Coral Antonia Sandhu

Coral missed the quietness of her attic room. She had generously traded rooms to the tiny study so that baby Eddy could eventually have a proper sized room, but hadn't yet got used to the part where she was now on a corridor that all her siblings had to tramp down to get to their own rooms. Gil, who was in the attic room now, couldn't get used to the noise of rain on the roof, and kept rushing down to have a wee in the night on wet days.

This afternoon had been particularly noisy. Eddy had colic, and her crying was causing Fry to kick off on a daily basis. Mum and Dad were very patient with this, but Mum had sent him to his room this afternoon for telling her that she and Dad should both be 'spayed'. Coral could still hear Fry stomping around upstairs, but tried to block him out to get on with her homework.

Miss Havisham was pleased with Coral. Despite being dyslexic, her efforts were earning a lot of credits; like Fry, she always did the extra credit work, even if she wasn't good at it, and Miss Havisham said it was really paying off.

She was just finishing a worksheet on 'Where does sand come from?' when her phone bleeped. With Fry getting a new phone for passing his exams, she had been allowed to use his old Nokia. It was Mae, her friend, who had texted. But when she opened the message, she blinked in surprise.

'I hate you. I wanted to tell you for ages but I was too scared.'

Coral stared at the message. She had befriended Mae at school at Miss Havisham's request - Mae had selective mutism and it was hard for her to make friends when she never spoke - but as far as she'd seen Mae liked her just as much as she liked Mae - a lot. The thorn in the side had been Hannah, who had been competing for Coral's attention for half the school year.

She looked at the message for several minutes before typing a reply.

'Why?'

Send. Her mind raced in the meantime. The only plausible reason she could think of was that perhaps Mae thought Coral was only her friend out of pity. But that wasn't true.

It seemed to take forever for the message to come back.

'I hate people thats why I don't talk so you should just leave me alone'

Coral read the message over and over. And then, something clicked in her mind. She picked up the phone, and rang Mae's home number. Her mum answered the phone.

"Hi, it's Coral. I think Mae's phone might have been stolen." Coral said. "I'm getting some texts that I think aren't from her."

Mae's mother disappeared to make enquiries, then returned a minute or so later.

"She's left it at school. Are you okay, what's this about texts?"

"Oh I'm fine, tell Mae not to worry, it's someone in our class that has it." Coral said. "I'm sure we can get it back in the morning."

Mae and Coral were among the first to arrive at school the next morning, in their eagerness to report the theft to Miss Havisham, so that she could keep an eye and see who if anyone tried to put it back where they found it. Miss Havisham lurked in the supply closet and was soon rewarded by the sight of Hannah opening Mae's locker.

"I think we'd better go and see the headmistress, hadn't we Hannah?" Miss Havisham said, coolly.

Coral and Mae, seeing Miss Havisham lead Hannah off towards the office, followed them in case the head had questions. As they sat down outside the office, Coral heard the tiniest whisper.

"Thank you."

Coral looked round. Mae blushed. It was the first time in the nearly six months they'd known each other that Coral had heard her speak. Coral smiled at her.

"Any time."

Mae glanced up and down the corridor to make sure nobody else overheard, then whispered again.

"How did you know it wasn't me?"

"Because you're my best friend." Coral said, shrugging.

Several things happened after that day. Hannah got suspended, but escaped expulsion because she had been trying to return the phone. When she came back, her friendship with Coral was mutually over, and Coral and Mae got to be friends in peace.

Mae carried on talking to Coral, and occasionally whispered to Miss Havisham, and gradually built up more confidence. When she was alone with Coral, she would talk at an almost normal volume. Coral didn't make a big deal of it, but a few weeks later, she did venture a question.

"Mae, why did you stop talking? If I'm allowed to ask."

Mae was quiet for a moment, then said.

"Mummy and Daddy kept telling me to shut up because I was disturbing the baby. And once I started shutting up I decided to be stubborn and stay shut up, and then after a while I didn't know how to stop shutting up."

