He walked over to the counter and hovered there, ordering, his eyes flicking back every now and again to where I stood, unsure of myself. Waiting. Then he was back with two steaming Styrofoam cups and a bag of croissants.

“Here,” he said, his voice lowered, “take this—hot chocolate—an’ listen—I’ve had an idea.” He gave me a conspiratorial wink and leaned toward me, “As luck would have it, I’ve got my daughter’s passport in the van—you can use that. She looks like you an’ all. Just let me have it back when you get through customs on the other side. Then, when you get to your nan’s, you just get your folks to mail your own one over for the return. See—sorted—told you I’d think of something, right?”

“They’d see it wasn’t me.”

“Border control? They barely look at the things. Been over three times this week and they didn’t ask for it once, the lazy bums. You’ve just gotta have one in your hand, that’s all. Come on—we’ll grab it, then you can sort out your ticket. I can even give you a lift in the van if you like, save you wandering ’bout on ya own.” I stood, hesitating, torn. “Up to you,” he said. “I’d just like to think if my kid was in a bind, some nice bloke would do the same for them.”

He turned away, leaving.

I hesitated for a long moment, watching him walk away through the doors. My one and only option. Then I followed.

Outside the terminal doors was a space like a vast amphitheater, ringed by concrete barricades, a circling flyover, and behind that the curved wall of the scrubby White Cliffs and the heavy dome of a granite-lidded sky. We were walking diagonally across a car park at a good pace, past rows of cars and lines of massive haulage trucks, heading toward a livestock lorry that smelt of pure terror, where the wet eyes of calves peered out darkly between the gaps in its side. I felt a sudden reluctance to go any further. I thought, This place is hell. Rain started to fall.

“That’s me,” he said, indicating a blue Bedford van half hidden behind the truck, rust mottling its flank.

“Jump in. Keep yourself dry.”

He opened the passenger door with a key. I glanced at him, then back at the squat terminal building, now just a gray block in the distance.

“Get a move on,” he said. “I’m getting wet here.” I hauled myself up on to the seat and he slammed the door behind me. He got in the driver’s side.

“S’better. Just realized I haven’t even properly said hello. Jerry, Jez.” He held out his hand. He waited.

I paused.

“Never mind,” he said. “You don’t hafta say. Right, don’t let your chocolate get cold. Here—have a croissant.”

I was so hungry. I took a bite of the stale pastry and chewed. Rain drummed on the windscreen.

“Just in time.” Jez shoved a load of old food wrappers off the seat between us. “Sorry ’bout the mess. I practically live in this van. Sleep in it too sometimes—see that?” He nodded toward the dark back of the van, which, as my eyes adjusted, I could see was almost entirely taken up by a stained mattress and filthy-looking duvet. “Here, give me that.” He took my bag and threw it in the back.

“I even got curtains, see?”

He reached across the windscreen and tugged together a pair of green curtains attached top and bottom by lengths of elastic cord; then he did the same with the side windows, and the cab filled with a strange greenish light, like I was under water, looking up from the bottom of a pond. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck prickle and rise. My eyes flicked toward the handle of the door.

“Right, then. Let’s get you sorted, shall we? Find that passport.”

He leaned across me and tugged open the glove compartment. His body suddenly felt very large and very close to mine. I could smell his head, the dirty smell of unwashed hair. I pushed back in the seat.

Shit, I thought, what was I thinking? Stupid girl. Stupidstupidstupid. Do something.

The moment he sat back up, I yanked open the door handle and, terrified he might somehow pull me back in, dived out, falling hard on the wet tarmac, hitting it with my hands and knees. I scrabbled to my feet and ran, rounding the truck of calves and out into the open space, my heart jabbering in my chest. I’d almost reached the other side of the car park before I understood he wasn’t following. My breath came in ragged gasps. I put my hands on my knees and retched. Slowly, I took account. I was okay; I was in one piece. It was fine. I was fine. But also I was a complete idiot. I needed to wise up, and fast. I turned toward the terminal, feeling strange and weightless, and only then did it hit me: I didn’t have my bag. In it was my old school uniform, the book and, inside that, my photographs of Frieda and Elisabeth and Ted. The woolly hat had gone too. But there was no way I was going back, no way I was going to risk being hauled back into that foul-smelling van. Freezing rain soaked my head and trickled down the back of my neck. My hands hurt, and when I held them up I saw they were badly grazed from my fall on to the tarmac. My shoulder throbbed under my coat. In panic, I patted the inside pocket. Thank God, the purse was still there. But that was it. I had the clothes I was wearing, a few pounds plus some old French francs. And nowhere to go.

I looked up. Ahead of me were three massive container trucks, each one dressed in a familiar gold-and-purple livery, and, in giant letters that filled the entire side of each, a single repeated word: martenwood.

