When he asked, ‘Are there any questions?’ I immediately raised my hand.

‘Is participation in the music performance night compulsory?’ I asked.

‘Yes, it is,’ he responded to my horror.

‘I don’t play an instrument,’ I croaked.

‘Your voice can be your instrument,’ he said.

Like hell it will be. Both Dad and Caitlin knew I hated singing. How could they drop me into this mess?

Finally, school ended. As the kids around me started packing up, I messaged Mum.

It took over an hour to catch a bus and train into the city, but I didn’t really care because I was so excited to see Mum.

While I was travelling, Mum messaged back.

I didn’t have any homework, so I messaged Katie.

Katie changed the topic.

I didn’t want to tell Katie how short arse Hayley absolutely annihilated me on the court.

With Katie busy, I decided to head to the sports store in the mall. As I checked out the kicks, a salesperson walked over and pointed to my shoes. ‘How are your LeBrons?’

‘Awesome,’ I said. I realised there wasn’t a better shoe on the shelf so why bother looking.

I walked over to the T-shirts and searched for another 36ers top with a logo smaller than my fist. I thought it was going to be impossible to find, but after flicking through jerseys and T-shirts like my ‘forbidden’ top, I found the perfect thing: a royal blue polo shirt with an embroidered orange 36ers logo on the chest, slightly smaller than my wrist. I took it to the counter and paid for it, then decided that I needed to go to the department shop for an escape. I’d always loved going there.

‘Let me know if I can help you with anything,’ one of the staff said when I entered and I literally felt myself exhale all of the tension from my body.

I had to go by the children’s section to get to the teen clothes and one of the child-sized Frozen dresses caught my eye. I ran my hand across the silky fabric of the Ana dress. I would kill to be able to fit into one of those dresses. Mum took me to see Frozen when I was little. We loved it.

But it was seeing a Cinderella dress that really made me happy. When I was about five, Mum used to tuck me in while pretending she was one of Cinderella’s little mousy friends, Jaq. She’d run her fingers lightly along my arm and sing in a mousy voice:

‘Cinderelly, if you don’t go to sleep

You will never go to the ball