"That's so sad. I'm glad you've started talking again now, even though I liked you just fine before too." Coral said. "Are your parents being nicer now?"

"Yes. I just got used to being quiet, I guess." Mae said.

"Be quiet as long as you need." Coral squeezed her shoulder.

Miss Havisham was glad that Coral had taken on the task of trying to befriend the silent Mae. Some of the other kids in Coral's class were, well, less than sensitive at times, and could be a little cliquey. So far, because she was new, nobody had been unkind to Mae, though they didn't know what to make of her silence and apart from Coral did not try to work her out.

Karol told Mae that her hair slide was nice, but Mae didn't reply, so Karol left her alone. Claire offered to lend Mae the sparkly pen Mae was looking at, but Mae went red and ran off. Millicent-Louisa asked her if she wanted to play wheelbarrows at break, but Mae just shook her head, so Millicent-Louisa didn't ask her again.

Coral was determined to be a good friend. But there was a snag. Unusually for her, someone else was competing for her attention. Hannah had latched onto her like a leech.

---

"I think Mae needs a friend." Coral tries to explain gently to her one morning. "I already said I'd pair up with her for the garden box project."

"Pair with me instead, I'm your best friend." Hannah says.

"You've only wanted to be my best friend for two days." Coral points out. "I'm not letting her down, you can make a three if Mae doesn't mind. Would that be okay, Mae?"

Mae, who has been watching Hannah with a cautious expression, is completely still for a moment, then nods.

Coral helps Hannah move her box over to hers and Mae's.

"Fry told me all about this project, the trick is to work as a team with other farmers." Coral says. "We're only allowed to spend five pounds each the whole year so we have to be careful. But we can trade with other farmers, and we can grow free food things like dandelions."

"I've got an apple in my lunchbox, let's grow a tree." Hannah says.

"Will a tree grow in that little box? In a year?" Coral asks, looking doubtfully at it.

"One way to find out." Hannah goes to get her apple, and buries it in the soil. Mae looks at the apple, then at Hannah, and shakes her head.

"What?" Hannah asks.

"I think she means that won't work." Coral says.

"Whatever. This is boring anyway." Hannah says, turning and flouncing off.

"I think you're right." Coral tells Mae. "Shall we go to the library and read about seeds?"

She offers Mae a hand, and Mae takes it.

Grandma had been begging Mum to take Coral and her siblings out for ages. Since Grandma and Grandpa split up, Mum hadn't been happy to let Grandma take them out on her own. Coral hadn't quite understood why, but she knew it was something to do with Grandma saying mean things sometimes, especially to Fry.

They got to see Grandpa quite often because he now lived with his new girlfriend called Maggie and her three kids. Grandpa and Maggie didn't say mean things. Coral wasn't quite so keen on Maggie's kids - Callum, Ethan and Mackenzie - who were a bit noisy and boisterous. But Mum said that Maggie was very kind because she would babysit at short notice which isn't easy when there are four of you.

Grandma said it wasn't fair that Grandpa got to see them all the time, and her new boyfriend wanted to meet them, so eventually Mum agreed to let them go out with Grandma and Bert for the day.

Grandma appeared to be on her best behaviour. Coral guessed Bert hadn't seen Grandma being rude to people yet. Bert was a bit older than Grandma, and was very tall and thin and posh. He said he liked children, but didn't have any grandchildren of his own, and that it was very nice to meet them. He seemed particularly impressed by Fry, who since being in Miss Havisham's class, had started standing up whenever any grown up came into a room and kept calling him 'sir'.

"Bert seems okay." Coral says to Brooke, after they finish lunch.

Brooke nods and grins. She's having a good time today, basking in the firm knowledge that she is Grandma's favourite. Grandma hadn't even been alarmed by the rather unusual hairstyle she was sporting since attempting to shave her own head.

"You've all been very good." Bert says. "We're going to take you to a toy shop, and you can all have ten pounds."

