27

Hiding

When I woke up the next morning my stomach instantly went into knots and I felt sick. The whole scene with Nadima outside Mrs C’s office came flooding back to me. There was absolutely no way I could face going into school. What if she still wasn’t talking to me? And not only that, Kara would gloat her head off.

After a while I heard a message ping in. I grabbed my phone, hoping it was from Nadima. It wasn’t. There were a few new texts, but none from her. I couldn’t face getting up. I dropped my phone back on the floor and hunched down under the quilt.

When I wasn’t down for breakfast Mum came up and put her head round my door. ‘Come on! It’s half seven!’

I rolled over to face the wall. ‘I’m not going in today,’ I said. ‘I’m not well.’

She came over and sat on the bed.

‘Is this about Nadima?’

‘No!’ I lied. ‘I’m ill.’

Mum obviously didn’t believe me, because she said, ‘If you go in you’ll be able to put things right with her.’

‘No, I won’t! She’s not even speaking to me.’

She paused for a moment and then said, ‘Jaz, these things often sort themselves out once everyone’s had time to calm down.’ I didn’t say anything, so then she said, ‘You don’t think you might be overreacting a little?’

‘No! I don’t!’ I cried. ‘She said I was a “bad friend”, and she’s right. I’m a rubbish friend. Lily would rather be friends with Kara than me, and now I’ve messed everything up with Nadima and she doesn’t want to be friends with me either.’

‘No, you haven’t, sweetie. She was worried and upset about getting a detention. Perhaps she was scared about how her parents would react.’

‘And that’s another thing! What if her parents won’t let her be friends with me any more?’

Mum reached out and tucked a bit of stray hair behind my ear. Then she said, ‘I honestly think you should get up and go in and try to sort things out. You can’t run away like this.’

‘I’m not running away! I told you, I’m ill. I’ve got a headache and I feel sick,’ I cried.

She put her hand on my forehead. It felt lovely and soft and cool. It reminded me of when I was little.

‘I really don’t feel well,’ I said, lying back on the pillow and shutting my eyes. I wasn’t even acting. I didn’t feel up to going to school. The more I thought about going in, the worse I felt.

‘OK. Stay off today. I’ll call and tell them you’re sick,’ said Mum.

‘Thanks,’ I said, rolling over and staring at the wall again.

‘Do you want me to bring you some breakfast before we go?’

‘No, thanks. I don’t want anything,’ I replied. I wasn’t even pretending.

I didn’t feel like doing anything all day. I couldn’t even be bothered to work on my website or my business plan. I just lay in bed listening to music and watching stuff. You’d think bunking off would be fun – it wasn’t. It was dead boring and I kept thinking about Nadima. And then I’d feel sick and anxious again.

All through the day I kept hearing texts pinging into my phone. I kept hoping there’d be one from Nadima. There wasn’t. They were mostly from Lily. I didn’t feel in the mood to answer them. But she kept on texting anyway. Which was nice of her.

Are you OK?

What’s up?

Are you ill?

At lunchtime she must’ve gone to find one of The Brothers to see what was wrong with me because she texted:

Gus says you’re sick.

Poor you.

Followed by:

Everyone says Hi and get well soon.

And then:

Will you be in tomorrow?

I thought about trying to skive off the next day too. But I knew Mum wouldn’t let me. Not unless I literally threw up everywhere. Besides, if I didn’t go in on Friday and sort things out, then Mum would probably make me go round to Nadima’s over the weekend. That would be even worse – I’d have to face her mum and dad.

Mum was right. I couldn’t run away from this forever.

So I texted Lil.

Much better

See you tomorrow

Jx

Tomorrow. I didn’t even want to think about it.

The next morning I was desperate to get in early enough to catch Nadima so I could talk to her on her own – without everyone eagerly hanging around with their ears flapping. Fat chance. The Brothers didn’t seem to understand the phrase ‘Hurry up! We have to go! NOW!’ It was like watching sloths race, the way they ambled to the car.

By the time I finally got into our form room Nadima was sitting between Kara and Lily, on their table.

When she saw me she blushed and looked away. She didn’t even say hi. I guessed that meant she still wasn’t talking to me. I was gutted. But I was determined not to show it, so I managed to smile at everyone.

‘Are you feeling better?’ Kara asked me, and I’m pretty sure she meant it sarcastically.

But I remembered I’d promised to be nice to her, for Lily’s sake, so I just said. ‘Much better, thank you.’ Then I slid into my seat, hoping Nadima would join me. She didn’t. Well, not until Mrs W came in for registration and by then it was a bit late to try to sort things out so I decided to leave it until break. And then the first lesson changed everything.

It was French. Much to my surprise, Lily sat down next to me. I looked round – Nadima was sitting next to Kara.

‘Hope you don’t mind,’ said Lily. ‘But when you were off I swapped places with Nadima so she wouldn’t have to sit on her own. And she seemed to get on really well with Kara helping her – so we thought we should carry on like it.’

I was speechless.

‘You don’t mind, do you? I thought you’d be pleased we were sitting together again,’ she said.

‘No, I am,’ I mumbled. ‘Course I am!’ And I would have been. I should have been. But I couldn’t stop feeling that Kara had done it again. Somehow she’d managed to steal another friend off me.