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“You sit here, Lucy, and Orla and Katie will look after you,” Mrs Walker said. “You’ll show Lucy where everything is, won’t you, girls?”

Orla and Katie nodded and smiled.“Hi, Lucy!” they chorused.

“Hello,” Lucy muttered, and sat down as quickly as she could.

Orla and Katie tried their best, but Lucy was too shy to give more than yes or no answers to their polite questions. Eventually they gave up, and although they stayed with her all through the lunch hour, they stopped bothering to talk to her.They don’t like me, Lucy told herself unhappily, as she listened silently to Orla telling Katie all about her ballet exam.No one’s even talking to me.

Class 5W were actually quite a friendly group, but they couldn’t do much faced with a silent Lucy, and she was so unhappy that she couldn’t see that she needed to make an effort, too. Lucy was in the cloakroom putting on her coat to go home, when she heard some of the girls talking about her. She stayed frozen where she was, hidden behind a coat-rack, and listened.

“That new girl is a bit strange,” someone said, giggling.

“Yeah, she hardly said a word all day.” Lucy recognized the voice of Orla, one of her minders. “I hope Mrs Walker doesn’t make us look after her tomorrow as well.”

“Perhaps she thinks she’s too good for us,” another voice suggested. “I’m glad I didn’t have to talk to her.”

“Yeah, she does seem a bit stuck-up,” Orla agreed.

Another girl from Lucy’s class who was on the same side of the cloakroom as her gave Lucy a worried look, and coughed loudly. There was a sudden silence, then Orla’s head popped round the coats, and her eyes went saucer-wide. She shot back again, and there was a burst of embarrassed giggling.

Lucy stood up and stalked out, blinking back tears. So what if they didn’t like her? She certainly didn’t likethem. She heard the girls start whispering very fast, worrying about her telling Mrs Walker what they’d said.I hate this school, she thought, as she brushed her sleeve across her face angrily, trying to pretend to herself and everybody else that she wasn’t crying.

“So how was your first day? Did you have a good time?” her mum asked eagerly as she met Lucy at the school gate.

“No. It was horrible, and I want to go home.”

“Oh, Lucy, I’m sorry.” Her mum looked at her anxiously. “I’m sure it’ll get better, honestly. You just need to take a few days to get used to everything.” She sighed, and then said in a cheerful voice, “I thought we’d walk back, it’s not far. Kieran wanted to go by himself, so you and I can see if we spot any nice parks on the way home.”

“Not there,home. I want to go back to our old house, and my proper school. I hate it here! No one likes me!” Lucy wailed. “I miss Ellie, and all my friends!”

Mum sighed again.“Lucy, your dad and I have explained this. We had to move. Dad’s job is here now, and if we lived in our old house, he’d have to spend hours getting to work. We’d never see him. You wouldn’t like that, would you?”

Lucy shook her head, and sniffed, trying not to cry where loads of people from school would see her.“I know,” she whispered. “But it’s really horrible here.”

Her mum put an arm around her shoulder.“I know it’s hard, sweetheart. But I promise itwill get better. We’ll just have to do lots of fun things to cheer you up.”

Lucy rubbed her sleeve across her eyes. She couldn’t believe she had to go back tomorrow.

Chapter Two

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Lucy stared out of the classroom window, trying not to catch anyone’s eye. She’d been at her new school for nearly a week now, but she still hadn’t settled in. She couldn’t forget the way Orla had talked about her. The awful thing was, Lucy knew she probably had seemed stuck-up and unfriendly, and all those things Orla had said. But it still seemed unfair.Didn’t they know how lonely she was? Couldn’t they see how difficult it was being the new girl?At least it’s Friday, Lucy thought.

“Hey! Pssst…”

Lucy jumped slightly as someone prodded her hand. She looked up, confused. The pretty red-haired girl who sat across the table from her in her maths group had poked her with a pencil.

“Mrs Walker’s watching you,” the red-haired girl whispered. “If you weren’t new, she’d have had a go at you by now. You’ve been looking out of the window for ages and we’re supposed to be drawing that hexagon shape. Are you stuck? Do you need a rubber or something?”

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Lucy shook her head, and gave her a tiny smile.“I’m OK, thanks,” she whispered back, glancing quickly over at Mrs Walker. It was true – the teacher was looking her way. She bent her head over her book, suddenly feeling a little less miserable. Maybe there were some nice people in her new class after all.