When I got home in the early evening, my father intercepted me before I even made it to the front door.

"The school phoned, Katherine. Just a friendly warning. Your mother is on the warpath."

I shrugged.

"I mean it, Katherine. She went up like a flipping IED after she put the phone down. What in God's name were you thinking, sweetheart?"

I loved my dad. I really did. But I didn't respect him anymore. I still saw him staring at his shoes and doing or saying nothing, while my mother spouted some sort of race-hate-filled rubbish. I knew that my dad felt differently deep inside his soul. But not standing up for his beliefs in front of his own wife made him guilty by association in my eyes.

I made sure that my sigh was loud enough to be heard by the neighbours. "I wasn't thinking, Dad. I was feeling. You weren't there. You are never there. You don't know what happened. So do me a favour and don't judge me before you have all the facts. You of all people should know better."

"I'm not judging you, Katherine. Maybe it seemed a good idea at the time. But for the love of God, you know what your mother is like. Things have been difficult enough lately between us and especially between you and your mother. Do you really have to go and tighten the wrench further?"

"I don't care about what mother thinks or what mother wants anymore, Dad. I'm old enough to make my own choices. Just let me go on in and get this bullshit over with."

I marched right into the hall and dropped my bag with a thud to make sure Mother couldn't possibly miss my homecoming. And she didn't.

"KATHERINE JANE, into the living room right away!" Her voice was already at jackhammer decibel level – and I hadn't even seen her yet, let alone exchanged any words with her. That was definitely a new record.

I entered the living room, my head held high.

"How can I not live up to your expectations today, Mother?" I asked in the sweetest tone my vocal cords managed to produce.

My mother's eyes went wide and her skin turned alarmingly red. I swear her facial expression gave a whole new meaning to the expression 'apoplectic'.

"You have always been our problem child. But we have always given everything we have to help you. To help you fit in and be normal." By the time she had reached the last word, I thought her prized crystal champagne glasses would crack. Unfortunately, they didn't, so my mother carried on, "But you never learn. You had better days and worse days, but you never really fit in anywhere – despite our best efforts. But now I don't even recognise you anymore. At least, you always used to be quiet and obedient. What happened to turn you into such a hard and cynical person – practically overnight? Isn't your life bad enough as it is?"

"I never asked for your help. I've had enough of trying to be what you want me to be. I am not Emma!" I put all the menace I could muster into those last four words, keeping my voice low and controlled. "If you can't accept that, so be it. I am who I am. Maybe that is not such a great person, maybe that is not Mrs Popular and Successful that you can go brag about to your Botox-and-bleach-blond coffee club every Sunday afternoon, but despite the fact that you brought me into this world, my life doesn't exist to make you feel better. My only suggestion is: Use Emma to brag about your offspring and use me to get all the sympathy votes. You might be surprised how ego-stroking it can be to sell my deficiencies as your cross to bear. You might even be awarded a bloody medal."

I turned on my heels and headed for the stairs.

"Stop using this kind of language and come back here at once!" my mother screamed after me.

"Make me!" I challenged before slamming my door shut. The poor thing had been taking so much abuse lately, it was a small miracle that it hadn't come unhinged like me.

* * * * *

Well, to say that the situation at home deteriorated after that would be like saying that a dead rat smelled a little strongly. I avoided going home whenever I could, sneaking in and out like some kind of elite soldier without making any noise at all. And I kind of felt like some sort of elite soldier, too, living behind enemy lines. Judging by the few conversations I overheard between my mother and my father when I was shut away in my room, there was not a great deal of love lost between those two either. But the old pattern prevailed. My mother complained, criticised, judged; my father listened, protested half-heartedly, if at all, and generally turned the other cheek. The whole thing disgusted me.

I spent most afternoons with Henry and/or the rest of our group and most evenings on my trusted bench. My room had lost sanctuary status.

I alternated between despair and anger. I had completely lost myself. Even when I was with Henry, I now felt strangely removed from reality, not as badly as I otherwise did, but it was still there.

Don't get me wrong. I tried to hold on to reality. I tried to 'pull myself together' and 'function properly'. But I felt like a total loser. There were people like Henry in the world, struggling with domestic violence and bullying. There were people like Malala Yousafzai in the world, fighting for the right of girls to have an education in a male-dominated society, being shot in the head for their efforts and still ploughing on. Then there was Katherine Shelley, whingeing and whining because mummy didn't love her. Maybe mummy was right. I was defective and I was doomed. Maybe I would do the world and myself a favour by removing myself from it. Win-win situation, you know. The only thing stopping me from giving in at that time was the little fairy tale gnome inside my soul who made sure to stoke the fire of anger every time the self-pity flame seemed to be winning the battle.

