Stella's POV

During winter, when I would get up for school, it would still be dark outside. Today, I should be returning to school after my suspension. But I'm not going to school. According to Kate and Harry, Frida paid the head teacher a visit and told her that I need some time off as the incident that happened at school has shaken me.

At first, Mrs Barry argued and threatened to fine my foster parents for not sending me to school. Fortunately, my social worker is clever and had already prepared her argument if my head teacher had refused.

"Before I came to see you, Mrs Barry, I checked on the government's website. For our situation, it says that you can't fine anybody if you've given permission in advance," Frida argues.

"Yes and I haven't given my permission," Mrs Barry reminds her.

"Do you give permission for parents to take children on holding during the school term?" Frida asks.

"Sometimes. Depends on the circumstances."

"So you would rather permit a child to go on holiday when they should be at school than allow a girl some time off until she feels safe in your environment?"

In conclusion, Frida won and earned permission from Mrs Barry, who told her that my teachers would send me school work to complete so that I don't miss out.

A knock at my bedroom door almost makes me jump out of my skin.

"Breakfast's ready!" Kate calls out.

I check the time on my phone. Why is she waking me up at the same time I wake up for school when I'm not going today?

"It's too early!" I croak before shutting my eyes. A second later, I hear the door open and I can feel someone's presence.

"We need to drop off Jake, Josh, Evie and Ellie at school," Kate says.

"We?" I question, my eyes still closed.

"Yes, we! In case you've forgotten, Harry needs to go to work today and I don't feel comfortable leaving you on your own."

I groan but I don't move.

"Do you know the first step to starting the day?" Kate asks.

I don't answer, unsure if it's rhetorical or not.

"Getting out of bed in the morning!" she answers her own question.

My duvet that is wrapped round me like a cocoon is ripped off me; the warmth that I had before is gone.

"Now, you have two options: you get out of bed yourself or I'll have to drag you," Kate explains.

Crying should be the third option!

"I'm too heavy! You can't drag me!" I exclaim.

"You're right!" Kate agrees and the sound of her footsteps get further away and my bedroom door shuts.

Is she gone? I open my eyes, which hurt because of the light that she must have switched on when she entered the room. No sign of Kate. I sigh out of relief and shut my eyes, planning to catch some more sleep. Lesson one of the day: not everything we plan for ourselves is what life has planned for us.

The door opens again. Not again! However, this time, there's more than one pair of footsteps. Before I could open my eyes to see what's going on, four small bodies land on top of me. When I try to move, there are a bunch of giggles. I know those giggles!

"Jake, Josh, Evie and Ellie, can you get off me?" I beg.

Jake is on top of my head so that the words that come out of my mouth are muffled while Josh is on my upper body. Evie is pressing down on my stomach while Ellie is doing the same for my legs. I can't move at all!

"Please get off me!"

All of them giggle out a 'no'.

"I'll tell Kate!" I threaten.

"Nobody likes a snitch!" Jake exclaims.

"And you telling on us won't work because Kate was the one who told us to go on top of you!" Josh adds.

"What do you mean?" I ask, confused.

"Kate told us that if we stayed on top of you until you agreed to get out of bed, she will add an extra treat to all of our lunchboxes, " Evie explains.

"And if you don't get out of bed, we'll just stay here," Ellie confirms, squirming. Her movement causes her to hurt my legs and I cry out in pain," Get off me, all of you!"

"Only if you get out of bed," Jake negotiates.

If Kate is going to try to be clever, then, I'm going to have to use smart tactics.

"You four, will all be late to school," I warn them.

"Kate said it's fine if we are," Josh tells me.

That didn't work!

"I'll give you my whole stash of sweets if you get off me!"

"Kate said she'll take them off us," Ellie says.

"Kate wouldn't be happy if you get all of your uniforms creased."

"She was going to iron them anyway this weekend," Evie informs me.

How did that woman anticipate my every move? Oh wait, Harry might have not left for work yet!

"Harry," I yell, which is challenging when you have a seven-year-old boy covering your face. I don't wait for long when my bedroom door opens, revealing Harry. There's a look of surprise on his face when he notices four of his foster children on top of the oldest one.

"Help!" I yelp.

Harry looks down at his watch on his wrist before exclaiming," Oh gosh! Is it that time already? I'm going to be late for work! See ya, kids!"

He's vanished before I get to cry for help again; Kate must have warned him about the plan. When the weight of Jake, Josh, Evie and Ellie become too much for me to handle, I decide to get out of bed and climb down the stairs.

"Good morning, Stella! How did you sleep?" Kate chirps at me, beaming innocently as if she just didn't bribe four of her foster children into staying on top of the fifth child until she agreed to get up.

I throw her a death glare before settling down at the table to eat a breakfast of toasted waffles with maple syrup, whipped cream, blueberries and strawberries. The heavenly aroma makes my stomach rumble and I beat my record of how long it takes me to eat waffles. Once I've licked the plate clean, I wash my dirty dishes before wiping them and placing them in their spots in the cupboard.

The bathroom is now free so I take the opportunity to brush my teeth. After I've finished using the toilet, I go back to my bedroom to change into a pink sweater and a pair of plain black leggings; I tie the shoelaces of my pair of white and black Adidas superstars. I tie my hair into a messy bun and don't bother to apply any makeup because Kate is calling for me to hurry up.

