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“You’re going out with a boy from a building site?”
“Why not?” I bristled. “He’s nice, he’s polite. He’s foreign. Polish, I think. Maybe Russian? I don’t know! Anyway, his name’s Alex and he’s definitely not Irish.”
Katie said, “Oh, well, that’s all right then.”
I had this feeling she was being sarcastic. I said, “Jimmy Doohan’s Irish. You’d go out with Jimmy Doohan fast enough!”
“Jimmy Doohan doesn’t work on a building site.”
“He might do! In his holidays. How do you know?”
“Holidays are different,” said Katie.
Of course, I suddenly realised: she was probably a bit put out. Even, maybe, a bit jealous? Still, I didn’t like the thought of her feelings being hurt. She was my best friend, after all.
“It’s so weird,” I said, “the way things turn out. I mean, me living in the same road…if it had been you living there, it’d probably have been you he asked.”
“I wouldn’t go,” said Katie.
Well! How ungracious was that? And there I’d been, thinking we could chat about what I should wear, the way other girls do.
“No point getting the hump,” said Katie.
Pardon me? I wasn’t the one getting any hump!
“I just think it’s a bit dodgy, going out with someone you haven’t even properly met. I mean, who is he? You don’t know the first thing about him!”
“So I’ll find out,” I said. “We’ll talk.”
“He could be anything.”
“So could Jimmy Doohan,” I said. “Who knows what he gets up to in his spare time? He could be a drug dealer, for all we know. Could go round bashing old ladies over the head. I reckon you have to have a bit of trust or you’d end up never going out with anyone.”
She grew a bit hot and pink at that. I immediately wished I hadn’t said it. But quite honestly you can’t afford to leave these things too late or you’ll run the danger of never getting going at all. Ellie might be only ten, but already she knew far more about boys than either me or Katie. The situation was growing desperate!
“Have you told your mum?” said Katie.
It was my turn to grow pink. She’d asked a good question, cos the answer was no: I hadn’t told my mum.
“Are you going to?”
Slowly, I shook my head.
“Dunno why not,” said Katie. “If there isn’t anything wrong with him.”
“There isn’t anything wrong with him! He’s really sweet. It’s just…you know what mums are like.”
“I know what mine’s like; shouldn’t have thought yours would mind.”
Katie always says that my mum, being an actor, isn’t as strict as other people’s. Like she doesn’t care what me and Ellie get up to. It’s true she doesn’t fuss and flap, but I wasn’t sure she’d be too pleased at me going off on a date with a boy I’d only just met. She’d want to know who he was, and where he lived, and how old he was, and all stuff I couldn’t tell her. All I really knew was his name, and that he worked down the road. It was probably guaranteed to get even my mum in a flap.
“So if you’re not telling her…” said Katie.
“I thought I’d say I was coming round to you!”
There was a pause. “Is that all right?” I said.
For a moment I thought she was going to say an outright no, or even suggest she came with us. We were so used to doing everything together I could understand if she took it as her right. In the end, somewhat grudgingly, she said she would think about it. “I’ll let you know.”
I said, “Please Katie, pretty Katie, please!”
She didn’t even smile; just repeated that she would let me know. I definitely sensed a coolness between us.
The last time we’d had a coolness was when Katie had been asked to Millie Simms’s party and I hadn’t. I’d felt really hurt. I’d almost felt that if I couldn’t go then Katie oughtn’t to, either. So I didn’t hold it against her, but I didn’t want to ask her to join us. She might be my best friend, but Alex had asked me. And I wanted it to be a proper date!
I wondered if perhaps I could tell Mum I was going round to Beth’s. That’s Bethany Dewar, who’s in our class. She’s not a particularly special friend, but she lives quite near and she knows about boys, and about the need for sometimes having to keep things from your mum. She’s what my nan calls fast. Some of the girls say she’s a slag, but that’s unfair; she just has this reputation because boys find her attractive. What’s so wrong with that? I wouldn’t mind boys finding me attractive!
I decided that I would call Beth and tell her the whole story. In fact, to be honest, I was dying to tell her the whole story! Swear her to secrecy and soon it would be all over the place…guess what? Tamsin Mitchell’s got a boyfriend! And at least that way I wouldn’t run the risk of Katie having second thoughts.
