Charlie thought she’d got clear, but the kick had slowed her down and her sneaker squealed as it hit a puddle. She started doing the splits, but managed to rebalance. As she tried pushing into a run, the giant got an arm round Charlie’s waist.

The pocket on the back of Charlie’s jeans ripped as the giant failed to hold on. Tracksuit had enough breath back in her lungs to launch a kick, but the giant started squealing like something out of a horror movie. One of the giants’ manicured fingernails had snagged Charlie’s T-shirt, and Charlie was horrified to see a tear in her shirt, filled with a bloody fingernail.

As Charlie tried to scramble up before Tracksuit could kick her again, the giant dry heaved, nauseated by the blood dripping from her fingertip.

Still half blinded by saliva, Charlie found her feet and scrambled towards the door. But the giant’s screams had brought attention from across the hall and a hairy-legged gym teacher blocked the entrance.

‘Ladies, ladies, what the heck?’ the coach yelled, as he took in Charlie’s gasping, spit covered face, the giant trailing drips of blood across floor and Beaky staring mortified at her cracked iPhone.

Charlie was breathless, tearful and hurt in at least four places. She’d been relieved when she first saw the teacher, but Charlie wasn’t confident how things would pan out when it was her word versus the word of three best friends out of Swallow Park.

23 VICE PRINCIPAL

‘I’m jinxed,’ Charlie moaned. It was five in the afternoon, and she sat on the floor at the end of her bed with puffy eyes and her phone tucked between face and shoulder. ‘Isn’t luck supposed to even up? Because, if it does, I must deserve to win the state lottery by now.’

Harry was shocked hearing about Charlie’s day and tried to sound soothing. ‘So what happened after that?’

‘This nice girls’ coach came in. Luckily she knew what monsters those other three were, and she pointed out that this Meghan girl never could have got her nail ripped off the way she did unless she’d tried to grab me as I ran away. Then she got a wet towel from her office, so I could wipe the spit off.’

‘But you still got in trouble?’

‘It didn’t look great when we got to the vice principal’s office. One was sobbing over her smashed phone and there was Meghan with her finger bandaged up. The other girl was going for an Oscar. She had her inhaler out, saying I’d set off an asthma attack. All I had was a ripped shirt. It almost looked like I’d beaten the three of them up!’

‘Where was the teacher who took your side?’