I nod. I don’t let many people touch my knitting. I learned that the hard way. Some folks turn into kittens and can’t help pulling and tugging. But Annie knows what she’s doing.

She sits down on the bed, with the knitting in her lap. She gently nudges the tip of the needle under the dropped stitch and lifts it. I watch as it slips back down the needle to join the others. She does it again and again.

“Good as new,” Annie says.

“Thank you.” It comes out as a whisper, but I know she’s heard me.

*

Annie makes me eat lunch. Luckily, there’s macaroni cheese left over from yesterday and I’m so ready for it. Annie’s even sliced up some of those baby cucumbers that I like because they’ve actually got flavour. Sweet cucumbers to sweeten me up.

She unloads the dishwasher as she talks to me. We both know that’s my chore, but it’s easier to have these kinds of conversations if we’re not staring at each other across a table.

“I know you think the school’s being unfair,” Annie says. “But if you could do it this once, Charlene. Say sorry. Make our lives easier.”

I push the last slice of cucumber aside. “But I’m not sorry,” I say. “I’d be lying.”

Annie turns to face me. She has her thinking face on. “What if you start off writing a letter to someone who you … maybe … you really think you do owe an apology to?”

I don’t reply, but I instantly know who that would be.

“Then maybe when you’re in the sorry zone, you can knock off a couple more letters.” Annie says this so fast I almost miss it. “Before your brain kicks in and realises what you’re up to.”

“You want me to trick my head into writing ‘sorry-not-really-sorry-letters’?” I say.

“Something like that. Think about it.”

Annie kisses me on the cheek before she goes.

I clear away the lunch things and go back upstairs to my room. I don’t pick up my knitting straight away. I look in all the books until I find the pictures of the T-rexes and lay them side by side. I think about handing Kandi the finished blanket and watching her unwrap it. She’d grin at me, so happy. Maybe I can even teach her how to knit too. When she’s older, Kandi might make something for me.