As Friday, Melanie and Ian made their way down the Rue de Bercy they could see the station long before they got there. The Gare de Lyon was essentially a very functional building. All day and all night, trains flooded in and out from the south of France, Italy and Switzerland. But this was Paris, and Parisians love to add beauty to the functional. The station had the most spectacular clock tower. A cathedral at the height of medieval religious opulence would have been proud to sport this magnificent monument to French craftsmanship. And yet here it was on a train station. The face of the clock had been beautifully decorated in blue paint and gold leaf, and in the open space of the courtyard – as the sun caught the tower – the face of the clock seemed to shine out like a beacon across the busy Paris streets.

  Friday and Melanie were panting as they approached the station forecourt. They had been walking quickly and neither of them was terribly fit.

  ‘Not far now,’ urged Ian as he picked up his pace.

  ‘Wait,’ gasped Friday.

  Ian glanced at his watch. ‘We need to get on a train. I’ll feel better once we’re out of Paris.’

  ‘No! Quick! Into the café,’ said Friday. She darted into the nearest doorway.

  ‘This is no time for a coffee break,’ said Ian, but he followed her in.

  ‘Maybe not,’ said Melanie. ‘But a hot chocolate and a lovely croissant would be just the thing.’

  Friday had grabbed up a magazine and was sitting on a stool by the café’s front window. She held the magazine so it blocked most of her face from anyone walking past. The station was on the other side of a large courtyard. An awning ran around the outside of the building. In the shadow of the awning, they could see a crowd of people. Now that he looked closely – Ian could see that they were men. Men in uniform.

  ‘Police?’ asked Ian.

  ‘The army,’ said Friday.

  ‘They called the army out on you?’ asked Melanie.

  ‘The army in France isn’t the same as at home,’ said Friday. ‘There is a long tradition of citizens doing national service. The army is part of the fabric of the community.’

  ‘They have very large guns,’ said Ian.

  ‘There have been a lot of terrorist attacks in Paris,’ said Friday.

  ‘Do you think they’re here for you?’ said Ian.

  ‘No,’ said Friday. ‘There’s always a large police and military presence at national monuments and public transport hubs in Paris. This train station is both. But I am a suspected terrorist and the police are trying to arrest me. I am a hundred per cent certain that all those soldiers, and all the police and guards inside the station, will have been shown a photograph of me at their briefing this morning before they started duty.’

  ‘So we have to get to Switzerland another way,’ said Ian.

  ‘There is no other way,’ said Friday. ‘It’s four hundred and sixty-five kilometres from here. We’re too young to drive and that’s too far to walk. A train will get us there in five hours.’

  ‘But how are we going to get past all those men in uniform?’ asked Ian.

  ‘Makeover!’ exclaimed Melanie.

  ‘What?’ said Friday.

  ‘A whole new look,’ said Melanie excitedly. ‘Finally! I’ve been waiting to do this for years.’ Melanie grabbed the hat off Friday’s head and threw it in the nearest bin.

  ‘Hey!’ said Friday.

  ‘You have to get rid of it,’ said Melanie with delight. ‘You need to be in disguise.’

  ‘Taking off a hat is not a disguise,’ said Friday.

  ‘No, it’s step one,’ said Melanie. ‘I’m going to make you totally unrecognisable.’

  ‘Please don’t,’ said Friday.

  Melanie realised Friday was not embracing the frivolity of the situation. ‘I know your physical appearance makes you feel vulnerable,’ she said kindly. ‘You don’t like it when people look at you and notice you. But would you rather be your comfortable normal mousey self inside a Paris prison cell or uncomfortable and looking totally fabulous on a train to Switzerland?’

  Friday looked into her friend’s eyes. What Melanie was suggesting terrified her.

  ‘You hated jail,’ Melanie reminded her.

  ‘Everyone hates jail,’ muttered Friday.

  ‘I can’t believe you’re actually weighing up those two options,’ said Ian. ‘Melanie says you have panic attacks.’

  ‘I have panic at the thought of letting Melanie give me a makeover,’ said Friday. ‘It’s a devil or the deep-blue-sea situation.’

  ‘Then we’ll let your mother decide,’ said Melanie.

