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FOR SAM
First published in paperback in Great Britain 2016
by Egmont UK Limited
The Yellow Building, 1 Nicholas Road, London W11 4AN
Text copyright © 2016 Katy Birchall
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
First e-book edition 2015
ISBN 978 1 4052 7826 3
eISBN 978 1 7803 1701 4
www.egmont.co.uk
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication and Copyright
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
Acknowledgments
Back series promotional page
About the Author
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: You’re overreacting
So you got stuck in a plant pot. It’s not that big of a deal.
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: You’re overreacting
No, you’re right. It’s not that big of a deal. It’s not that big of a deal that a video of me stuck in a plant pot, trying and failing to get out, has been watched on YouTube by MILLIONS OF PEOPLE.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: You’re wrong
Excuse you, but you WISH you were that famous. It has not been watched by millions of people, only a few thousand. Let me check and I can tell you the precise –.
WHOA. It’s had almost two million views! That’s gone up really fast in the last hour.
Do you know what that means? Almost two million people have seen you stuck in a plant pot!
This is the best day of my life.
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: You’re wrong
I am never leaving the Hoover cupboard again. I don’t care how hard Dad is trying to tempt me out with that plate of duck pancakes he’s left right outside the door. I can smell it. He’s even shut Dog in the kitchen so he can’t get them. He thinks he’s so clever. HA.
Clearly he does not know me very well if he thinks that I would be tempted out of hiding by some stupid duck pancakes.
Honestly, I have more self-respect than that. This is all his fault in the first place, anyway. If it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be the laughing stock of the ENTIRE country right now.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: What?!
Explain to me how this is your dad’s fault?
J x
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: HELLO
Are you there? I sent that last email almost fifteen minutes ago. Why don’t you just answer your mobile? You’re so useless with your phone.
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: HELLO
Sorry about the delay there, I was just rearranging my cushions. If I’m going to be stuck in here for the rest of my life, this cupboard has to be comfy.
I can’t answer my phone because I’ve turned it off. I’ve had a crazy amount of calls and texts from people asking me to explain the plant pot situation and the beeping was driving me insane.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: I’m on to you
You went out to get the duck pancakes, didn’t you?
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: I’m on to you
Absolutely not. What do you take me for? I am not that weak. Please. Have some faith.
Like I said, I was arranging cushions.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Stop your lies
Sure. I bet your dad blocked the door with his foot when you reached out to get the duck pancakes, so you were forced to talk to him for a bit. Is that why you took fifteen minutes to reply?
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: Stop your lies
No. I was arranging cushions. Then I replied to your email.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: Stop your lies
I just got this text from your dad:
‘Hi Jess, Nick Huntley here. Anna is refusing to come out of the Hoover cupboard again. Can you try talking to her? She’s eaten the duck pancakes I left out for her. I talked to her but she tried to slam the door on my foot. N.’
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: Stop your lies
What’s your point?
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: You’re ridiculous
Tell me why you think this is your dad’s fault.
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: You’re ridiculous
HELLO. Obviously it’s his fault.
He’s the one who had to have his stupid engagement celebration party in Helena’s stupid house, where she has stupid palm tree things in her hall sitting in stupidly massive pots, which innocent victims might stumble backwards into, get their bottom stuck in and then be filmed trying to get out on someone’s stupid smartphone.
If he had stayed single and not got engaged to the world’s most famous actress I would never have got stuck in a palm-tree plant pot and I would be living in PEACE.
And also, why did people FILM it rather than help get me out?! This is what is wrong with the world today. Why did they film it? WHY?!
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: You’re ridiculous
Because you folded into the pot with your legs sticking up like that and your arms flailing around was really funny.
I’ve added it to my favourites. And I’ve bookmarked it. Now I can get it to come up on my screen with just one click.
My dad’s watched it five times. He said he’s sending it round his entire office first thing in the morning.
J x
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: You’re ridiculous
Everyone is going to be laughing at me into the next century. This is the worst way to start the new term.
