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to. The cat and Nina were not at all alike—the cat was probably a lot more like her mother: a wild thing, sometimes giving the appearance of normality, of enjoying the care and love of others, but ultimately independent. Nina, on the other hand, wanted stability, and to be loved and to love unselfishly.
    Perhaps she had the cat all wrong—it was just a cat after all. All cats are aloof. But maybe this cat was different, maybe it missed her when she left, maybe it scratched at the front door and longed for tuna and milk and a hug and some love?
    She thought of the cat during that first robbery—to calm herself down, to distract herself as Sophia instructed her to take the money from the till and put it in the bags, ‘now that’s a good girl’. Nina knew she was too young for this, she would always be too young for this. Right in front of her was a girl her own age, cowering with her mother. Why were they there? Wasn’t everyone banking on the internet these days? They both looked petrified. Nina would learn to distance herself, but never entirely. This was all so unnecessary.
    That afternoon, after Nina’s first bank robbery, they did indeed go to the beach. Tom was desperate for details, for stories.
    ‘Was it exciting?’ he asked. ‘Were there many people?’ He bounced on the spot. The sand was hot beneath their feet. She ignored him. There were too many people lying on the beach for her family to be talking about this.
    At twelve, she felt she had entered a different world from the one Tom existed in—maybe this was what becoming a teenager meant? Before, on days when their parents went ‘to work’, they had lazed around and watched TV and made packet cakes. They knew what their parents were doing then, but it didn’t feel real to them.
    Now she knew what it was like for people to stare at her in fear, for her to be the cause of that look in their eyes. She had seen her parents transform into criminals. She had seen the other side, and it was awful there. There was no excitement for her, definitely not in the way Sophia seemed to experience it. There was just her own horrible fear now.
    Nina’s first bank robbery went perfectly—Sophia had said so, quick and painless and no police—but Nina was still tense on the beach. She imagined a couple of police officers stomping across the sand, knocking her onto her towel, handcuffing her. She couldn’t say this to Tom. She’d have to lie. From now on, it felt like she had to lie about everything.
    ‘Yeah, Tom,’ she finally answered. ‘It was ace.’
    Sophia smiled at Tom. ‘Come on, let’s go for a swim.’ She winked at Nina. Nina could do nothing but stare back.

Nina
    Nina doesn’t like starting at a new school, but after being The New Girl seven times, she knows what to expect, what to do, how to deal with it. It isn’t a big deal; it’s only a temporary situation. School was never pleasant, but it needn’t be hell either.
    In order to avoid bullies and survive the next four months, she can choose one of two options. The first is to manufacture an image of herself as tough, dangerous—this requires a lot more effort than it’s worth, and can be quite risky. She could start rumours about how she got that scar on her lip in a fistfight as a ten-year-old, or how she was in juvie for the past year. If there happened to be a genuinely tough girl in the school, she would find herself in a fight, when she’s never thrown a punch in her life.
    Her second option is to make sure she’s neither too weak nor too strong—socialise, don’t be a loner, but don’t present yourself as a threat to the social hierarchy. Nina knows very well what a delicate system it is: the popular bitches, the sporty people, the hipsters, the people who party, the people who don’t. You mustn’t be too attractive, or too smart, or too funny, and you most definitely must not make eye contact with the most popular group, male or female, because that creates all sorts of