The paranoia began when I discovered that our cabins were below the sea level. It was increased by the fact that I had somehow lost Clio on the way to our cabin that we were sharing, and I didn't have anybody to moan to. I went to find somebody to keep me company whilst I waited for Clio, but nobody seemed to be around. Once I had realised this, Clio turned up.

'Where have you been' I asked.

'Up on deck.'

'Is that where everybody is?'

'Pretty much.'

She dumped her bag and I locked the cabin.

'Aren't you going to take a key'? I inquired.

'Clio don't trust herself.' I could foresee future disasters, but I was far too excited to argue. We hiked up all the stairs to the front of the boat, where we found a crowd of passengers who we didn't know, along with Steven, Bobby, Richard, and Lizzy and Yasmin, both of cellos. The ferry was just pulling out of the North Tyneside port.

After ten minutes, we had made hardly any progress, and most of the crowd had dissipated. However, the orchestra members remained like stalwarts, and all the spaces by the rails were re-filled. I sensed somebody behind me, and so I turned to face Pat.

'Is it okay if I stand behind you'' he asked. 'It's just that you're quite short, and I can see over your head.'

'Not you as well,' I moaned.

'Sorry?'

'Short jokes.'

'Oh, sorry.'

'No worries.'

'How come we're going so slowly'? asked Lizzy.

'I bet we've got a learner driver for a captain,' said Steven.

'Yeah,' I said, 'And I bet this is their driving test.'

'This is probably the three-point turn.' We all laughed, realised that we were doing a three-point turn, the laughed some more. As we cruised through the harbour area, I played at two different games with Lizzy and Yasmin and Steven. Lizzy, Yasmin and I would wave manically at every person we spotted on dry land. A response would result in a loud cheer and further waving until we lost sight. When there were no people around, Steven would point to a car in the distance and tell me its make and model. The ship would slowly approach the car, and to my disbelief, Steven would be correct. I spotted some buoys floating widely apart in a straight line.

'Oh God!' I cried. 'I bet we've got to weave in and out of those buoys!'

'Oh no,' Steven groaned despondently. Whilst all this was taking place, nearly everybody else had gone inside, either due to boredom, cold, embarrassment at Lizzy, Yasmin and I, or all three combined. Once Newcastle was behind us, only Steven remained with me.

'I'm going to watch the sunset,' I said. 'Staying'? We talked and talked for ages. I gazed at the play of the sunset on the water. The clouds overhead glowed orange against glimpses of blue sky, all of this reflected in the rippling water.

'I love this time of day,' I sighed.

'My dad sits in the front garden watching the sun set in the summer,' remarked Steven. 'He sits drinking beer and talking with our neighbours.'

'That sounds nice. Just if it was me, it would be Chardonnay.'

Steven looked at me to check if I was joking.

'I'm joking,' I confirmed in a dull voice. We returned inside after we had completely lost sight of Britain. There was nobody in sight in my and Clio's corridor, and the route down had been scarily deprived of any West Wiltshire Young Musicians. In a panic, I realised that I would have to hang around our cabin until Clio reappeared, as she did not have a key. I ate some of the huge bag of food that I had brought as a form of dinner, sat around for ten minutes doing nothing, then thought, 'Stuff this, I'll go and see if Meghan and Rebecca are around. '

Meg and Rebecca's cabin was diagonally opposite the once that I was sharing with Clio. I knocked on the door, and somebody shouted at me to come in.

Entering, I discovered Meg, Rebecca and Bobby, and I told them off for being too trusting.

'Huh?' said Meg.

'You didn't ask who I was,' I explained. 'I could have been an evil Norwegian psycho, and you wouldn't have known.'

'Yeah, but you're not,' said Rebecca with a slight Australian accent, 'So it's okay.'

'Oh, are you Australian?' I asked.

'My British passport is registered there, and I've lived there before.'

'But you were English this morning.'

