Blue sky thinking?

At the same moment as two police offers were walking back to their car - slightly dazed-looking, perhaps, but smiling - Adam was looking of the bedroom window of The Wee Hoose.

The bedroom he was starting, he realised, to think of as his room.

After just a few days of being cooped up with his gran's friends, he was already feeling more than a little stir-crazy. How long had it been now? It felt like years.

Earlier, he'd heard Margaret's noisy return to the house, but had resisted going downstairs. Curious as he was about the outside world, he wasn't going to ask her what was going on out there.

Although he wouldn't have admitted it, Adam was sulking.

Sulking because he felt like a bored schoolkid again, forced to live in a world that was entirely run for the benefit of grown-ups. From the TV in the sitting room - strictly terrestrial, not even Channel 5 - to the books and magazines dotted around the place, nothing was anything he'd chosen, or would have wanted.

And for what? Some strange idea that there was something odd going on. Yes, it had been strange to see the man outside his flat - but the more distant those events became, the more ridiculous the situation seemed.

Adam sighed. He wished his gran was here to sort all this out.

Realising how childish that was, he sighed again.



Part Two begins here.