“But it doesn’t mean that you can’t see your sister,” Skye says.

“Her dad said—” I start to say.

“And what?” Skye cuts me off. “Who cares what he says?”

Someone at the barbecue calls out that the chicken’s ready at last. Someone else shouts that they hope they don’t get food poisoning. There’s more laughing.

“Last time, Nana bit into a wing and it started bleeding,” Skye says. “Look, I got to go or there won’t be nothing left for me, but, man, do you have to do what Kandi’s dad says? He shouldn’t have split you and Kandi up. Go and see her, Chaz. You hear me?”

“Yeah,” I say.

“Gonna meet up soon?” Skye asks.

“Yeah.”

And then there’s no Skye and no barbecue. It’s just me sitting here by myself next to the window. It’s as easy for Skye to tell me to go and see Kandi as it is for her to invite me to her sister’s barbecue. She doesn’t know about all the rules I’ve got to follow.

But, man, do I have to follow them?

I sit upright. I think of that little dog just now that barked and ran away when its owner wouldn’t behave properly. The dog decided that it had been patient long enough and was gonna do things its own way. Why can’t I?

I tried to follow the rules. I even listened to Annie and wrote those letters, but that didn’t get me nowhere. My stomach bubbles. In the school before last, a teacher told us it’s adrenalin. It squirts out from glands above our kidneys when we’re in danger. We can fight or we can run away. We can run away …

Who knows where they’re gonna take me tomorrow? At least I’m still in the same city as Kandi. I can get to her even if I don’t have nothing to take her now. All the hate I’ve got for Blake makes me feel like I’m plugged into the sun. There’s this power zapping inside me and I know it for sure. I have to go to Kandi.

I slide off the bed and open the bedroom door. I peer along the landing. The bathroom door is still shut and I can see light underneath it. The foster carer’s got her music playing in there too. If I’m gonna run for it … Am I gonna run for it? Yeah. I am. I have to do it now.