***

That was my choice: go on or go home. On was the entire world, unknown and utterly terrifying; home was heaven and hell.

I thought about my father. The bolt of fear that shot through me as a child whenever I heard his car pulling up on the gravel drive. Hiding in my room, flattening myself into a thin blade, pressed between my chest of drawers and the wall, or under the bed, making myself as small and silent as I could. The slap of his hand, the crack of his belt. Being made to touch my toes for an hour as a punishment for rudeness, watching the minutes of the clock tick past, every muscle in my body screaming with pain.

I thought about my mother and my sister, how much I longed for them. My squeaky-clean, dependable, wonderful big sister lecturing me on how to be good. My beloved, funny mother singing us George Michael songs in the bath. For a long time I stood there, thinking about the two of them, letting blooms of love open soft velvet petals inside my chest.

I knew exactly what the cost of going back would be, what punishments I’d face. But I had to anyway; I didn’t have a choice. I found a telephone box and dialed the number of my parents’ house, a clutch of ten-pence pieces ready in my bloodied palm. It rang. I heard the sound filling the spaces of my home; tears filled my eyes as I imagined my mother dashing toward the phone in the kitchen or their bedroom, snatching it up—Lai? My eyes drifted over the cards stuck to the board behind the phone—ads for women with oily-looking breasts and bums: busty and fun, strict discipline, mature, hot schoolgirls, sexy massage; a blonde with her eyes blacked out and the words real photo scrawled across it in pen.

Please pick up, I thought, and then Let it be Mum.

Pips. I shoved my money in the slot.

“Martenwood.”

I took a breath. “Dad?” My voice caught in my throat.

Silence rang in my ears.

“Where are you?”

I took a breath. “Dover.” Then, “I’m at the ferry port.”

“What are you doing there?”

I knew only a straight answer would do. “I was going to France.”

“And then?”

My voice was small. “I didn’t have my passport.”

Pips. I shoved another coin into the slot and waited.

“Stay where you are. I’m on my way.”

***

It had a good view of the entrance, so I did stay exactly where I was, hidden inside that old phone box, but even then I almost missed him because he was driving a Martenwood works van and not his own car. I stepped out of the box and held up my hand. He stopped next to me. I got in. We circled the car park once, then he parked up. He turned off the engine.

“Wait here.”

My father got out of the van and slammed the door behind him. I twisted in my seat, watching him walk into the terminal building. I sat, waiting. Five minutes later he was back. He sat back behind the driver’s seat but didn’t start the engine. Instead he stared straight ahead. I could see his tongue moving about under his cheek.

I said, “I’m sorry.”

His jaw moved forward and he turned to look at me.

“Is that right. So the girl who’s done everything possible to ruin me, is sorry.” Silence fell between us. I sat very still, my heart beating fast. “Let me tell you something about me, Laika. I was thirteen when I started working for my old dad. Up at the arse crack of dawn, cracked round the head when I fucked up. Full time at fifteen. Age of twenty, I said to him, you’re not going to make proper money messing about with a piddling fleet of Lutons—put me in charge—I’ll show you how it’s done. And he did, didn’t he? Old bastard wanted to see me fall flat on my arse. Didn’t, though, did I. Martenwood Removals became Martenwood Haulage and, as they say, the rest is history. I did that, Laika. I took that business from a couple of old removal vans to five hundred trucks. Me. Five hundred trucks and hundreds of staff, everyone doing exactly what I say, when I say it, not one of them putting a foot out of place, every one of them just that little bit scared. That business, Laika, earned me my right to live on the best road in the county, earned me my place on the golf course, my right to hobnob with judges, lawyers, CEOs, anyone I want, people born with money. I earned my place at that table, and don’t they know it. Earned myself the cars, the watches, the beautiful wife. Earned my right to have everyone jumping up and down. And you know who’s brought that business to its knees? You.” A small tremor moved through his cheek. “You take off and next thing I know I’ve got the pigs on my tail. The police took away every single fucking truck, interviewed every single fucking driver. Went through every lockup. Went through all the books. Went through the entire lot again. In the last three months I’ve lost hundreds of contracts. The moment you took off, Martenwood Haulage started hemorrhaging money out of its arse. You turned something of a spotlight on me there, Laika. And I’ll bet you think you were being that little bit clever, right, shining the light straight back at Daddy’s eyes?” He paused, his face hardening. “Yet here she is, here’s Laika, tried living in the real world and found it a little bit tough. Thinks she’d like to come home for a bit. See what other havoc she can wreak. Show me your hands.”

I turned my palms over, showed him the cuts, the lines of drying blood.

“Want to go to France, do you? Want to make it on your own? Never did me any harm.”