‘They didn’t fit in, so I hung out with them, my new pals. We’d sit in the garden and talk. I was still recovering, trying to get strong, but hurting too much. I was really weak, slept a lot.

‘We were like a weird little gang. I’d always felt a bit of an outsider at school, at Rowhurst. There were only a couple of Muslims in the whole place. I was expected to be friends with them just because we all happened to share the same religion. But we didn’t have much else in common and I didn’t really get on with them, to tell you the truth. I mean, there wasn’t a lot of crap about me being a Muslim; for the most part the boys had been OK. Obviously there were moments whenever there was anything in the news about terrorists or troubles in the Middle East. Then there’d be comments, jokes, people taking the piss. Same as if we were playing Germany at football, the one German kid at school had to put up with a load of digs.

‘But now I really was different. I looked like a monster. You can’t deny it. I am a monster. I frighten people. And you know, when people are all squashed up together and things are going badly, they look for other people to blame. I mean, we had grown-ups for an enemy, but there was never enough food in the house. There wasn’t enough room for everyone. So people got forced out.

‘Rav was doing his best. He was a good leader as it goes, but it was hard for him to keep everyone happy. They were always trying to find more food. And when they went out looking they were often attacked by grown-ups. Graffiti started appearing. The kids were spraying the walls. A sort of logo of a mouth, with big lips, bared teeth and a tongue sticking out. The words “Too many mouths” next to it. Too many mouths to feed. In the end they had a meeting. Rav tried to fight for me. He was cool. But he was voted down, and he wanted to stay in charge.’

‘So did they throw you out?’ asked Ella.

‘Not just me. All of us. All our little gang. Me and Andy and Susannah and weird sweary Henry. They booted us all out. Told us we were on our own.’

‘Were you cross with them?’

‘I just felt too bad to get angry,’ said Malik. ‘I thought that if it wasn’t for me they probably wouldn’t have kicked the others out. Felt it was all my fault.’

‘What did you do? What happened to the others?’