. I pretend not to notice. But anyway, Elizabeth is looking instead to see if Mairi heard, or got sad by hearing her brother called a skeleton, but she didn�t seem to.

�The right thing is sometimes the wrong thing,� Elizabeth says. �Like when you wanted to be near someone at the end. That was wrong, even though your heart said right.�

When she says this I wonder: will we be leaving Mairi behind? But then she shows another idea.

She takes out a ball of string from her rucksack and begins to unroll it. Then she walks on so that it trails and dangles behind her.

When it reaches the length of about five kids she beckons Mairi.

�Stay that far away,� she says. �Until we know better.�

There was the day when Calum Ian and me talked about fate. That was back in spring, back when we were still working out how to stay alive.

It was just the two of us, at Message Rock. He�d thrown in a bottle�� he still believed in sea-mail back then. I was on a rock, higher up. It was my job to spot the way it drifted, in case it came back into the bay.

He asked if I believed in fate. When I said I didn�t know (because I didn�t know what fate was) he said, �Dad said there was nothing you could do about it. Like it had to happen, no matter what.�

�Like going asleep?�

He shivered at the sea-wind. �Listen: Gran met Grandpa because she was late for her bus. Fate. Aunt Clare fell down the stairs and broke her leg, then the man who pushed her in the chair at the hospital, he ended up becoming Uncle Frank. That�s fate.�

I tried to know fate from these two examples.

�When a mistake leads to marriage?�

Calum Ian clicked his tongue. �More than that. Like I said: it�s got to happen. It could be something good, like meeting Uncle Frank, or bad, like this.�

He circled his arms to mean: all the world. The island we were on. The sea keeping us on it.

He threw a stone in the direction of his bottle then said, �Keep wondering how it could�ve turned out differently. What I could�ve done to change things. Only what if the stuff we did never made a difference?�

I gathered up pebbles for thinking. �You mean we shouldn�t bother sending messages?�

�We could try. But maybe it�s the same, in the end?� He held his head for thinking, then said, �You can�t change the end of a film.�

I let him go ahead on our way back to the village: so far ahead that he was just another brown dot, just another rock under the headland.

I didn�t like the thought of being part of a film. Not being able to change it. But I didn�t argue against, because I knew by then that Calum Ian had to have all the right answers.

It�s just that now I think I could�ve said more. Because a person can�t always come up with the right answers.

Especially when that person is in a hurry.

Alex�s bed is wet next morning. He stays late so he can hide the dampness of it. When Elizabeth finally stands him up he wobbles like he�s still inside a dream.

Alex: �It�s only sweat��

Elizabeth: �Look, it doesn�t matter. It was an accident.�

Alex: �I said it was sweat.�

Elizabeth: �Here�s a flannel, OK? I got you some fresh clothes. Want a drink?�

�I get sweaty, thirsty if I don�t get my injections.�

�I know.�

He drinks and drinks, caving in the plastic bottle of red sterilised as he tips it high and finishes it.

The water dribbles down his chin, settling in beads on the mucky front of his T-shirt. He begins to change his clothes and we see that Alex now has three red lumps on his stomach. One is the same size as his hand in a fist.

He tries to scratch this but it hurts, so he presses around the edges of it instead.

Covering up his stomach again he says, �Know what my dream told me last night?�

Me: �Say it.�

�It told me I didn�t have any weakness. That I wasn�t scared of zombies, or bad men. Or dogs. And even though I had diabetes, it didn�t count.�

Alex looks at us confident�� so confident that we can�t argue back, to say that it does count, that a person can�t just dream away their weaknesses.

Still, he maybe sees that we�re unsure, because he gets the same doubt in his eyes that I feel and says, �When you die you have worms up your nose. Sad to say, I haven�t lost my weakness for that.�

As I don�t have an answer he just sags his body and adds, �The injections aren�t working.�

�You should ask Elizabeth. She�s the boss.�

He looks across at Elizabeth, who�s now gone to the window and is peeping out through the blinds.