How come ever since I started there a term ago I’ve been the official laughing stock of Woodfield?
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Cc: dantheman@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Desperate times
Falling into a palm tree pot is so not the worst way to start a term, Anna. You did that last term. You set Josie Graham on fire, remember?
Look, I’ve brought Danny into the conversation to cheer you up.
Danny, Anna is upset because she’s a YouTube sensation. Any kind words you can throw her way?
J x
From: dantheman@zingmail.co.uk
To: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Cc: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: Desperate times
I’ve been looking at the video and it’s actually a Dracaena Lisa plant that you fell into, Anna, not a palm tree, although they are often mistakenly identified as palms due to their similar shape. The name Dracaena Lisa comes from the Greek word drakaina, which means ‘dragon’. This is because, if you cut the stem of the Dracaena, the juice that seeps out resembles dragon’s blood.
Danny.
From: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk
To: dantheman@zingmail.co.uk
Cc: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Well, that settles it
I hate my life.
See you guys at school.
Love, me xxx
From: jess.delby@zingmail.co.uk
To: anna_huntley@zingmail.co.uk; dantheman@zingmail.co.uk
Subject: Re: Well, that settles it
Three million views and counting!
J x
‘You know, I think you will find that this whole situation will really boost your popularity,’ Jess said, leaning back against the cubicle door.
‘How, exactly?’
‘For one thing.’ She hauled her bag up from the floor sharply, causing her Chemistry book to tumble out on to the bathroom floor. Jess grimaced. ‘It makes you . . . approachable.’
‘Approachable?!’ I pulled my knees closer to my chest, struggling to maintain my balance on top of the closed toilet seat.
‘Yes.’ Jess shuffled into the corner of the cubicle and awkwardly leaned sideways to pick up her book, her forehead narrowly avoiding my knees. ‘Approachable. You’re one of the people, just like Princess Diana was.’
‘I don’t remember Diana, Princess of Wales, ever getting stuck in a plant pot,’ I huffed.
‘Probably because there were no smartphones back then,’ Jess said comfortingly.
‘This is so embarrassing.’
Jess looked at me. I could tell that she was less sympathetic than she had been before I’d forced her to cram herself into a toilet cubicle with me before school began on the first day of the summer term. ‘Are you speaking to your dad yet?’ she asked.
I sighed. The truth was, what had happened at Dad and Helena’s engagement party probably hadn’t all been his fault. But everything else that had happened up until then definitely was.
You’d think that after your dad decided that he was going to marry the most famous actress in the world, meaning that you suddenly have not only a future stepmum who has two Oscars sitting on her drinks cabinet but also a future stepsister who happens to be Britain’s most well-known It Girl, your life would get a bit better.
But noooooo. Since Dad’s sudden revelation last term I have:
1. Become the enemy of the most popular students in my year.
2. Accidentally tried to steal the Queen Bee’s boyfriend.
3. Accidentally set her best friend on fire.
4. Been left hanging upside down in a waterfall in front of my entire year, my Wolverine vest on full display.
5. Unintentionally become an It Girl in the press and almost lost my two best friends, Jess and Danny, when I attempted to use this to become more popular.
6. Sung Fame! in front of my WHOLE school, out of tune and with no backing music.
7. Fallen backwards into a plant pot, the video of which has now gone viral.
So yeah, you could say that Dad’s surprise, very public engagement hadn’t really helped my personal and emotional growth as a teenager.
And yes, it was pretty annoying of him to choose to have the party in Helena’s house rather than a super-cool exclusive club somewhere in London. I mean, come on, he’s marrying the most famous actress in the world and where do they choose to have their engagement party? At her home.
If you ask me, it’s disappointing.
But still. I guess it wasn’t not technically his fault that I fell into the plant pot. I don’t even blame Helena for having Dracaena Lisa plants in her house. Some people might think them an unnecessary decoration for a hallway. And yes, some people might perhaps have thought to move them away from a space that guests might be gathering in.