* * * * *

Trying to stick to my resolution to share my real self with others more, to try and connect with other people on a deeper level, I decided to share this latest home front situation with my new friends one afternoon, when we were all out together. We had just sat down in a grassy area in our local park, when Sue said, "I really have to hand it to you, Cat, you have totally changed in the last few days. Most of the teachers are terrified of you now. If you carry on like that, you'll be able to do whatever you want." She snickered.

To me, it felt good that my friends had taken to follow Henry's lead and had started to call me Cat. It felt right most of the time, too, because I did feel different. Not exactly the way I had envisioned Cat to be. Cat didn't turn out to be life-embracing and a bundle of belly laughs. But at least people noticed me now. Respected me. Even if was for my sarcasm and lick-my-arse attitude rather than a sparkling and inspiring personality that I had originally aimed at.

 "Did old Capote actually phone your parents in the end?" Trish enquired.

That was my cue. I took a deep breath.

"Yeah, he did. My mother wasn't too impressed, I guess. I don't know for sure because I didn't bother to stick around for the entire lecture."

"You're joking, aren't you?" All eyes were on me now.

"My parents and I, well, we don't really see eye to eye. Haven't been for a long time. Especially my mother is not an easy person to live with. She doesn't like me very much, either. She had expected to give birth to another kid like my older sister. Emma is the poster child for beauty, popularity and likeability. After having spent 17 years trying to be a version of Emma – without any success, as you can see – I have now decided that I don't give a shit about my parents' opinions and expectations anymore." I grinned. "So, I just walked off in the middle of Mother's righteous indignation. She shouted after me, 'Katherine, come back here at once!' in her grating voice, but I called her on her bullshit and simply said, 'Make me!' What was she supposed to do? Beat me up?"

"You didn't." This was Johnny, one of Henry's friends, and he sounded incredulous.

"Well, what did she do?" Trish demanded to know.

"Nothing. That's what I mean. We give our parents so much power over us. Maybe your parents are different and the power they hold over you is warranted. But my parents... Well, I'll be 18 soon. Whatever it takes, I am determined to move out then. That's for sure." 'If I last that long', I silently added. I wasn't ready to share this with anyone yet, if at all.

"With your grades, I'm sure you'll be off to university, right? How are you going to finance that then?" another friend asked.

I felt anger rise again, but managed to swallow it.

"Everyone assumes that. My mother already knows that that's the plan. No one has ever asked me. I don't even know what I want to be. I have absolutely no idea! It really aggravates me that everyone else seems to have a solid plan already. 'I have wanted to be a doctor since I was three years old.' 'I always knew I wanted to be a rocket scientist.'" I shuddered. "How does everyone do that? Or are you just saying what your parents have been feeding you since you were three years old? My mother has always known that I would study either medicine or law. I don't give a shit about either of those things. But according to my lovely mummy it is all about getting ahead, choosing a successful and safe career which will guarantee a prosperous life."

"But isn't that important? I mean, you need a steady pay check, don't you?" Johnny said.

"Maybe you are right, all of you. But I don't want to study law. I don't want to be a doctor. How can your life be prosperous if you spend it doing something you hate? Maybe I'm a little too idealistic but I'd like to do something that inspires me, something where I feel I'm making a difference. I just don't know what that is yet. Do I need a university degree for that? Who knows? I just want to make that decision for myself." I laughed out loud. "When I tell my mum that I might want to do a gap year first before I decide on anything, she'll have a fit."

This conversation was an amazing experience for me. The others seemed to be genuinely interested in what I had to say. We carried on for a while, with the others joining in, sharing their problems and insecurities about family and future. Again, this served as a revelation. I had never exchanged ideas, attitudes and values with anyone, except lately maybe with Henry. It was at this point where I truly learned to appreciate the power of dialoguing, if you will, to make us grow as human beings and thus to enable progress. Suddenly I understood that - despite the fact that I despised so many of my parents' values and guidelines – I was still the product of said values and guidelines. Only by engaging in respectful dialogue with others and by being open-minded to different ideas and constructive criticism can we come close to seeing the full picture and learn to embrace a whole new set of ideas, which, combined with our old belief systems, push us right into the future.