'Oh, my accent comes back when I'm excited.'

Somebody knocked on the door. I inquired, loudly, as to who it was. It was Steven.

'Come in,' said Meg, after giving me a Look. Steven entered the broom-cupboard of a cabin and found a spot to sit. Meg and Bobby were perched on the top bunk, Rebecca was sat on a footstool beside an excuse for a desk, I had collapsed on the floor. Steven had decided on the lower bunk, which for some reason nobody had occupied.

'Where's Clio?' I wondered.

'Oh, she went to the cinema with Jezebel and Ophelia,' said Rebecca, again with her hint of Australian accent.

'Do you think that we could make her accent stronger if we fed her lots of e-numbers?' I pondered to the world.

'Er?' said Meg, 'I'm not sure, because I have to share a room with her tonight.'

'Well, I'm bored,' I said, 'So I'm game.' I rushed back to my cabin, where I dug out a newly-opened pack of Citrus Polos. On my return, I gave Rebecca three to start with, then proceeded to give everybody else one each. Rebecca was kept talking so that we could hear the gradual progression of her Aussie tongue, and we consumed more and more e-numbers. The already cramped cabin became hot and stuffy.

'Right, that's it,' I declared. 'This party is spilling out into the corridor.' Before anybody had time to argue, I stood up, pulled open the door and sat in its frame, half-in, half-out of the room and corridor. As an afterthought, I shoved a Citrus Polo each into everybody's hands. Outside in the corridor, Pat sauntered along, looking lost.

'Stop!' I shouted at him, on wild impulse. 'You may only pass along this corridor if you say something Australian on behalf of Rebecca,' I explained.

'Er?' said Pat.

'Just say 'G'day, mate.' Or 'Bonzer.' Bonzer is good. Or 'No worries.' 'Half a pint of Foster's, mate' also goes down quite well.'

'Bonzer, mate,' he said, not even bothering to put on an Aussie accent, and introduced himself to the inhabitants of the cabin. He paused at Rebecca. 'Sorry,' he said to her, 'I don't recognise you.'

'My name's Rebecca,' she said.

'What instrument do you play?'

'Violin.'

'Oh, right.'

'If you don't know somebody in this orchestra,' I said to Pat, 'They are likely to be a violinist.'

He smiled, then sat down beside me in the corridor. The ship lurched, and I landed, sprawled, on the ground. 'Dear God!' I exclaimed, and I moved into the corridor completely so that I could jam my legs between its narrow walls. I could just reach with my legs straight. Pat looked at my action. 'You know, it's really hard for me to do that, because my legs are much longer than yours and I have to bend my knees.'

'Why do you feel that you have to torment me because of my height? You shall have to have my two remaining Citrus Polos for that.'

One-by-one, Steven, Meg, Rebecca and Bobby migrated into the slightly roomier corridor, if only in length. After a few minutes, Clio turned up at one end of our corridor.

'Stop!' I cried.

'Why?'

'Because you have to say something Australian for Rebecca.'

'Why?'

'Because she's Australian.'

'Oh, g'day, mate,' she said finally, and sat down.

'You missed the Citrus Polos,' I said, 'But I'm sure you'll get into the spirit of things.'

'This is madness,' said Steven. 'It's very good material for one of those terrible books in a series of five-thousand that ten-year-old girls read and collect to feel grown-up,'

I replied to Steven's statement. 'We could call it 'The Corridor Club.''

'I'd buy it,' offered Meg.

'You'd buy anything,' said Clio.

'So would a ten-year-old girl!' I announced joyfully. 'We're in the money!'

'Who'd write it?' asked Steven.

'I could,' I said. 'It's easy: 'We were sat in the corridor again, bored as we always were. The ground moved. That's what it's like when you're on a ship.''

'And people actually read this'' said Steven in disbelief.