Coral cheers with the others. Bert drives them to a really big toy shop, on the edge of town, then hands Coral and Fry and Brooke ten pounds each.

"We'll all meet at the till." Grandma says, taking Gil's hand. "Don't drop your money, or you won't get any more. Nobody is to leave the shop without us."

Coral hesitates as Fry and Brooke dash off. Nobody has ever let them all loose in a toy shop before. Has Grandma forgotten that Brooke is only four? She doesn't think Brooke would shoplift, but does she even know how to read prices? She makes a mind to keep half an eye on Brooke, then goes into a big pink aisle to look for Sylvanian Families.

There's a cute set of red pandas, costing £9.99. Coral picks them up and looks at them longingly. It's hard not to adopt all of them; she feels sorry for them trapped in their boxes, waiting for someone to tell their story.

At the end of the aisle, Grandma has come past with Gil. Gil has got his eye on something, and he toddles forward to grab it. Coral looks over at him to see what he's found.

"Pretty!" Gil declares, bringing it over to show her. It's a soft angel doll, with a white dress with sparkles woven in, and golden wings, and when you press its tummy it plays the tune of Hark The Herald. Coral can see why Gil likes it.

"Oh, you don't want that sweetie." Grandma says suddenly, taking the angel doll from Gil. "That's for girls."

"Mum says there's no such thing as boys and girls toys, she lets us play with both." Coral says.

"Your mum's wrong, dear." Grandma says. Coral sighs. Now we're back to typical Grandma.

Grandma and Bert lead Gil down the next aisle to find him 'a nice car' or something. And Gil does look quite happy when he finds a big green tractor, but immediately lugs it back to the previous aisle and reaches for the angel again.

"No sweetie, just one toy." Grandma says, putting the angel back. Gil's lip wobbles slightly, as she marches him off with the tractor.

Coral watches them. She looks down at the red pandas, then goes and puts them back on the shelf. "Sorry Pandas." she whispers to them. "I hope you find a good home."

She goes back to the angel and picks it up, then goes to find the others. She finds Fry in the craft aisle, with a packet of 1000 ironable beads, and a frog-shaped board to put them on.

"That's two pounds fifty." Fry says. "That means I have seven pounds fifty left. I'm going to save it. Miss Havisham is teaching us about saving."

"You don't want to get a second colour?" Coral asks.

Fry blinks at her. "What for?"

"Never mind. Have you seen Brooke?"

"Grandma left Brooke here on her own?" Fry asks.

"Yes, you were there." Coral says.

They debate whether to find Brooke. Neither of them wants to confiscate anything off her, so they decide to go to the checkout instead, but half way there, a horrible monster jumps out at them with a loud gun that goes WOWOWOWOWOWOWOW!

Coral screams, and Fry puts his hands over his ears. The monster stops pressing the gun and takes off the mask.

"Scaredy cats!" Brooke teases. "Chickens!"

"I bet those are more than ten pounds." Coral says, looking hopefully at the labels. "The mask is seven and the gun is ten so you can't have both, and anyway, Mum says no gun toys."

"Mum's not here." Brooke says, taking the mask off and dumping it on top of some teddies, then marching off to the checkout with the noisy gun.

Grandma doesn't look too pleased with the noisy gun either when they all get back to the door. After five minutes she takes the batteries out and hands it back. Brooke looks somewhat disappointed, but manages to add her own sound effects.

Back at the house, Coral hands the angel doll to Gil. Seeing his little face light up is worth it, and he quickly puts the angel in the tractor, as she thought he was going to do.

"Pretty inna tactor! Pretty inna tactor!" he sings, driving them around. Coral volunteers to be the bridge, and the tunnel, and the hill, and Gil pushes the tractor and angel over and under and round her contentedly.

It was a red squirrel in a sweater.

Coral wouldn't normally go into the woods, certainly not on her own. Daddy has taught her better than that. But... she can see the tree from the edge of the wood, and she can still see the bar from the tree, so that's within the rules.

