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Sarah sighed. She knew Janice would be disappointed. Theones who brought in photos always were. They came in thinking that Sarah could turn them from themselves into supermodels and celebrities. She was a hairdresser, not a magician.

She wanted her customers to feel good leaving the salon. If they felt better, she felt better. But sometimes the ones who brought photos cried when they weren’t transformed and she felt terrible.

Sarah went into theback room to get the hair extensions and found Ollie and Lucy bent over his maths book.

‘Lucy’s brilliant, Mum. She makes maths seem easy.’ Ollie grinned.

‘This young man will end up ruling the world, he has sucha quick mind. He just needs to focus it.’ Lucy ruffled Ollie’s hair.

He tried to duck away. ‘Don’t touch the hair. I spent ages gelling it.’

‘What am I going to do about Janice?’Sarah asked.

‘Women are mad,’ Ollie piped up. ‘Imagine a granny thinking she can look like a pop star.’

‘Easy with the granny comments, sunshine. I’m not that much younger than Janice,’ Lucy said.

‘What? Well, you look thirty years younger.’

‘Aww, thanks.’ She kissed the top of his head.

‘But, seriously, a granddad would never come in with a photo of Ronaldo and say, “I want to look likethis.” ’

He had a point, thought Sarah. Men were less delusional about some things.

‘Yeah, but a sixty-year-old man would buy a sports car that he can barely get in and out of and think he looks cool in it. One of the dads on Dylan’s team bought some fancy sports car, but it’s so low to the ground, he takes ages getting out. He has to open the door, grab on to the roof and heave himself up.It’s hilarious to watch – he looks like such an idiot.’

‘I heard Dylan scored a hat-trick on Saturday.’

Lucy smiled. ‘Yes, he did. He was brilliant, if I say so myself.’

Sarah was glad to see Lucy smiling again. When she had called over to Sarah the night after Dylan had got benched for being hung-over, she was so upset Sarah had got a fright. Sarah hadn’t seen her that upset in years. In fact,she didn’t think she’d seen her that upset since Tom had left. Lucy was terrified that the twins were going to be expelled. It had taken Sarah ages to calm her down.

It was lovely to see Lucy back to her old self. The only problem was, Lucy thought Dylan wasn’t seeing Taylor any more, but Shannon had told Sarah he was. Shannon had seenphotos on Taylor’s Instagram of the two of them drinkingat a party only the week before. Shannon said Kelly was really worried about Dylan’s partying too.

Sarah didn’t know whether to tell Lucy or not. But Dylan had played well on Sunday, so maybe he had only had one drink and was able to manage it all. Sarah didn’t want to upset Lucy or land Dylan in trouble unnecessarily. She’d asked Shannon – if truth be told she’d had to bribe Shannon by agreeingto do hair extensions for her – to keep her updated on Dylan’s movements.

She’d play it by ear. If he did seem to be partying too much or going off the rails, she would have to tell Lucy. It might be only a matter of time, Sarah thought glumly. From what she had seen of Taylor’s Instagram pics that Shannon had shown her, the girl liked to party all the time.

Sarah felt weighed down by all thesecrets and lies. She was keeping the Tom secret from Lucy. Dylan was lying about Taylor. Kelly was lying about Sean. All of these family and friends lying and keeping secrets from each other – it was crazy. But that was what you had to do sometimes to protect people from hurt. Sarah was keeping the Tom messages secret because she didn’t want to hurt Lucy. She still hadn’t figured out a way to tellher, and things were about to get a whole lot more complicated. Her head hurt with all the information she was keeping inside. Every time she looked at Lucy she felt guilty. What would her best friend do when she found out Sarah was in touch with Tom? Sarah shuddered at the thought.

‘Mum, hello?’ Ollie waved his hand in front of his mother’s face. ‘I want my dinner now. I’m starving.’

‘I haveto finish Janice’s hair, love.’

‘I’ll take him,’ Lucy said. ‘He can come back with me. I’ll give him something to eat and he can finish his homework.’

‘Great, and when Billy closes the shop we can go to the shed.’

‘If it’s not too late.’ Lucy smiled at him.

‘Are you sure?’ Sarah asked.

‘Of course.’

‘That’d be great, thanks.’

As Ollie and Lucy left, Jenny came through the door. ‘I just wantto make an appointment for next week,’ she said, winking at Sarah.