Amy laughs. “I was having a bad day. But I’m better, now.”

I step back and say, “I’ve got to go. You should probably ask for another partner.”

“Meet me at break.”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

I can feel my panic bubbling like a kettle starting to heat up. I could risk it coming to boil, but it’s easier to switch it off.

“I can’t,” I say, mostly because I don’t usually spend time with girls, and partly because this one used to live in my house.

She shrugs and says, “No worries.”

I walk away, thinking of the day I met her, when she left and didn’t look back. This time, I can feel her watching. I turn and see her sitting on the top step with a book in her lap, looking at me, then the book, then back to me, scribbling like it’s the last five minutes of an exam.

Then I think of the holes in my door: the echoes of a story Amy may be too afraid to tell.

I could ignore her until she gives up and bothers someone else. Or I could talk to her and find out if I’m right.

8

You know those songs you hear in the morning and can’t get out of your head all day? It turns out some girls are like that.

In class, Amy gate-crashes my thoughts. I keep having flashbacks of her on the steps and that big smile. Most girls look at me by accident, but she did it on purpose.

I should be thinking about her because of the doors. I should see her as a mystery to solve. But I think it might be more than that. She shakes up my thoughts like the insides of a snow globe, and I need to focus.

At break, I go back to reception, and she looks relieved and says, “I’m here for the tour.”

This isn’t me. I usually avoid being sociable, but, if I want to find out the truth about the holes, I need Amy to trust me. That’s why I show her the school again, except, this time, I’m honest.

“The laptops are ancient, and they take the common room away whenever there are exams,” I say.

“If you have classes in the trailers, don’t take your coat off unless it’s boiling outside. And don’t turn left after you leave school. They mug kids in that alley. Even the teachers turn right.”

Amy nods and says, “It’s still better than my last school.” I think of St. Gregory’s Academy—the redbrick girls’ and boys’ schools standing side by side—and wonder if she’s joking. From what Nia says, it sounds like a different world—a lot better than this one.

At the running track, I point at the extra white line painted on the grass and say, “That’s Simon Marlow’s head-start line.”