I was sitting on the bus, on the point of dialling Beth’s number, when a text came through. It was from Katie.
U can tell ur mum ur with me OK. I wont split. Luv Katie.
How do people exist without friends??? I wasted no time in texting back:
Fank U, fank U. I will do the same 4 U.
She rang me almost immediately to say that I wouldn’t ever have to do the same for her “cos I wouldn’t ever go out with someone I didn’t want my mum to know about!”
“It’s only just this once,” I pleaded.
“That’s what you say now,” said Katie.
I couldn’t help feeling a little tingling of excitement…
CHAPTER THREE
I spent practically the whole of Sunday morning trying to decide what to wear for my date with Alex.
First of all, I put on my best pair of jeans—skinny, with little diamantés—and a blue top. Then I thought maybe jeans might be a bit too boyish.
So I took off the jeans and put on a skirt, only the skirt didn’t go with the top, so I took off the top and put on a blouse, but the blouse had a weird flat sort of collar which made my neck stick out like a broom handle. (I have rather a long sort of neck, which Mum tries to make me feel better about by saying that it is elegant.)
Crossly I tore the blouse off and scrunched it up and shoved it in the back of a drawer. Why had I ever bought the stupid thing in the first place? Ellie wouldn’t have done. She’s hugely fashion conscious, is Ellie. Always designer labels and nothing older than about six months, cos if it’s older than six months it’s past its shelf life. And Mum encourages her! So does Dad; they both think looks are important. Which I guess they are, if you’re going to be an actress. If you’re just a boring boffin like me, then who cares? I’d always known I couldn’t compete with Ellie, so I’d just never bothered. I always told myself that looks didn’t matter. I might even have believed it…until now.
Suddenly, I was in a panic. I tried on another top, another skirt. A short skirt, a long skirt. A plain top, a stripy top. An off-the-shoulder top. A crop top. A dress. Another dress. Denim trousers, white; combat trousers, green. I even tried a pair of shorts! I was that desperate. In the end, with the entire contents of my wardrobe scattered across my bedroom floor, I went back to what I’d started with, the skinny jeans and the blue top.
At that point Ellie came battering at the door, demanding to be let in. She knows she has to knock, but it’s a totally empty gesture since she never actually waits to be invited. She just barges her way in.
She said, “Yikes! What’s all this?”
I said, “Clothes. What’s it look like? Don’t trample on them!”
“I can’t help it, there’s nowhere to walk. What are you doing? Are you going out?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Just taking an interest. Where you going?”
“I’m going round to Katie’s, if you must know. What d’you want?”
“Um…” She pressed a finger to her nose, then giggled. “I can’t remember! Why are you getting all dressed up just to go to Katie’s?”
“Cos I want to. Get out!” I gave her a shove. “I’m busy!”
“Cool jeans,” said Ellie. “Oh—” She stuck her head back round the door. “I just remembered…I’m on telly in half an hour!”
On telly! Pur-lease. One of about five thousand faces in a crowd. She’d gone to the filming of some kids’ TV show. Now you’d think she was the big star.
“I’m sure they got me, I was smiling like crazy at the camera. Dad’s going to record it!”
“In that case, I can see it later,” I said. “Now, go! I’ve got things to do.”
I wished I could have told her I had a date, but she’d never have been able to keep quiet about it. She’d go and blurt it out to Mum and Dad, and then they’d want to know who I was seeing and where we’d met, and I just knew if I said “He works on the buildings down the road” Mum would freak. Dad too probably.
I filled in the rest of the time until lunch by putting on lipstick and taking it off again. Then putting it on again, then taking it off again. Then plaiting my hair, then unplaiting it. Then putting it up, then letting it down. God, this was frightening! I wasn’t fit to go out on dates. I just had no sense of style whatsoever.
I went down to lunch minus the lipstick, with my hair hanging loose. Then immediately after lunch I rushed back upstairs and did my lips with Topaz Glow and put my hair into a sort of complicated pleat thing. That was better! Now I looked sophisticated. I felt it was important to look sophisticated. Alex wasn’t just some silly little spotty schoolboy like everyone else went out with. He was practically grown-up!
“So when can we expect you back?” said Mum, as I left.
