I think this streamer’s young. But seeing as they have to put their feet up on the wall to fit inside the make-believe children’s castle, they’re not a kid any more.

And then I see it. Their feet are in the way, but behind them I see a drawing – by the same artist as the kraken, I’m sure of it. It’s the same style: hundreds of tiny lines, each one a different colour, twisting round each other to make scales, which make a tail, which makes a rather haunted-looking mermaid. Her tail wraps round the window to the slide as her arms clutch the frame of the window to the pole as if she, too, can’t decide which one to launch herself out of first.

Her hair is nothing like the mermaid from the Disney film – it’s every shade of blue the sea has, with strands wrapped in green weeds and purple shells. She’s naked on top, but she wears an expression like she thinks there are more pressing things going on in the world than who sees her boobs.

I follow her sunset eyes burning down out of the window she’s holding. From here, you can see for miles and miles – across a field where some boys are playing football, using their T-shirts as goalposts – across a road with a bakery and a shop selling sherbets – across rows of houses and buildings and lamp posts – all the way to a vast expanse of blue.

‘The sea!’ I gasp.

I’m already imagining myself diving right into it, so when the new streamer opens their mouth it almost sounds like it’s coming from somewhere up on the surface.

‘Huh –

I don’t even notice the sea from here usually.

Weird.’

I stop.

And then I swallow a breath all at once and it scrambles like ice water in my lungs and I’m panicking, because they –

They heard me. And they just spoke. To me.

You have disconnected from this stream.

11

Alice

I slam the laptop closed and throw it on the floor, which makes a colossal thump. Just like my heart is doing. Again and again.

I sink down my pillow and kick up my duvet, where the air is too warm to come into my lungs that fast and I can breathe. Breathe.

And think.

The new streamer. They heard me speak. They must have done, because they answered me, even though it was a silly answer. Who lives by the sea and doesn’t see it?