Drama Queen (19 page)

‘But you want me to.'

‘I'd like you to be friends.'

‘I'll think about it.'

At last, I heard Mum's key in the lock. She let herself in and dumped her bag on the floor. ‘Nice lunch?' she asked brightly.

‘Not very,' I said.

‘I'm exhausted. Be a love and make us some tea.' I heard her take off her coat and hang it up and then she came into the kitchen and watched as I filled the kettle. ‘What's up?'

‘Did you know about Mandy?' I asked. I didn't
mean
it to sound like an accusation.

‘Oh,
Mandy
, yes. Yes, yes I did. So Ted's introduced you.'

‘Why didn't you tell me about her?'

‘I thought your dad should.'

‘Dad
can't
like her. She's hideous.'

‘Is she? I wouldn't know. What's so hideous about her?'

‘
Everything
.'

‘Come and sit down,' said Mum. I followed her into the sitting room and sank into a chair. My legs were feeling wobbly and I had a big hard lump in my throat.

‘You've known about her all along, haven't you?' I forced out.

‘Come on. Tell me. What's so dreadful about her?'

‘She's … she's not like us. You'd hate her. She wears these awful clothes like they're years too young for her. Stuff I'd wear. No, stuff I
wouldn't
wear, ‘cos it's really horrible. And … and she's got a belly-button ring and Dad wouldn't even let me get my
ears
pierced … ‘ I tailed off.

‘Well, maybe he'll have to now.'

‘I don't want to have them pierced any more.'

‘Jessica, aren't you forgetting something?'

‘What?'

‘Maybe she's what your dad needs.'

‘How do you mean?'

Mum then went into a long monologue about how we had to let Dad make a new life for himself. I was only listening with half an ear. I wanted her to scream and rant and sound Dad off. How could she be so calm about it?

Apparently, Dad had met Mandy down at the gym. The very one I'd suggested that day at the bus stop. Mum said she thought Mandy had been really good for him. In fact, apparently, all those things I'd been congratulating myself on, like him cutting down on booze and giving up smoking and taking more exercise, had been down to Mandy all along. She was his
fitness instructor
.

‘Haven't you noticed how he's making an effort? He's looking so much better and—'

‘Huh,' I interrupted. ‘Fitness instructor. She didn't look particularly fit to me.'

Mum gave me a look. ‘Didn't she?'

‘No.' I was near to tears now. I got up and turned my back on Mum. Clearly she was taking his side. Nobody seemed to care how I felt. I went to my room with my mind in a turmoil. I had to speak to someone. I desperately needed Clare. But she still wouldn't answer my calls so I sent another text.

need to talk to you
desperately
j

Almost immediately she texted me back:

no way
c

I stared miserably at my mobile. She must be really mad at me. This wasn't like Clare. When we argued she'd flare up but she'd usually calm down. Generally, within an hour or so, we could laugh the whole thing off.

I went into school on Monday determined to make it up with her. But she wasn't on the bus. Her coat wasn't hanging in the cloakroom. And she wasn't in English either. Apparently her mother had rung in. She was off sick.

Off
sick
. My heart did a lurch. Then it hit me with the full force of conviction. Cedric was right. She'd been pale and limp and weak-looking and now she was
off school
. It was anorexia. I had this sudden horrible vision of her lying in bed, white as the sheets, too
frail to move. And then later laid out on the Murphys' dining-room table with a candle at each end and me coming in with a huge bunch of pink gladioli (her favourite flowers). No, not gladdies, it would have to be something more mournful, like lillies perhaps. Yes, huge white scented lillies. I'd visit her tomb every spring and put gladdies – no, lillies – on it.

‘Jessica?' Mr Williams's voice broke through my sombre thoughts.

‘Yes, Mr Williams?'

‘How did you get on with your
Tess of the d'Urbervilles
chapter?'

‘Umm. Fine thank you, Mr Williams.'

‘Well, would you let me have a look at it?'

