Here, the houses couldn’t be more different to the ones on the street where Kitty lived. Tiny two-up, two-down cottages that constantly felt as if the walls were closing in on you. These houses were big, detached, two- and three-storey mansions with double garages and huge gardens with views across town. It wasn’t fair that Lucy and Maeve got to live in a big house with a garden and a tree house, when Kitty had to share their tiny house with her parents and Emer. It wasn’t fair that Lucy’s parents never argued and her mother never, ever told Lucy she was a mistake and she wished she’d never had her. Kitty was starting to realise that nothing in this life was fair.

She’d half expected Lucy not to come. But when she reached the meeting point, behind the tree at the end of Lucy’s road, Lucy was already there.

‘You’re late,’ Lucy said.

‘Sorry,’ Kitty said. ‘I had to wait until my mum left. Did you bring the torch?’

Lucy held up the torch.

‘Good.’ Kitty nodded. ‘Don’t turn it on yet. Wait until we need it.’

She crossed the road to the woods that divided the town in two, separating Irish Town – the older part of town – from the newer houses where Lucy and Kitty lived. There was a road that ran around the edge of the woods, joining the two sections of the town, but the quickest way to Old Town, and the Coyne house, was to follow the path that ran through the woods. Going through the woods also meant there was less chance they’d be seen by any nosey adults wanting to know what two girls were doing out by themselves this late in the evening.

But even though the sun hadn’t set yet, the woods felt dark and scary.

‘Better switch that on,’ Kitty said.

Lucy did as she was told, but it wasn’t long before she was moaning about being scared and telling Kitty she wanted to go home.

‘No!’ Kitty grabbed Lucy’s arm, tugging her forward. ‘You promised, Lucy. You can’t turn back now.’

‘I don’t like it in here.’ Lucy pulled her arm free. ‘And stop dragging me like that. What’s so important about doing this, anyway? Don’t tell me it’s just because we won’t be able to do it soon because the house will be knocked down. There’s something else going on, isn’t there?’

‘There’s nothing else,’ Kitty said. ‘I thought it would be an adventure, that’s all. Don’t you want our lives to be more exciting than they are? You read all those books about kids who do things like this all the time. Why can’t you be a bit more like them?’

‘They’re just books,’ Lucy said. ‘Not real people. In case you hadn’t noticed.’