‘Um,’ he said. ‘I brought you your homework. Mr Walden gave it to me to give to you. He said he hoped you were feeling better.’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Thanks, David. Just put it down there on the bed.’

David did so, but he didn’t go. He just stood there staring at the bedpost. I figured he needed to talk, so I decided to let him by not saying anything myself.

‘Cee Cee says hi,’ he said. ‘And that other kid. Adam McTavish.’

‘That’s nice of them,’ I said.

I waited. David did not disappoint.

‘Everybody’s talking about it, you know,’ he said.

‘Talking about what?’

‘You know. The quake. That the Mission must be over some fault no one ever knew about before, since the epicentre seemed to be . . . seemed to be right next to Mr Walden’s classroom.’

I said, ‘Huh,’ and turned the page of my magazine.

‘So,’ David said. ‘You’re never going to tell me, are you?’

I didn’t look at him. ‘Tell you what?’

‘What’s going on. Why you were down at the school in the middle of the night. How that breezeway came down. Any of it.’

‘It’s better that you don’t know,’ I said, flipping the page. ‘Trust me.’

‘But it doesn’t have to do with . . . with what Jake said. With a gang. Does it?’

‘No,’ I said.

I looked at him then. The sun, pouring through my windows, brought out the pink highlights in his skin. This boy – this red-headed boy with the sticky-outy ears – had saved my life. I owed him an explanation, at the very least.

‘I saw it, you know,’ David said.

‘Saw what?’

‘It. The ghost.’

He was staring at me, white-faced and intent. He looked way too serious for a twelve-year-old.

‘What ghost?’ I asked.

‘The one who lives here. In this room.’ He glanced around, as if expecting to see Jesse looming in one of the corners of my bright, sunny room. ‘It came to me, last night,’ he said. ‘I swear it. It woke me up. It told me about you. That’s how I knew. That’s how I knew you were in trouble.’

I stared at him with my mouth hanging open. Jesse? Jesse had told him? Jesse had woken him up?

‘It wouldn’t let me alone,’ David said, his voice trembling. ‘It kept on . . . touching me. My shoulder. It was cold and it glowed. It was just a cold, glowing thing, and inside my head there was this voice telling me I had to get down to the school and help you. I’m not lying, Suze. I swear it really happened.’

‘I know it did, David,’ I said, closing the magazine. ‘I believe you.’

He’d opened his mouth to swear it was true some more, but when I told him I believed him, his jaw clicked shut. He only opened it again to say wonderingly ‘You do?’

‘I do,’ I said. ‘I didn’t get a chance last night to say it, so I’ll say it now. Thank you, David. You and Jake saved my life.’