Acting Friends (2 page)

The red-haired girl shook her head. ‘He’s rubbish.

So wimpy-looking. And he was pathetic in
Land
Boys
.’

In spite of my terror, irritation bubbled up inside me. How dare she make fun of Frankie?

‘He’s not wimpy-looking,’ I snapped. ‘And he wasn’t even in
Land Boys
.’

The girl who’d spoken earlier giggled. ‘That’s told you, Shaz.’

I glanced round again. The atmosphere wasn’t what I’d thought. Most of the girls weren’t even looking at me. They were laughing at Shaz.

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‘Whatever.’ Shaz gave an angry shrug. She pulled a cardigan out of her bag and tugged it on, covering the stain I’d made on her shirt. ‘She’s still a freak.’

I tried to catch Grace’s eye, but her eyes were firmly fixed on the ground. I held out my hand for my purse. My fingers trembled. With a toss of her head, Shaz shoved the purse into my hand. I grabbed Grace’s arm and started walking away. The girls to our right parted to let us through. As I marched away, Shaz ran up.

‘I’ll get you,’ she hissed in my ear before racing off.

With shaking legs, I led Grace towards the main school building.

‘What did she mean, she’ll “get you”?’ Grace whispered. Her face was even paler than when we’d met.

I shook my head, not wanting to think about it. As we reached the steps, the bell rang and the hordes of shrieking, laughing girls surrounding us sped up, racing off in different directions.

Was it possible that I’d made an enemy already –

and I hadn’t even gone inside the building yet?

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Feeling anxious, I walked into the school’s entrance hall. When I’d been here before it had seemed spacious and intimidating, full of wood-panelled walls with lists of head girls and prefects going back fifty years. Now it was a heaving mass of students.

Grace and I stood by the door as girls zoomed past us, chatting to each other, scurrying off in all directions. Within a minute the room had cleared of all but the year sevens. Looking round I could see plenty of girls about my height, most of whom were, like me, carrying the regulation navy bag and wearing the regulation flat black shoes. Everyone with long hair had it tied back in a neat ponytail except for one girl whose dark, shiny hair snaked down her back in waves. She was different in other ways too: her skirt was shorter and her heels were higher but mostly it was her attitude . . . the way she 9

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stood to one side, looking around the room with an air of amused confidence.

Grace sidled up to me. ‘That was scary with those girls outside,’ she said. ‘What year do you think they were in?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know, but it’s a big school.

Maybe we won’t see them again.’

‘Do you have a sister who comes here?’ Grace asked.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I don’t have any sisters, just a brother.

What about you?’

‘Two younger—’ But before Grace could finish, a whistle blew and the room fell silent. Across the hall a grey-haired teacher in a stiff woollen skirt cleared her throat. This was Miss Litton, the deputy head and admissions tutor. I’d met her at the interview and on the induction day and she’d seemed nice, if a bit formal. Four teachers stood around her. I fixed my gaze on the woman on the far right. She was unsmiling, with close-cropped dark hair and skinny legs under a short skirt. This, I knew, was Mrs Bunton, my form tutor.

‘I’m in her class,’ Grace said. I followed her pointing finger. To my relief, She was looking at Mrs Bunton as well.

‘Me too.’

We grinned at each other. Relief seeped through 10

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my anxiety. Maybe Grace wasn’t quite a friend yet, but at least I had someone to hang out with.

The four teachers took it in turn to call out our surnames and initials then we followed our particular tutor to our form rooms. Mrs Bunton led our class along a wide corridor, past the canteen, then up the back stairs to the first floor. Our form room was painted bright orange. Books and folders and files filled the shelves along one wall. There was a whiteboard by the teacher’s desk at the front, plus a large sash window overlooking the playground at the back of the school – and rows and rows of individual desks.

‘It’s nice, don’t you think?’ Grace whispered hopefully.

But I barely heard her. I’d just looked up and found the red-haired girl from outside staring at me across the room. Shaz. I couldn’t believe she was in our year. She was taller than everyone else and –

from the way she’d acted outside – certainly wasn’t displaying any new-girl-style lack of confidence.

