“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” said Jack, helping his sister put on a dark top to match her dark trousers.

“Shh,” said Amy.

“I’m already whispering,” he said.

“No, you’re not. You don’t even know how loud your voice is since it broke. You’ll wake Mum up!”

“You’ll wake Mum up!”

“Now is not the time to do the repeating thing. But if you must, do it in a whisper!”

It was midnight. Jack had on black clothes too. He brought her chair – the old one – round to the side of her bed. As he helped her into it, he said, “Shall we leave a note for Mum?”

Amy frowned. “I thought about that. But we’ll be there by tomorrow, if everything goes according to plan. Then we can call her, first thing.”

Jack nodded, although he looked a bit doubtful. He settled her into her chair, crouched down and looked directly at her.

“OK? You sure you want to do this?”

Amy looked up. She could see his face, lit by the hallway light outside her door. His expression was, she thought, amazingly serious. It had been a long time since she had seen it look like that.

“Yes,” she said, “I’m sure.”

Amy had always known she would need Jack’s help. She needed someone to assist her in getting from her house to Sanjay’s garage. Which, even though it was only a few streets away, was not easy – she was, after all, disabled. Plus her wheelchair, the old one that hadn’t been made into a supercar, didn’t go forward in a straight line, unless someone else was pushing it.

When she’d first approached Jack with her mad, crazy, wild idea, the conversation had gone like this:

“Let me get this straight,” Jack had said. “Your plan is to drive to Scotland, to show Dad your insane vehicle, and you think he’s going to be pleased? Oh, and he’s leaving for Japan on Sunday and it’s currently Friday night.”

“Yes,” Amy had replied, nodding.

“In that … crazy wheelchair thing that Rahul made?”

“The Taylor TurboChaser. Yes.”

“Are you on drugs? Have you lost your mind?”

“Probably. I mean, not the first one. The second.”

“On the motorway?”

“No, I think I lost it somewhere round here.”

“Ha ha.” This was not a real ha ha. “Good meme.” This was not real praise. “You’re going to drive that thing – with your friends – on the motorway? For, like, six hundred kilometres?”

“No. Back roads. Late at night. When there’s hardly any other cars around.”

“Right.”

Amy suddenly felt a bit scared. “It’s only just Scotland. I’ve checked it on the map. It’s only a few miles from the border with England.”

“Oh, that makes all the difference.”

“I just think if he sees what an amazing thing the TurboChaser is – and that we were able to drive it all that way – he’ll change his mind about it,” she said. She looked up at her brother. “Won’t he?”

Jack made a face – not a particularly encouraging one.

Amy sighed. “Is it a really stupid idea?” she said.

“Amazingly,” said Jack. “Bad meme.”

There was a short pause when Amy thought,OK, well, that’s that, then.

Then Jack said, “I’ll come to your room at midnight.”