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He caught up with me on the marshes, just as the river widened and the last farm house disappeared from view.

"What are you doing?"

"I left home." I kept walking. Actually, I should have done it years ago, but even a Masters degree is no guarantee that you'll find a decent job any more, and there's no way I could afford to pay rent on what the supermarket paid me. So yesterday I quit my job, had a screaming fight with my parents about that, and now here I am.

He grabbed my arm, and I reluctantly slowed. "Why?"

I shook myself free and kept going. He trotted along beside me. "Do you even want to talk about it?"

"There's nothing to say."

"But what are you going to do?"

"Walk until I get somewhere, and then take it from there."

"Where? There's nothing round here for miles."

"Then I'll walk for miles." I pulled ahead and, for a moment, he watched my retreating back. Then a sigh and he was alongside me again.

"Can I walk with you, then?"

"It's a free country."

We walked in silence. I'd long ago calmed the fury that saw me slam a few clothes into a bag, stuff my savings into my pocket, and pick up a few odds and ends. Now all I cared about was putting as much distance between myself and them as I possibly could, and I knew their first thought would be to follow me towards the city. So I went in the opposite direction entirely. Onto the marshes. Mark laughed. "I haven't had this much exercise in ages."

"Nobody asked you to follow me."

He was silent again, and I wondered whether I ought to feel at least a little regret at having snapped so hard. Of everyone I knew back there, he was the closest I had to a real friend, and probably the closest I cared to have. I'd always been a quiet child, although my parents preferred to call me sullen, and barely spoke even at school. Mark was the only boy who could get more than a few words out of me, probably because he was the only one who never stopped trying. The fact he lived just three doors down merely gave him more opportunity.

"I heard you fighting with them in the garden." Again, he broke the silence. "Quite a row."

I said nothing, but he was right. It had been. Then I ran upstairs, packed and stormed out. He'd probably heard the door slam behind me as well.

"Have you eaten?"

"Not hungry." Damn, I'd forgotten to bring any food. Never mind, there would be a pub or a little shop somewhere. There always is.

Again silence, and this time it stretched out for a mile or more. A light rain came on and I pulled up my hood, then flickered a glance towards him. T-shirt, jeans, sneakers. "I dont suppose you thought to bring an umbrella?"

"No. I bet you didn't, either."

"I'm not the one who's going to need it," I said, nodding towards some ominous dark clouds as they gathered ahead of us.

"I'll be okay," he said, and I cursed him for following me. If the weather got worse, we'd have to stop and take shelter, if only to stop him getting soaked through. And stopping meant losing time. But the

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