Shaz gazed at me with absolute loathing then turned to the girl with long, shiny hair who happened to be standing next to her. The second girl glanced over at me. They were talking about me. I could feel my cheeks burning and I looked away.

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‘I’m going to seat you alphabetically,’ Mrs Bunton called. She pointed to the seat directly in front of her desk. ‘River Armstrong.’

Everyone stared at me as, still blushing, I crept towards the desk. It was one of those old-fashioned types with a lid and space inside for your books. I could hear whispering around the room as I walked on, my legs shaking. It felt like it was taking an eternity to reach the desk. I was sure they were all laughing at my first name. Downstairs they’d only used the initial ‘R’ but now everyone knew what I was really called. Not for the first time, I cursed my parents for giving me such an unusual name.

I sank into the wooden chair at my desk. But in my confusion I caught the edge of the seat and it tipped sideways. I fell towards the floor, hands out-stretched, just saving myself from tumbling into a heap on the ground. Laughter rose up around me.

‘Stop that,’ Mrs Bunton snapped. ‘River, are you all right? Is there something wrong with the chair?’

I half-stood, examining the seat. It was perfectly solid.

‘I’m . . . it’s fine, Miss,’ I mumbled, my face now feeling like it was on fire.

‘Maybe she needs a special chair, one that can take a bit more weight,’ Shaz hissed.

More laughter.

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‘Be quiet,’ Mrs Bunton insisted. She looked at me, hesitating. I gulped. Suppose she really did think I was too fat for the chair. Mum was always saying how I wasn’t fat at all – just ‘a little pre-teen’ – but whenever I looked in the mirror I only ever saw a shapeless blob.

Mrs Bunton turned away to address the class.

‘This is a general point for everyone. At this school we do not refer to teachers as “Miss”.’ She glanced at me and I realised that I’d just used that very word myself. My face burned. Mrs Bunton smiled apologetically, as if to say she was sorry for having to draw attention to my mistake when I was already totally humiliated.

‘Please address staff by their proper names. I am always Mrs Bunton.’

I bent my head and stared down at my desk.

Mrs Bunton seated everyone else. The shiny-haired girl, whose name was Emmi, was at the back of my row. Horrible Shaz, whose real name was Shannon, was halfway down the row closest to the door. I noticed that she’d buttoned up her cardigan so the stain on her shirt didn’t show.

Grace was in the row next to mine, two desks down. As she passed me on the way to her seat she touched my arm sympathetically. The gesture just made me feel worse.

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Mrs Bunton talked us quickly through procedures in the event of a fire drill, stressed the vital importance of the twice-daily registration and recapped the dress code – with a hard stare at Emmi and an instruction to tie her hair back – and the mobile phone policy: we could keep our phones with us, but they had to be switched off all day. She also explained how this room was our base, but that we would travel to different rooms around the school for our various lessons, and handed out our planners – small notebooks with a map in the back to help us locate all the various rooms, in which we were supposed to log our homework and copy down our timetables.

It was overwhelming. When the bell rang for break I felt completely exhausted. Shaz gave me another lethal stare as Grace and I followed our maps along the corridor in search of the nearest toilets.

‘That girl hates me and so does Mrs Bunton,’ I said miserably, as we passed a small booth marked Snack Bar on the map. I had, previously, thought I might stop here and buy a bag of crisps, but one look at the noisy scrum in front of the booth and I decided against it.

‘I don’t think they hate you,’ Grace said soothingly.

‘Mrs Bunton was just making a point and that girl, 14

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Shaz, is probably just feeling awkward cos it’s her first day and . . . and she didn’t get put in a class with all her friends.’

‘That’s because all her friends are in year eight now,’ said a sharp voice behind us.

I spun around. It was the girl with the loose shiny hair and the attitude. Emmi. Close up I was struck by how pretty she was. Her eyes in particular were huge and a deep, velvety-brown colour.

‘What do you mean?’ I said.

