Running on the Cracks (16 page)

A pigeon strides boldly up to a man with a sandwich, pecks at the crumbs on the white marble floor of the station, then takes off. It flaps slowly past the ticket barrier and away along a platform into the unroofed, unwalled world.

‘That one’s no breaking any records,’ says Kenny.

‘There you go again,’ says Marina. ‘The lassie’s going 400 miles away and all you can talk about is pigeons.’

I think about the last time I travelled 400 miles. That was three months ago. I remember looking at myself in the mirror of the station loo. I probably don’t look that different now. My
hair’s a bit longer, and instead of the jumble-sale clothes, I’m wearing the cosy cords and fleece which Marina bought for me at the Barras – her Christmas present to me. I don’t think Flo and Caitlin will be wild with envy but I’m hoping they’ll keep their mouths shut this time.

‘Are you looking forward to seeing your wee cousins?’

‘Well, sort of. It depends whether they’re reformed characters or not.’

‘They’d better not be so reformed that you don’t come back. Look, it’s come up!’ Marina points to the departures board.

At first my eyes go to the wrong section, the one headed London Euston. For a second our sitting room back home flashes before me. Inside the room, a little Christmas tree is competing with all Mum’s exotic plants. Dad is turning on the fairy lights and complaining that candles would be much prettier.

But there aren’t any trains to the past.

The right train is the 2.10 to Bristol Temple
Meads. My eyes run briefly down the orange letters on the board: Motherwell, Carlisle, Preston, Birmingham New Street, Cheltenham Spa. The same names in reverse order from three months ago.

‘Have you got your ticket?’

‘Yes,’ I tell Marina, and silently I add, ‘No more fare-dodging, Mum.’

This time I’ve got the right ticket. And there’s a return half.

I am hugely grateful to Lisa Lee for telling me the story of her family and helping me find out about the Chinese community in Glasgow, and to Dr Derek Ball for reading the manuscript and updating me about the admission and treatment of psychiatric patients. Many thanks too to Laura Irvine, the service manager at Aberlour Child Care Trust’s ROC Refuge for runaway children, for her time and advice, and to her daughter Sarah Davie for being the first teenage reader of
Running on the Cracks
. My editor, Cally Poplak, was inspiring and astute, and my agent Caroline Sheldon was her usual wonderfully reliable and encouraging self. Above all, my
thanks go to my four brilliant sounding-boards – my husband Malcolm, my sons Alastair and Jerry and my daughter-in-law Christine, all of whom patiently and enthusiastically listened, read and came up with suggestions for making the book as authentic and exciting as possible.

Julia Donaldson