Of course, I didn't put this in so many words at that time, but I did feel it somehow. Let me try to explain. For example, I had always detested how my parents, especially my mother, put so much weight on making money. To her, it was all about the rat race and about appearances. And I detested that. But, of course, it's easy to be so dismissive when you never had to worry about money. It was always there in my world, plenty of it, and you can say whatever you want about my family, they were not stingy with the money they made.

But then Johnny told us a little bit about how his father was made redundant and how his mother worked her butt off stacking shelves in one of these cheap shops – Crap Nobody Needs for a Fiver, I think they are called, or at least something along those lines – every day earning hardly minimum wage. He told us how he felt guilty every time he needed new clothes or something for school, let alone when he wanted luxury items. I had always taken being well-off for granted, never even considered that I might not be able to afford what I needed and what I wanted. It somehow made me look at my parents' university aspirations for me with kinder eyes, even if that didn't mean I would go along with their plans for me.

Henry didn't contribute much, but given his family history that was to be expected.

Towards the end, things became a little uncomfortable.

The conversation started to fizzle out a little bit, and suddenly we faced this rather awkward silence. You know this situation, I'm sure. Everybody frantically searches for something to say and whoever breaks the silence first isn't always the most brilliant mind or has found the most interesting subject to discuss. It is usually the guy (or gal – I was raised white middle-class after all, so my inner thought policeman – or woman - forces me to compulsively observe the rules of political correctness at all times, even when it's in a context adversely affecting the cause of feminism) who can stand the silence the least and just blurts out the next thing that comes into their minds without engaging any kind of filter. The police and other investigative services utilise this neat little trick when they are trying to get someone to talk. Make sure there is absolute silence and people will say or ask anything to break it.

In this instance, Sue won. She and Trish had already tried more than once to find out what was going on with Henry and me, but so far always only when we had been alone. It turned out that I wasn't exactly trustworthy in Sue's eyes because right now, when no one was talking, she decided to ask, "So, Henry, when are you going to get off the pot and finally claim Cat? Cat tells us it still hasn't happened."

My blood pressure spiked; my palms felt sweaty. This felt very much like a mild panic attack coming up, but this time I activated my inner garden gnome again. I knew why this question made me feel so uncomfortable. Henry was a handsome guy. A lot of girls adored his looks. They were put off by his nerdiness, but quite a few girls acknowledged – some secretly, some openly – that Henry was hot. Well, I wasn't hot. Boys didn't look at me twice and, let's face it, a great character and a cute smile might, if you're lucky, win you a few friends, but things like that won't turn you into a sex symbol. On top of that, there was this tiny issue with me not possessing any sort of engaging personality. My smile wouldn't have won any medals, either, to be honest. So, any mention of Henry and me hooking up, usually felt, well, awkward, awkward, awkward, to say the least.

But this time, I channelled my strength and stamina. "Sue, darling, Henry can't put in a purchase order for me because as a devout feminist of the 21st century I have decided that I am not for sale. My self-respect and self-worth stem from my sense of independence and self-reliance. So, please, don't mention my good friend Henry and modern-day slavery in one sentence again."

I winked to take the sting out of my unsolicited answer. Everybody laughed good-naturedly and even Sue replied with a smile, "Wow, now I have a totally clear picture of how you sounded when you had your little heart-to-heart with our beloved Mr Kaput." Kaput being Capote's nickname, as you might have guessed, but I thought I'd clarify for those of us who are grateful for the advice on frozen pizza packaging to remove the plastic before shoving the thing into the oven. No offense.

During this entire little discourse, Henry had remained oddly quiet. He had averted his eyes and hadn't done more than mumble a few unintelligible words. His reaction concerned me, although I pretended that I hadn't noticed anything. Did this mean that he was really into me? That could have ramifications I really didn't want to ponder at that time or ever. Or did it mean that he found me as repulsive as everyone else? Well, that thought cheered me right up, considering it was the more likely of the two scenarios in my head.

* * * * *

On my way home that day, I decided to confront my parents with the fact that doctor and lawyer were off the table and that even university wasn't a given. I knew it wouldn't go over well with them, but contrary to my old self my new self was looking forward to the fight. At the same time, Johnny's words still resonated within me, making me more inclined to listen to my parents in the upcoming battle of wills and to take their concerns seriously rather than rejecting everything they would say on principle, as I had done so far.

At least that was the plan. But we all know about man and plan and God and laughter, I guess.

No sooner had I uttered words to the effect that I wasn't sure yet what road I would take upon leaving school in a few short months than my mother jumped up from her seat, nearly toppling over her after-work glass of wine.

"Of course, you are going to university, Katherine. Your lack of social skills notwithstanding, your cognitive abilities are a gift to be cherished. I will not stand idly by, watching how you squander the one good thing God has given you."

