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‘They make my life hell.’

‘You need to stand up to them, Kelly. I know it’s hardwhen you’re on your own, but if you let them think you’re in any way weak, they’ll get worse.’

‘I do try but I have to be careful not to get into trouble in school. If I tell them where to go, I’ll end up in the headmaster’s office.’

Shannon was so frustrated for Kelly. Putting up with that kind of abuse all the time must be a nightmare. ‘It’s really crap for you, Kelly. You need to tell Lucy.’

‘I can’t, Shannon. I don’t want to burst her happy bubble.’

Shannon handed the crisps to the checkout lady. ‘Well, at least we sorted them out today and gave them a bit of a scare. Hopefully I’ll have made them think before they’re horrible to you again.’

Kelly smiled, but she knew nothing had been sorted out. She knew she’d pay for this in school.

They went back to Shannon’s house and setup the coffee-table with drinks, crisps, chocolate and popcorn.

‘Right,’ Shannon said, coming in with two glasses and curling up on the couch in her zebra-print onesie. ‘Let’s watchGossip Girl. I love that Chuck Bass, he’s so fit.’

Kelly sat back and tried to block out the supermarket incident, but she was already dreading the fallout.

Kelly trudged out of the school gate, head down, aftera day of taunting from Melissa and Co, slagging off her ‘fat friend’.

‘No wonder you don’t fit in here. You clearly like hanging around with foul-mouthed, obese lowlifes.’

It had taken all of Kelly’s resolve not to punch Melissa in the face. She could handle people being mean about her, but not about her friend. She had tried to avoid them as much as possible, but Melissa was relentless. Kellywas never so glad that school was over. She wanted to kick the wall and scream.

She kept her head low and hurried down the road to the bus stop. Then she heard a familiar whistle. She looked up from beneath the hood of her uniform coat. ‘Sean?’

‘Hey, gorgeous, I thought I’d come and meet you. I missed you.’

Kelly wanted to weep. Sean had cycled miles to see her. He’d missed her. His timingcouldn’t have been more perfect. Kelly ran over and threw her arms around him.

‘Woah, careful, you’ll knock me over.’ Sean steadied himself and hugged her back. ‘Bad day?’ She nodded into his neck. ‘Poor Kelly. Don’t let those bitches get to you.’

A car pulled up. ‘OMG, is this your boyfriend?’ Melissa squealed.

Kelly’s heart sank. Melissa was leaning out of her car window, Alicia was in thepassenger seat and Chloe was in the back, sniggering.

‘Nice bike. I think I saw one like it in a skip,’ Melissa said.

‘What is that uniform, Scumtown National?’ Alicia laughed, taking a photo of Sean.

Sean let go of Kelly and walked over to the window.Leaning in, he said, ‘Hello, bitches. How’d you like to climb out of the car and say that to my face?’

‘Why? Are you going to beat us up? Isthat how boys behave in Scumtown? Beat their women?’ Melissa said.

‘Oh, no, love, we’re really nice to the good-looking ones, but ugly girls like you and your two mates, well, we set them on fire. We can’t have ugly birds messing up our view.’

‘How dare you, I’m –’

Sean leaned in further. ‘What are you going to do? Run to Daddy and Mummy? Take another photo of my bike? Seriously, you’re pathetic.Piss off and leave Kelly alone.’

Melissa drove off, shouting out of the window, ‘Nice boyfriend, Kelly, a lowlife just like you.’

Sean turned to Kelly. ‘Are you okay?’

She nodded. ‘Yeah.’ She was lying. Melissa had seen Sean. He was her other life, her private life. She didn’t want them to know what he looked like or the bicycle he rode. She was proud of him and he was gorgeous. But she knewthey’d say horrible things about him to hurt her and it would hurt. It would hurt so badly because Sean was so special to her. She was thrilled he’d come all the way to meet her after school, but now she kind of wished he hadn’t.

‘Hey.’ Sean lifted her chin to look into her eyes. ‘Don’t let them get to you. They’re jealous of you because you’re gorgeous and you have a hot boyfriend. Just ignorethem.’

Kelly gave him a smile. He didn’t get it. No one did. You can’t ignore girls who torment you all day long. It’s not that easy. It was so bloody hard to deal with it day in, day out, and now they would be cruel about Sean and she couldn’t bear that. She swallowed back her tears. ‘Come on, let’s get away from here. I hate this place.’

‘Your wish is my command. Hop up,’ Sean said.

She saton the crossbar, holding him tightly as they cycledhome. He kissed her neck and slowly the tension began to fade.

When she got home, she checked WhatsApp and her heart sank. There was a string of photos of her and Sean, then the inevitable list of comments, going on and on … Kelly’s boyfriend and his Ferrari … Kelly’s boyfriend the thug … Kelly’s boyfriend goes to Scumtown National School …Kelly and Scumbag, a match made in Heaven!

Kelly switched her phone off and tried not to cry, but she couldn’t help it. It felt like Melissa had reached into her life and taken possession of the one thing that she really, truly cared about. She didn’t want those cows anywhere near Sean, and now the whole class was staring at him and judging him. Kelly sobbed into her pillow to muffle the noise.She felt like she was being dragged lower and lower. If this didn’t stop, she didn’t know what she’d do.