After I had shaken my head around to dry my hair I went into the loo. On the loo door it said:

Couldn’t you hang on for a bit?

Oh phew. I was certainly feeling the bleeding slippers of fame. And maybe even the bleeding bottom of fame. I’m going to just have a look to see if I have got a bruise on my …

Flossie shouted, “Lullah, where are you? We are going to the sacred tree again to eat our lunch.”

I said through the door, “I’m just having a little private …”

Flossie looked at me from under the door.

“Poo?”

“Er, no. I’m just …”

Then Jo’s head popped up over the next cubicle.

“Come on. You’re being selfish, just looking at your own bottom. I want to talk about me and whether Phil might be at the tree today.”

This was ridiculous.

Vaisey’s curls bobbed up next to Jo and she looked down at me and said, “My head’s not so red any more, is it? Maybe the boys will be at the sacred tree. Come on, Lullah.”

I was being looked at in the loo. This would have never happened at my old school.

I staggered out. Ouch, ouch!

When we got there, the boys weren’t at our tree.

I said, “Come on then, let’s go back.”

Then we heard the barking of dogs in the distance. And coming nearer, the sound of panting and crashing through the trees.

It was really scary and for some reason we all got onto a tree stump that was about a foot high, and held on to each other. Vaisey practically had her head buried in my corker area.

The barking was getting closer and closer and so was the panting and crashing.

I said, “Maybe it’s a pack of wild otters.”

Jo said, “I can hear barking.”

I said, “Well, a pack of barking wild otters.”

Jo said, “Otters don’t bark.”

I said, “They do now.”

Flossie said in a doomy voice, “No, no, it will be Fang and his wild child puppies.”

Noooooooooooo.

The panting and scuffling got nearer and nearer. We closed our eyes. I was so tired after being Mr. Sharky, I said, “Please don’t hurt us. We mean you no harm.”

The crashing stopped and a voice gasped, “Bloody hell, it’s the Tree Sisters on a stump!”

Charlie.

It was Charlie, Jack, Ben, and another couple of lads we had seen about from Woolfe Academy. But no sign of Phil. Perhaps the otters had got him.

We were still on the stump while the boys flung themselves onto the ground, panting and sweaty. They had tracky bums on and vests with numbers on the front. And attached to the numbers were a couple of sausages.

Jack was getting his breath back, but then he said, “Hello, Vaisey,” and he beamed at her.

She looked a bit shy and then smiled back at him. Her curls were all smiley. She’s right—Jack has got a nice cheeky face. His teeth are crooked but in a good way and he’s got curly hair like hers. As I was looking at him I caught Charlie’s eye and he smiled.