It started with an unbelievably loud buzzing that came from my phone, as if a text was landing, but much deeper, like a church organ would throb if it could get inside a phone. It attracted everyone’s attention. Slipping off to our pile of bags and coats behind the touchline, I pulled it out of my bag and now it ticked, like a clock. Ticka-tick thrum. Ticka-tick thrum. It couldn’t be. Whizzy? In my phone?

The coach waved his arms at me. ‘Turn that off and put it away, please, Alfie.’

I pretended to do as I’d been told. Everyone stared. Sam glowered.

The ball-control drills continued, but so did the mega-buzzing, and I ended up leaving the pitch three times.

‘Alfie, what on earth are you doing?’ the coach said, coming over to me. ‘Your phone should be off! Get rid of it immediately and focus!’

My cheeks burned. ‘I need a break, Mr Mason.’

‘Not now, Alfie – we’ve just got started!’

‘Please, I feel a bit strange.’

One of the other boys sniggered.

‘OK,’ Mr Mason said. ‘Take five, everyone.’ He crouched down so we were on the same level. ‘You’re Alfie Bradley, aren’t you?’

I nodded.

‘Look,’ he said, ‘you’ve got yourself a bit of a reputation as a disruptive element, so watch it, OK? This is a warning – if you’re genuinely poorly, I’ll phone your parents and send you home, but mess me about one more time, and you’re out. Is that clear? You don’t look ill to me. You look full of beans.’

‘I’ll be fine in a minute,’ I said, but my head was reeling. Was nowhere safe from Mr Lombard’s tentacles?

‘Have a drink of water, then get back to it.’

I nodded, pocketed my phone, and headed for a big patch of mown grass that was turning into hay. It was well away from everybody else. All the way there, my pocket fired out more pulsing, and when I took it out, the screen was white with grey dots all over it: a very ill-looking screen. Near the bottom, something like a hole shimmered and swirled. White whiskery tendrils leaked from it.

Seconds passed. The tendrils folded up to nothing, then reappeared and whooshed to the edge of the screen, where things carried on out of sight. Fast things. I could just see the edge of what was going on.

Then Whizzy came gushing into clear view – long and stringy and bright, like a wild, frantic pink candle flame with a seahorse’s head. Major unreality. Felt like I might burst. The feeling got stronger and stronger as Whizzy got clearer and brighter and more brilliantly wonderful than I can describe.

‘Hello,’ I said gently. ‘How have you got inside there?’