Secret Meeting

My friend Annie is completely bonkers. Loopy, wacko. Seriously doolally, as my nan would say. She does the craziest things! Like in biology, one time, we were supposed to be dissecting plums, and when Miss Andrews said, “Annabel Watson, where is your plum?” Annie said, “Oops, sorry, miss! I ate it.”

“Ate it?” said Miss Andrews. “Ate your plum?”

She couldn’t believe it! I could, ’cos I know Annie. She drank some paint water once, when we were in juniors. She said it looked so pretty, like pink lemonade.

Some people think she does it to show off, but it’s not that at all. She just happens to be a very zany sort of person. I, on the other hand, am desperately sensible and boring. I would never do anything silly, if it weren’t for Annie. She is always getting us into hot water! The only times I ever have my name in the order mark book are when Annie’s told me to do something and I’ve gone and done it, even though I know it means trouble. Like, for instance, hiding ourselves in the stationery cupboard when we should have been outside playing hockey. I knew it would end in disaster. I only did it ’cos I hate hockey – well, and because Annie said it would be fun. What she didn’t realise was that Mrs Gibson, our head teacher, was due to take a special sixth form study group in our classroom. With us still in the cupboard!!!

Mrs Gibson was quite surprised when someone opened the cupboard door and we fell out. We were quite surprised, ourselves.

That was two order marks. One for missing hockey, and one for damaging school property (trampling on the stationery).

Then there was the time she decided – Annie, I mean – that we should go to school wearing birds’ nests in our hair. She’d found these old nests in her garden and she said, “Think how cool it would look! We could start a new fashion.”

She perched one on her head and it sat there like a little cap, really sweet, with tiny bits of twig and feather sticking out, so I did the same, and we went into assembly like it, and people kept looking at us and giggling, until all of a sudden this thing, this horrible maggoty thing, started to crawl out of Annie’s nest and slither down the side of her face, and the girl next to her screeched out, really loud, like she was being attacked by a herd of man-eating slugs. I screeched, too, but in a more strangulated way, and tore my nest off and threw it on the floor, which started a kind of mini stampede and brought the assembly to a standstill.

We didn’t actually get order marks for that, but Mrs Gibson told us that we were behaving childishly and irresponsibly, adding, “I’m surprised at you, Megan.” Later on, at Parents’ Evening, she told Mum that I was too easily influenced.

“She lets herself be led astray.”

She meant, of course, by Annie. If it weren’t for Annie I’d probably be the goodest person in the whole of our class! I might even win prizes for “Best Behaviour” or “Hardest Working”. To which all I can say is yuck. I’d rather have order marks and be led astray! I can’t imagine not being friends with Annie. Even Mum admits that there is nothing malicious about her. She may have these wild and wacky ideas that get us into trouble, but she is warm, and funny, and generous, and is always making me laugh.

Last term she gave me this card. It was really beautiful, all decorated with little teensy pictures of flowers and animals that she’d done herself.

Inside it said:

TWELVE TODAY!

HIP HIP HOORAY!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

“What’s this for?” I said.

Annie beamed and replied, “For your birthday.”

But my birthday wasn’t for another whole week! I couldn’t believe that my very best friend in all the world had forgotten when my birthday was.

“It’s not till the end of the month,” I said. “Twenty-eighth of April!”

“I know,” said Annie. “But I wanted you to have it now. I’ll do you another one for your real birthday!”

“You’re mad,” I said. “Who gives people birthday cards when it’s not their birthday?”

Annie giggled and said, “I do!” And then she said that maybe it was an unbirthday card, and she started singing “Happy unbirthday to you, happy unbirthday to you, happy unbirthday, dear Me-gan, happy unbirthday to you!”

I put my hands over my ears and begged her to stop. Annie has a voice like a screech owl. Really painful! Not that mine is much better.

Mum says it sounds like a gnat, buzzing to itself in a bottle. But it is not as loud as Annie’s. And I wasn’t the one singing happy unbirthday!

“I’m going to give you a really good birthday present,” said Annie. “A really good one.”

I said, “What?”

Annie said she hadn’t yet decided, and even if she had she wouldn’t tell me. “But it’s going to be something you’ll really, really like!”

“What I would really really like,” I said, “is the latest Harriet Chance.”