�I did. She won�t tell. But I know. I�m not a very stupid boy, I know already.�

�They�re coming,� Elizabeth interrupts, coming over to shake Mairi from her nest-bed. �Alex, be beside me. I want the two of you out of sight.�

I can�t think too much about Elizabeth or Duncan. If I do then all I want is the world to stop. But the only way to stop the world is to stop myself. And if I do that, I might as well stop caring about finding the others.

It�s dark. The dark feels damp on my skin. There was orange in the sky when the sun went down. I couldn�t stop looking at the colour of it.

It�s the same with buoys, or orange pens, or oilskins, or straws. Everything: reminding me of that last smudge of orange we saw at sea.

The same colour as Mum�s jacket.

Since they died I�ve been searching my memory for all the last things. Did we say the right stuff? Did we say please, and keep good manners? Did I tell them how much strength they had, or praise their bravery? Tell how much I was hoping we�d stay friends?

Most of the time I can�t remember. Sometimes I remember real bits, and it seems we were in a hurry.

Yesterday I had a memory where everyone took time to tell each other their good points: that one was false.

Earlier on I went shopping. Not Old: but New Shopping. And I did it all on my own.

I discovered that having a bad memory, having the worst memory, stops the worst fear.

Even so, I�m not sure this is a good strength to have.

There was a sign at the coastguard�s office which said: Who�s afraid of getting their feet wet? Not us!

I found a message written in dust on the silver ledge of a window at the pub: John Anne-Marie.

I found words written on a dirty van: ALSO AVAILABLE IN WHITE. Then underneath: If only my wife was as dirty as this.

I found a pair of slippers, waiting.

I found a house with four people all fallen over each other, beside a note saying who they loved.

I found lots of Bibles in people�s hands. I found some on the floor beside their hands.

I found a mess of things I didn�t understand, beside a dead cat. Then a mess of fur and bones.

On a school jotter someone had written: I�m going to draw you a map with no pictures on it.

I found a game called �Beat the Parents�. I stomped on it until the box was broken.

One house had all its furniture covered in sheets, like ghosts. It took me ages to realise it was a holiday home.

A house with tins and tins of dog food.

One man dead at his computer.

One of the firemen from the station at home, on his couch, still in his uniform.

The sun came up. My blanket got cold on its edges. I can hear the wind going around the walls outside, can see the grass being pushed and pulled by it.

Calum Ian is sitting at the window, alone. I wonder if he�s been outside again. He�s wearing his sleeping bag. I�ve decided that sleeping bags don�t work if it�s too cold.

�They�ve not moved,� he says.

His scars look the worst ever. There are two dirty marks going down his cheeks from his eyes.

Mairi�s on the bench at the head of me, curled up so tight she�s nearly gone. There�s just one tuft of her hair. Alex is a bit further up, also buried. The bottle of pink water on the floor beside him is caved-in, finished.

�You think there�s other people?� I ask.

Calum Ian keeps looking out of the window, and I almost don�t hear when he answers, �Somewhere.�

�Why haven�t they come?�

�If they�re getting things fixed. Like the electricity. Like radios. How the fuck would I know?�

I rub cold from my legs, sit up. Outside the sun is making a long yellow waterfall of the sea.

Me: �Do you think they�ll be kind?�

�Kind?�

�The people. What if they don�t want to look after children who don�t belong? We�ll maybe have to fend for ourselves.�

Calum Ian doesn�t answer. I notice the stink of him: the smell of smoke from his fire-torch.

He�s not looking out at the world now�� he�s looking in the way, at us.

�So I lost my family,� he says. �That should be the worst, but�� you�� He looks away, back. �You got an idea why you don�t�? Family. I can�t have my brother. Now you want to talk about fending for ourselves?�

I stare at the dirt worked in under my nails. The dirt on my skin, on the knees of my jeans.

�He was going to be the best fiddle-player,� he says. �Practised every bloody day. Oh, I gave him a big row�� for collecting books for the fiddle, and not food.�

Calum Ian holds the sides of his head like there�s the loudest noise. He bumps into the bench then kicks it�� then keeps kicking until I know it must be hurting his foot.

