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Chapters (75)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. About the Author
  4. Title Page
  5. Intoroduction
  6. ONE
  7. TWO
  8. THREE
  9. FOUR
  10. FIVE
  11. SIX
  12. SEVEN
  13. EITHT
  14. NINE
  15. TEN
  16. ELEVEN
  17. TWELVE
  18. THIRTEEN
  19. FOURTEEN
  20. FIFTEEN
  21. SIXTEEN
  22. SEVENTEEN
  23. EIGHTEEN
  24. NINETEEN
  25. TWENTY
  26. TWENTY-ONE
  27. TWENTY-TWO
  28. TWENTY-THREE
  29. TWENTY-FOUR
  30. TWENTY-FIVE
  31. TWENTY-SIX
  32. TWENTY-SEVEN
  33. TWENTY-EIGHT
  34. TWENTY-NINE
  35. THIRTY
  36. THIRTY-ONE
  37. THIRTY-TWO
  38. THIRTY-THREE
  39. THIRTY-FOUR
  40. THIRTY-FIVE
  41. THIRTY-SIX
  42. THIRTY-SEVEN
  43. THIRTY-EIGHT
  44. THIRTY-NINE
  45. FORTY
  46. FORTY-ONE
  47. FORTY-TWO
  48. FORTY-THREE
  49. FORTY-FOUR
  50. FORTY-FIVE
  51. FORTY-SIX
  52. FORTY-SEVEN
  53. FORTY-EIGHT
  54. FORTY-NINE
  55. FIFTY
  56. FIFTY-ONE
  57. FIFTY-TWO
  58. FIFTY-THREE
  59. FIFTY-FOUR
  60. FIFTY-FIVE
  61. FIFTY-SIX
  62. FIFTY-SEVEN
  63. FIFTY-EIGHT
  64. FIFTY-NINE
  65. SIXTY
  66. SIXTY-ONE
  67. SIXTY-TWO
  68. SIXTY-THREE
  69. SIXTY-FOUR
  70. SIXTY-FIVE
  71. SIXTY-SIX
  72. SIXTY-SEVEN
  73. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  74. CLIMATE EMERGENCY
  75. Copyright

It takes a few hours for Mum to arrive. I have to wait in one of the juvenile cells. There’s a mattress, covered in green vinyl, on the narrow bed, and a door between the toilet and the main area, which is about three metres square. Apart from that, it’s just bare, white tiles on the floor and the ceiling. And silent.

After the first hour, I ask if I can see Dana. I’m told she’s sleeping in a cell on the same corridor. I go back to sitting on the bunk, counting the tiles, figuring out how I’m going to explain all of this.

After a lot more waiting and counting tiles (I keep losing count after about two hundred and thirty, and counting the same tiles twice) I finally hear a key in the door. It swings open to reveal Mum. She’s standing next to Sargant Prangle. She’s like the sun; I can’t look directly at her. I’d go blind and melt if I even tried. I don’t know if she’s more relieved or furious.

‘You … silly bugger,’ are the first and only words she says to me as we make our way back to the interview room.

She sits quietly as I tell Sargant Prangle – and the tape recorder – what I know. I start from the beginning, with Alan’s link to the website. About going to the meeting at the Crown. About how they’re doing it all for me. Because of me. About the SIM card that I stuck inside my drawer which I’ve brought with me. It goes straight into a little plastic bag marked ‘evidence’. I tell them about how the plan is to kidnap Ahmed after school on a particular day, use him as bait to draw his mother out, then kidnap her as well, film what Carl and his machete will do to them and put it on the internet with a list of demands. For every day the demands are not met, a target will be bombed by the White Lions. I don’t know what the targets are, but I explain to the tape machine what Dana has explained to me, about the chemicals that Carl’s been stockpiling, where he’s keeping them. The words, what they signify, feel like bile in my throat. The thought of Carl’s plan has coiled itself around my every waking thought for months, but the hard fact of speaking the words aloud feels like releasing a thousand serpents into the room. Then Ahmed’s words come back to me, about decency, compassion, humanity. I explain my role, what I was supposed to be doing. It gets hard to talk towards the end. I tell them about Vince and Alan and Carl taking me to the charity shop, about what they made me do, how I injured my hand.

When I finish, Mum is crying.