"Hello?" she says, running after the squirrel. "Are you... are you the red squirrel?"

The Red Squirrel preens his little jumper.

"I suppose." he says shyly.

"So this is really it..." Coral breathes, stepping forward and touching the tree tenderly. "This is the Faraway Tree?"

The Squirrel nods.

Coral grins.

"I should go and get my brother." she says.

"No, this is your adventure." the Squirrel says. "Come on!"

Coral hesitates.

"Please can I leave a note for my Daddy so he knows where I am?"

"Of course. I'll take it for you, I'm faster." the Squirrel offers.

Coral gets some paper and writes 'Gone up Faraway Tree, back by diner, love from Coral'. She watches as the Squirrel bounds back to the bar, pops in through the door, and then scurries back out again. Satisfied, she starts climbing up the tree, pausing occasionally to help herself to a grape, or a cherry, or whatever happens to be growing on the way up.

She doesn't peep in the first window. She knows better; if this is really the Faraway Tree, that's the Angry Pixie's house, and he doesn't take kindly to peeping. Instead she carries on up and up, past the owl when...

She hears the rush of water, but can't see a bough to move to, and as a massive wave of soapy water engulfs her she loses her footing. She screams, fearing she'll fall all the way down the tree, but she lands precariously on some thinner branches and twigs, grabbing onto leaves, and hoping they will hold her weight... this never seemed to happen in the books, it was implied that it was no more difficult than walking up some stairs...

"Grab my hand!" A pretty fairy is inching across the bough on her hands and knees, and reaching down to her. "I won't let you fall!"

Coral grabs the hand, and the fairy hauls her up.

"Thank you!" Coral gasps, holding onto her tight. "I'm Coral."

"I'm Silky, are you all right?" Silky asks, looking her up and down. "You poor thing, you got caught in Dame Washalot's water! Come in, I think I have something just about your size..."

Coral follows Silky into her little house. Silky gives her a towel, then goes through to her bedroom and looks in her wardrobe. She pulls out a little fairy frock, and hands it to Coral, who stares at it in delight. It isn't pink - although Coral doesn't mind pink she doesn't feel the need to have everything pink - instead it's a light, shimmery yellow, the colour of buttercups.

"Here, Coral!" Silky smiles and hands it to her.

"Thank you!" Coral goes into Silky's room to get dry, and get changed, and stares around it in wonder. She doesn't touch anything, but she comes out with her wet clothes.

"We don't get many children as little as you." Silky says. "It's nice to meet someone my size for a change!"

"Is there a land at the top of the tree today?" Coral asks.

"Yes, the Land of Wishes." Silky says. "But you have to be careful what you wish for."

Together they climb up, and Coral asks about the rest of the tree. They pass the top house, where a man with a big round head called Moon Face joins them. They put Coral's bag of wet clothes in his house to dry.

Together, they climb up a ladder at the top of the tree, up through the clouds, into a small land with a single cottage near the ladder, the other parts of the settlement can be seen in the distance. Coral starts wondering what she should wish for. Various little folk are queuing for the cottage, then emerging with a happy look.

"You only get one wish." Moon Face tells her. "So make it a good one! And remember you can't undo it."

Where to start? World Peace (or would that make aliens take over like on the Simpsons)? A bunny? A little height? Oh, but then she won't fit this pretty dress. A wish to have known this morning that she would get one chance to make a wish?

Suddenly, before she knows it, she's at the beginning of the queue. Silky nudges her to go in, and she goes in to face a rather gothic witch, who looks vaguely bored.

"What'll it be?" the witch asks, looking up at her.

"I..." Coral hesitates. "I think I am lucky and I have everything I need, can someone who really badly needs two wishes for something important have my wish?"

The witch headtilts at her, then shrugs.

"Sure. I can do that."

"Thanks." Coral beams.

"You really don't want anything?" the witch asks.

