in our schools, then make friends and try to muscle in on our lads…’

I will never get through to Lily – she doesn’t want to know. She’s a bully, mean and sour and spiteful, and nothing I can do or say will ever make her like me. I wish that didn’t matter, but it does, somehow.

‘My father did not take the job of an English man,’ I tell her. ‘He gives people jobs, and my mother does a job no English person wants to do. The place we live is cold, damp, ugly. I don’t want to be here, but I have no choice, Lily, OK?’

‘My heart bleeds for you, Sauerkraut Girl,’ she says, blowing a perfect smoke ring into the November air. ‘You and your loser friends.’

I’d like to slap Lily Caldwell, wipe the smirk off her cold, cruel face, but that would make me as bad as she is. I turn, looking for the white markers, the way back to school, and I break into a run, leaving Lily behind.

Miss Barlow is not impressed. ‘You were in pairs!’ she tells me, as if I didn’t know. ‘Besides, the others were back ages ago! Where is Lily?’

Blowing smoke rings in the woods, I think, but I don’t say that.

‘Ridiculous!’ Miss Barlow huffs. ‘Didn’t you understand a word I said?’ She makes me stay behind and tidy up the gym cupboard, and I’m still sorting through crates of tennis balls when Lily strolls back into the changing rooms ten minutes later.

‘Lily!’ the teacher yells. ‘Where on earth have you been?’

‘Looking for her,’ Lily says smoothly. ‘She ran off and I didn’t want to come back without her…’

‘Typical,’ the teacher says. ‘Get changed, Lily, and run along.’

Miss Barlow walks away, and Lily flings a lazy smirk over her shoulder at me. ‘One thing,’ she says, and I hold her gaze steadily, a part of me still hoping for something that won’t happen, for a friendship that will never be offered.

‘Yes?’

‘Dan Carney,’ Lily says in a whisper. ‘Stay away from him, OK? He’s way out of your league.’

‘League?’ I echo, frowning. ‘I don’t understand…’

‘He’s mine,’ says Lily. ‘Hands off. Dan Carney is mine.’

The trouble is that Dan Carney doesn’t seem to know he belongs to Lily. On Sunday morning he turns up at the flat, telling my parents he’s helping me with a school project about Liverpool.

There is no school project, except in Dan’s head, but his bright eyes and wide grin make up for that. He has my parents eating out of his hand. They don’t know that Dan is trouble, or that he belongs to another girl. They think he’s sweet, and practically bundle me into my coat in their enthusiasm to see me settling in, having fun, doing something with a friend.

We walk towards Princes Boulevard in silence.

‘You’re cross with me,’ he says. ‘What did I do?’

‘You just turned up again, no warning!’ I huff.

‘But I promised,’ Dan says. ‘I said we’d explore some more! It took a while to plan, that’s all. I wanted to surprise you.’

‘I’ve had enough surprises,’ I tell him. ‘Sometimes I see you, sometimes not. Sometimes we are friends, sometimes not…’

‘I thought I explained,’ Dan says. ‘It’s complicated. My mates think I’m a hero, the teachers think I’m heading for an ASBO. I’m just juggling it all, trying to keep Mum from finding out, because that’s the very last thing she needs…’

I bite my lip. I wish I could forget Lily Caldwell, her cold grey eyes, her perfectly painted lips blowing smoke rings into the frosty air, but I can’t.

‘And your girlfriend,’ I ask Dan. ‘What does she think?’

Dan stops walking. ‘I don’t have a girlfriend,’ he says.

‘Lily says you do.’

‘Lily?’ he echoes. ‘Er… you’ve got that wrong, Anya. Lily is just a mate!’

‘This is not what Lily says.’

‘No way!’ Dan argues. ‘I’ve known her since primary school. I like her, sure, but… Lily’s just one of the gang! You must have misunderstood.’

I know different. Language barrier or not, Lily made herself very clear.

Dan takes my hands, right there in the middle of the pavement. ‘If I was going to ask a girl out… well, trust me, Anya, it wouldn’t be Lily.’

My heart soars, and for a moment I don’t care about Lily Caldwell. Dan likes me… I know he does!

‘Only, it’s not that simple,’ Dan sighs, and the dreams come crashing down around my feet. ‘I can’t ask anyone out right now, because my life’s a mess and I can’t keep myself out