Then he looks at us and says, �Was probably her fault.�

It�s not the sort of talk for saying back to. And I don�t know if he means Elizabeth, or me. Safer not to look at him in case it�s me. He says, �It should�ve been me with him on the rib. I�d have kept it close to shore. He�d have survived, would be a certainty. With his brother�� for sure, and maybe she would�ve, too� well she�d be here, with you, she�d be all right. Except now he�s�� not. I�ve got nobody left in the world.�

�You have us.�

�It�s not the same. You�re not my family.�

We just get the wind-noise around the walls. Now-and-then crackle of rain. Alex sniffing.

�At least you had somebody. Alex�� he always knew his mum and dad were gone away. So did Elizabeth. At least you had someone for a while.�

Calum Ian turns to statue. I�m moving the most, Alex maybe second most. Mairi isn�t even as still as Calum Ian.

He comes over, sits beside me.

�Go back to lying down like you were before,� he says.

I go back to lying down. Calum Ian has almost a sweet face, or a kind face. Then he puts his hands on my neck. Either side.

He presses, presses. Like he�s trying to choke me.

He lets go, then presses again.

I want to remain calm. Like Elizabeth�s mum said on choking when she came to visit our class�� but his hands are too hard. Instead, I try to twist free from one side.

I hear someone crying�� Alex.

His hands are bigger, stronger than mine. His eyes don�t look like his eyes�� they�re angry and scared, but all at the same time, which is the worst thing.

Then Mairi is there. She�s tugging on his T-shirt. Waving a hand in front of his face.

When he turns and sees her, she waves again.

He lets go. Lets go. Lets go.

He rubs on my neck. �Made a red bit,� he says.

I get away to the window. My legs don�t want to stand me up, they�re shaking too much.

Calum Ian curls himself up in the blanket I just left. His face pressed to the wood of the seat.

The noise he makes isn�t crying�� it�s more like a man�s sound, like a man gasping, drowned.

�I tried, tried. It didn�t come out right� If I could get back�� to before� this. I�d be going on that boat. No question. What if it did sink�� could it? If it did then I�d just hold onto him�� we�d get on with it fine.�

He looks at the ceiling. There�s just cobwebs, one cracked tile by the striplight.

�You said, you said Dad�� learn to swim first. Then I�ll let you on the boat. Let you get sailing. So you were right. The proof�s in the pudding, so I turned out to be a big fat coward after all�� are you happy with that?�

He says this last word as loud as he can, so that the racket of it seems to stay even after.

�Don�t shout, please,� says Alex. �It makes me cold and shivery when you shout.�

For a long time then, there�s just his gasping-breath sound.

The sun comes out: one ray in the edge of the room. It finds Mairi�s foot: she moves to be more in the warm of it.

�Nothing else I need to try for.�

�What about us?� asks Alex.

�What about you?�

Calum Ian did not come back that night, or the next, or the next. I made a hundred bargains with the sea to bring them home, but the sea never listened.

The first night a shiver went through the air, and it began to rain. The water got moving shapes on it, which I thought were rescuers, but they were only waves.

I stared at the sea until I saw boats, whales, faces. When the rain came I walked to the ferry slip to save Elizabeth and Duncan�s bags. Duncan�s fiddle had got wet, and the strings sounded wrong.

I ate the packed lunch that Elizabeth made for us: oatcakes, pineapple juice, jelly vitamins.

Stuffed beside Duncan�s lunch were other things. The fiddle book he was learning last year: Fiddle Time Christmas. Also clothes, pencils, chalks, a packet of cards, a conjuror�s set, jotters, felt-tip pens.

I made a cairn out of stones to remember them by. I threw flowers in the water and begged the sea to change its mind, to be kind to my other friends.

When a plastic bag flew past I thought it was a person, but then I saw it was just rubbish blown from the lines of junk along the shore.

There were big birds�� flying, circling over the next beach along. I didn�t want to look too close at them in case they told me where Elizabeth and Duncan were.

At night I went on lookout, for lights on the sea or maybe from the next island. I looked for Calum Ian flashing his torch. He might have a flare: he could shoot it up to tell me they were safe. But I saw no lights.

