I opened my mouth to assure him we were genuine, but he held up a hand.

‘What you did was … not safe. My job is not really that important compared to your safety.’ He smiled for the first time. ‘That’s not to say I’m not glad to still have it. And I’m grateful to your parents for ringing up the school board and pleading my case. But you could have died out there. And I would have spent the rest of my life knowing I should have prevented it. You’d be dead, so your suffering would be over. The suffering of your parents, your family and friends would just be beginning. Think about that, Ashleigh and Aiden Delatour, before you do anything like this again.’

We promised we would.

‘Then we won’t mention it anymore. But I should tell you that you are first up for the oral presentation after recess. You decide which of you is going first.’

Aiden and I glanced at each other in alarm. An oral presentation? This was the first we’d heard of it.

‘The first you’ve heard of it?’ said Mr Meredith as if reading our minds. ‘That’s because the assignment was given out yesterday afternoon. You know, when your father had taken you home. I think you’ll find that if this comes as a surprise, it’s your fault and your fault only.’

‘But we haven’t prepared,’ I said.

‘No,’ said our teacher. ‘So you’d better use the next fifteen minutes wisely. A two-minute talk on something about you that stands out from the crowd. Now go. The clock is ticking.’

I hate oral presentations at the best of times. Aiden doesn’t seem to mind and I figured he wouldn’t be fazed by this bombshell. But I could feel my face flush with the first symptoms of panic. We went out to the verandah.

‘What are we going to talk about?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘We’ll think of something. Just don’t go on about how wealthy we are, okay? Don’t talk about the pool or the library or how Mum has her own company and travels the world. People don’t like that. They think you’re bragging.’

I knew he was right, but it also occurred to me that if I didn’t mention those things then how were people expected to know? Anyway, he wasn’t helping. I wanted to know what I should talk about, not what I shouldn’t. I was going to tell him this, but he beat me to it.

‘I’ll go first to give you a bit more time to prepare. You tell them what it’s like to be the eldest of identical twins. That’s a subject very few people can talk about.’

For two minutes? I’d be lucky to get to fifteen seconds before running out of stuff to say. I can talk an awful lot at home, according to Mum and Dad, but when I’ve got loads of people staring at me, I dry up. It’s embarrassing. But Aiden was right. I was probably the only expert on this subject for a fifty-kilometre radius. At least.