I want to tell her everything, but also I just can’t. And suddenly I’m angry; why am I so far away? Why does it have to be this way? Why, why, why?

Tryouts, or auditions, as they call them here, are overrated.

So we get off classes for an afternoon, big deal.

Instead of sitting in class — where I could doodle or daydream or do my own thing — I’m standing in a crowded hallway, surrounded by hyper, chattering girls, and feeling like the world’s biggest loser for having no one to stand with, or talk to.

I never had anyone to stand with or walk with, never thought I wanted or needed them, but it always felt like my choice.

Now, rebuffed by the girl most interested in being my friend, I feel… off-kilter.

I stand awkwardly in the hallway as five girls at a time enter the dance auditions room. Honestly, I don’t have much interest in dance, but I guess I can dance, and it’s better than choir. I’d probably enjoy acting, but the lines outside the play tryouts stretched down two hallways and a staircase in between, something about the play heads trying every girl out individually for five minutes at a time, so I gave up on that.

Noise all around me, none of them even my classmates, argh. In front of me is a tight foursome, probably from Year 9, wearing identical hoodies draped over their shoulders. Behind me is a short girl who looks too young even for Year 7. She also looks so nervous I want to pat her on the head, but then she leans in toward her best friend and they whisper and giggle, and every so often, dart a glance in my direction. Probably wondering why in the world this weird new girl in Year 10 is standing totally alone with no one from her class.

I try for my most casual, don’t-care air, even as I glance around for a familiar face. At this point, even Faiga Berg would do. But zilch.

I want to muster up some interest in production, this creative stuff is really up my street, but I’m feeling super self-conscious and from my vantage point leaning against the wall, it all looks so stupid and shallow, the giggling and whispers and the fragments of sentences I’m catching from the quartet in front of me: I hope I’m in the sharp dance and they better put us together, ugh, Mrs. Perr will never… she always splits up friends.

I want to tell them that Mrs. Perr is right, that play time is the best way to get to know other girls, that there would be no point in spending all those hours with the same girls you’d spend time with at home, but that would be admitting I care.

The door in front of us opens, and a bunch of younger girls pile out. Next five up, that means the foursome clique and me.

Joy, oh joys.