"Well I was going to ask you a question but I don't know if that counts as a wish." Coral says.

"Ask away, I'll keep your wish to give away your wish." the witch says. "What was your question?"

"My brother made a wish that turned out bad." Coral says. "Not here, at home. He wished to never hear about a girl's horse again, and then she fell off the horse, and now she's sad. He's worried it's his fault. He's autistic and it's hard for him to stop thinking about things. What should he do?"

"Did he hear about her falling off the horse?" The witch asks.

"Yes." Coral says.

"Then his wish didn't come true." the witch points out. "Because he heard about the horse when he found out she fell off it."

"Oh yeah." Coral grins. "I'll tell him. Thank you so much!"

"You're welcome." the witch gives her a grin. "Now clear off, there's a queue!"

Coral goes outside to join Moon Face. You aren't supposed to tell anyone what you wished for, so they wait for Silky.

"We won't get stuck up here, will we?" she asks anxiously.

"No, you should be all right." Moon Face says. "The land is not due to move on for a couple of days."

Silky comes out, and beams at Coral.

"The witch wants you to go back in."

Coral goes back into the witch's cottage. The gothic witch gets up, and crouches next to her.

"What's your name?" the witch asks. "I never asked."

"Coral." Coral says.

"Coral, I want to tell you something." the witch says. "If you give wishes, or good deeds, or anything else, people will always come to you for help. And that's a good thing. But remember, don't ever be too nice to have your own adventure. Promise?"

Coral nods soberly. The witch hands her a little gothic witch doll, and gives her a grin.

"Now clear off." she says again.

"Thank you!" Coral skips back out to join Silky and Moon Face. From the books she's read - or listened to - she feels like she's known them forever. They climb down the ladder back into the Faraway Tree.

"I'm so glad the tree is here." she says, hugging them both. "I mean, I've heard of it, but I never thought I'd see it. Thank you for taking me on an adventure."

"You're welcome, it's better than going to the lands on our own." Moon Face says, handing her her bag of clothes.

"I'll bring back your dress." Coral tells Silky.

"You keep it." Silky says. "My wardrobe is full, and it suits you."

"Oh thank you!" Coral hugs her again. "I'll come back soon."

Moon Face takes her into his funny round house, and gives her a cushion. In the middle of his house is a big hole.

"You can get to the bottom of the tree by sliding down here." he says. "This is the Slippery Slip. Give your cushion to the squirrel when you're done!"

Coral says goodbye, and carefully nudges herself over the edge of the hole... as she falls onto the slide she squeals as she whizzes down in the pitch black, but within seconds she's popping out at the bottom of the tree. She slides out so fast that she comes to a stop a good ten metres away. Picking up the cushion, she runs back with it.

"Mr Squirrel?"

The squirrel isn't there. She stops, putting the cushion down at the bottom of the tree. But the tree seems thinner now. And when she looks up, it's shorter. It's the same height as the other trees. She looks around, wondering if she walked back to the wrong tree, but her own footprints are there from where she skid out the bottom of the tree...

She searches another couple of minutes. But the footprints don't lie.

The Faraway Tree is gone, as quickly as it appeared.

Slipping a hand in the pocket of the dress, she pulls out the Witch Doll. It was real, it must have been. But it's gone.

Her eyes fill with tears and she runs back to the bar.

Coral stands in front of the mirror painstakingly putting her school tie on. Was it under the bridge and pull, or over the bridge? It's no surprise that so many kids cheat and use the elastic one, but Coral had watched enough people get pinged by them to be put off.

Mummy eventually comes in to help her tie it and do her hair. By break time, it will be in a mess again. Sometimes she wishes that she had curly hair like her brothers and sister, but when Mummy fastens it up with her froggy hair clips, she doesn't mind so much, because Mummy always says it's nice that at least one of them has hair like hers.

"Mummy?" she looks up as Mummy finishes fastening the ribbon. "Do you think Carol will still be cross that Hannah's my friend now since the party?"

