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"Sit." Miss Havisham barks, leading Fry and Bradley into the classroom. "Bradley tells me that Thomas has left the school without his parents' knowledge, and that you know where he is."

"He doesn't want Bradley to know." Fry says.

"Bradley, you may..." Miss Havisham peers at the pair of them. "You both appear to have the start of a black eye. Have you two been fighting?"

Bradley and Fry exchange a look. Bradley looks back at Miss Havisham.

"He tripped over my wheelchair and I fell out." he says.

Miss Havisham looks sceptical, but given that she needs information out of Fry, decides not to comment for now.

"Bradley, go and see the nurse." she says. "Alexander, stay here."

Bradley leaves.

"Right." Miss Havisham says. "Where is Thomas?"

"I can't tell you, it's a secret. You can only tell a secret if someone is in danger." Fry says. "And he's not."

"How do you know?" Miss Havisham asks. "Anything could have happened to him when he left the school on his own, on the way to wherever he went."

"He wasn't on his own, he was with Mark." Fry says.

"Right, so he's gone to Oaking with his brother." Miss Havisham says. "I can only assume taking the exam. Why don't his parents know?"

"Because he doesn't think he'll get in." Fry says. "He didn't want people to make fun of him."

Miss Havisham sits back in her seat.

"How very sad." she says. "We could have helped him. I assume he told you because you've been helping him?"

Fry nods. "He needs to move school because ours hasn't got a tennis court. He didn't want Bradley to know he's got to leave because they're mates. Well. They were mates."

"Well, he should have come and talked to us." Miss Havisham says, getting up.

"Is he in trouble?" Fry asks.

"Not with us." Miss Havisham says. "I shall telephone Oaking to confirm he is there, then telephone his parents to let them know. I very much doubt they will interrupt him. You may go to the nurse, and tell Bradley that I am dealing with it and that it isn't for him to know."

Fry gets up, and starts to head out of the door.

"One more thing, Fry." Miss Havisham says.

Fry turns around, startled momentarily at her dropping the use of his full name for a moment.

"There is another time when you are allowed to tell secrets." Miss Havisham says. "You can tell a trusted adult a secret any time it makes you hurt inside or feel uncomfortable or scared, or the secret is simply too big. Those secrets should usually not have been thrust upon you in the first place."

***

The next day, by break time, Tommy had come clean to the whole class what he'd been up to yesterday. One look at Fry and Bradley's black eyes had made him realise that he needed to start telling the truth.

"So how did it go?" Fry asks him eventually.

"It was hard, but I had a go at all the questions." Tommy says. "Listen, thanks for covering for me, man. My parents were annoyed that I went without them knowing but they agreed to take me back for the interview next week."

"Fry? I was there too." Xiao says, coming up to them. "I'm sorry I lied to you, I was afraid you'd be doing the test too if you heard."

"Maybe we need a clean break from all secrets." Tommy says, looking at Fry. "We just need to deal with one more to be done."

"What's that?" Xiao asks.

"I know what happened to Pixie from my trip to the Gates, and I need to make it right." Tommy says. "Fry, if you can handle one more, come with me, she seems to trust you."

Fry considers this. But he kind of wants to know the answer, so they leave Xiao and go to find Pixie, who is sat in the corner as usual with her nose in a book.

"Hey." Tommy says. "Can we sit here?"

Pixie looks up, anxiously, then nods.

Fry and Tommy sit down next to her.

"Listen." Tommy says. "It was great that you told me all the tips to get into The Gates, thanks. But I told the kids there I definitely wouldn't go without knowing what they did to you."

"Oh." Pixie says, looking suddenly much more anxious. "Did they tell you?"

"Yeah." Tommy says. "I haven't told anyone. And I won't, if you don't want me to. But I think if you let me tell Fry, between us, I bet we can think of a way so it never gets out to anyone else here. So you don't have to be so scared."

Pixie considers this.

"Okay." she says. "But I'll tell it."

Fry listens, with interest.

"After my Mum left home, I was sad a lot, and I lose all my confidence, and it was hard to make friends." Pixie says. "My Dad kept trying to help, but he would go really over the top. He made big banners saying 'Team Pixie' and he would come to every school event and make a big fuss. He moved down the road from The Gates so I could be a day girl rather than boarding. They'd only sent me to board because of the divorce.
When I moved in down the road, he kept inviting other kids for 'playdates'. I didn't really want them to come and they didn't want to be there, so it was hard. I guess eventually they got fed up with giving up their Saturdays to play with me. Three girls in my class begged Dad to take us all to a theme park. They were going to scare me on the rides so I wouldn't want to hang out with them any more.
Except I got sick on one of the rides, right on the photo section. The girls I was with thought it was really funny. One of them took a picture of the ride photo on their phone and sent it to the others. Then they sent it to their friends. They just thought it was funny. But..."

She looks at the floor. Tommy picks up the story.

"The picture got out. By Monday, the whole school had it. And then one of the older kids must have put it on the internet, and it got shared by people outside the school, and someone turned it into a meme called 'Piggy Pukey'. And you know what the internet's like, people started leaving nasty comments."

"The girls who did it, they said they never meant it to go that far. I believe them." Pixie says. "I couldn't face going back to school after I saw what people had written online. The girls came round to my house crying and said they were really sorry. But my Dad found out, and he went crazy, and sued their families. They stopped being sorry pretty quick. And he's suing the school and the older kid who put it online..." she puts her head in her hands. "If he hadn't gone crazy it would all have just blown over. Now I'm scared it'll be in the papers and everything, and then people will see it here. There's no point in making friends if I'm just going to lose them again."

"I'm pretty sure we can stop the picture from being searched on school computers." Fry says. "But we'll have to tell a teacher."

"And if anyone does find out, I'll stand with you." Tommy says. "And I'm Form Captain, because I have Natural Leadership Skills."

"And I'll stand with you too." Fry says. "Because we're both introverts and introverts sometimes need to stick up for each other."

"What's an introvert?" Pixie asks, looking up again.

"Someone who likes to be by themselves a lot. It's quite common." Fry says. "It's on this week's extra credit spelling words too."

"You mean it's... normal?" Pixie asks.

"Sure." Fry says. "Just look around." He points across the playground. "Noah's an introvert too, he only has one sister and she's much older and doesn't live at home any more, so he's on his own nearly all the time at home and he says it's peaceful."

"Not me." Tommy says. "I'm an outravert."

"Extrovert." Fry says.

"Oh, bum, that was on the test too."

***

"Jim?"

"Yes, Miss Havisham?" Mr Irons looks up from his book in a corner of the staff room.

"I need to..." Miss Havisham refers to the bit of paper in her hand. "'Block a meem'. What is a 'meem'?"

"It's, er, it's sort of a rapidly spreading idea." Mr Irons says. "Like a craze, but usually a picture or video or some catchy text or quiz."

Miss Havisham blinks.

"What for?" she asks.

"People like to join in what everyone else is doing, I think." Mr Irons says.

"Sounds like nonsense." Miss Havisham says, tutting. "Children used to manage just fine with skipping, and yoyos, and pugs."

On the other side of the room, Mr Magnesium-Fitzgerald develops a bit of a cough.

"I think you might mean 'pogs', Miss Havisham." Mr Irons says, cautiously, getting up. "I will come with you to the IT room."

"Why the IT room? Are these meems on the computer now?"

"I should think so, yes."