Zoe's first instinct was to ride to her friend Robert's house. But this plan was no good.

The backroads by her house, on the other hand, were far less travelled. And so that is where Zoe went. She struggled up the hills and zoomed down the slopes. Zoe lived near the dunes bordering the lake, and most of the backroads eventually led to the beach. Good, she thought. The lake was as good a place as any to run away and clear her head.

It was almost pitch-black. The main roads had white lines that faintly reflected the moonlight, but eventually these gave way to narrow, black roads curving through woodland. Somehow, Zoe remembered the path to the beach, the dips and bends of the roads. The sillhouttes of the trees gave way to a huge, sighing expanse of blackness. The road ended and a sand dune sloped down towards the water, black and grey in the moonlight.

She rode her bike straight down the sandy slope. Her hoodie flipped back in the lake's wind, and her exposed hair whipped around her face. She skidded a few yards from the water's edge. It was even colder here, but luckily she packed many layers of sweaters and sweatshirts. She had never been to the beach alone, or at night. It seemed so much vaster to her now, like how she imagined the ocean must look. Or outer space.

Zoe

I wonder what will happen to me...

Zoe spoke to herself aloud as she lay on the sand. Then, after considering for a moment:

Zoe

Who cares.

In the end, she thought, her and her problems were amazingly unimportant. Somewhere in Iraq a starving 14 year old girl would find her whole family dead under the smoking debris of her house. Zoe wondered if this girl would feel sorry for herself or feel the need to complain to her friends.

Zoe closed her eyes, opened them, and closed them again. There was so little difference between the two states. Both were vast black spaces, and the droning sound of the water was the same as the white noise inside her head. Was she drifting off to sleep? Or was she becoming one with the outside world?