  ‘She’s in jail,’ said Friday.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Melanie. ‘And there’s no way you can get her out if you’re in jail in a different country, so you have to let me give you a makeover. Come on, we passed a hair salon two doors back.’

  It felt counter-intuitive to Friday to be sitting in a hair salon for an hour waiting for peroxide to bleach the colour out of her hair, when there were dozens of armed men 500 metres away on the lookout for her. She wanted to be moving. But Melanie insisted that Friday had to sit there and wait, because she needed to get Friday some new clothes. Melanie had unleashed a blizzard of instructions to the hairdresser in French before she left. Friday was sitting in a catatonic state, letting the hairdresser and her assistants carry out their procedures.

  Ian hadn’t gotten off unscathed. He was sitting in the chair opposite, flirting with the hairdressers while he sipped the coffee they had made him. He was getting a makeover too. His beautiful blond hair had been dyed brown. It was now a nondescript mousey colour, neither dark nor light. Much the same colour Friday’s had been. And they had cut his hair in an unflattering style – short at the front and long at the back. It was something of a cross between a mohawk and a mullet. And yet, Ian was still gorgeous.

  As Friday looked at him, she realised – he could have a terrible facial scar, contract monkey pox and have weeping sores all over his face, but he would still be handsome and attractive. Ian had been so good looking for so long it had become a part of the fabric of who he was. He had the confidence of extreme beauty. Even without the beauty, he would still have the confidence, and the confidence itself was magnetically attractive. He was like a celestial object drawing people into his orbit with the gravitational pull of his charisma. It made her sad. It was like her relationship with him was a dream, and one day he would wake up from it.

  Friday wanted to block everything out. She closed her eyes and started counting her breaths. In for five, hold for five, out for five, hold out for five – trying to calm her surging adrenalin. She was just managing to soothe herself when she felt a surge of cold fresh air. Someone had opened the door.

  ‘Aaaghhh!’ screamed Melanie. Friday flinched in fear. ‘You look amazing!’ cried Melanie.

  Friday realised Melanie was screaming at her, and it was happy screaming, a rare emotion for Melanie who was not a high-energy person. Melanie wrapped Friday in a big hug.

  ‘Do you love it?’ she demanded.

  ‘Love what?’ asked Friday.

  ‘Your hair!’ said Melanie.

  The hairdressers had turned Friday away from the mirror because watching them work had made her hyperventilate. They realised Friday was distracted when she could see Ian. At first he tried chatting with her, but she was too distressed to concentrate on what he was saying. Then he started flirting with the hairdressers. Weirdly, that was calming. It was a normal sight. Things as they should be.

  ‘You haven’t seen it yet?’ asked Melanie.

  ‘Be careful about showing her,’ said Ian. ‘She started shaking when they got out the nail polish. She isn’t going to like seeing the hair.’

  ‘I’m wearing nail polish?’ asked Friday, looking at her hands. ‘When did that happen?’

  ‘I started flirting with Sophie to distract you,’ said Ian. ‘You were so busy thinking up ways to kill her and me. You didn’t notice. And they did four coats.’

  Friday looked at her fingers. They were glittering and shining back at her, like little disco balls on the tips of each finger and they were green.

  ‘Green?’ said Friday.

  ‘It’s your signature colour,’ said Melanie. ‘I thought it would make you happy. To remind you of your hat.’

  Friday remembered that her hat was in a bin in a café, probably covered with the dregs of coffee cups and melted ice-creams by now. Her breathing started to accelerate again.

  ‘Friday, I’m going to show you your hair,’ said Melanie. ‘Now remember, you’re doing this to save your mother.’

  Melanie slowly turned the chair around so that Friday was facing the mirror. At least that’s what Friday expected would happen, but what she saw wasn’t her. She was facing another girl. A scary-looking, scrawny girl with platinum-blonde hair and a nose ring. Then Friday realised her nose hurt. She touched her nose. The girl opposite touched her nose too. Friday’s brain crunched into reality.

  ‘Noooooooo!’ she cried.

  ‘It’s okay. It’s okay,’ reassured Melanie.

