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hard shoulder. ‘What will we say? I’m not going home. Please don’t tell them I’ve run away!’
    With both of us panicking, the policeman approached us and said, ‘Do you know it’s illegal to ride a scooter on the motorway?’
    ‘Er, no. I’m really sorry,’ Emma fibbed. ‘I had no idea. But I won’t do it again, I promise.’
    ‘Well, I still have to impose a penalty fine. You’ve broken the law and you were posing a serious danger to yourself and other motorists.’
    She gave her details to the officer, as I sat there praying that would be the end of it and we could scoot off to her mum’s house via some country lane instead. But the look of terror on my face must have been a giveaway because the policeman then asked for my name and address. After I’d told him, with my heart thudding, he frowned at me.
    ‘So what are you doing here this late at night? Wakefield is a long way away. Do your parents know you’re here?’
    ‘Yes. Well, kind of. Anyway, they won’t mind. They know Emma,’ I stammered.
    ‘How old are you please, miss?’
    ‘Er, I’m fifteen.’
    The policeman sighed and looked at his watch. It was at least 11.30pm by now and he looked as if he really could do without the hassle so late in the evening.
    ‘I think you had better come with me to the station,’ he said. ‘We can call your parents and ask them if they’re happy about you being away from home.’
    ‘No, please. It’s really OK. They’re fine with me doing what I want. You don’t need to call them,’ I begged. ‘Please just let me go home with Emma.’
    But he was adamant and insisted we both go to the police station, which was so humiliating. My first attempt at running away and I couldn’t even make it through a couple of hours before being found out.
    ‘Mr Hayes, I’m sorry to disturb you at this hour but I have your daughter Chanelle here at Hull police station,’ he said into the phone. There was a pause. ‘Yes, she’s safe and well. But I take it you didn’t know she was here?’
    There was a pause. ‘No, I thought not.’
    As their conversation continued, I sat with my head bowed, feeling like such a baby. And though I tried not to cry, I couldn’t help it.
    Emma hugged me. ‘Don’t get upset,’ she said. ‘You can come and visit me another time.’
    ‘It’s not that. I’m just going to be in so much trouble,’ I said.
    ‘Don’t worry, it’ll be fine,’ she tried to reassure me. ‘They’ll just be glad to get you home.’
    ‘You don’t know my dad,’ I said, sniffing.
    Then I heard the officer say, ‘Yes, of course. We’ll look after her here until then. See you later.’
    It turns out that Mum and Dad hadn’t realised I’d gone until they got that call – no doubt assuming I was tucked up in bed and fast asleep.
    In desperation, I tried one more time to win over the officer. ‘Do I really have to go home? I want to stay here with Emma.’
    It was no use. ‘Yes, you do have to go home, young lady. You’ve got two very concerned parents back in Wakefield. Do you realise the risk you put yourself in by not telling them where you’d gone?’
    I said nothing and stared at the ground. And as I waited for Dad to pick me up from the freezing cold police station, I felt nauseous about his reaction. When he arrived an hour or so later, he looked pale and worn out but he didn’t even need to say anything. I could tell from his expression how angry and disappointed in me he was.
    We drove back without speaking a word. Mum was still up when we got home and she dashed to the front door and flung her arms around me when we arrived. But then she took a step backwards and the expression on her face changed drastically.
    ‘What on earth were you playing at? You can’t just go off on your own without telling us. Anything could have happened and we would never have known where you were.’
    Feeling too exhausted for a big scene, I ran straight upstairs to my room and shut the door. I climbed