8

Whoosh, Bang!

I go out, after dark, and flash the torch. What is it you’re meant to do? Dot dot dot, dash, dash dash, dot dot dot…

I worry about the battery running out and not finding any more. But hell – I’ve got to get off this stupid island. I’ve got to get back there and tell the truth for once. See if I can get someone to believe me. Someone who can actually do something about it.

I find a proper whistle at the back of a kitchen drawer, run out and blow it. Hard and long. Over and over. Three times, isn’t it? Three long blasts, then a silence.

But the wind’s getting up. The sea’s getting rougher. The rain’s come in, so I go back inside. And by morning I can’t even see the mainland any more.

I find a load of stones and spell out HELP on the beach. Above the high tide line, of course.

But the sea’s bigger. The weather’s turned. High tide, when it does come, is even higher than before. It wipes out my message. So I have to do it all over again. Only this time I write SOS, because it’s quicker.

I tear up a sheet and write SOS on that too, in really big letters. Then I tie it to a length of wood and struggle up the hill.

Blimey, the wind’s pretty strong up here! Anyway, I wedge the wood in the rocks at the top, leaving the sheet blowing like a flag. Maybe someone might see it from the mainland. Someone with binoculars. Or someone flying overhead. My own personal search party. If anyone’s still looking.

I’ve run out of baked beans. I’m on to tins of tuna. The gas for the cooker ran out in the first house, so I’m over in the other one now. The one where I found the wind-up radio. I give it a quick twirl…

‘Search parties are being scaled down in the hunt for missing schoolboy Ben Hastings. After four days, with no news, the police say that hope is fading…’

Four days! Is that all they’re going to give me? That poor kid in the south of France – aren’t they still looking for her after ten years or so?

I’d a terrible night, last night. No sleep at all. I just lay there, tossing and turning and listening to the wind and rain. But I’ve decided what to do. It’s down to me now.

They’ve given up on me already. They couldn’t care less if I live or die. (Except Mum and Dad. They always care.) But four measly days! Is that all I’m worth?

It’s not as if anybody’s going to stumble across me by chance. There’s nobody coming out to the island. No boats on the sea because it’s so rough. So they’re not going to just spot me by accident. I’m going to have to show them where I am. I’m going to have to force them to pay attention.

I spend the day bringing all the rubbish I can find to the old fishing hut by the slipway. Paper, cans, cardboard, broken chairs, old bits of bed, driftwood… Anything really. Anything that’ll burn.

I wait till dark and then I stick a lit candle in under it all and stand well back.

Whoosh! Up it goes. The flames are leaping, dancing.

Bang! A can explodes and I run for it.

Whoosh! An even bigger one. Probably the oil can. Or the engine.

Soon the whole hut’s going up. The sea lights up all around. Someone’s sure to see it. I mean, what about the coastguard? Isn’t that their job – looking out to sea for weird stuff going on?

I wait. All night I wait. And no one comes. All the next morning I wait, but still no one comes.

‘Come ON!’ I yell. ‘Don’t you even WANT to find me any more? Don’t you even CARE! Doesn’t anyone even CARE!’

Well, if that didn’t work, there’s only one thing left to do. Only one way to get the big wide world to notice me.

And it’s not a flipping message in a bottle.