Cherry Blossom Dreams (12 page)

‘What about the dresses?’

‘They’re still there. You’d better grab them now if you want them.’

‘I’ll have to check with Miranda first,’ I said. ‘Come on. Let’s go and get started on the shed.’

Inside the shed we found a lot of discarded junk, including an old birdcage and a large box covered with an old sheet. When Sean pulled off the sheet an old dark-blue metal trunk was revealed.

‘That looks a bit like the one in Mum’s photograph,’ I said. ‘You know – the magician’s trunk.’

Sean nodded but he was clearly more concerned with what was inside the box, which was locked with a chunky padlock.

‘I’m going to fetch those old tools from under the stairs and see if I can get it open,’ he told me.

While he was gone I squatted down beside the box to examine the sides more closely. That’s when I spotted the gold stars. They were very faded and it was difficult to make them out in the dim light inside the shed, but they were definitely there.

This box was
exactly
like the one our grandfather had owned!

Sean soon came back with the tools, including a metal saw that he thought might cut through the padlock. (I should probably mention that Married Michael was a DIY buff and he’d spent loads of time with my brother, showing him how to do stuff around the house using his impressive collection of tools.)

‘Right, then. Here goes.’ Sean set to work with confidence but after less than a minute the saw flew out of his hands and landed on the floor. ‘Stupid thing!’ he hissed.

‘Do you want some help? Leo might be able to do it,’ I suggested. Not that Leo’s DIY skills are anything to celebrate. Once he’d tried to put up a new curtain rail in my bedroom and I’d had to scream for Mum to come and stop him as he started his sixth attempt at drilling a hole in my wall.

‘No, I can do it.’ Sean picked up the saw and started again, really leaning on the thing now. This time when the blade slipped, it nicked his other hand, making him yelp.

‘Let me see.’ I grabbed his hand to examine the cut, dragging him back outside where the light was better. Since Sean is used to me fussing over him whenever he hurts himself he gave in to my examination without too much protest.

He didn’t speak until I pulled out a tissue from my pocket to dab at the wound, which didn’t appear to be too deep, thank goodness.

‘I hope that’s a clean tissue,’ he grunted sourly.

‘Nah, it’s covered in snot!’

Just then we heard Leo calling and we looked up to see him coming towards us through the trees.

Straight away Leo homed in on the bloodied tissue Sean was holding. ‘What happened?’

‘It’s OK. Sasha already checked it and … hey!’

Leo had taken hold of his wrist and now he was inspecting the wound, which was still oozing blood at a steady rate. ‘How did you do it?’ he asked when he’d satisfied himself that the cut wasn’t deep enough for stitches. As he spoke he replaced the tissue and began pressing down on it himself.

‘It was an accident,’ Sean mumbled. ‘The saw slipped.’

‘
Saw?
’

Seeing his frown, Sean immediately went on the defensive. ‘Michael always let me use his tools!’

‘Michael?’ Leo looked confused (possibly because Mum only ever refers to Michael as ‘that two-timing rat’ or ‘that utter snake-in-the-grass’).

‘
Married
Michael,’ I explained quickly, hoping that would jog his memory.

‘Oh … right.’ Leo gave my brother a serious look. ‘Listen, Sean, I don’t really care what Michael did or didn’t let you do … In future I don’t want you doing stuff like this without asking me or your mother first.’

‘Right … like
you’d
be any help,’ Sean muttered snippily.

‘Oh, I don’t know … I might be useful for driving you and your finger to A&E if you accidentally cut it off,’ Leo retorted. ‘What were you trying to saw through in any case?’

We took him inside the shed to show him.

‘Those hinges look almost completely rusted through,’ I told Sean. ‘It might be easier to break
them
off, don’t you think?’

‘Any more wielding of tools can wait,’ Leo said firmly as he pushed my brother out of the shed towards the house. ‘Come on. Let’s get your hand sorted.’

As we stood in the kitchen (where Sean was obediently holding his injured hand under the cold running water), I asked, ‘So how long do you think it’ll take to finish clearing everything out?’