“Oh…I dunno!” How long should a first date last? Would we just have coffee and that would be that? Or would we…go for a walk, maybe?
“I mean, you’re not planning to spend the whole evening round at Katie’s? Because you know we’re going to Giovanni’s.”
I said, “Are we?”
“To celebrate Ellie’s first TV appearance.”
She had to be joking!
Mum gave a little giggle. “I know it’s daft, but the
camera really loves her…they went back to her twice!”
Big deal. But what did I care? I had a date! I assured Mum that I would be back in plenty of time.
“You’re sure you don’t want me to take you over to Katie’s? I can, if you like. And do you want one of us to pick you up?”
I said, “No!” And then, because it came out as a sort of yelp, I added, “It’s OK, honestly. I can get the bus,” and shot out of the gate and up the road as fast as my slinky strapless backless sandals would carry me. Which wasn’t very fast as I kept falling out of them.
Alex was already there, in Starbucks, waiting for me. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and looked just, like, totally gorgeous. There are some boys who can wear T-shirts and some who can’t. I think it is so wimpy, for instance, when boys have these thin, white, weedy arms without any muscles, so that the sleeves just flap. Alex had arms that filled the sleeves. And they were heavenly brown, from all the healthy outdoors work that he did.
He stood up when he saw me. I thought that was just so polite. Most boys, at least the ones I know, just have no manners at all. Although maybe I’m being unfair; if you actually went on dates with them they might act a bit differently, and not treat you like you’re just a piece of the furniture. Alex even pulled out a chair for me, which made me all flustered. I thought, God, why am I so pathetic??? Why couldn’t I manage to be elegant for once, and show a bit of maturity? It’s not much use, putting on lipstick and doing fancy things with your hair if you are then going to ruin it all by behaving like some kind of social retard.
At first, what with me being almost completely retarded—i.e. not saying a word—and Alex speaking so little English, it seemed like we were doomed to sit in awkward silence. I sought frantically for something to say, but my brain seemed to have gone into a state of permanent hibernation. If it hadn’t been for Alex, we might never have said a word from start to finish. He ordered two cappuccinos, then smiled at me across the table and said, “I glad you here. I think maybe you not come.”
I said, “W-why would you think that?”
“I not—” He waved a hand. “I not sure you like me. I not sure…you want see me. I hope—but!”
I said, “B-but?”
“If you not here…” He smiled again, and my heart started on its walloping act. “I understand, but I be unhappy. I happy when I see you! I wait ten minutes…quarter hour. I think, she not come—”
“You’ve been waiting quarter of an hour?” My voice suddenly squeaked into action. “I wasn’t late, was I?”
“You not late. I very stupid! I come early.”
I said, “I could have come earlier, if you wanted.”
“Then I be even more early!”
He grinned then, and I giggled. He was making such an effort in a foreign language I couldn’t just leave him to struggle along on his own. By the time we’d drunk our first cup of coffee we were having almost a real proper conversation. I asked Alex where he came from and he said, “I come from Poland, from a leetle veellitch.”
I didn’t understand at first what he meant; I couldn’t think what a leetle veellitch was. Alex said, “Leetle?” and held up a finger and thumb, about half a centimetre apart.
I said, “Oh! Little.”
He nodded and said, “Yes! Leetle. A leetle veellitch.”
I got it, then. “A little village.”
We both laughed. Alex said, “My accent…not good. You teach!” So then we practised saying “A little village” until he had it right.
“You good teacher,” said Alex. “You speak good. I understand! Sometime—not so good.” He made quacking motions with his fingers. “Like duck! I not follow. You like person on radio!”
I told him that was because of Mum and Dad being actors and always going on at us to speak clearly.
“You going be actor?” said Alex.
“Me?” I said. “No way!”
“Why no way? You pretty! You be good actor.”
I got all embarrassed when he said that. I wish I could accept compliments gracefully! I couldn’t even shake my hair over my face to hide my stupid blushes. Quickly, I changed the subject. I said, “Tell me about you! Are your mum and dad over here? Why did you come? Don’t you miss Poland?”
“I miss at first,” said Alex. “My mum and dad, they stay. I call every day. I very…what the word?”
I said, “Homesick?”
