Perhaps he should have been worried. These little fantasies he imagined were more and more frequently intruding themselves on his conscious thought. For the brief moment he was imagining them – imagining punching Lance square in the jaw, or winning the heart of the girl he’d had a crush on now for very nearly two whole weeks – they seemed so real, so tangible. Perhaps he should have been worried.

But he wasn’t.

After all, he had a lot on his mind. Most teens do. Besides which, his body was changing almost every day, so why wouldn’t be so that his mind would be doing the same thing? As far as he was concerned, that was the end of it. There wasn’t really anything to worry about, so he didn’t.

Except that there was. There was something very, very wrong indeed. The teachers had noticed, when he’d had a five-minute chat with someone who wasn’t actually there. His parents had noticed, when he’d go up to his room and just talk. It was time to get him checked out, they’d decided, before something bad happened.