“Jamie! I’ve told you a million times not to slam that damn door! I’m trying to work.”

Chris sounds like he’s had a bad day at the office. Which is bad for me too, since his office is our living room.

“Sorry!” I yell back at the top of my voice. I peel off my rain-soaked jacket and dump it on the floor along with my schoolbag and damp jumper. Leaving a trail of mud over the hall carpet, I race into the kitchen, forgetting in my frenzy to raid the fridge that I’m supposed to take my shoes off at the front door.

Mmm. Whipped cream in a can. Mum’s been to the shops this morning.

I grab a couple of slices of bread and slather peanut butter and jam across them, shaking the whipped cream can and grinning at how much fun it is to scoosh it into big spirals on my sandwiches. Some of it goes over the counter, and some of it lands on the floor, but most of it goes on my bread, so that’s OK. I stick another piece of bread over the top, double up my sandwiches and take a great big bite.

Mmm. Mad Jamie Specials. My favourite kind of snack.

“For God’s sake! Do you have to eat like an animal?” Chris comes into the kitchen to refill his orange juice, and frowns when he sees the mess I’ve made. “Sit at the table – you’re getting jelly all down your front.” His American accent gets even stronger when he’s on the verge of losing his temper. Right now he sounds like that singer Elvis Presley, so I know he’s really angry with me.

“Sorry,” I mumble through a mouthful of whipped cream, “I’ll clean it up after.” I won’t though. We both know that in thirty seconds flat I won’t even remember the mess exists.

Chris rolls his eyes and goes back to the living room to shout at his computer instead of me, and I bang the cupboards open and shut trying to find where Mum’s hidden the cola this time. She doesn’t like me having fizzy drinks, she says they make me even more hyper.

Aha! Behind the microwave. Bingo.

I slosh cola into a glass and wipe up the spillage with my sleeve, then I head upstairs while I’m waiting for Chris to finish work and stop hogging all the fun gadgets in the living room. Mum won’t let me have a TV or a computer in my bedroom as I get way too obsessed watching shows or playing games, and then I get cranky and shouty when I have to stop and come out for dinner or go to school. It’s not my fault watching horror films or playing Zombie Attack 3 on the computer is way more exciting than real life.

I trip over a pile of laundry on my bedroom floor, and that reminds me that I’m supposed to take my school uniform off when I come home. I pull my shirt over my head so I don’t have to waste time on the buttons, and drop it on the floor while I fish around under my bed for a top that doesn’t have jam and cola stains on it.

Hey! What’s that?

I forget all about getting dressed and grab the parcel that’s sitting on my unmade bed. Chris must’ve left it there when the post came this morning. I don’t need to read the Scottish return address. I already know it’s from Dad.

I rip it open eagerly, wondering what he’s sent me this time. I get a gift from him every week. ‘Red Cross parcels’ he calls them. He’s never missed a single week since he moved out two years ago. He calls me every Sunday and Wednesday too, but the parcels are more exciting cos I never know which day of the week they’re going to arrive. ‘Bribery’, Mum calls it, but she doesn’t understand. He doesn’t send me toys to buy my forgiveness for leaving us and moving in with his new family all the way up in Scotland. It’s thoughtful stuff that no one else would think to buy me.

The brown parcel paper comes flying off, landing on the floor on top of my gym shoes. Dad sent me those a couple of months ago when I told him my old ones were giving me blisters in PE and Mum was too busy to get me new ones. Next to them is a big pile of pens, pencils, rulers, and a stack of Transformers notebooks and stickers. Dad got me all of them too. He knows I always lose stuff at school.

I hope it’s the new smartphone with the fancy camera. Please say it’s the new smartphone!

Dad said he’d get me one for going to the States so we could do video calls and I could send him pictures of my cool new school and fancy house and American Dream Life. I don’t even know what that means, I just heard it on TV once, but I know it sounds better than the life I’m living now.

I’m so excited, I fight to get the bubble wrap off without checking if Dad sent the parcel by recorded delivery. There’s no way he’d be dumb enough to send an expensive phone by ordinary post. He’s clever, my dad, not like me.

There’s only one vaguely neat place in my whole room, and that’s the top of my chest of drawers where I’ve been piling all of Dad’s ‘Get Ready for Sunny California’ gifts. I’ve got swimming trunks there, and surfer shirts. He sent me a specially made Transformers passport cover, and there’s a journal where I can write down all the exciting things I do and see when I get to the USA. On top of that is a pair of supercool sunglasses and, so I don’t forget home, a Southampton F.C. baseball cap, which is kind of a funny thing to call it since they’re a football team. Just in case it gets cold in the winter, he’s got me a beanie hat with ‘Oakland Raiders’ on it. That’s the American football team from the new place I’m going to. Dad must’ve got that online specially too.

All I need now is the new smartphone, and I’m good to go.

I finally get the bubble wrap off, and stare at the box in disappointment.

It’s not a smartphone. It’s a chemistry set.

Usually a science kit would be a really good thing, and I’d be dead excited. Experiments are my favourite thing. Not the boring ones you do in school, I mean the kind where you mix things up and make them fizz and change colour and go boom, or grow insects in your bedroom and release them into the garden, or—

Uh-oh. The lid’s come off my tank of ants again. I promised Mum I’d let them go outside as soon as I’d finished my experiment. Maybe if I look under my bed I’ll be able to find them before she—

No! Focus. Figure out the mystery of the missing smartphone first.

Dad’s always sending me new experiments to do so I can tell him what I’ve discovered when he calls. But why’s he sending me a science kit when I’m going to California? It’ll take up way too much room in my suitcase. I pick up the note and read it slowly.

OK, so that makes no sense. What does he mean, ‘Have you talked to your mum yet?’ Talked to her about what? Discuss ‘what happens next’? Huh? That doesn’t sound good. I know what happens next: I go to California and start a brand-new American Dream Life where I’m not a total headcase any more.

Just then I hear Mum walking down the hall and sighing over the muddy prints I’ve left on the carpet. Before I can hide my shoes so I can pretend it wasn’t me, she knocks on my door.

“Jamie? We need to talk.”

Ah. Looks like I’m about to find out exactly what happens next.