My Sister Jodie (25 page)

‘Give it here!' I said, leaping up and snatching it from her.

‘Don't worry, I don't want to know your silly secrets,' said Jodie.

I wasn't so sure. I wished I could think of a really good hiding place for my journal. I didn't dare write everything in it now. I wrote one small sentence, though I embellished it with stars.

* I have such a wonderful secret with Harley! *

I LED A
weirdly wonderful secret life for the next few weeks. I hung out with Jodie, I played with Sakura, I helped Mum and Dad, I made several shy visits to Mrs Wilberforce – and I saw Harley most afternoons, when we read our books by the badger set.

Harley started keeping a special Badger Watch notebook, writing up each day and night in meticulous detail. He noted every new bedding mound, tuft of hair and pawprint. He even described every trace of badger dung. He drew the badgers in his notebook, carefully shaded accurate portraits. He let me draw them too. I tried to copy his style but I couldn't help giving the badgers humorous expressions. The big male had bushy eyebrows, the female had a smile under her snout, and I drew the two cubs holding paws.

Harley sighed. ‘So you'll be calling them Billy Badger and Betty Badger, together with their twin cubs Bobby and Bessie?' he said.

‘No! I'll pick much better names,' I said.

Harley smiled at me.

‘How do you know they haven't got names for us? They might waffle away in their burrow about Little Soppy Fair Girl,' I said.

‘What do they call me then? Great Giant Freak?'

‘Of course not. You're Wondrous God Food Provider. They say prayers to you night and morning. Whenever they feel a bit peckish, they grunt, “
God will provide
,'' and then they go outside their set, and lo, God has indeed been busy with his honey jar.'

The grass around the set was permanently sticky now. I had to watch carefully where I sat down. I stole a jar of honey out of Mum's pantry. Then Harley experimented with a jar of peanut butter he'd bought at the village shop. The badgers licked it up equally enthusiastically.

They didn't come out every night, but somehow those long hours of crouching together watching the entrance of the set were still precious. We even met up once when it was pouring with rain. I got soaked even though I was wearing my jacket. Harley brought an enormous tarpaulin he'd found in one of the Melchester College sheds, and we huddled together under it as if it was our tent.

I hung my jacket outside my wardrobe and pulled my sodden pyjama bottoms off when I got back to the house. I spread them out over the end of the bed, hoping they'd be dry by morning. They were still soaking wet though, and the legs were covered in mud up to the knee.

I got dressed hurriedly, keeping an eye on Jodie, who stayed hunched under her duvet. Mum and
Dad were already up but I dodged them both, my pyjamas a screwed-up parcel in my fist. I got to the bathroom, locked the door, and then ran a bath and leaned over it, trying to pummel my pyjamas clean with soap. I didn't make too bad a job of it, though I had to clean the bath out very thoroughly to get rid of all the muddy scum.

I got back safely intending to drip the pyjamas dry on a hanger inside my wardrobe, but Jodie was sitting up in bed, arms folded, waiting for me. My heart started beating fast. I clutched my pyjamas to my chest as if they were a baby. They started dripping down my jeans.

‘Had a little accident?' said Jodie.

I swallowed, going red. ‘Yes, actually,' I said. ‘Don't tell Mum.'

‘Don't tell Mum what, exactly?'

‘That I had to wash my pyjamas,' I said, hurriedly hanging them up in the wardrobe and putting a towel under them to catch the drips.

‘I see you've wet your jacket too,' said Jodie. ‘And my goodness, look at the state of your welly boots. You've had one mighty accident, Pearl.'

I sat down on the edge of the bed, wrapping my arms round myself. My damp jeans dug uncomfortably into my tummy.

‘So what have you really been up to?' said Jodie.

‘I – I couldn't sleep last night, so I just went for a little walk,' I mumbled.

‘As you do, in the pouring rain at midnight in muddy woods,' said Jodie. ‘All by yourself?'

‘Mmm.'

‘Sorry, who are you? You
look
like my sister Pearl but she's scared of the dark.'

‘I had my torch.'

‘Harley's present. So you could slip out at night and meet up with him?'

‘No. Yes! Oh, Jodie,
please
don't tell.'

‘I'm not going to tell – but I
should
. What are you playing at, Pearl? I couldn't believe it when you started this lark. I mean,
I
don't think I'd have the bottle. I just can't credit it that you're up for it. You and Harley, of all unlikely people. But what the hell is he playing at? You're only a little girl.'

‘No I'm not. What do you mean, anyway?'

‘He's got no right to play about with you. Tell him I'll punch his stupid head in if he hurts you in any way.'

‘Of course he wouldn't hurt me! He doesn't do anything to me. I never even said I met up with him.'

‘Oh yes you do!
Harley and I have such a wonderful secret!
'

‘You read my journal!'

‘Well, I couldn't help it, you leave it lying around in such stupid places. And I've been worried about you. I didn't know what to say. It's kind of embarrassing. You're too young. You don't do anything really full-on, do you? It is just kissing?'

‘What?' I stared at her. ‘We don't
kiss
!'

‘Well, what do you do then?'

‘Promise you won't tell anyone at all. Do you swear?'

‘Yes, yes, I swear, I swear,' said Jodie. She said several very rude swear words out loud to be funny but she still looked serious.

I pulled her head close to mine and whispered in her ear. ‘We watch badgers.'

‘What?' said Jodie, blinking. ‘
Badgers?
'

‘There's a set in the woods. We've seen them lots of times – two adults and two half-grown cubs.'

‘Oh, for pity's sake!' said Jodie, starting to laugh. ‘You don't have to creep off to the woods to watch badgers. Just sit cross-legged on the lawn, it's heaving with them. Jed's going bananas – they're ruining it all with their earthworks. Oh, Pearl, you are amazing. So that's why Harley gave you that torch! So you could go on your little badger-watching expeditions. Sweet!'