Meg, Rebecca, Clio and I sat in a guilty silence. Two of Pat's roommates appeared at the same end of the corridor that Clio had materialised at. I recognised one as being Damon of horns, Pat's younger brother, and the other as Xander, a clarinet, but I had never spoken to either of them before.

'Wait!' I exclaimed. 'You may only enter this corridor if you say something Australian.'

'Oh,' said Xander, the taller, dark-haired, bespectacled one of the two. 'We did this in English.' He said something unidentifiable in what sounded like a bad Cockney accent. Good enough for me.

'And you, good sir'' I addressed Damon, who had sandy hair and looked extraordinarily like Pat.

'G'day,' he said.

'Welcome to the Corridor Club.' I offered them both my hand and introduced myself. They both told me their names, which I had known already but they didn't know this, but only after they had told me that they had known who I was.

'How come you know who I am'' I asked.

'Everybody knows who you are,' said Damon. 'You know everybody else here, don't you'' I introduced everybody who wasn't Pat and I.

'I'm sorry,' said Xander to Rebecca, 'But I've never seen you before. What instrument do you play''

'Violin,' said Rebecca.

'Ah,' said Xander knowingly. D�j� vu. I smiled and met Pat's eyes, who gave me a grin back. After a while of meaningless talk that made complete sense at the time, but none in retrospect, the ferry intercom system buzzed into life. A Norwegian man chattered away in his native tongue, signed off with a cheerful 'Tak!' (which means 'Thanks' in Norwegian), and there was silence. Steven decided to translate. 'Would all Norwegian speaking people please make their way to the top deck as we have hit an iceberg and we are currently sinking. We would appreciate it if you didn't mention this to any non-Norwegian speakers.'

'Tak!' added Xander.

'Oh, great,' I moaned.

Everybody laughed. This subsided, however, when a strange, whirring noise started up. 'What's that noise!?' I panicked.

'Bilge pumps,' said Pat.

'I think that you're forgetting that we are the bilge,' said Steven.

'Oh, God, we're going to drown,' I said despondently.

'What are we going to do'' wailed Steven sarcastically.

'Follow the rats!' I cried heroically, and we all laughed again. The ceiling began to creak. 'What's that, then'' I practically screamed.

'Oh, it's probably just the ceiling undergoing the stresses of having all those coaches and instruments piled on top of it,' said Steven.

'What do you mean?' asked Meg.

'We're underneath the car deck,' replied Steven.

'Oh, bloody hell!' I exclaimed. 'If I don't drown, I'll be crushed! We're never going to get to Bergen!'

We had been sat in the corridor for ages when everybody apart from Pat, Clio and I expressed a desire to go to bed and could we please shut up. The three of us went into my and Clio's cabin, where we discussed the state of the British music industry; Clio sat on the bottom bunk, I on the top and Pat on the footstool. Clio took a malt loaf out of her bag and offered me a hunk, which I took. Pat declined his.

'Oh, for heavens' sake, eat some, Pat,' I said. 'If I'm going to die of clogged blood vessels, then so are you.' A minute later, Clio emerged from the bottom bunk to place the wrapping in the bin. I have never known of a malt loaf to be diminished in so quick a time. An immeasurable amount of time had passed when we received a knock on the door.

'Who is it?' I asked.

'Carol Marrow,' was the reply. Pat opened the door. 'Ah, there you are,' Carol said to Pat. 'Your brother was looking for you.' Then to Clio and I she said, 'There's a drunk going around being nasty to people. Lock you door and go to bed.' We said goodnight to Pat and locked the door after him as Carol Marrow had asked. While I showered and brushed my teeth, Clio got ready for bed.

'Don't wake up Clio in the morning,' Clio told me before she went to sleep. 'Clio likes her sleep and she gets really hacked off when its' ruined.'

I stamped this thought on my memory. Clio can be rather vicious at times, evident from her Snap tactics. Just before I switched the light off before succumbing to sleep, I glanced at my watch and realised that it was half-past two in the morning.

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