I sat on a rock to watch. I imagined a genie, giving me three wishes. I could use all three wishes to make the sea go away, like Moses. Then run to the next island to join them. But each time I imagined the sea bottom it was full of mud, or wrecks, or the bones of whales, and then the water came back anyway too quick, and I didn�t have a raft or armbands to stop me from drowning.

The metal shutters are down at the surgery, even though it�s daytime. There�s a lot of people waiting outside, standing at the front entrance, looking cold and wet.

Mum drives past and parks on the going-down shore road. She checks nobody followed her, then sends a message on her phone, then waits.

In ten minutes someone opens the side door. It�s Morven, who works on reception. She doesn�t say anything or get too close, just shows us in.

As soon as the door�s locked we hear a person running up to it and banging on the other side.

�Will ye at least look?� a man, shouting. �I�m not sick, you can look can�t ye? Need our son�s medicine.�

Morven asks the man to be quiet, not to draw attention to himself. Then she goes upstairs ahead of us to ask the doctor what to do.

She comes back�� and unlocks the door, lets him in. It�s Mr Gillies who works on the ferry.

When we get to the waiting room Dr Schofield is there. She�s wearing strange clothes: a white paper suit, with blue gloves and covers over her shoes something like the covers they wear at the fish factory.

I see her daughter, Elizabeth, from the big class P7, looking out from one of the nurses� rooms along the corridor: watching us, her mum.

Mr Gillies looks impatient when he asks the doctor about deliveries and boats and rations. Then he says, �Much can I take?� with a voice that sounds too keen. �Away with me, right now? How much?�

Dr Schofield takes off her glasses, rubs at her eyes. �You could have all of it.� Then: �But I don�t know, would have to check��

�There�s a boat coming day after tomorrow. I could get more to boost up your stock, right? Fair enough? There�s nothing here, you know as well as me. If you give me a note for your supplier��

�Look, there�s a dozen others�� same as you, same situation. Then the others, with chronic illnesses. Everyone has their own want. We�re trying to provide for everybody. There needs to be some reserve��

Her voice goes small, until it�s less than a whisper. Mum is trying to listen in: I can see by the way she tilts her head, not looking away for one second.

Dr Schofield goes back into the dispensary. Finally, she returns holding a white paper bag.

�This needs to be kept cool,� she says. �You know about cold chain? You have a generator�� no. Outdoors, then. These are mixed�� long-and short-acting. You can dose twice, same units. Or if you want to ration: fine, as long as maybe half is going in each day? If there�s some insulin that stops ketosis. You know about that.�

Mr Gillies holds out his hand. His voice is broken up, jagged, when he says, �Look: Alex needs his medicine. I had to take this chance, OK? He�s at the Cr�ileagan. I�m not allowed. Can you get someone to hand it in there for him?�

Dr Schofield looks at Mr Gillies� hand for a long time, then doesn�t shake it. �I will see,� she says.

Mr Gillies leaves: then Morven goes downstairs to make sure the door is locked behind him.

We hear Dr Schofield calling on Elizabeth.

Then we hear her explaining about the boy. She talks about pens: how to dial up numbers. How to inject into a person, where to inject, how often.

Then she comes to talk to us. I notice her hands are shaking, as if she�d been out too long in the cold.

�How�s Dr Schofield?� Mum asks.

This confuses the doctor: because it�s her name, too. When Mum adds, �Your man? Your husband?� Dr Schofield closes her eyes and says, �He went to hospital.�

�I am so��

�Really need not to think about this just now.�

She goes away, then returns with a box. In the box are lots of smaller white boxes, plus leaflets.

�One each house,� Dr Schofield says. �If they open the door get back to your car. Don�t touch the gates, the letterboxes, the handles. Use gloves, always. Keep your mask on. Hand hygiene�� you�ve got scrubs? There�s a recording on our answering machine. Let them know about the D.E.C. Also world service, long wave.�

�We couldn�t get the computer��

�Get a wind-up radio.�

�They�ve all gone from the store� Doctor, do you need more help? Will I come again, deliver again?�

�Stay in after.�

Mum goes to take her hand, but Dr Schofield doesn�t reach out for hers.