But I have decided to overlook this lack of judgement. For my humiliation there really is only one person to blame: the person who invented sausage rolls.
I told Jess this.
‘You’re blaming sausage rolls?’
‘No. Just the person who invented them,’ I stated. ‘I tried looking it up online. There’s no one listed specifically, but I bet it was someone who owned a cat.’
Jess, for some reason, looked confused. ‘What do cats have to do with anything? And why are we talking about sausage rolls?’
‘Because,’ I explained to her wearily, ‘that’s the whole reason we’re in this mess in the first place!’
At the party, I had been happily listening to Marianne Montaine, my It Girl soon-to-be stepsister, wax lyrical about her hugely famous rock star boyfriend Tom Kyzer. But Dad forced me to come with him so he could introduce me to some of his old-person author friends. They weren’t talking about interesting things like rock stars, either, just history and politics, which no one cares about really.
Luckily I spotted a waiter milling around with a platter of sausage rolls and an escape plan formed in my mind. ‘Sorry,’ I excused myself to no one in particular. ‘I’m going to go get a sausage roll.’
The waiter had sped back towards the kitchen, though, so I followed him. But as I looked back over my shoulder to see if anyone was watching, he came back out with another big tray of sausage rolls. I swerved to avoid him, he yelped, I got scared by the yelp, lost my balance and fell back into the plant pot.
Jess blinked at me. ‘And now you have a thing against sausage rolls?’
‘The inventor of sausage rolls. The sausage rolls themselves were not at fault.’
‘Well, it’s a great story that makes no sense,’ Jess nodded. ‘Now can we get out of this cubicle? There really is not enough space in here for both of us.’
‘But there are people out there.’
‘Yeah, and I’m sure they’re all desperate to hear the sausage-roll-plant-pot story.’
‘Jess, be serious. It’s all over the Internet. Everyone will be laughing at me. Again.’
‘I’m sure they won’t laugh. And if they do I’ll tell them off.’
‘Promise?’
‘Yes.’
‘OK, then,’ I gave in. Jess opened the cubicle door and squeezed herself behind it while I shuffled nervously out towards the sink and checked the coast was clear. She followed me.
‘Much better,’ she sighed, putting her bag down again so she could run her fingers through her hair in front of the mirror. ‘Now, what was I saying?’
As she spoke the door swung open and two girls from a couple of years below us came in chatting excitedly. They stopped as they saw us and then one of them hurriedly reached into her backpack, pulling out a notepad. ‘Hi Anna,’ she squeaked, coming nearer. ‘Can you sign this for me?’
Jess smiled at me encouragingly. This girl couldn’t be one of the four million people who had seen the plant-pot video.
‘Of course,’ I said in my most sophisticated voice, taking the pink sparkly pen that she offered and doing a swirly AH on the page.
‘Thanks!’ she giggled. ‘You getting stuck in the plant pot was really funny.’
I shot a look at Jess. I was very much ready for this girl to get told off.
‘It was hilarious, wasn’t it?’ Jess squealed – then she saw my face and stopped abruptly. ‘But, er, not that funny.’
I pursed my lips and then, head held high, swept past the two girls out of the bathroom. As the door swung back I heard the first girl say, ‘I’m putting this on eBay.’
‘OK, so that wasn’t the best telling-off I’ve given,’ Jess admitted as she walked beside me along the corridor, ‘but from now on I will be seriously cross if anyone even dares mention plant pots.’ She patiently waited while I fiddled around with the code on my locker.
‘Hey, anyone got any spare plant pots?’
I didn’t give Danny the satisfaction of turning round.
‘No, Danny,’ Jess said sternly. ‘That’s not OK.’
‘Hey,’ he responded defensively. ‘You’re the one who told me that you’ve sent the video to your relatives in Canada.’
I looked at Jess accusingly. She held up her hands. ‘That has definitely not happened. I have definitely not sent it to my four relatives in Canada and also a random second cousin in New Zealand.’
‘Cheer up,’ Danny said happily, giving me a nudge. ‘It’ll blow over.’