“Homesick! I very homesick. Now not so bad. Specially now not so bad.” He grinned as he said that, and I started blushing all over again!
So why did you leave?” I mumbled.
He hunched a shoulder. “No job. No money. My family…not rich. My dad, he not well. My mum, she work. Not earn much. No future. Not good. This—” he opened his arms—“this the place to be. Good job, earn money…pretty girl!”
He took my hand across the table. Hot tingles ran up my arm. A woman sitting nearby caught my eye and smiled at me. I smiled back.
“I want come last year,” said Alex, “but my mum, she say wait. She say when you seventeen, then you go. How old you?”
“Me? I’m…fifteen. Nearly sixteen!” The words were out before I could stop them. I would have given anything to take them back, but I wasn’t brave enough. It would make me look silly. But why did I say it? Why? Who would believe I was nearly sixteen? I did have my hair up, and I was wearing lipstick, and I know that I do look quite a bit older than my age, but…nearly sixteen?
I waited with heart hammering for Alex to laugh. Instead, quite seriously, he said, “So you still in school?”
I said, “Yes,” and pulled a face, as if I’d rather not have been.
Then he did laugh. He said, “Me, I free…no more school! No more lesson! Out in the world.”
“I wish I could be,” I said. It was absolutely not true. I like school! My tongue just seemed to be running away with me. Alex asked me if I’d like another coffee, but regretfully I said that I probably ought to be getting home. I could have rung Mum and pretended I was staying on at Katie’s, but I already felt nervous about lying to her. Alex wanted to walk me back, so I said “just to the corner” in case Mum or Dad—or Ellie! Just as bad—happened to be looking out of the window.
It seemed for a moment, as we got to the corner, that he might be going to kiss me. I think I wanted him to. That is…I wanted him to want to! After all, it was what people did on dates. But in the end he changed his mind. Or maybe he hadn’t ever been going to. Did that mean he didn’t fancy me? Oh, God, please don’t let it mean that! Please!
And then, very solemnly, he said, “You like see me again maybe?”
At which my heart gave this massive leap and I said, “Yessss!” and we immediately agreed that we would meet the following Saturday, same time, same place.
Alex said, “I look forward,” and he squeezed my hand, very hard. And that was when I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that I was about to fall in love…
I was aching to tell someone! Ellie was coming downstairs as I let myself in. She said, “Ooh, you’re all pink.”
I nearly cried, “Yes, I’m in love!” But I managed to restrain myself. It would have been absolutely fatal to let Ellie know.
Even as it was she felt the need to go and tell Mum that “Tamsin’s all pink…pink as a raspberry!” Which of course just made me go even pinker.
Mum laid a hand on my forehead and said, “I hope you’re not sickening for something.”
I gave a silly little giggle of excitement.
“You are just so weird,” said Ellie. She turned to Mum. “We don’t want her throwing up, or anything. D’you think she should stay at home this evening?”
I wouldn’t actually have minded staying at home. If I’d stayed at home I could have wallowed in the bath, listening to music and dreaming. But Mum wouldn’t hear of it.
“It’s a celebration,” she said. “We’ve all got to be there.”
So we all trooped up the road to Giovanni’s to eat pasta and drink champagne with Mum proudly explaining to anyone who would listen that “Ellie’s just been on the television!” She did it jokingly, but I could tell that underneath she was simmering with a quiet, mumsy-type pride. I have to admit, when I saw the thing later, Ellie did look good. She was a natural! And I guess it was quite something to have the camera pick her out twice, in such a huge crowd of people. I didn’t begrudge her her little moment of triumph. I might have done, once; but not any more. I didn’t begrudge her anything any more. She could be on TV as much as she liked. I was going out with Alex!
I made a resolve that I wouldn’t say anything to Katie even though I was bursting to let it all out. I could see that she didn’t want me splurging all over her. I was quite surprised, at first break on Monday, when she dragged me off to a quiet corner and said, “Right! Tell! What happened?”
I said, “Nothing really happened. We just sat and talked, and then…he walked me home!”
“Did you ask him in?”
“No! Mum still thinks I was round with you. Can I be round with you again next Saturday? Cos I’m seeing him again then!”