"Maybe." Mummy says, tucking her tie in. "But Hannah's allowed to be friends with anyone she likes, just like you, and Carol's got other friends. She might feel a little sad though, so don't rub it in, okay?"

"What's rub it in?" Coral asks.

"It's like showing off." Mummy says. "Maybe you and Hannah would be best staying away from Carol, but being nice if you are around her."

Coral thinks about this on the way to school, squeezing the toy dinosaur in her pocket. She's not sure Carol will be playing by the same rules. They've been arguing about mixing up each other's name since the nursery class, and Coral suspects this is the last straw, even though it's a silly thing to fight over.

"Are you even listening?" Fry asks her suddenly. "Mr Irons has moved the seating around again and I don't know where I'm going to sit."

Coral comes out of her daydream and pays attention to her brother.

"It'll be okay. Mr Irons always looks out for you." she says, in lack of a better reply.

This seems to pacify her brother, who goes back to rambling on about some sort of theory he has about the seating arrangement using words like 'per cent' which Coral doesn't really understand, before he goes back to counting the 'checkpoints' along their route to school, which Mummy introduced a while back to stop him worrying about being late.

In minutes, they're in the playground, and Coral looks around for her new friend. Hannah is waiting for her, and waves, before skipping up.

"Did you bring your dinosaur? Let's play on the big tree!"

The big tree stood in one corner of the playground; behind it was a gap that the smallest children could wriggle through, known as the 'Monster's gob'. Since someone had got their head stuck in it, going through the hole wasn't allowed, but it was a good place for toys to go through.

After a couple of minutes, they are interrupted by Carol, who used to be Hannah's best friend before the fateful party. Except two weeks previously, when she was Sally's best friend*.

"Hey, midget." Carol says, coming up to Coral.

"Don't call her that." Hannah says, glaring at Carol. "What do you want?"

"I want to tell you that now I'm spelling my name with a K." Carol says. "So that babies who can't read won't keep stealing my stuff."

"Like K A R O L?" Hannah asks.

"Yep." 'Karol' says, folding her arms. "It's more cool anyway."

"You don't have to, I'll be more careful." Coral says.

"No you won't, you never are." Karol glares at her before turning back to Hannah. "Hannah, I thought you and me were best friends."

Hannah looks away awkwardly.

"I hate you both!" Karol goes red in the face and runs off.

***

Karol's new name spelling meets with a raised eyebrow from Mr Walker, but he doesn't forbid it. She gives Coral an icy glare as she sits on the table behind her, and proceeds to spend the morning doing annoying things like flicking paper at her.

Half way through the morning, Coral gets up to take some work to the teacher, and squeaks as she discovers her plaits are tied to the chair by the ribbon. Mr Walker doesn't notice above the general chatter, and the boy next to her, Extremely Brian**, gives her a hand to untie them.

"Just ignore her, she's being stupid." Extremely Brian says, tugging her hair out of the ribbon in order to free her.

Coral shoots him a grateful smile, before going up to get her maths book marked.

"Good job Coral, have you been practicing your maths over the holiday?" Mr Walker asks, giving her a smile.

"Yes, every day." Coral says quietly.

"Working hard will get you a long way." Mr Walker says, approvingly.

Coral feels a lot better when she sits back down. She ignores Karol for the rest of the morning, eventually more successfully than Extremely Brian, who puts his hand up.

"Mr Walker, Karol keeps throwing things, can you make her stop?"

Mr Walker comes over to investigate, discovers Karol has done hardly any of her maths, and keeps her in for break, much to Coral's relief.

It's only later on in the afternoon, at PE, when she remembers the ribbons, and heads back to her seat to find them gone.

[*As is the fickle nature of friendships among six year old girls
**Nobody could remember the origin of this nickname, including Extremely Brian himself, whose actual first name was William]

It's going to be difficult to top Gil's play from last night, but Coral has been excited and nervous all day. Her one big chance, the lead role as Elpheba. Well, alongside Candy, who is playing Galinda.

