‘I’ve got summat to show you’, whispered Kristal into Sophie’s hair, unable to wait any longer.

‘Something to share with the class O’Brien?’ Mr Jones was the only teacher at Knowle who called kids by their surnames. Kristal hated it.

‘No, Sir.’ Sophie looked around at Kristal and winked – a rare gift, which she returned once Jones’ stare was re-fixed on his long-division demonstration.

At afternoon play Sophie hung behind in the corridor, arm-in-arm with sickly sweet Yvette, but without her usual throng of admirers. ‘What is it K?’ she asked, ‘Done us another friendship band?’ Kristal’s eyes glowed as she reached down to pull out the money from her socks. Holding it tight she tried to look casual.

‘Know what film’s on in town tomorral?’ she asked.

‘You mean skip school? I …’, began Sophie, with a sideways glance at Yvette.

‘Yes you can’, said Kristal, ‘you done it before. Yvette can come too.’ Yvette looked away.

‘Okay. Meet you eleven tomorrow outside the Odeon.’ Sophie winked again before gliding out of the door.

The next day Kristal left the van at the usual time, grabbing her bag with her school library book The Runaways inside.^* The money was neatly folded in her jeans pocket. She planted a kiss goodbye on Mary’s sleeping face and the semi-conscious reply arrived just as she was closing the door behind her.

She looked at the site with new eyes that morning. It was so small, and so uninteresting. Balanced on top of Keynsham Hill and squished between the trees, it joined the city only by rugged pathways and streams. Its little gate and the fences were always broken and the toilets stunk. Why of all places had her mum and Sean chosen to flee here? In a world full of bright lights, comfort and style, why had they picked somewhere so basic, so unexciting? It wasn't for her.

Zeelah was already back from her morning walk, organising the wild flowers she’d collected in the woods into saleable bunches. She waved at Kristal without smiling. Manouevering around Jinx’s collection of junk between his van and their own, Kristal climbed over the rusty back gate, and walked briskly up towards the Bath Road as usual.

She decided to wander over to Cabot Tower. It was the last place they’d gone with Sean before he left, more than half her life ago. She remembered the day well because he’d pulled a small duck from his army bag! It had come from the circus he worked with. Grinning, Sean whistled and the duck clapped its wings. He and Kristal had laughed and laughed, Kristal trying in vain to whistle and begging her dad to show her again and again. But Mary said it was wrong to keep the duck and Sean should return it straight away. He did, and himself along with it. Kristal remembered being so sad; it was such a cool duck.

The walk to Cabot was a long one, and Kristal felt surprisingly unnerved to have stepped out of her normal routine. She thought about the book she was reading, and how it must feel to be on the run. Just to leave… Although she knew it was half-crazy, she looked behind every minute or so to check no one was following her. Walking down Pylle Hill and towards Temple Meads she felt sure every person in every car knew exactly what she was doing. If she looked anyone in the eye they might call the police, and there’d be hell to play on the site if she was dragged home by the pigs! But she kept her head down, through Broadmead and across the centre towards the Hippodrome. She wasn’t being watched at all, just another nobody going about their business. No one cared, and that was a good thing, because it seemed that at school and at home on the site everyone cared too much; they were all too interested. To be anonymous made her feel free from what other people wanted of her - to be able to make her own choices.

She reached Park Street. Shop windows with shoes and clothes in matching colours beckoned her inside with their soft lighting, but she knew better than to accept the invitation. Already at this early hour, the place was packed. Smartly dressed men with rolled-up newspapers and vacant expressions marched hurriedly in both directions; painted women tried to overtake, skilfully balancing on high heels, while calmer, more elderly women were nearly run aside in their wake. It was money that walked about, parading itself unashamedly. Kristal felt her own stake burning in her pocket – she could join in; it was that easy.

At Cabot, she climbed the banks and rolled down the hill. With no one to tell her otherwise she did it again, and again and again. Until she felt so dizzy she just lay there for ages, watching the trees and people whiz around. She gazed down at Bristol; it looked amazing from up here. So many different colours and everything so neatly arranged! The pointy spires of churches and the cathedral stood tall with pride; even the smog from the factories looked fairytale-like. There was a red and yellow hot air balloon floating over the city, and as she followed its path Kristal realised she could see the site – so clean and green from here, with the little white vans like specs of snow. She could see the rows upon rows of flats and houses where everyone else lived, stretching out into the autumn mist beyond Temple Meads and the City ground in the other direction. Bath Road reached up through Brislington, and past Eagle’s Hill, pointing like a grey arrow towards the ‘splendour’ of Bath. Her eyes lingered on this road a while, trying to imagine her mum as a girl there, growing up in the same house where her grandparents were born. All those houses now bulldozed away into memory, and yet there’d never been a flyover built as planned. She wondered where all the scattered people had got to now. Like them, she could live in one of the city’s million houses, once she grew up and left Mary behind. She could blend in. It really wouldn’t be so hard.