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The bus ride to Minehead Primary School was very noisy. Wondering who was making the most noise? Us five foster care children. The other passengers kept on throwing us dirty looks and I bet they celebrated when we alighted from the bus.

We started walking from the bus stop we had got off at and five minutes later, we had entered the school gates, where we were greeted with the loud chatter of children. After saying goodbye, Jake and Josh left with their friends so that they can go to their classroom together.

Kate and I dropped off Evie at her classroom and Ellie at hers, which was next door. On the way, Evie was complaining about how her best friend has stopped playing with her for no reason. Kate told her that she would talk to the girl's mum because they were also best friends. This helped soothe Evie.

We said goodbye to the twins and just as we were about to leave, we bumped into Evie's best friend, Hailey, being dropped off by her mum.

"Hey, Mia!" Kate greeted the mum, who had just escorted her daughter to class.

"Oh, hi, Kate," Mia replied but she seemed on edge. Her merry tone didn't sound believable and even though she had a smile on her face, I could tell that it was fake. I just wasn't sure if Kate had noticed that.

"It's probably nothing but Evie told me that she and Hailey are having some friendship problems. Evie doesn't understand what's going on so I was wondering if you could talk to Hailey about it."

"I'm sure everything's fine! You know kids! It's probably the usual."

Kate frowned.

"Mia, we've been friends longer than I can remember. I know when you're lying," she said.

"Can we talk about this privately?" Mia asked, glancing at me for the first time since this conversation started.

"If you have anything to say to me, you can say it in front of Stella!"

"Kate...I've read some stuff...about Stella."

"Stuff?"

"The post on Twitter about Stella's family's past."

"What does Stella and her family have anything to do with Hailey and Evie's friendship?" Kate questioned.

"I think that for now, Hailey shouldn't be around Evie a lot," Mia responded, looking down at the ground.

"Why's that?"

"Because she doesn't want her daughter to be around the same girl that lives under the same roof as a murderer," I answered for Mia before turning to Kate, "Can we get out of here?"

Kate nodded and together we didn't turn back as we left the school in silence. At the bus stop, we waited for the bus home and although I was there with Kate, in my mind, I was still at Minehead Primary School, replaying the moment that confirmed that not only was my life ruined but also Kate's and Evie's. They've both lost their best friends on the same day. All because of me.

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A warning pops up on the laptop screen:

Low Battery

"Kate, where's the laptop charger?" I ask.

"I'll go get it. I think I left it upstairs," Kate offers.

She jumps up from the sofa, where she had previously been sitting while watching one of her boring TV shows, and walks towards the entrance of the corridor. A few seconds later, the stairs start to creak as they usually do when somebody's either climbing up or down. From Kate and Harry's room, there's a lot of shifting about while she tries to find the charger in the last place she had put it. The sound of rearranging objects stop and a moment later, Kate's footsteps are heard coming down the stairs.

"Got it!" she says when she comes back into view," I'm about to start making lunch now so you can charge the laptop in the meantime."

I shrug and close all the tabs I was using; I click onto the 'Start' menu, drag the cursor to the power button and choose the 'Shut Down' option. I plug the charger into the laptop and socket, remembering to turn on the switch. Yes, I sometimes plug a charger that is attached to a device in the socket but forget to turn on the switch! Later on, when I think the device is charged, I find that all this time it hasn't been charging and I get so annoyed!

As I wait for lunch to be prepared, I try to take interest in what is currently being shown on TV but it's a battle to keep my eyes open. Coming to my rescue, Kate brings me a bowl of chicken pesto pasta salad.

"Thanks, Kate! Would you mind if I ate this in my room?" I ask.

"You do know my 'No Eating Upstairs Policy'," Kate replies.

"Can you make an exception?"

"Do you really not want to eat with me?" Kate tries not to sound hurt but she isn't that great of an actress.

"It's not that! I just want some peace and quiet!" I insist.

"Then, I'll turn off the TV."

I cross my arms across my chest.

"You're going into overprotective mode!" I exclaim, exasperated.

"I'm not!" Kate denies.

"Don't think that I haven't noticed how while you've been pretending to watch TV, you've been watching me."

"It's not a crime to be worried!"

"I don't need you to worry about me!"

"You're going into defence mode!"

"Maybe it's because you're attacking me!"

"I'm not attacking you! I want to help you! I want you to talk to me!"

"Fine, then!" I throw myself on the sofa," What do you want to talk about?"

"Whatever you want to talk about," Kate responds simply.

"Ok, let's see, where should I start? There's so much to choose from with my life being a huge mess! There is my classmates writing that I'm a murderer on the girls' bathroom wall. There is me having no friends. Oh, of course I can't forget what happened today with your ex best friend not allowing her daughter, Evie's ex best friend, near Evie because of me. So unless you can wave a magic wand and go back in time so that I died in that car crash that killed my parents, you can't help me!"

"Don't say that, Stella! You have no idea how grateful I am that you didn't die that summer! I wouldn't have met you otherwise and I would have never got the chance to know the strong girl you are."

As Kate declares this passionately, there are tears in her eyes; I have never seen this woman cry and I've never even pictured it. The silence that surrounds us soaks in all the words angrily voiced.

"Stella, what happened to your parents and how people are treating you right now sucks! Nobody deserves what you are going through! But when the world turns it's back on you, you don't say 'why me?'. You say 'try me!'"

Lesson two of the day.