‘Well, if we spend the whole evening here again tomorrow, I’m hoping that should do it,’ Leo said. ‘The big pieces of furniture are going to stay in any case.’

‘I can’t wait to show Mum that trunk,’ Sean said as he turned off the tap with his good hand.

‘Here. Use this.’ Leo handed him a wad of dry kitchen towel to stop him dripping watery blood all over the draining board.

As Leo applied a large plaster to Sean’s injured hand, my brother gave him a smug look. ‘Leo …’

‘What?’

‘You do realise, don’t you, that Mum’s going to be desperate to open that trunk as soon as she gets here?’

Sean was right about Mum being just as keen as we were to open the trunk. In fact she was practically bouncing off the walls in her excitement once she saw it. She knew straight away that it was a magician’s trunk.

‘It’s really funny,’ she said. ‘It’s just like my dad’s – your grandpa’s. He stored all his props in it and used it in his act. I haven’t seen one like it since he died.’

We had just been debating the best way to get inside it when Miranda, who had arrived with Mum, miraculously produced the key (apparently it had been on an old set of house keys she kept at the office).

But to everyone’s immense disappointment there had turned out to be nothing inside the box. Sean had insisted on checking for a false bottom or a secret compartment, but even after a very careful search he’d still come up with nothing at all.

That said I was way too excited by my three new dresses – which Miranda had agreed I could keep – to feel too disappointed by the empty trunk. When we got home I sent Lily and Ellie photos of each dress and Ellie texted me straight back suggesting that I wore one of them to the party.

I thought it was a brilliant idea, although I was having a difficult time deciding which of the three to choose. My favourite was the red halter neck, but the skirt was too long on me. It might have been OK if I was wearing high heels but I didn’t have any, and even if I had I wouldn’t have wanted to totter about in them all evening. The emerald dress fitted me well and I liked the way the skirt swished when I spun round. But the boned bodice dug in a bit and I thought the bow on the front was a bit too fussy.

I eventually settled for the third dress. It was less swishy (because of the bead-studded netting over the skirt), but the velvet bodice was more comfortable and very flattering. I don’t tend to wear black very much, but now I could see that it suited me and it also made me look older, plus the fuchsia-coloured skirt was really eye-catching.

‘You’ve gotta be kidding!’ Sean exclaimed with a smirk when I went downstairs to show Mum and Granny.

I ignored him and gave Mum a little twirl. ‘How do I look?’

‘Lovely,’ she replied with a smile. ‘And very grown up.’

‘Where’s Granny?’ I asked.

‘She went outside. Actually I’m a bit worried about her.’

‘Why?’

‘Sean was showing her the sales brochure for Blossom House and pointing out all the pictures he took,’ Mum explained. ‘She started peering at them with a really funny look on her face. Then she just rushed out.’

‘Sean, what did you say to her?’ I demanded.

‘I didn’t say anything!’ Sean protested.

‘Are you sure?’ Mum was frowning at him.

‘I’ll go and check she’s all right, shall I?’ I suggested, slipping a cardigan on over my dress and heading for the front door.

I caught up with Granny a short way along our street. It was dark outside and she had stopped on the pavement a few houses along, where she seemed to be staring up at the stars.

‘Are you OK, Granny?’ I asked her as I caught up.

‘What? Oh, it’s you, Sasha … Yes, I’m fine. Just felt a little peaky all of a sudden.’ She shivered and I saw that she’d come out without her coat.

I wasn’t really cold so I took off my cardigan and gave it to her.

‘Granny, did Sean say something that upset you?’ I asked gently.

‘Oh no, dear. It wasn’t anything Sean said,’ she assured me as she began to walk with me back to the house with the cardigan round her shoulders. As we passed under a lamppost she turned to look at me and suddenly froze. ‘What are you wearing?’

‘It’s an old evening dress that came from Blossom House. Miranda said I could have it. Do you like it?’

‘
Like
it? Sasha, I want you to go and take off that dreadful old thing and … and … I never want to see it on you again, do you understand?’

