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It is 10:13 at night, and I am sitting on my bed, eating canned tuna in the dark. This is, unfortunately, a normal occurrence, as is my crying. When you’ve got a dad that doesn’t respect your career goals, your sexuality, your existence or pretty much anything else about you, and a mum that doesn’t like to step in, being sent to bed without dinner is a usual punishment. So usual, in fact, that I have a hoard of tuna hidden in the back of my cupboard. (Yes, Clara - my cat - thinks I’m the best person ever).Clara’s fur is damp with my tears as I rock back and forth, cradling her in my arms. I know it’s only a year till I turn eighteen and can get away from this haunted house, cursed by seventeen years of fights and yelling and crying, but sometimes a year feels impossible. I stand and walk to my window, and peer out onto my balcony.Balcony is a fancy word for it - it’s a gated platform about three meters off the ground. Still, I carefully prise open the door, careful to keep the wood from creaking. My dad is watching TV two rooms away, and the last thing I want to do is have a fight at this hour. Successfully opening the door, I slip outside, my bare feet padding on the balcony’s tiles, and gaze out at the bay. Sydney is beautiful at night: the moon creates shimmering lines across the indigo water, and the silhouettes of boats rock on the water.But I’m not here to star-gaze, or water-gaze, as it were. I lean on the rusted balustrade and stare at the concrete meters below. I often wonder how freeing it would be to jump. To fall, knowing gravity has you securely in its grasp, and then to know nothing, never have to worry or cry again. But three metres isn’t a lot: I am more likely to break both legs than break my mother’s heart, and so I stare back out at the water.Ten minutes pass. To any bystander, I would appear to be lost in thought, hypnotised by the water, ignoring the rest of the world. In reality, my ears are like a rabbit’s, listening to every creak and whistle of the house and the trees in hope that my dad isn’t lumbering across the house like a minotaur. That’s why I notice it. It’s quiet at first, like a vacuum that isn’t quite sure how to start, or a cat choking on a flute. And then it crescendos- and I flee inside. I leave the door ajar though, to keep listening, but that amount of noise is definitely going to summon my dad.Cozy under my covers, I hear a door creak open.“I asked for Australia, space man, and what do I get? A dark street in the middle of nowhere!” a British woman’s voice speaks into the night. I furrow my brow. Space man? Are my neighbours on drugs or something?“Well, it’s definitely Sydney, according to the controls, and don’t complain about it being night, Donna. Britain isn’t the centre of the universe. I should know!” a man says. He’s also British. I didn’t realise we had them as our neighbours.“I wanted to see the Harbour Bridge! The Opera House! The beaches! This,” I presume ‘Donna’ gestures to the bay at this point, “is not a beach.”“Well,” the man says, “we’re here for a reason.” Ding!“What’s that?”“It’s an emergency tuna detector. No, don’t give me that look - have you not had canned tuna before? No? Never? Disappointing. Well, back in the day, there was a whole emergency where a friend of mine had no way of obtaining help and- well, I’m not going to go into the whole story now, but basically if you’re really in need, and there’s a can of tuna nearby, the TARDIS will pick up on it as an emergency signal. See? You get to see Australia and help people out!”Genuinely, what the fuck.Before I can get even more confused, though, I hear the creak of my dad’s steps in the corridor - clearly he’s been disturbed by the noise. He also hates English people, but that’s a separate issue.I hear his window swing open.“It is eleven o’clock at night! Stop that racket!” I hear the pair outside squeak in surprise. Yep. If you’re not listening for him, Dad can scare you quite easily. I should know.“Sorry!” the British man calls back. “We’ll stop that now! Apologies for disturbing you!”“Some of us are trying to relax at this hour! We don’t need you people ruining our peace!”“Terribly sorry, sir, we’ll just be going now. We were just trying to orient ourselves. Have a lovely night!” the man replies.My dad’s window swings shut and I can hear him walking back to the TV.“Well, he was a bit of an old grouch, wasn’t he?” Donna says, much more quietly this time.“Yes…” the man replies thoughtfully. “Though, I wonder…”The beeping machine beeps again, and suddenly clinking noises start coming from the bin next to my bed. Mewing, Clara jumps off the bed and nudges at it. Quietly, I pry it open and peer in- you’ve got to be kidding me. The can of tuna from earlier is just rattling around, seemingly of its own volition. Genuinely, what the hell. This has to be linked to what’s going on outside - only how? This is surely beyond the laws of physics?“Aha!” the man declares. “The emergency is… in the house with the old grouchy man.”“Is he the one with the emergency?” Donna asks. “It seemed like his only emergency was us.”“No,” says the man, sounding distracted. “The signal is tinged with… powerlessness… sorrow… hopelessness… and depression. And they’re young. Whoever sent the signal, they aren’t any older than twenty.”“Sometimes I swear you make this up, and then you do something that makes me realise that you make none of this up.” Donna sounds exasperated. “Go on then, space man, show me the emergency.”“Well, I’m not going into the house- we got arrested yesterday and I don’t fancy experiencing Australia’s police system today, but, let’s try this!”My can suddenly stops rattling. Tentatively, I reach into the bin and pick it up. It seems perfectly normal, from the lid peeled off awkwardly to the residual oil pooling in the bottom to- on the bottom of the can there’s writing! I squint in the dark, tilting it towards my window. It reads:HI WE’RE HERE TO HELPTears well in my eyes, and I swipe them harshly away. If I’m getting out of this haunted, horrible house, then tears are absolutely not stopping me. Praying to any god who might listen, I press my lips to the bottom of the can, and whisper back.“Hi. I’m Marie. How can you help me?”