"Mum, please, can we for once talk about this in an objective way. Forget about my social skills; forget about my other shortcomings; forget about your expectations of me. Just focus on what is best for me. I'm not saying I don't want to go to university at all. All I need is a little time to find out what I want to do with my life. Doing something different first of all will give me the chance to do just that. It might even prove to be character building. Maybe, just maybe I'll improve my non-existent social skills."

"We cannot talk about your future without looking at the whole picture, and that includes your shortcomings. You are terribly naïve, dearest. Now, that is not meant as an insult. You are not even 18 years old yet. Everyone your age is naïve, but most kids realise that and decide that their parents know better. So, please Katherine, stop being silly and trust in your parents' judgement for once. With your grades, you will most likely be able to choose any university you want."

"But I don't want any universities. At least not yet."

"Well, you will go to university, and that's that."

"Well, I will NOT go to university, and that's that, mother," I spat and raced out of the room.

"Thanks for the support, John," I heard my mother hiss at my father, who hadn't said a word one way or another the entire time.

Upstairs, I slammed my poor door once again. This time, I swear, I heard the hinges groan and some wood splinter. I suppressed the urge to do it again.

* * * * *

"I was willing to listen, I swear to you, Henry, but I couldn't listen to the crap my mother was spouting one more second. I have it up to here with everything."

Fighting the urge to give in to the darkness and to grab my trusted pills and run off to my bench, I had decided to phone Henry instead, hoping this would rustle up enough anger to get me through the night in one piece.

"Your mother can't make you do things against your will when you are 18."

"At least I now know the difference between respectful dialogue and spiteful monologue disguised as some sort of conversation. I am quite tempted to let my grades slip on purpose, I'm telling you. Maybe scrap the whole school thing altogether on my 18th birthday and start training to become a hairdresser or a shop assistant or something. Nothing against hairdressers or shop assistants from where I'm standing, but everything wrong with them from where my mother is standing, at least when it comes to her offspring. I mean she goes to the bloody hairdresser's often enough."

I hadn't even heard what Henry had said in my attempt to kill my self-pity and resurrect my inner Rumpelstiltskin.

"I understand how you feel, Cat."

"And my undercooked French fry of a father didn't say one single word. Can you believe that? He's a fucking lawyer, for God's sake. Why can't he man up, for fuck's sake?"

I was venting now, riding roughshod over Henry's words, until he asked, "What do you mean by 'manning up'?"

"What do I mean by that? I can tell you what I mean by that. I mean standing up for himself, for his daughter, for what is right, even if it's uncomfortable. I mean doing the right thing, for crying out loud, Henry."

"So, essentially, you are saying that 'doing the right thing' is a man's job, correct?"

"What are you talking about?"

"I just wanted to point out that the expression 'to man up' is one of the dumbest in the English language. This has nothing to do with anything, though. Whenever someone uses it, I feel my blood pressure spiking because it's so bloody sexist. I'm sorry. I didn't want to interrupt you. Carry on."

All of a sudden, I had to laugh. The rage was still there, underneath the surface, and I was grateful for that. But here again was ample evidence that I was the unwitting product of my parents' education.

"You are so right, Henry, as always. And thank you so much for pointing that out to me. Believe it or not, but my parents have taken great pains to raise me in the spirit of gender equality and equal opportunities and using the corresponding language because 'language reflects reality and is the most powerful weapon mankind has ever created' as my mother continuously reiterates. And, miraculously, I do agree with her 'the pen is mightier than the sword' assessment. Of course, I know that you really don't care all that much about that expression and that you only said that to stop my uncontrolled rant. Thanks for that. I guess I needed your intervention. But looking at both my parents, saying 'I wish he'd woman up' would be more appropriate anyway." Then I snorted. "Sorry, stupid joke."

"It's alright. Look, if you need me there, I can come over. You know that, don't you? I'll be there for you anytime and anywhere."

"Not necessary, but thanks, Senator Obama. And before you ask, I mean that as a compliment. Obama rocks, you know."

Henry laughed.

"Well, thank you to you, too, then, I guess. But seriously, I can be there in 15 minutes if you need me."

That was the nicest thing anyone had ever offered me. I still held on to my anger, but I also felt the titanium wall around my heart cracking just a little bit.

"You are the best man in the world, Henry. Good night," I said before I put the phone down and before the l-word escaped my mouth. Because at that moment in time I loved Henry, unconditionally and with all my heart. I just didn't know what kind of love I felt.