‘But, Granny –’

‘NEVER!’ She yelled it so loudly that the entire street probably heard.

Mum certainly did from where she’d been standing at the front door waiting for us.

‘Sasha, what happened?’ she asked as I rushed past her into the house.

I was almost in tears. ‘She was really horrible to me about this dress.’

‘The
dress
? Why?’

‘I don’t know.’

Mum frowned and I could tell that Granny’s behaviour made absolutely no sense to her either.

There were only thirty-six hours to go until the party and we still hadn’t found Monty. Plus I was seriously worried about my grandmother.

‘Maybe she’s going demented,’ Lily suggested helpfully at school when I told her what had happened. ‘My great-aunt’s demented and she’s always shouting at us for no reason and accusing us of stealing her clothes and things.’

‘I don’t think it’s that,’ I said. ‘Granny’s memory seems fine. It was only that
one
thing she said about my dress that didn’t make any sense. Mum tried to get her to say what the problem was but she wouldn’t. Though she did tell me later that she was sorry for yelling at me.’

‘Strange … so are you still going to wear that dress to the party?’

‘Yep. And Priti’s going to wear the red one if it fits her. I’m taking it round to hers after school today so she can try it on.’ I had already offered Lily one of the dresses to wear but she had declined, saying that vintage clothes weren’t really her thing.

‘Priti won’t turn up,’ Lily said. ‘She’ll make some excuse at the last minute. You’ll see.’

‘No, Lily, I think she’ll come,’ I said. ‘She’s already got it all planned out.’

Priti had relayed her plan to me the day before: ‘I’ll tell Dad I’m going to yours for the evening on Saturday and I’ll arrange for him to drop me off there. Mum won’t be in because she’s going to see my auntie, and Dad won’t notice I’m all dressed up if I wear my long coat over the top. I’ll walk round to Blossom House, stay at the party for a couple of hours, then walk back to your house and be waiting outside when Dad comes to collect me.’

I was actually surprised by how gutsy she was being. Priti never usually broke the rules or disobeyed her parents. I knew this was a really big deal for her.

As for my own cover story, Mum thought I was sleeping over at Lily’s place and Lily’s mum thought she was staying at mine. Hopefully our mothers wouldn’t mention it to each other at any point, though since they hardly see each other these days, I thought it was unlikely.

‘I am
so
excited about tomorrow night, Sasha!’ Lily exclaimed, slipping one arm through mine. ‘You do realise this is going to be the most fun we’ve had in, like … forever!’ And she let out a delighted giggle as she teased, ‘You know, I’m starting to think I might not lose you to the dorky side after all!’

I had a great time at Priti’s house on Friday evening. We’d stopped at mine on the way back from school to pick up the dress, and when Priti tried it on it fitted her perfectly. It turned out she even had a pair of high-heeled red shoes to go with it.

As usual Priti’s dad insisted on giving me a lift home at the end of the evening. He actually drove us past Blossom House, and I saw to my surprise that the lights were on. Weird!

I got home to find Sean sitting in the kitchen eating a large slice of Granny’s homemade chocolate cake. (One really good thing about Granny coming to stay is that she always does loads of baking.)

‘Sean, I just passed Blossom House and I saw –’

‘Mum and Granny are round there,’ Sean said without looking up from his cake.

‘
Granny?
’

‘Yeah. She decided she wanted to go and see the place after all. They’ve been gone ages.’

‘Did Mum and Miranda finish clearing it out?’

‘Yeah – just as well, because I’m taking Zack round there tomorrow to look for Monty. He’s bringing a mouse to try and entice him out. He says snakes are naturally shy, so he’s not surprised Monty hasn’t shown up while there’ve been people in the house.’

‘Right …’ I murmured. I couldn’t believe I’d almost forgotten about the Monty crisis in all the excitement about the party.

‘Don’t worry. Zack and I will be well away from the place by the time
you
lot get there,’ he added.

‘But I thought Zack wanted to look for Monty after dark.’