I resented her tone. She was acting like it was a very childish thing to do.

‘Lots and lots of people do badger watches and keep notes. Harley started watching in April, that's when all the big watches start. Some are set up so that forty people at a time can watch underground.'

‘Oh, wow, fantastic! Forty anoraks huddling together all night watching for dopey Mr Stripy to amble out and have a crap and a scratch for the benefit of his doting public,' said Jodie.

‘There's no need to be so snotty about it,' I said. ‘I wish I hadn't told you now.'

‘Of course you had to tell me. You must always tell me everything,' said Jodie. She nestled up to me. ‘So what do you talk about when you and Harley are watching your old badgers?'

‘We don't talk. The badgers wouldn't come out then.'

‘So you sit there for hours in silence? I'd go crazy!'

‘I know. That's why we didn't ask you along too.'

‘Oh. So you're saying you would have wanted me along if I'd kept quiet?'

‘Yes, of course,' I said, though this wasn't one hundred per cent true.

‘So, do you and Harley snuggle up together while you're badger-watching?'

She was teasing again. I glared at her.

‘Of course not.'

‘Well, Harley's as cuddly as a set of iron railings, I must admit. So you don't even hold hands?'

‘No,' I said firmly.

We
had
held hands but I wanted to keep this private.

‘Well. I'm glad my little sister's such a good girl,' said Jodie, patting me on the top of my head.

‘What about my big sister? Are
you
a good girl?' I said.

Jodie laughed. ‘No fear! I'm a very bad girl,' she said.

‘Are you a bad girl with Jed?' I dared ask.

‘Ah, that would be telling,' said Jodie.

‘Well,
tell
then,' I said. ‘I know you like him and you do gardening with him, but
you
don't do anything, do you?'

‘Like what? We've snogged a bit, that's all.'

‘You haven't.'

‘Have too,' said Jodie, licking her lips.

‘But he's a
man
.'

‘Oh, well done, keenly observed, Miss Pearl, Girl Detective. He's not
old
though. He's eighteen. A teenager.'

‘He still shouldn't kiss you. That's way way worse than you thinking Harley was kissing me.'

‘No it's not,' said Jodie.

‘Did he make you?'

‘Of course not! No one makes me do anything,
you know that. I was mucking around and he was getting irritated and told me to run away and play. I got a bit narked and said I wasn't a kid. He said I was just a silly little schoolgirl. I said, “No, I'm not – come on, give us a snog and you'll see.” And he said, “Watch out or I'll do just that,” and I said, “Go on then, or are you all talk?” and so he gave me this stonking great kiss. It was just fantastic, you've no idea, but then he pushed me away and said I was a precocious little whatsit and I needed my bum spanked.'

‘How horrible! How dare he say that! I hate him.'

‘I think I love him,' said Jodie.

‘No you don't. You're just playing. You just want him to fancy you. You want
everyone
to fancy you.'

‘Maybe,' said Jodie. ‘And they do, they do, because I'm so Totally Gorgeous.' She sashayed round the room in her pyjamas, hand on her hip, tossing her head and striking poses. She went to the door on her way to the bathroom. Then she paused.

‘I'm going to get every guy in this whole school fancying me. Just you wait till term starts! But don't look so worried, I'll let you keep old Harley.'

I wasn't sure if Jodie was really telling the truth about Jed. I couldn't stand the idea of him kissing her, even though she'd asked him to. I knew I should tell Mum. But then Jodie would get into huge trouble. I couldn't do that to her.

I decided she was probably pretending, the way she often did. Even so, I took to stalking her, wandering round the gardens, peering behind bushes and inside huts, bracing myself in case I discovered Jodie and Jed embracing. But Jed was
either working alongside Mr Wilberforce or digging by himself. The one time Jodie was with him he was ordering her about in a lordly fashion, getting irritated with her when she pulled up a flower instead of a weed.

‘How do I know whether it's a stupid geranium or whatever? It looks totally weedy to me,' she said, flinging it down on the ground.

‘You need glasses, you do. Go on, clear off, you're hopeless,' he said, dismissing her.

We used exactly the same tone when we'd got tired of Zeph and Sakura and Dan tagging along and we wanted to be rid of them. It didn't look as if there was any romance between them whatsoever. But the next day I spotted Jodie squashed up in front of Jed on his garden tractor. They were roaring along at a tremendous pace, zigzagging wildly while Jed let Jodie steer. Jodie was laughing. Now I wasn't so sure.

I asked Harley that evening, on our badger watch. I felt terribly awkward bringing it up.

‘Harley, you know Jed,' I whispered.

Harley snorted.

‘Do you think there really might be something going on between him and Jodie?'

‘I don't know,' said Harley. ‘Why don't you ask Jodie?'

‘I have. And she says there is. But she would do anyway. I never know whether to believe her or not. I'm worried about it, Harley.'

‘I wouldn't worry. Jodie wouldn't fuss so about you.'

‘Well, she would, actually,' I said, blushing in the dark.

I'd die if I had to admit that Jodie had given me the third degree over Harley.

‘I think Jodie's old enough to watch out for herself,' said Harley.

‘Yes, I suppose so. But she can be so mad sometimes.'

‘Oh, Pearl. You're driving
me
mad. Do shut up about Jodie. You're making too much noise. The badgers won't come if you keep nattering.'

I shut up altogether, feeling wounded, because I'd been talking in the tiniest whisper. The badgers didn't come out, though we waited till gone midnight. Harley didn't say anything, but I was sure he was blaming me. He didn't understand. He didn't have a sister, a very special sister like Jodie.