  ‘When did I get a nose ring?!’ she wailed.

  ‘That was when I threw a handful of loose change on the floor and bent over to pick it up,’ said Ian. ‘You were too busy watching to notice.’

  ‘It really suits you,’ said Melanie.

  ‘Really suits me?!’ cried Friday.

  ‘Strangely, yes,’ said Melanie.

  ‘I look like a complete stranger,’ wailed Friday.

  ‘That’s the idea,’ Melanie reminded her. ‘They’re looking for a dowdy bookish nerd in a brown cardigan and green pork-pie hat. You’re going to walk through that station looking like brash obnoxious Eurotrash.’

  ‘Not the cardigan,’ said Friday, clutching her arms protectively about her beloved favourite garment. ‘You’re not going to take the cardigan.’

  ‘You have to give it up,’ said Melanie. ‘You know it’s true.’

  Friday shook her head.

  ‘You need to do this, for your mother,’ said Melanie.

  ‘I don’t even like my mother that much,’ said Friday. ‘She’s neglected me since the day I was born. She let my name be wrong on my birth certificate. She’s missed every milestone in my life ever since. I doubt she knows my age, or the name of my school. Or the fact that I haven’t been at school for months now.’

  ‘But you’re a good person,’ said Melanie. ‘And you know she has been wrongfully arrested, so you are going to help her because it is the right thing to do. Because it doesn’t matter who your mother is – you are a good person.’

  Friday realised Melanie was right. Her own eyes were starting to water. She hated it when she felt emotion. It was so confusing. So irrational. Melanie leaned in and gave her a hug. ‘It’s going to be okay,’ said Melanie. ‘Trust me.’

  ‘I don’t trust you,’ said Friday, trying not to blubber. ‘But I like you, so I’ll do what you want.’

  Ten minutes later they were striding across the square towards the train station. Ian lagged behind. Melanie had somehow found dirty work clothes for him. He was wearing cement-stained cargo pants, scuffed steel-capped boots and a navy puffer coat with high-vis orange panels – all of which were filthy. Friday suspected that there was now, somewhere in Paris, a labourer on a building site dressed in high-fashion designer clothing.

  Melanie was dressed much the same as usual, except she was wearing large sunglasses and a red beret. Which at home would have been comical, but in Paris it only made her look more genuinely French.

  In contrast, Friday’s outfit was a work of art. She looked like she had been dragged out of bed after a late night performing as the lead singer in a neo-punk band. She was wearing a long, tailored coat with a cape on the shoulders and a split back that billowed behind her as she walked. It was the type of thing the hero in a regency romance novel would wear when kidnapping a lady from a stagecoach. Under the coat she was wearing a metallic mini dress, black velvet leggings and military boots. Friday did not know a lot about fashion, but she was dimly aware, as Melanie bullied her into putting on these strange clothes, that the labels said Alexander McQueen and that he was a famous designer. She felt terrible in the dress and leggings, like she was wearing a Halloween costume. But she did like the coat. It had a lot of pockets. She jammed her hands down into the side pockets and glared at the floor, trying not to make eye contact with anyone.

  ‘Everyone is going to stare at me,’ Friday muttered to Melanie.

  ‘No, this is Paris,’ said Melanie. ‘Parisians are too cool to stare at someone just because they look spectacular.’

  ‘I feel so self-conscious,’ said Friday.

  ‘Just act like you’re really angry,’ said Melanie. ‘Play the part.’

  ‘What’s my motivation?’ asked Friday. ‘Why am I angry?’

  ‘Because it’s exhausting being that glamorous,’ said Melanie.

  Friday tried to figure out what this meant, so she mainly looked confused as she walked past the soldiers smoking cigarettes. No-one stopped them. Although one of the men wolf-whistled.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Melanie with a beaming smile. ‘I know it’s not for me. But it’s so nice of you to notice.’

  ‘You’re not meant to encourage men to whistle at women in the street,’ said Friday. ‘It’s harassment.’

  ‘Oh gosh, you’re right, I’m sorry,’ said Melanie. ‘I’m so used to the silliness of my own brothers, sometimes I forget to be a feminist.’ She turned back and called out to the soldiers, ‘You’re very naughty. You shouldn’t make young women uncomfortable in the street. No matter how well observed your appreciation of fashion is.’