Slowly, as if giving me up as a lost cause, Katie shook her head.
“Pleeeze,” I said.
She sighed. “All right. If you must. What about our sleepover?”
“I could sleep over Friday.”
“And then go off next day and meet him.”
“Not until the afternoon.”
“A secret assignation.” She does choose good words. Of course, her mum is an English teacher. “So tell me what you’ve discovered about him.”
It was all the excuse I needed. I said, “Well…he’s only been here a little while, which is why he doesn’t speak much English. Yet. But he will, cos he’s really trying. He’s Polish. He comes from a leetle veellitch—”
“You what?” said Katie.
“A leetle veellitch. It’s the way he says it! It’s so cute. A leetle veellitch…”
“Yeah, OK, I get it! Go on. What else?”
“The other boy—the one with red-hair—”
“The rude one.”
“Yes. His name’s Marek. They came over together. The older guy, the one they work for, he came from the same village. But he came two years ago. Now he has his own business.”
“So how old is he? Your guy. Alex.”
It gave me such a tingle when she called him that. Your guy…
“He’s seventeen.”
“Are you sure?”
“What d’you mean, am I sure?”
“You sure he’s not older?”
“No! He’s not older…his mum said he couldn’t come over here till he was seventeen.”
Katie said, “My mum’d do her nut if she found I was going out with someone that age.”
I thought yes, well, Katie’s mum was a bit of a mother hen. Katie is her only child and she must have been at least forty when she had her. Unlike my mum, who was still a student when she had me. And would also do her nut, in all probability.
“Doesn’t he find you a bit young?”
I said, “No.” I didn’t confess that I’d lied about how old I was.
Katie said, “Maybe…” She stopped.
I said, “Maybe what?”
She nibbled on a fingernail. It’s her thing that she does, like me hooking my hair behind my ears. “Maybe next time he should bring his friend with him and I could come, as well, and keep an eye on you!”
I was taken aback, to say the least. She didn’t even like his friend; she thought he was rude. And why should she think I needed an eye kept on me?
She assured me that it was perfectly all right, she wouldn’t interfere. So why did she want to come? I didn’t want her there! She might be my best friend, but just because you’re best friends doesn’t mean you have to do everything together.
“Thing is,” I said, “Marek’s already going out with someone.” Liar, liar, pants on fire! “He’s not really free to go out with anyone else.”
“I don’t want to go out with him,” said Katie, nibbling and munching as hard as she could go. “I just thought I could come along to…watch over you.”
“Honestly,” I said, “I don’t need watching over. Stop fussing!”
“I can’t help it, I feel responsible for you.” She looked at me, hurt. “Wouldn’t you feel responsible for me, if I was going out behind my mum’s back with someone who was seventeen? I hope you would, cos it’s what friends are supposed to feel. And if they don’t, then they’re not being very good friends.”
I didn’t like the thought of Katie being upset. “Look,” I said, “maybe later?”
“Later what?” she mumbled, ungraciously, as she munched on another nail.
“Maybe later you could come along.” Except who would she bring? She didn’t know anyone. A foursome might be fun, but she was right: three was definitely a crowd. In my imagination, Alex and I were already kissing and cuddling and holding hands…how would we be able to do that with Katie sitting there scowling all on her own? Maybe, after all, she and Marek could come along. He couldn’t be too bad if he were a friend of Alex. I made a note to find out whether he really did have a girlfriend or whether I’d just made it up.
Katie took her finger out of her mouth and stuffed her hand under her armpit where she couldn’t get at it. “I hope you don’t think I want to spy on you,” she said.
I said no, of course I didn’t; though that was exactly what it felt like.
“I just think it would be…safer. I mean…seventeen! That’s practically grown-up.”
That was what was so exciting about it.
“He might want to do things.” She whispered it at me, earnestly. “Things you don’t want to do.”
I said, “Then I wouldn’t do them.”
“You might not be able to help yourself! You might get carried away. People do,” said Katie. “It’s the way it happens. You don’t mean it to. It’s the heat of the moment.”
Yes, and at that particular heat of the moment, thank God, the bell rang for the end of break. I was beginning to feel quite uncomfortable with this conversation. Loftily I informed Katie that she had a mind like one of those magazines you find in the dentist.