When she was five years old, Judy Smith unintentionally caused an accident which crippled her younger sister, Audrey. Years later, Audrey could only walk with the aid of a stick, and Judy still felt guilty about causing the accident. Secretly, Audrey had never forgiven Judy and was determined to make her suffer too.
Cheryl Todd was left to look after her two brothers, sister and invalid father when her mother went missing. Cheryl’s great passion was for drama and she won a scholarship to a special stage school, but the scholarship was being withdrawn and, unable to afford the school fee, Cheryl looked like having to give up her dream of becoming an actress.
Katie Briggs and Catriona Challoner lived very different lives — Katie in a poor part of town with her large, crowded family, and Catriona, an only child, with her parents in their luxurious detached house. Then the girls found a family of young kittens whose mother had been killed. Catriona’s mother disliked animals, and Katie’s small brother was allergic to them, so the kittens had to stay in the shed where they were born, and the girls secretly looked after them, although they didn’t always get along.