  Friday grabbed Melanie by the arm. ‘Please keep walking,’ she pleaded.

  There were even more police in the station, but still no-one stopped them. There was so much bustling activity. There were crowds of travellers hurrying to and from trains, heading to destinations all around Europe. Friday and Melanie got to their train without any trouble. Before she climbed aboard, Friday turned back to try and get a glimpse of Ian. She thought she saw a flash of high-vis five cars down.

  ‘Ian isn’t in our carriage?’ asked Friday.

  ‘No, he’s in economy,’ said Melanie. ‘It’s part of his disguise.’

  Friday looked about and realised she was sitting in a very fancy carriage.

  ‘You booked us first-class seats?’ said Friday.

  ‘I always travel first class,’ said Melanie. ‘It’s important to support local public transport services.’

  ‘We’re supposed to be trying to blend in,’ said Friday.

  ‘I blend in better in first class,’ said Melanie. ‘I wouldn’t know how to blend in economy.’

  When the train finally pulled out of the station, Friday felt a wave of relief. She’d made it out of Paris. The police would still be searching the streets around the Louvre for her. Hopefully she could get across the border into Switzerland before they widened the search. Melanie was sitting opposite her, talking to the waiter in perfect French, ordering lunch for them both. It would be nice to eat a meal that hadn’t come out of a vending machine.

  After lunch, Melanie predictably went to sleep. Friday sat back and looked out the window. It was rare for her to catch a form of transport without having a book to read, but Melanie hadn’t let her go to the bookstore at the station. Even when Friday was in prison and she’d had so many long hours to fill, she’d always had a stack of books to read. They weren’t necessarily the books she would have chosen, but they were something. Each one a world she could escape into when the real world was inescapable.

  Now she had to spend five hours with her own thoughts. There were a lot of thoughts spiralling in her head. How were they going to get across the Swiss border? What exactly had her mother been arrested for? Were there any pretty girls in the carriage with Ian? But one persistent thought kept swimming to the surface of this babbling brook and drowning out all the others. It was her inner monologue yelling hysterically, ‘YOU ARE GOING TO DIE!’ Which was irrational because sitting on a train was not a life-threatening scenario. It also yelled, ‘THEY ARE GOING TO LOCK YOU UP FOREVER!’ Admittedly, this was a lot more likely.

  Friday tried reasoning with her inner voice. Yes, she might get locked up, but she had been locked up before and she’d made it through. Then her inner voice would shout down these rational thoughts by yelling, ‘SHUT UP! YOU ARE GOING TO DIE!’ And so, the vicious circle continued. It was deeply unpleasant.

  Friday glanced about the carriage looking for something she could do to distract herself. She was surrounded mainly by business people. At least, Friday assumed they were business people, because they were wearing suits and a lot of them were typing on laptops. Maybe they were just people who enjoyed dressing smartly, and they were all playing computer games or watching movies. There was also an elderly couple sitting across the aisle.

  The elderly couple were very smartly dressed in an old-fashioned, conservative sort of way. They seemed to be arguing about something. Their postures were stiff, and they had angled away from each other, not making eye contact – all classic body language for people pretending not to be having a fight because they didn’t want to create a scene in public. Friday wondered if it was a problem she could solve.

  Obviously, she shouldn’t try to help. Whatever the problem was, it wasn’t any of her business. Also, she was on the run from the police. She shouldn’t be striking up conversations with strangers. But her inner voice was still yelling, ‘YOU’RE GOING TO DIE,’ so she decided it was better to risk imprisonment than sit there listening to that for five hours.

  Friday was sitting in the window seat, so she scooted across to the aisle seat and leaned across. ‘Excuse me,’ she said. ‘I noticed you both seem a little upset. Is there anything I can do to help?’

  Now that she was closer, Friday could see that the man looked flustered and intensely embarrassed. The woman looked calm, but as soon as she spoke Friday realised the woman was actually really angry and she’d suppressed her feelings into a tight knot of rage inside herself. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Are you a forger? Can you forge a passport?’