‘Yes, all right.' I located it in my backpack and handed it over to him. Mr Williams cast a critical eye over the page, frowned and put it in his briefcase. I knew it wasn't a very long chapter but Mr Williams didn't realise what I was up against. It was all very well for Thomas Hardy. He hadn't had the problems of reuniting his parents, curing an anorexic best friend and solving a love triangle when he wrote his version.

 

As soon as I was out of class I hid in the cloakroom and dialled Clare's mum. She answered right away.

‘Yes, Jessica?'

‘I just wondered, Mrs Murphy, how's Clare?'

‘Well, I really don't know. I've called the doctor, as a matter of fact.'

‘The doctor?' I repeated weakly.

‘I don't know what's got into her. She hasn't been eating properly for weeks. I found all her dinner in the bin the other night.'

‘Can I speak to her?'

‘She's asleep at the moment. But she said she didn't want to speak to anyone.'

‘Oh, I see.' I clicked my mobile off. She'd called the doctor, so it must be serious. I felt like a criminal. Oh, why had I let her go on a diet?

For three agonising days Clare didn't come into school. She wouldn't answer my calls and I ran out of cheery things to say in text messages. I rang Cedric but he had become strangely elusive too. I even went down to his flat a couple of times but each time his mum said he was out. She didn't know where. Maybe he was sitting by Clare's bedside holding a limp hand. Oh Clare, how could I have done this to you?

The rumour about her being anorexic had gone
through the school like wildfire. People kept coming up to me and asking about her as if I was the eyewitness at some sort of national disaster. The swots had sympathetically taken me into their group and insisted I sat with them every lunchtime, which was really kind of them but incredibly humiliating all the same.

After three agonising days, worried sick … on the fourth, Clare was back in school.

I didn't actually see her till lunchtime. I caught sight of her across the canteen. Actually, she didn't look too bad from a distance, considering she was at death's door. I got my tray of lunch and approached cautiously. She was eating. I'd have to be really really careful not to put her off.

I coughed gently. ‘Hello … Clare.'

‘Mmm.' She looked up.

‘Would you mind? I mean, would it be all right if I sat here?'

She nodded with her mouth full. I slid in opposite her. She continued eating without saying a word. In front of her was a huge plate of beef stew and mashed potato. She was shovelling it in as if there was no tomorrow.
Beef stew and mashed potato!
And after the
way I'd been worrying about her?

I took a tentative mouthful of my salad, wondering who would be the first to break the silence. Then she looked straight at me and came out with one of her perfect dimpled grins. She pushed her plate away. There was hardly a trace of gravy left on it.

‘God, I needed that,' she said.

‘You could've called me. I was really worried about you,' I complained.

‘It was only a virus,' she said.

‘A virus. I thought you were practically dead.'

‘I laid it on a bit. I wanted to be sure I'd be fit for Saturday.'

‘Saturday?'

‘The Cranshaw Ball.'

‘He's asked you?'

‘Yes. As a matter of fact.'

‘I knew he would.'

Clare looked at me archly. ‘How?'

‘Well, you're really made for each other.'

‘You'd got it all worked out, hadn't you?'

‘Yes. I mean no.'

‘You can't run everyone's life you know, Jessica.'

‘I know. I mean, I don't want to.'

‘Good, because basically, both Cedric and I feel you've interfered.'

‘Me? Interfered?'

‘In fact, we were so mad at you I reckon it kind of bonded us …' said Clare. The dimples reappeared. Then she told me in detail how brilliant Cedric had been and how understanding he was and how he'd caught up with her and walked her home after the party and stayed with her and talked for hours because she'd been in such a state.

‘So you see, you've me to thank after all, haven't you?' I said.

‘In a round-about way, yes, I s'pose I have.'

‘And you can wear that dress after all.'

‘That dress was rubbish. I took it back. It was way too small anyway. And I found this brilliant funky dress with this cerise lining that kind of shows when it's …'

Christine wafted by at that point. She leaned towards Clare. ‘Will you tell Cedric thank you from me. Matt just loved the compilation. See you at the ball.'

‘I'll let him know,' said Clare.

