Mr Mack cleared his throat. ‘Now, our new girl captain is …’

The desktop drum roll started up again.

Holly was banging away furiously, partly to cover up her own nerves. In fact, she was making so much noise she didn’t hear what Mr Mack said.

‘What did he say?’ she asked Lily.

‘You heard!’

Holly realised Mr Mack was looking right at her. ‘Come on, Holly,’ he laughed. ‘Stand up and take a bow.’

Holly stood up slowly. Is he really saying that I am the girl captain?

But then all her classmates started cheering and clapping. She turned and peeked at them, still in shock.

It is me! she thought, grinning and blushing at the same time. How amazing!

It was like a dream, or the end of a really good movie where everything works out perfectly.

And I wasn’t even going to run! she thought to herself, as Mr Mack handed her the shiny new captain’s badge. It was all Lily’s idea!

That made her think of Lily. Holly looked down at her best friend, hoping to see Lily grinning up, but it wasn’t like that. Not at all.

This time, Lily was concentrating very, very hard on sharpening a pencil.

Oh, thought Holly. It’s like that.

When the clapping died down, Holly said, ‘Thank you for voting for me! I promise I’ll work really hard to make this term great!’

She sat down quickly and looked again at Lily. Lily didn’t look at her.

‘Lils?’ whispered Holly.

Lily ignored her.

‘Hey, Lily,’ Holly tried again. ‘You OK?’

‘Yep,’ said Lily, staring straight ahead at the whiteboard.

‘OK,’ said Holly.

Lily was obviously mad, and she obviously didn’t want to talk about it. Holly wasn’t going to push it. She hardly wanted to get busted for talking in class in her first minute of being captain.

I’m class captain! thought Holly, feeling another rush of excitement as she pinned the metal badge onto her shirt. Unbelievable!

She glanced again at her friend, but it was like Lily had put up an invisible wall between them.

Holly sighed. I hope we can sort this out at lunch. I don’t want to fight with my best friend over being class captain.

Talking to Lily at lunchtime wasn’t as easy as she’d thought, though. For one thing, all the girls wanted to congratulate her.

‘You’ll have to keep Oscar in his place,’ said Layla. ‘Otherwise, he’ll try to make us all call him Captain Oscar every time we speak to him!’

‘Yeah, you might have a tough time captaining with him,’ laughed Olivia.

Holly smiled, and then looked around for Lily. She’d thought Lily was right beside her when they left the room, but then she’d disappeared.

Holly stood on her tiptoes and craned her neck to look past the girls standing in front of her.

There she is! Up by the oval, watching the boys play football. Holly frowned to herself. As if Lily’s ever watched football in her life!

When she rocked back on her heels again, Holly saw that Ching Ching was now standing beside Olivia.

Ching Ching grinned at her. ‘Congrats!’

‘Thanks,’ Holly said, then she lowered her voice. ‘Can I ask you something? Are you upset you didn’t get in?’

‘Nope,’ said Ching Ching. Then she scrunched up her nose. ‘Well, maybe a tiny bit, but not really.’

‘So you don’t feel ripped off? Or, I don’t know … mad at me?’

‘No!’ said Ching Ching, looking shocked by the idea. ‘You deserve it. I wish I’d thought of raising money for planting trees. Anyway, you didn’t become captain by yourself. The whole class voted.’

‘Yeah,’ said Holly thoughtfully. ‘Thanks, Ching Ching.’

I don’t think Lily sees it that way …