‘Can it blow over quickly?’ I hissed, my eyes darting towards a group of students with their eyes glued to a phone. They burst into laughter and looked up at me.
‘You have way more important things to care about,’ Jess said, a smile slowly expanding across her face. ‘Like your boyfriend.’
I blushed furiously. ‘Connor is not my boyfriend.’
‘Maybe not yet, but you’re a great match,’ Jess said matter-of-factly. ‘You’re both kind of weird.’
‘Did you see him lots over the holidays?’ Danny asked as Jess ruffled his blond curls. He swatted her off.
‘A little,’ I said quietly, looking round to make sure he wasn’t there. I still didn’t know how Connor, the super-gorgeous, comic-drawing, perfect-in-every-way boy who made my hands go clammy just by smiling, still seemed to like me despite all the ridiculous things I had done last term. Well, I thought he still liked me . . . ‘We saw some films.’
‘Aaaaand?’ Jess asked.
‘And what?’
She sighed. ‘I’ve only been asking you this question all holidays and you’ve been avoiding it. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I said, turning back to focus on the contents of my locker in the hope that Jess wouldn’t make fun of how red my cheeks were going.
‘Did you . . . kiss?’
‘Jess!’ I exclaimed, hitting the back of my head on my locker door, which had started swinging closed behind me.
‘Well, did you, you smooth operator?’ Jess laughed, pushing the locker door back open for me as I rubbed my head.
‘It didn’t come up.’
Danny raised his eyebrows. ‘I’m surprised at that.’
‘Why?’
‘You obviously like each other.’ He shrugged. ‘Still, I suppose you can’t rush these things.’
‘OK, Dr Casanova,’ Jess snorted. ‘Since when do you know anything about these things?’
‘Casanova was not a doctor.’ Danny rolled his eyes. ‘What I meant was that Connor and Anna are both quite shy. Or, well, I guess I mean that Anna is quite socially awkward.’
‘I am not socially awkward,’ I protested.
They both looked at me.
‘Anyway,’ Jess cried. ‘Why didn’t Connor just lunge at you?’
‘JESS!’ I yelped, desperate for her to keep her voice down.
Despite my annoyance at Jess’s lack of subtlety, it was actually a question I had been asking myself too. Connor and I hadn’t seen much of each other during the Easter holidays. I’d had a bunch of things going on, including all of the celebrity events I now had to attend with Helena and Marianne, and Connor had been going to art lessons and working on his cartoon strip, The Amazing It Girl.
But still. There had been enough opportunities for him to, you know. Lunge at me.
‘It’s none of your business.’ I fumbled for my books and shoved them in my bag.
‘Oh please, it’s always our business. You’ve been thinking about it, I can tell,’ Jess teased.
‘I have not. Well, maybe a little. It’s just . . . do you think that . . . ?’
‘Ahem.’ Sophie Parker, the Queen Bee of Woodfield, had marched over with her ever-present sidekick Josie Graham. By the scowl on Josie’s face, she clearly still hadn’t forgiven me for setting her hair on fire last term.
‘Hello, Anna,’ Sophie said, coolly.
‘Hi, Sophie, how was your Easter?’
‘Great. I spent most of it with Brendan.’
I flinched. Brendan was the most popular boy in our school. In an attempt to prove my popularity last term I had accidentally (and temporarily) stolen him off Sophie. It was all sort of behind us now, though. Sort of. ‘That’s nice.’
‘It is,’ Josie sneered, from behind Sophie. ‘Because she’s Brendan’s girlfriend, duh. And it’s nice . . . being Brendan’s girlfriend.’
Danny snorted.
‘Thank you, Josie,’ Sophie hissed back at her. Josie looked embarrassed.
‘Miss Duke wants to see you in her office, Anna,’ Sophie told me, looking at her perfectly-manicured nails. ‘Pretty impressive, getting called to the headmistress’s office on the first day of term. Oh, and don’t forget to check out the list of events for sports day. I’ve put it up on the main noticeboard.’