I see Elizabeth once more before we go. She�s not looking at us, but at her mum: at the woman who usually walks so tall, now sagged down in a seat.

As the crack of the door closes I see her girl Elizabeth standing and waiting.

It�s no fun staying up if you can�t be blamed for it.

I�ve just one clock to tell the time, now. I put all the rest in the garden�� which turned out to be a mistake, because the electric ones stopped working after it rained. Then the wind-up ones stopped because I forgot to wind them up.

So my last clock, with its true time, is precious.

I�m dressed first. Everyone else is bleary this morning. �Rise and shine, time to dine,� I shout out. Alex wanders out to the toilet. Mairi gets dressed and just sits waiting at the table, holding her spoon up.

Breakfast is wafer biscuits, then the powder from chocolate sponge mix, mixed with water. It looks like mud at first but be patient, it will come right. Alex has a fierce hunger and eats while it�s still powder-dirt. Mairi has the least appetite of us. I tick her off and she bunches shoulders but it doesn�t make her eat good.

After breakfast, we pile up the plates and get ready for school. First there�s fly-killing time. I�m the winner at that with twelve. After this we check the radios. Static. Then the light switches. No lights. Then I write up our shopping list for today: Batteries. Sweets. Gaelic stickers for remembering. Fizzy cans of juice. Better water.

Then it�s calendar time. That�s next door. I�m in charge, so the others have to wait. The calendar has pictures of trucks with blown-up wheels. We found it at a house in the village. It�s just me that gets to mark the days.

I put a cross over yesterday. I used to use circles, but circles can mean red-letter days so I stopped, in case it made a confusion for rescuers. Last week I even drew circles on days ahead to make things happen. So I wrote on the 23rd of June: �When the radio will start working!!� Then on the 26th: �Electricity working again!!!�

But I passed those circles. And when you pass too many circles you get fed up with doing it.

At the door it�s my job to check everyone has their bags. Plus pencils, felt-tip pens, mid-morning snack.

Me: �Ready?�

There has to be a rule about not answering.

Mum honks her horn. We�re in a car jam. I never saw a car jam before, not on our island. In films, maybe. Never in real life.

It�s nearly dark. The telegraph lines are whistling. The sea looks stormy, white. The cars are in a long line.

After ages the red lights go off the car in front, and we move along one, and then the lights come on again.

Me: �Why�s it taking so long?�

Mum: �They have to ask questions, that�s why.�

Me: �I remember we did see a car jam before, once. Getting on the ferry. You remember?�

Mum smokes. She turns off the van to save diesel.

They�ve put orange and white fences across the road, which means that just one car can get through at a time. Next to the fences, there�s a lorry. On the back of the lorry are the big metal baskets they were using to strengthen the cliff road. Now the workmen have changed their mind; they�re using them to narrow the road instead.

�Keep down,� Mum says.

Seonaid, the nurse from hospital, is standing at the fences. She�s wearing a white all-over suit, like the one Dr Schofield wore, plus a mask and eye protectors.

She looks cold, she bounces, jumps to stay warm.

Mum gets me to curl up on the floor as we get closer to being the frontmost car.

When it�s our turn Seonaid shines a light inside and finds me hiding. She hands Mum a piece of paper. I want to look at it first but Mum won�t let me.

�Rona, then,� Mum says.

Seonaid comes around to my window. She taps politely and I roll it down.

�Can I just pop this in your ear, love?� she asks.

She reaches in and presses a white plastic gun into the hole of my ear; it beeps. Then Seonaid reads the number. After this she rips off her glove and puts on another one.

�Did very well.�

When she goes around to Mum, they talk first. Mum has questions. One of the cars behind starts to honk its horn. Mum still has questions.

�We�re trying to keep a safe haven.� Seonaid waves to the men at the gates, to say everything�s all right.

Then she leans in closer to Mum and whispers: �Mary, you need to, otherwise I�ll have to pull you over.�

�But which side is this safe haven? It�s not clear, is it behind or ahead? Are we in it right now?�

Seonaid thins her mouth, looks around again at the cars. Someone else peeps their horn.