I’m sure I don’t need to tell anyone who Harriet Chance is. She is just my all-time mega favourite author is all! Mine and about fifty million others. But I am her number-one fan! I have read almost every single book she’s ever written. Which is a lot of books. Fifty-one, to be exact; I looked it up on one of the computers in our school library. Thirty-four of them are on the shelf in my bedroom. I call them my Harriet Chance Collection. I couldn’t wait to get my hands on the latest one!

“It’s called Scarlet Feather,” I said. “Scarlet is this girl who goes to stay with her nan ’cos—”

Annie made an exaggerated groaning noise. She quite likes Harriet Chance, she is just not the huge fan that I am.

“Well, anyway,” I said, “it’s all right, I wouldn’t expect you to get it for me. It’s in hardback and costs simply loads.” I heaved a sigh. Very dramatic. “I’ll just have to wait till the paperback comes out.”

“Why?” said Annie. “You can get it with your book tokens. You know you’ll have lots.”

It’s true, I always ask for book tokens when it comes to my birthday or Christmas. Annie thinks it is just sooo boring.

“You get it with your book tokens,” she said, “and I’ll think of something else … I’ll think of something far more exciting!”

I said, “Nothing could be more exciting than a new Harriet Chance.”

“Oh, no?” said Annie. “Wanna bet? I’ll find something, don’t you worry!”

“Not like last time,” I begged. For my last birthday she’d given me this long blonde wig and some spooky black eyelashes and plastic fingernails, “to make you look glamorous!” I did look glamorous. It was brilliant!

Mum didn’t approve, of course, but I sometimes think that my mum is just a tiny bit old-fashioned. Certainly compared to Annie’s. But she didn’t really mind, she let me dress up for my birthday party and paint the plastic fingernails purple. Unfortunately, I turned out to be allergic to the glue that stuck the eyelashes on, and next morning when I woke up my eyes were all swollen like footballs.

It wasn’t Annie’s fault, but I had to go to the doctor and get some special cream and couldn’t leave the house for three whole days. Well, I could have done, but I was too embarrassed. This is the sort of thing that just always, somehow, seems to happen with Annie.

“I don’t want more eyelashes!” I said.

“Not going to get more eyelashes.”

“I don’t want anything with glue.”

“It won’t be anything with glue! I’m going to think of something really special … hey!” Annie tiptoed over to the door (we were in her bedroom at the time) and peered out. “D’you want to go on the computer?”

I hesitated. “You mean … go to that site you told me about?”

Slowly, I shook my head. I would have liked to, I would really have liked to, but I’d promised Mum.

“When you’re round at Annie’s, I don’t want you playing with that computer. I want you to give me your word!”

When Mum said “playing with the computer”, what she really meant was chatrooms. She’d heard all these stories about middle-aged men pretending to be young boys, and girls going off to meet them, and they had scared her. They scared me a bit, too, though as I said to Mum, “I wouldn’t ever go and meet anyone.” Mum said she didn’t care, she wanted me to promise her.

I do sometimes think Mum tends to fuss more than other people’s mums. I suppose it is because I am all she has got, now that Nan is in a home. I don’t remember what it was like when Dad was with us; I was too young. Perhaps it was after he left that Mum got nervous. Well, not nervous, exactly, but not wanting me to do things like go into chatrooms. Annie’s mum and dad let her do pretty well whatever she wants. She even had her own computer in her bedroom. I didn’t have a computer at all! Mum had always promised me one for when I was fourteen. She said we’d find the money somehow. I didn’t really mind not having one. Not usually, I didn’t. Not when I had all my Harriet Chances to read! Just now and again I thought that it would be fun and wished Mum didn’t have to “count every penny”. But I knew it was a worry for her.

“Megs?” Annie was standing poised, with one finger on the mouse. She had this impish grin on her face. “Shall I?”

I muttered, “You know I’m not allowed into chatrooms.”

“’Tisn’t a chatroom!” said Annie. “It’s a bookroom. Wouldn’t go into a chatroom.” She looked at me reproachfully. “I know you’re not allowed into chatrooms.”

I was still doubtful. “So what’s the difference?”

“This is for bookworms,” said Annie. “You just talk about books, and say which ones you like, and write reviews and stuff. Honestly, you’d love it! It’s your sort of thing.”

