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all . . . feels. It feels wrong. Always listen to your inner voice , was Mum’s thing. Never ignore a feeling . It didn’t work out so well for her, of course. But she was right, in a way. It’s how I knew I should barricade myself in
     my bedroom at night when I fostered with the Andersons, even before another kid told me about Mr. Anderson and his preferences.
     And way before that, before foster care even, it’s how I knew I shouldn’t go into that locked room—even though I did.
    I don’t want to call the police, though. They might want to know things about you ,a little voice says. They might have questions you don’t want to answer. The police and I have never got on all that well. Let’s just say I’ve had my share of run-ins. And even though he had it coming,
     what I did to that arsehole is, I suppose, technically still a crime. Right now I don’t want to put myself on their radar
     unless I absolutely have to.
    Besides, I don’t really have enough to tell them, do I? A cat that might just have killed a mouse? A necklace that might just
     have been innocently broken? A brother who might have just fucked off, yet again, to leave me to fend for myself?
    No, it’s not enough.
    I put my head in my hands, try to think what to do next. At the same moment my stomach gives a long, loud groan. I realize I can’t actually remember the last time I ate anything. Last night I’d sort of imagined I’d get here and Ben would fix me up some scrambled eggs or something, maybe we’d order a takeaway. Part of me feels too queasy and keyed up to eat. But perhaps I’ll be able to think more clearly with some food in my belly.
    I raid the fridge and cupboards but besides half a pack of butter and a stick of salami they’re bare. One cupboard is different
     from all the rest: it’s some sort of cavity with what looks like a pulley system, but I can’t work out what it’s for at all.
     In desperation I cut off some of the salami with a very sharp Japanese knife that I find in Ben’s utensil pot, but it’s hardly
     a hearty breakfast.
    I pocket the set of keys I found in Ben’s jacket. I know the code now, I’ve got the keys: I can get back into this place.
    The courtyard looks less spooky in the light of day. I pass the ruins of the statue of the naked woman, the head separated
     from the rest, face up, eyes staring at the sky. One of the flowerbeds looks like it has recently been re-dug, which explains
     that smell of freshly turned earth. There’s a little fountain running, too. I look over at the tiny cabin in the corner and
     see a dark gap between the closed slats of the shutters; perfect for spying on anything that’s going on out here. I can imagine
     her watching me through it: the old woman I saw last night, the one who seems to live there.
    I take in the strangeness of my surroundings as I close the apartment’s gates, the foreignness of it all. The crazily beautiful buildings around me, the cars with their unfamiliar numberplates. The streets also look different in daylight—and much busier when I get away from the hush of the apartment building’s cul-de-sac. They smell different, too: moped fumes and cigarettesmoke and roasted coffee. It must have rained in the night as the cobbles are gleaming wet, slippery underfoot. Everyone seems to know exactly where they’re going: I step into the street out of the way of one woman walking straight at me while talking on her phone and nearly collide with a couple of kids sharing an electric scooter. I’ve never felt so clueless, so like a fish out of water.
    I wander past shop fronts with their grilles pulled down, wrought-iron gates leading onto courtyards and gardens full of dead
     leaves, pharmacies with blinking neon green crosses—there seems to be one on every street, do the French get sick more?—doubling
     back on myself and getting