And the Dreaminator? Okay, I’ll grant you that. The Dreaminator was my fault, but I’d have probably got away with it if it hadn’t been for him.

You’ll understand when I explain – but to do that I’m going to have to go back to when I found the Dreaminators, and Seb and I first discovered Dreamland.

Just don’t start being all judgy with me when I tell you what I did, okay? Because I’ll bet you’ve done stuff that’s bad yourself. And everything is more complicated when you have an annoying younger brother.

Just clearing that up before we start.

Four Weeks Ago

Chapter 6

It’s early September and school starts tomorrow. Kez Becker and I are in the empty back lane behind the row of big terraced houses that overlook the river. It’s about seven p.m. and still fairly light. Between you and me, I don’t think I really like Kez Becker, but she’s an alternative to whiny Seb.

In order to ‘celebrate the end of the summer’, she has just dared me to commit a robbery.

I’m pretty sure she doesn’t mean ‘robbery’ or ‘celebrate’ exactly, and I am about to point that out, only now she’s got my phone, the one Dad sent me for my birthday last month, and she’s refusing to return it. She’s my friend (sort of) so I’m pretty sure I’ll get it back at some point, only she’s also the weirdest kid in the school and you can never be quite sure.

(‘Weird?’ you say. ‘How?’ Well, Kez’s dad is a funeral director, and Kez has offered ten pounds to anyone who’ll spend half an hour alone in his workshop after dark. I think there are dead bodies there. It’s another of her dares. She calls it ‘the Halloween Challenge’. That’s weird if you ask me.)

Kez is in the year above me and she has taken my phone because …

Banter.

That’s what she says, anyway. ‘Only bantz, innit, Bell! Lighten up!’

Kez was sitting at the top of the stone steps that lead up from the bay, examining the purple-dyed ends of her blonde hair, when I ran into her earlier.

‘A’reet, Bell?’ she grunted, barely looking up. She calls me by my last name. I don’t like it, but I haven’t said anything. Then she said something about a ‘nice evening’ and the sunset behind her turning the river-mouth a sort of brownish-pink. It was so unlike her that it should have made me wonder, right there and then, but my guard was down. So when she said, ‘Ha’way, I’ll take your picture! Your mam’ll love it,’ I handed her my phone …

… and ten minutes later she still has it. Like a hostage.

‘Please, Kez. Give it back. Me mam’ll kill me …’