�The side you�re going to. Come on Mary. I don�t want to have to pull you over.�

Mum tries to ask another question, but when Seonaid walks away like she�s lost her patience, Mum stops asking. Instead she rolls down her window all the way, and puts her head towards the outside.

The white gun beeps.

Mum keeps her eyes away. Seonaid looks at her number for a long time: then writes it down on her plastic card.

Then she rips off her gloves and says, �I don�t want to have to separate you right now. So can you keep your mask on?� Seonaid has to shout over the wind and rain. �Listen Mary: keep Rona�s hands washed. Wash everything: cups, bowls, cutlery, before she touches anything. The both of you need to wear gloves.�

�Been doing all that.�

Seonaid bites her lip: then gives the man at the barrier the thumbs-up. He waves us through.

�I�ve got us safe,� Mum says. She rubs my shoulder, picks up her cigarette packet with a shaking hand.

The real reason I didn�t put Mum�s letter back together was because she wrote three of them.

One telling me how to work the heating. The next, a list of emergency numbers.

But the last one: what was it?

If I�d seen the other two envelopes as well, it would�ve been easier. But I never found them.

There was just this one, the one she posted back through the door. Paper gone pale on one side, from the sun.

Try not to look at the words as I tape the torn pieces back together again. Dirt-marked but readable, only her signing-words blurry from when I dropped it that day on the wet ground:

I say it out loud. I hear, or imagine I hear, Mum saying the words. I put the letter against my cheek. I don�t care if there are germs of illness on it.

I write the whole thing up on my wall. I colour around the words in rainbows. It takes me hours, and my hands get numb, but it�s worth every second.

I want more. I look at the letter side-on, in case she pressed into it a secret message. I look inside the envelope, unpeel its glue. It�s just plain.

What else? I get hungry for other messages. So I go back to my old home and do a complete search.

Some of the cards on the mantelpiece fell down since we came in. But there�s still dirty washing in the sink, Mum�s grey pants and bras on the clothes horse still.

I rub the pen-marks off the tablecloth. Then I use Sellotape to stick down the wallpaper I peeled.

I peel off the stickers I shouldn�t�ve put on the wall upstairs. But I have to stop, because the wallpaper rips underneath.

�Sorry,� I say to Mum.

She�s not answering today.

I look around for anything of her: and after a strong search I find a shopping list at the bottom of a plastic bag, in the cupboard. It says: Carrots, Lentils, Eggs, Tomato sauce, Milk, Breakfast, Rolls, Juice, Treats.

Her writing isn�t hurried, and even though it�s only a shopping list, I want to keep it: because it�s of her.

Six becomes one, when I remember that water is the most important thing. So I put loads of plastic cups in a fish crate on the stone wall of the house, with green nets over the top to stop the cats getting in.

After this I wait for rain. Still: I know that if you wait too hard then it never comes. So I pretend to the sky that I was busy doing something else instead.

It works for a day before the snails get in.

I never got to see where they came from. There had been a spot of rain at night, and I went straight out in the morning to find there�d been an attack.

When I shouted the dogs started to bark. There was only a couple of cups spared, so it became a battle: me against the snails. I crushed and smashed them: threw them against the wall, flattened them under rocks.

But then I saw a snail try to slide off, with its sad cracked shell. And all the world hated me, because I was the worst person for hurting this creature.

Daytime. A man stands over me. He holds a mirror up to my mouth, then looks surprised to see me waken.

He holds a mirror over the baby�s mouth.

I notice there are three other blanket-shapes in the room. The man goes around them all with his mirror, coughing, doing the same thing he did with me.

When he leaves, a lady comes in. She takes away two of the blanket-shapes, then the baby.

She leaves more biscuits and juice, even though we didn�t eat much of the earlier stuff.

The boom is at the back of the house. Then I�m lying down: there�s a flash of light racing over�

Then I�m not hearing.

That�s fire: big fire. I can�t hear any sound of it.

Dogs run past. Their mouths go big, shut, big.

I run away to the fence, to the back of the next house, to behind the neighbour�s bins.

It�s like the sun came up again. Light that makes the sky seem dark everywhere else.

