Surprised, we all looked round. Maria and the others were standing behind us in the queue, staring hard at the three boys.

“These are our friends,” said Pilar. “So now we are ten girls!”

I stared at Maria. Then I moved next to her so that we were standing shoulder to shoulder. “Yeah, so you’d better move out of the way!” I said with a grin.

“We’re not scared of ten girls!” said Ginger, although his two mates didn’t look quite so sure. “We’re not scared of a hundred girls!”

“Hey, I’ve got an idea!” Frankie announced. “Why don’t we grab them and kiss them to death!”

This time the three boys went quite pale.

“Yeah, good one, Frankie!” Lyndz agreed. “Then their mates will really take the mickey out of them!”

“Now wait a minute—” Ginger began, starting to back away.

“Let’s get them!” I yelled. “Come on – kissy kissy!”

And we all rushed forward. The three boys panicked and ran for their lives, nearly tripping over in their eagerness to get away. We all had to hold each other up, we were laughing so much.

“Did you see the look on their faces?” Rosie gasped.

“They look like… like we going to beat them up!” Isabella giggled.

“I don’t think we’ll be seeing them again in a hurry!” said Frankie.

“Good – I would not like to kiss them!” Pilar laughed. “They are very ugly!”

After we’d stopped laughing, Maria and I started shuffling our feet and looking a bit awkward. Everyone else was standing round waiting for us two to say something.

“Thanks for helping us out,” I muttered at last.

“Is OK.” Maria shrugged. “We want to go on Mega-Loop, and when we get here, we see you have problem.”

“I thought the M&Ms didn’t want to go on the Mega-Loop,” Frankie said.

“We say goodbye to M&Ms,” Maria muttered, looking even more embarrassed. “We – how you say – dump them!”

“They annoy us very much!” said Pilar with a grin. “They not want to go on any good rides!”

“Typical M&Ms!” I said. “They’re right wimps!”

“Yes, you are right about them!” Maria said. “And we think maybe they did send those nasty emails!”

“They not like you at all!” Isabella added.

“Well, we don’t like them either!” I said firmly.

“We forget everything now and have a good time, yes?” Maria looked at me.

“You bet!” I said, and I meant it!

Now that there was ten of us going on all the rides, everything was even better. The Mega-Loop was wicked! You got spun round upside-down so fast it made your teeth rattle inside your head! Fliss and Isabella both looked pretty green when we got off, and I felt just a little bit funny myself. After that we went into the Haunted House, and then to the Hall of Mirrors. That had those weird mirrors that give you really funny reflections, and we nearly died laughing when we looked at ourselves.

Then it was time to go to the picnic area and meet the others for lunch. Boy, I wish you could’ve seen the M&Ms’ faces when the ten of us turned us laughing and chatting and being best mates. The Queen and the Goblin looked as if they were going to burst with rage!

We all stuffed ourselves silly, and then Mrs Weaver and the other teachers rounded everybody up and we went to watch some of the afternoon shows. There was a show with animals doing tricks, and one with acrobats, and afterwards we were allowed to go shopping. I got a cool blue baseball cap with WonderLand is Wonderful! written on it.

“I wish we didn’t have to go home,” Rosie said with a big yawn as we climbed on to the coach. “We didn’t get to go on all the rides.”

“But at least Maria and Kenny made friends at last!” Fliss added as we all filed down the coach. I sat next to Maria, Frankie sat next to Pilar, Rosie and Anna sat together and so did Lyndz and Elena and Fliss and Isabella.

“Hey, look at the M&Ms!” I nudged Maria. “They look like they’ve swallowed a wasp!”

The M&Ms had just got on the coach, and they were glaring at us. They found seats as far away from us as possible, and then turned their backs on us.

“I am glad we not have to be friends with them any more!” said Maria. “They are – how you say – a pain in the neck!”

“Definitely!” I agreed.

Although we were all pretty tired, the trip home was great. We showed each other what we’d bought, shared what was left of our packed lunches and played games.

“That was my best day ever!” Rosie sighed as the coach pulled into the school playground. We were a bit late getting back and all the other kids had already gone home.

“And tomorrow’s the last day of term – even better!” Frankie added. “Then it’s the summer holidays!”

“It’s a real shame we can’t play any tricks tomorrow though,” I grumbled as we collected up our empty crisp packets and picked up our bags. “Mrs Poole’s a real meanie!”

I was a bit surprised by what happened next. Maria stared at me with her mouth open as if I’d just told her the sky was about to fall on her head! She immediately jumped to her feet and began gabbling away in Spanish to Pilar, who was sitting behind her. Then the others started joining in.

“Hey, what’s going on?” I asked.

“I set a trick for your teacher!” Maria said breathlessly, looking worried. “In her table. When she opens the drawer, flour will fall out over her!”

We all stared at her. “You set a trap for Mrs Weaver?” Frankie said, eyes wide. “Why?”

“It was Emma’s idea,” Maria muttered, looking ashamed. “She say it will be good fun.”

“Well, it’s too late to do anything about it now,” I said. “Anyway, Mrs W. won’t know who’s done it, so you’ll be OK.”

“No, you not understand!” Pilar looked worried too. “Emma say we have to blame you!”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“She put two more bags of flour in your – how you say – locker, Kenny,” Pilar explained. “Then Mrs Weaver think it is all your fault!”

“The nasty little ratbag!” I hissed furiously, bouncing right out of my seat. “Right, Emma Hughes is for it!”

“Never mind that now, Kenny!” Frankie said. “It’s more important that we go into school and get rid of that booby-trap. Or you’re dead tomorrow when Mrs Weaver gets flour all over her!”

“Yeah, she’ll go ballistic and so will Mrs Poole!” Lyndz agreed.

“We get rid of it,” said Maria. “I go into school now and do it.”

“I come with you,” Pilar told her.

“Come on, girls.” Mrs Weaver was waiting impatiently at the front of the coach, glancing at her watch. “Off you go.”

We looked up and realised that everyone else had got off and we were last. So we scrambled our stuff together, and hurried over to the door.

“Right, we’re a bit late getting back, so hurry straight home or your parents might start getting worried.” And Mrs Weaver started ushering us over to the playground gate.

“Miss, I have to go into school for something,” Maria began, but Mrs Weaver shook her head.

“Sorry, Maria. Whatever it is it will have to wait until tomorrow.”

“But, Miss, I have to go into school!” Maria insisted.

“And it’s still open, Mrs Weaver,” Frankie pointed out. “The caretaker hasn’t locked up yet.”

“Yes, that’s because the cleaners are here, and we don’t want you getting in their way.” Mrs Weaver stood by the gate and watched as we all reluctantly filed out. “Now make sure you go straight home.”

We didn’t have any choice. We walked down the road, staring gloomily at each other.

“So what are we going to do NOW?” Frankie asked.