"Break a leg." she says to Candy, who is getting make up next to her.

"Why would I want to do that?" Candy asks, blinking at her. Coral, knowing her 'secret', translates without taking the mickey.

"It means good luck, in the theatre. According to Gil, anyway." she says.

"Oh. Thanks." Candy smiles slightly, and as her make up gets finished, goes abruptly to talk to Heidi.

Coral watches after her, sighing slightly. Heidi has retained her role as Queen Bee, most 'popular' girl in the class, and of course that attracted Candy to her like a moth to a flame. When Candy had been at Fry's school, she'd longed to hang out with 'normal' girls, to be 'popular'. Since joining Coral's school earlier in the year, Candy has struggled to make friends with anyone, yet has largely shunned Coral's attempts to be nice.

"Look, if I know you, they'll know I went to special school. So you don't know me, Coral. And since you're not exactly in the cool group, there's not really much reason for us to hang out here."

Well whatever. Coral maintained her default level of nice towards Candy, and was more than happy to hang out with her own friends. She had hoped the play might bring them a little closer together, like their characters.

The first part of the play goes flawlessly. That is, until Coral mounts the broomstick at the end of the first half. When she was picked for the part, Faye from the sixth form had said how lucky they were that they'd found someone who was actually small enough to use the stage's hoist. Faye is set in position tonight, and lifts Coral up at the right moment.

It's Candy's job to turn on the wind machine just below her. As she does so, Coral notices Candy pushing the machine way too far forward, with an amused smirk on her face. Coral is mid-song, so she hasn't long to wonder about this, before the machine turns on and blows her skirt right up.

A laugh breaks out from the audience, all the more so from some of the girls when they realise Coral is wearing a pair of pink little girl knickers with bunnies on.

"Turn it off!" Coral covers her mike and hisses at Candy, fighting with her skirt, but the girl is laughing too much. She steps back on the broom, her foot catching it behind the second wire that hoists it to the ceiling. The front of the broom shoots up, smacking her full in the face and knocking her glasses off onto the floor.

Everything stops. The laughing stops, except for Candy, who continues for an awkward few seconds until she realises everyone is staring. She turns the wind machine off.

Coral freezes just for a second. Her right eye is watering and can't see anything, the left is so short-sighted normally that she can't see anything through that either... but there's only one thing she can do. She holds the broom upright, as though that is how it is meant to be, and sings her line with all her heart.

"And nobody in all of Oz
No wizard that there is or was
Is ever going to bring me down!"

The spell is broken. The pianist plays, the chorus sings, and she carries on. As she finishes her song, the audience breaks into a standing ovation, not that she can see it, and the stage hands quickly close the curtains.

Faye lowers her down, and she gropes for her glasses. Heidi, for once not playing the mean girl, finds them and hands them to her.

"I think they're broken." she whispers awkwardly. "Are you okay? Your lip is bleeding... you're pretty blind without these aren't you, stage door is over here."

Things must be bad if Heidi is being kind. Coral thanks her and sits down backstage, examining her glasses. Everyone is talking at her at once. She puts her wonky glasses on and makes a beeline to just one person.

"You. Complete. Bitch." she says, standing square up to Candy, albeit a lot smaller. There is a slight stunned silence around her. Nobody has ever heard her swear before. "I saw you do that on purpose, how could you do that? I thought we were friends!"

"I didn't know you were going to smack yourself in the face." Candy says, defensively. "It was just a joke."

"Well why couldn't you do it during rehearsal, then?" Coral asks, feeling her temper rising. "You humiliated me in front of everyone!"

"Is this true?" Faye demands. "Did you do it on purpose?"

Candy, beginning to realise that she's in trouble, points a finger at Heidi.

"She told me to do it."

"What are you, four?!" Heidi explodes. "I was clearly joking! I'm not that mean."