Now I start to hear again. My one ear hurts. The dogs, barking. The roar of an angry giant.

All the sound turned up again. A roar of fire, twisting up above the roof of their house into the sky.

Arm wet. Face wet?

Glass in my arm. It makes me gasp for seeing it.

From the roster we could see the last runs had gone through late-Feb. Four, five months ago.

There was a shorter run: shorter than the removals, taking in towns, any open harbour. Anchorages a nightmare, frequently: wrecks up and down the coast, cos nothing got tied proper for the weather.

Shipping lanes: empty. Told us about the last. Belfast picked up a man�� a farmer�� on Colonsay. Guy had set fire to his fields and was brought mainland in April.

By consensus he was a one-off. Oldest by a mile, how�d he lived? All the rest was for clean-up.

Murdo saw first. There was an early front: low coming in from sou-west. Punching through that, over above: smoke. Stood out hardest at dusk, then we lost it. Too far, not Morven, not Mull, not even Inner Hebs.

So then we get off shift. Inverness said they�d pick up in the morn, otherwise not keen to send out a search, conserve this, conserve that, usual story.

Calum goes on his VHF, runs up and down the channels. Got a bit of stick from Donnie: said there was something like half a boat between here and Newfoundland, so he was better off shelving it and focussing on salvage.

Admit I couldnae sleep�� thinking about that smoke. Set me thinking on everyone I was missing.

Family. Pals. All the older folk.

When ye meet or hear of someone from before it�s like: no way. Can�t believe there�s an auld-lifer.

Skip, he has a nephew who�s survived. So Skip has his family. That�s pretty remarkable.

Kept asking him, what�s it like? There�s someone from your before. What does that feel like?

He�s a dour bugger though. Hard to get a word out of him for what went. Nor any word of outlook.

Where did my kind go, I think, when I�m not guarding against thinking too much. Where are they?

Stayed up late, blethering to Donnie. Why�d I come to the coast? he asked. All the way up here?

Had tae think. Know something: clearest answer, crazy but. It�s hardest being in the city. Even the towns. When ye�re there it hits ye, ye cannay escape it.

Empty streets. Whole districts: empty. No cars on the roads. No folk in the town centres.

Here at least, looking out where there was never much in the first place, ye can pretend no much changed.

The wool over yer eyes, Donnie said.

So what? I answered back. Better that than getting to see how bad it did us.

Plus in the city there�s all the eyes on ye: all the time, so ye feel like a museum piece. Some type of freak.

Hundreds�� no thousands�� of kids, looking at ye like ye�re the faither and mother they need. Because it was the adults that got it worst: which makes us, the few survivors above the age of twenty, truly remarkable.

I won�t say lucky. Remarkable will do for now.

Thank you to Karolina Sutton, Norah Perkins and Lucy Morris of Curtis Brown, and to Katie Espiner, Charlotte Cray, Suzie Door�, Cassie Browne and Ann Bissell and all the team at the Borough Press. Thanks to Claire Ward for her fantastic cover design. Thanks also to Donald Sinclair for checking my Gaelic; and to Jamie and Elspeth Traynor and Miranda Barkham.

Special thanks to Karin for all her support and encouragement over the years, and to our three children, whose book title suggestions�� Life�s a Beach, Staying Alive�� were better than any I came up with. Thanks also to the real-life Elizabeth, for the gifts you gave. And thank you mum, for everything.

A final thanks to the people of Barra and Vatersay, for their warmth, humour and kindness during our stay there.

Rob Ewing is a GP who spent several years living on a small island off the Scottish coast (with more than five other people). His poetry and short fiction have been published by New Writing UK, New Writing Scotland, and performed on BBC Radio. The Last of Us is his first novel.

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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2016

Copyright � Rob Ewing 2016

Cover design by Claire Ward � HarperCollinsPublishers 2016

Cover photographs � Marie Liesse/Plain Picture (children); Image Source/Plain Picture (landscape); Shutterstock.com (flies).

Rob Ewing asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author�s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Source ISBN: 9780008149581

Ebook Edition � April 2016 ISBN: 9780008149604

Version: 2016-03-22