Lots of little bad things and five very big bad things happened during my stay with the Roystons.

The first very bad thing was that I hated, hated, hated Maudie’s school. Because it was nearly the end of the year, everyone had already made friends, and there were no friend spaces available anywhere. I missed Venita and Maynard and hoped someone would explain to them why I had suddenly disappeared. I wondered who they would be friends with now, and whether they wouldn’t need me anymore when I went back next year. I thought about writing a letter to Maynard, but I realised I didn’t know his address. I asked if I could look in the Roystons’ telephone directory to find it but they said they didn’t keep one – all the numbers they needed were in the list of church members that were copied and distributed at the beginning of each year.

My temporary teacher seemed okay but didn’t try very hard to help me fit in, and largely left me alone. She seemed perpetually exhausted. Sometimes she set us work and rested her forehead on the desk at the front of the room. One day she didn’t even look up when the bell sounded; she just lifted her right hand and waved us all away. Her name was Gloria Gizzard, and I wondered to what extent an ugly name had contributed to a tired life.

I spent the breaks by myself, although for the first couple of days Maudie and her friend Susan came to find me. But I could tell Susan wasn’t that keen about being friends with me and by the end of the first week they gave up. Maudie walked to school with me, but I walked home by myself.

I spent a fair amount of time in the library. The librarian was nice, although not as good as Mrs Sandicock at Rostrevor Primary. They had three books on knights I hadn’t seen before, so that was a bit of a highlight. I asked if I could see a telephone book, but she said they didn’t keep them in the library and I wasn’t allowed to go into the staffroom. One lunchtime I decided to go and look in a phone booth I had seen on the way to school. I took a pencil and a piece of paper so I could write down addresses. I would look up Maynard’s address, the Hodgesons’ address and Aunty Maisie’s address so I could at least write people letters and let them know where they could reach me.

I didn’t know you weren’t allowed to leave the school yard without permission, although I should have realised that when I was the only one to walk out of the front gates. I must have taken a lot longer to walk to the box and find all the names than I realised because when I returned to school, everyone was back in class. There were three prefects walking around the grounds, pretending, as I found out later, to be looking for me, but really they were just having an extended lunchtime and giggling together.