"Enough." Faye says, irate. "Candy, even if Heidi told you to do it, you're not a baby, you chose to do it yourself. You haven't even apologised to Coral for getting her hurt. Go and get changed."

"What?" Candy gasps slightly. "But what about the rest of the play?"

"Lucy has understudied you just fine, she can take your role." Faye says.

Candy looks at the hostile faces, bursts into tears and runs off. Coral looks uncomfortable.

"I don't want to spoil the play, I can still work with her." she says to Faye.

Faye puts a hand gently on her shoulder and leads her to one side.

"Coral, if you are nice to people who are horrible to you, they will take and take and take. I know you're the forgiving type but don't let her push you around, okay? I'm not going to kick her out of the play completely - even if I ought to - so let's get you cleaned up and back out there."

***

But Coral knew it wasn't going to be over that easy, even if Lucy did just fine and her performance was, apparently, stunning. Gil had videoed the whole thing and promised to give her the £250 for selling it to Home Video Show.

***

The atmosphere in school is awkward. On one hand, everyone is crowding Coral to ask about the black eye and to support her. On the other, she feels terrible seeing Candy ostracised and miserable.

It gets worse when her form tutor tells her the headmistress wants to see them both at break.

"Did you sneak?" Candy whispers, as they wait outside the office.

Coral shakes her head.

"Do you really think I'm a bitch?" Candy asks, sounding genuinely upset now.

Coral hesitates. Then replies honestly.

"No. I don't think anyone is a bitch really, and I'm sorry I called you that. There's just people who sometimes do bitchy things."

Then, the headmistress calls her in. Suddenly, she's very afraid. She called Candy a swear word in front of everyone... but the head doesn't seem angry with her, just asking her questions.

"Am I in trouble?" she asks timidly, after a minute.

"No no, we don't tolerate bullying of any sort in this school." the head says. "And certainly not of the public display Candice admitted to."

"I swore at her." Coral admits.

"Not something to be proud of, but you were clearly very much provoked." the head says. "You can go now."

Coral goes back to the classroom and tries to avoid questions. Candy is being an awfully long time.

"I bet she gets expelled." Claire says, swinging her legs on the desk.

"Are you serious? For a prank?" Coral asks, in alarm.

"I heard the governors were at that play, and members of the public." Claire says. "You can't arse around when you're representing the school, the governors will have gone nuts... geez, don't look so worried, it's not your fault, she was the one who chose to do it."

Candy appears back in the classroom the minute before the bell goes, giving Coral no chance to talk to her until later. She follows her out the school gate and stops her before she can escape.

"Um, Candy?"

"Get lost." Candy says, miserably.

"Look, I don't want you expelled..."

"They're not expelling me." Candy says, then lowering her voice. "They said if I didn't have Asperger's they would have."

"Well, I'm glad, that would have been too far."

"It's nothing to do with you any more." Candy says.

"I've asked everyone to drop the hostility." Coral says. "Everyone screws up."

"You don't get it!" Candy says, raising her voice now. "You're not the only person who's been nice to me. A whole bunch of people have. Pretty much everyone welcomed me here. It was like a wonderful high. And what did I do? I struck straight for the people I saw as being top of the social ladder, everyone else I rejected. And now I have nobody."

Fry, who has come to pick Coral up, appears nearby.

"You should come back to Jackson Street." he says. "I don't know why you left in the first place."

"To be normal?" Candy says.

"But you're not normal. Neither's Coral, neither's Rahne or Brooke. Not even Heidi. Nobody is normal." Fry says. "There's no such thing. And even typical popularity is a myth. Coral might be the geekiest teacher's pet in her class but the others soon stuck up for her when you hurt her. We liked having you in the band, and Nimesh missed you a lot."

"Jo hates me. So does Kathy. And I can't bear Jordan. I don't have any girl friends."

"They haven't seen you for a year, just make a fresh start and don't insult them." Fry shrugs. "We have a couple of new people anyway."

Candy hesitates.

"I'll think about it." she says.