‘Shaz was ill last year,’ Emmi said, lowering her voice. ‘I know cos my sister’s friends with her sister.

Shaz didn’t come to school for six months so they’ve kept her down a year. Her birthday was in August anyway, so nobody thought it was a big deal but Shaz hates it. Why’s she so annoyed with you anyway?’

I gulped. Emmi looked at me, her head tilted to one side. It was a knowing look, like she could see right through me to how stressed and miserable I was feeling, while Emmi herself exuded confidence from every pore.

‘It wasn’t River’s fault,’ Grace said timidly. ‘She bumped into Shaz and spilt her drink. Then . . . well, she just knew some stuff about Frankie Clarke that Shaz didn’t . . . River’s got a picture of him on her purse.’

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I could feel my face burning again. Emmi raised her eyebrows. She was so cool. She was bound to think it was really pathetic carrying around some teen actor’s picture.

‘Yeah, he’s cute,’ Emmi smiled and a dimple appeared in her cheek. ‘My sister worked on his last film, actually.’ She said this modestly – like she knew it was impressive, but she didn’t want to look all boastful.

‘Wow,’ Grace said.

I realised my mouth had fallen open, and shut it.

I stared at Emmi, trying to think of something to say to her. But the only questions I could come up with sounded stupid, even inside my head. What had her sister said Frankie Clarke was really like? Had Emmi met him?

What about Emmi herself? How did she manage to make her uniform look like it belonged on her body, rather than all big and shapeless like mine?

Looking at her closely I could see not only that her skirt was shorter than everyone else’s but that her tie was thin side out and knotted well below her shirt collar – like those of the girls we’d seen outside.

How did she know to do those things?

‘Did your sister come to this school?’ Grace asked.

Emmi nodded. ‘She left last year. So did Shaz’s sister. That’s how they know each other.’

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People were swarming around us now, heading to join the huge queue at the snack bar.

‘It’ll get less crowded as term goes on,’ Emmi said knowledgeably. ‘People run out of money.’ She made a face. ‘I’m going to the loo to sort out my hair for Mrs Bum-bum. My sister warned me about all these stupid rules you have to follow here.’

My mouth felt dry. She was so cool and I so badly wanted to impress her. She took a step away
.
Oh,
no.

My chance to make friends with her was going away too.

‘It’s my birthday on Saturday.’ I plunged my hand into my bag and pulled out one of the small blue cards Mum and I had filled out yesterday. ‘Bowling.

You can come if you like.’ I shoved the invitation into Emmi’s hand.

She stared at it, as if I’d given her a bomb.

No. Oh no, oh no, oh no.
Why had I done that? Now I looked desperate, as well as pathetic.

‘Thanks.’ Emmi flicked her hair over her shoulder and turned away. I was sure I heard her stifle a giggle as she sped off towards the toilets.

I sank back against the wall. What a disaster.

‘River?’ Grace’s pale face loomed in front of me.

‘You must be the oldest person in our class.’

‘Oh my God,’ I wailed. ‘That sounded sooo stupid.

I didn’t even mean to mention my birthday.’

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‘You didn’t sound stupid,’ Grace insisted. ‘What you did was nice, inviting her.’

I smiled, gratefully. ‘Will you come on Saturday, anyway?’ I said.

‘Of course.’ Grace beamed. ‘I love bowling. And you should give out the rest of your invites at lunch break.’

I shook my head. Inviting Emmi was definitely the last embarrassing thing I was
ever
going to do.

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The rest of the morning passed in a whirlwind of new rooms and new teachers. My head was totally spinning by the time lunch break arrived. At least Grace and I made our way down to the canteen without needing our maps. I couldn’t believe I would ever find my way around the school. It was just so huge compared with my primary school.

Huge, and noisy, and confusing.

The canteen was a cacophony of sound. Grace and I fetched trays and loaded them with pasta and salad. As we sat at the end of one of the long tables, I could see a few other girls from our class – and the other year seven classes – also in twos and threes, sitting quietly and looking as shell-shocked as we did.