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the boys.”
    “That’s true,” I agreed.
    “Rosie is really sweet and loyal. Lyndz is so good with animals, she’s like Cuddington’s Doctor Dolittle or something,” Emma’s voice cracked. “So now you know. It was stupid, just a stupid fantasy. I never imagined that Kirstin would come to visit. Now she expects me to hang out with you all the time. I had to tell her we’d had a silly misunderstanding. I feel awful lying to her. But I don’t know what to do!” Emma was furiously sniffing back tears.
    I fished a clean tissue out of my pocket and gave it to Emma. “OK, Emma, blow your nose,”I told her firmly. “I want you to listen carefully, because I just might have a plan.”
    By the time morning break was over, an outrageous alliance had been formed between the Sleepover Club and the non-nit-infested member of the M&Ms. Of course, when I say the Sleepover Club, I really mean me, Fliss. The others still had no idea of the scheme I was cooking up.
    And as it turned out, I couldn’t tell them until afternoon break. Cause Kenny had football practice at lunchtime. I shared out my family pack of Maltesers, then I dropped my bombshell.
    My friends could not have looked more horrified if I’d grown a beard.
    Frankie choked on her sweet. “Tell me you’re joking,” she said, when we’d finished banging her on the back.
    I shook my head. “I’m not joking.”
    “NO WAY!” yelled Frankie. “I’m not pretending to be Emma’s friend for one second, let alone an entire day.”
    Lyndz looked as furious as Frankie. “Fliss, this is the class trip we’re talking about! We’ve been looking forward to it for aeons.”
    “I know,” I said guiltily. “But—”
    “But nothing. We can’t enjoy ourselves with poisonous Emma tagging along.”
    “Kirstin will be there too,” I pointed out. “Kirstin’s way cool.”
    “You can invite Britney Spears for all I care,” said Frankie sourly. “We still won’t have a good time. I can’t believe you’ve actually been fraternising with the enemy.”
    I felt terrible when Frankie put it like that, but I still thought I was right. “You didn’t see her,” I said miserably. “She looked so, I don’t know, ashamed. I know if I was feeling that bad, one of you would try to help. But Emma’s only got Emily.”
    There was a long silence.
    “She does have a point,” Kenny admitted.
    “A very minor point,” Frankie scowled.
    “Imagine if the only person you could rely on was Emily,” said Lyndz.
    “Nightmare,” shivered Kenny.
    “And then Emily gets nits,” I said.
    “It wouldn’t kill us to help Emma, would it?” Rosie asked.
    “We could take a vote,” suggested Lyndz.
    “We don’t need to vote.” Frankie stood up.
    Here we go, I thought drearily.
    I almost fell over with shock when she said, “I say we help Emma out. No matter how smelly she is!” she added with an evil grin.
    I stared at her. “Seriously?”
    “Kirstin believes we’re super cool. Let’s keep it that way.”
    Frankie’s change of heart took my breath away.
    “We’ll call it Operation Pretend Friend,” suggested Rosie.
    “Coo-ell,” everyone giggled.
    “So when does it start?” said Lyndz.
    “O800 hours tomorrow.” Frankie sounded like a soldier in a movie.
    “It’s not going to be easy,” Lyndz warned.
    “Yeah, we’re constantly going to have to watch what we say.” Kenny looked genuinely alarmed. “We don’t actually have to be nice to Emma, do we?”
    “Nice as pie,” Frankie said sweetly. “Your face muscles will ache from all that fake smiling.”
    “It might be fun,” said Rosie in a brave voice.
    Kenny gave a yelp of laughter. “You sound like my mum when she’s taking me to the dentist.”
    “At least dentists give you laughing gas,” sighed Lyndz. “We’ve got to face Emma stone cold sober. What? What did I say?”
    We’d gone into total hysterics. We kept trying to explain we weren’t laughing at her, but that just sent us off into