It was my sort of thing; that was what made it so tempting. But I was quite surprised at Annie visiting a chatroom for bookworms. It’s not her sort of thing at all! I mean, she does read, but only ’cos I do. I don’t think, probably, that she’d bother with it if it weren’t for me.

“What books do you talk about?” I said.

“Oh! Harriet Chance. Everyone talks about Harriet Chance. I’m only doing it,” said Annie, “’cos of this project thing.”

She meant our holiday task for English. We all had to review one of our favourite books and write a bit about the author. There are no prizes for guessing who I was going to do … Harriet Chance! I just hoped Annie didn’t think she was going to do her, too.

I said this to her, and she said, “Well, I won’t if you don’t want me to, but who else could I do if I didn’t do her?”

“Anyone!” I said. “J.K. Rowling.”

“I can’t do J.K. Rowling! Harry Potter’s too long.”

“So do something short … do Winnie the Pooh.”

“Oh. Yes.” She brightened. “I could do that, couldn’t I? I love Winnie the Pooh!” She then added that even if she didn’t do Harriet Chance, half the rest of the class probably would. “There’s more people that talk about her books than almost anyone else.”

“That’s because she’s a totally brilliant writer,” I said.

“Yes, and it’s why you ought to visit the bookroom, so you can see for yourself,” said Annie. “Look, it’s ever so easy, all I have to do is just—”

“Annie Watson, you fat little scumbag, I hope you’re obeying the rules?”

Annie dropped the mouse and spun round, guiltily.

It was her sister, Rachel, who’d crept up the stairs without our hearing. Rachel is four years older than Annie and me. She always house-sits when it’s school holidays and her mum and dad are at work.

“I saw you!” she said. “You were going to use that computer!”

“I’m allowed!” shrieked Annie.

“You’re not allowed to go on the Net. Not when Megan’s here. You know that perfectly well.”

“Wasn’t going to go on the Net,” said Annie.

“So what were you going to do?”

“I was going to … write something. For school.”

“Like what?”

“Our project,” said Annie. “F’r English.”

“Fringlish?”

“Book reviews!” roared Annie.

Rachel narrowed her eyes. They are bright green, like a cat’s, and very beautiful. Rachel herself is rather beautiful. While Annie is little and plump, Rachel is tall and slim. This is because of all the work-outs she does, and the games of hockey that she plays (instead of sitting in the stationery cupboard, trampling on the stationery).

They both have black hair, but Rachel’s is thick and straight, like a shiny satin waterfall, while Annie’s is all mad and messy, with some bits curling in one direction and some bits curling in another.

I have often thought that I should like to have a brother or sister, if my dad hadn’t gone and left us before he and Mum could get round to it, but I’m not sure that I’d want a sister like Rachel. She is just sooo superior. Like she reckons anyone in Year Seven is simply beneath her notice. Like small crawling things in the grass; just too bad if they get trodden on. On the other hand she was supposed to be supervising us, so maybe it’s not surprising if she came across a bit bossy.

“If you can’t be trusted,” she said, “you can go downstairs.”

“We’re not doing anything,” said Annie.

“I still think it would be better if you went downstairs.”

“We don’t want to go downstairs! We’re happy up here.”

“Yes, well, I’m not happy with you up here! I’m the one that’ll catch it if you do something you’re not supposed to.”

Annie flounced, and huffed, but I knew, really, that Rachel was right. Another minute and I might have given way to temptation. I had to admit that I didn’t personally see anything so wrong in visiting a chatroom for bookworms; I mean you’d think it would be classed as educational, but I had given Mum my word. It was the only reason she let me go round to Annie’s. I knew she wasn’t terribly happy about it, because of Annie having her own computer and her mum and dad being a bit what Mum calls lax; but Mum couldn’t always get time off in school holidays.

“I just have to trust you,” she said.

It was probably all for the best that Rachel had stepped in. I don’t think I would have been tempted, because in spite of what Mrs Gibson and Mum believe, I do quite often stand up to Annie. Not if it’s just something daft that she wants us to do, but if it’s something I actually think is wrong. Like one time she showed me a packet of cigarettes she’d found and wanted us to try smoking one. I didn’t do it because I think smoking cigarettes is just too gross. In the end Annie agreed with me and threw them away.