Clare and Christine, talking to each other! And they were all going to the ball and I wasn't. And Clare was getting a brilliant funky dress. Hang on a minute – I was starting to feel really out of it.

 

That afternoon I came across Mr Williams in the corridor. He was adding a banner to his
Eight into Six Won't Go
poster on the Arts Activities noticeboard. TICKETS STILL AVAILABLE.
Sad
.

‘How's my most talented pupil?' he asked, catching sight of me.

‘Most talented, Mr Williams?'

‘I really liked that piece on
Tess
. You should use that imagination of yours, Jessica.'

‘Thanks, Mr Williams.'

‘I think we could count it as coursework, don't you?' He reached into his briefcase and handed me back my chapter with a smile. He'd given me an A+ for it. The writing down the side was surprisingly positive, at least I think it was. He said that I'd written a nice ‘pastiche' of Hardy.

I slipped into the library and looked up the word ‘pastiche' in the
Oxford English Dictionary
. It said: ‘
Literary or other work of art composed in the style of a well-known author
.' Uh huh. Literary! Perhaps Mr W was able to recognise true talent after all.

It was just as well I had literary talent because socially I was a total disaster. That Saturday while everyone
was getting ready for the Cranshaw Ball, I was due to go shopping with my dad's hideous girlfriend to get an awful dweeby outfit for my mum's excruciatingly uncool amateur dramatics party. Dad had it all worked out. It was blackmail really. He said that if I went shopping with Mandy, he would spend the whole day with me on Sunday. Just the two of us. I could stay over at his place on Saturday night and he'd do breakfast, lunch, everything. So I'd agreed.

I made my way into Mandy's leisure centre with foreboding. Mandy was already seated at a table in their coffee shop waiting for me. I wondered if I ought to offer to buy her a coffee. But she didn't give me a chance – she leaped up and got me a cappuccino with a double dose of chocolate powder on top. She was obviously bending over backwards to get me to like her.

‘Isn't this fun. Where are we going to shop then?' she asked.

I suggested the usual places I bought my clothes at but she pooh-poohed them. ‘No, your dad said to get you something really nice. Let's go to Top Knotch.'

‘But everything costs a fortune there.'

‘Come on, Ted won't mind. It's for a special occasion,' said Mandy. Some ‘special occasion' I
thought, taking a sip of my coffee. It was sickly sweet – I don't like sugar in my coffee.

‘Don't you like cappuccino?' asked Mandy.

‘No … yes. It's fine,' I said, choking it down.

‘Come on then. We're wasting precious shopping time,' she said and got to her feet.

‘How much did he say I could spend?' I asked.

‘Leave it to me,' said Mandy. She gave me a wink.

As soon as we entered Top Knotch, I knew it was a mistake. The racks were hung with really extreme designer clothes. Everything was covered in lacings or ruching or embroidery or whatever. It was the kind of stuff that shouted out ‘fashion victim' the moment you entered the room.

Mandy was in her element. She kept holding things up against herself and pouting into the mirror. ‘This is cute,' she said, handing me a blue jeans jacket that had sequins and cerise feathers sewn all around the collar.

I shook my head. I'd found a rack with some boot-cut black jeans that weren't too bad.

‘Black,' said Mandy with a frown of disapproval. ‘It's so last year.'

Luckily the next load of racks held clothes that
were much too old for me. But Mandy steamed on ahead, sifting through a selection of evening wear that was far too dressy. I lagged behind in the teenage stuff checking the price tags. I could feel myself coming out in a prickly heat rash. I couldn't let Dad spend money on me like that.

Mandy rejoined me and despite my protests started to gather an armful of stuff for me to try on. Everything she selected I hated. An assistant had noticed that I was coming under pressure. There weren't many people in the department and before I knew it another had joined her. Like lionesses that single out the weakest in the herd, they were closing in. The two of them started to do a really hard sell on a pair of snakeskin-print hipsters. Mandy agreed with them. I tried to say that I never wear stuff like that. It was getting really embarrassing.

‘Well, we've only got half an hour before I've got to get back to work,' announced Mandy. ‘I really don't believe that you can't find
anything
in a huge department like this.'