Then there was this other time when she thought it might be fun to write jokey comments in library books, such as “Ho ho!” or “Ha ha!” or “Yuck!” I told her off about that one. I said it was vandalism and that I really, truly hated people that wrote things in books. Or turned down the corners of the pages. That is another thing I hate. I don’t so much mind them doing graffiti in the school toilets as the school toilets are quite dim and dismal places and graffiti can sometimes make them brighter and more interesting. But books are precious! Well, they are to me. I know they are not to Annie, but after I’d lectured her she got quite ashamed and said that if I felt that strongly, she wouldn’t do it. She does listen to me! Sometimes.

But she hardly listens to Rachel at all. She grumbled all the way downstairs.

“We don’t want to go downstairs! There isn’t anything to do downstairs. We want to stay in my bedroom. It’s not fair! It’s my house as much as yours! What right have you got to tell me where I can go in my own house?”

“Every right!” snarled Rachel. “I’m the one who’s been left in charge!”

“You’re not supposed to push us about. You’re only here to protect us in case anyone breaks in.”

“I’m here to make sure you behave yourself!” shouted Rachel.

“I was behaving myself!”

“You were going to use that computer. You were going to do things you’re not supposed to do! You get down there.” Rachel gave Annie and me a little shove along the hall. “And you stay there!”

“But there isn’t anything to do down here!” wailed Annie.

“Oh, don’t be so useless!” Rachel herded us into the kitchen. “Go out in the garden and get some exercise!”

Rachel is a great one for exercise. She is an exercise freak. She is for ever charging fiercely up and down the hockey field, billowing clouds of steam, or dashing madly to and fro across the netball court. She also goes to the sports club twice a week and swims and jogs and does things with weights. This is why she is so lean and toned. In other words, super-fit. She thinks Annie and I ought to be super-fit, too. She is going to join the police when she is older. I just hope she goes and joins them up in Birmingham, or Manchester, or somewhere. Anywhere, so long as it is miles away from here! Here being Stone Heath, which is near Salisbury, and very quiet and peaceful, which it most certainly would not be if Rachel started bashing about with a truncheon. She’d whack people over the head just for breathing.

“Go on! Get out there,” she said, flinging open the back door. “Go and get some fresh air, for a change. You’re like a couple of couch potatoes!”

I said, “What’s couch potatoes?”

“Human beings that sit around doing nothing all day, like vegetables. Look at you! Megan’s like a stick of celery, and as for you” – she poked poor Annie in the stomach – “you’re like a water melon!”

“Water melon’s a fruit,” I said.

“Thank you, Miss Know-it-All!”

“Don’t you treat my friend like that,” said Annie. “You’ve got no right to treat my friend like that, and just stop shoving me! Ow! Ouch! You’re hurting!”

Rachel took absolutely no notice of Annie’s howls; she is a really ruthless kind of person. She must have a heart like a block of cement. She drove me and Annie into the garden and for over an hour she made us throw balls at her so that she could whack them with a rounders bat. By the time she let us go back indoors we were completely exhausted.

“See what I mean?” she said. “You’re so out of condition it’s unbelievable! When I was your age I could run right round the playing field without even noticing it. You can’t even run round the garden!”

She still wouldn’t let us go back upstairs. She said she was going upstairs, and we were to stay in the sitting room until Mum came to collect me. Well! Quite honestly, we were so faint and wobbly from all the crashing about we’d done, chasing after the balls she’d whacked, we just sank down side by side on the sofa – a big shiny water melon and a little trembly stick of celery – and watched videos all afternoon. One of them was Candyfloss, which was the very first Harriet Chance I ever read! I know the film practically off by heart, word for word. If ever we did it as a school production, I could play the part of Candy, no problem! I would already know all my lines. Except that Candy has bright blue eyes “the colour of periwinkles”, and blonde hair which “froths and bubbles”, whereas I have brown eyes, more the colour of mud, I would say, and mousy flat hair, not a bubble in sight; so probably no one would ever cast me as Candy, more is the pity. But it doesn’t really bother me; I wouldn’t want to be an actor. I am going to be a writer, like Harriet!

RACHEL’S DIARY (THURSDAY)

I am just SO SICK of baby-sitting. Mum says, “For heaven’s sake, Rachel! It’s only a few weeks in the year.” She also points out that I am being well paid for it, which is perfectly true. Mum and Dad pay me more than Jem gets paid for stacking shelves, AND I don’t have to take fares out of it. Or food. But as I said to Mum, there is more to life than just money.