Pink Wellies and Flat Caps (38 page)

‘Hi
ya,’ says Georgie to the spotty-faced assistant in her
you’re my best
friend voice, ‘how are you today?’

I mime two fingers down my throat.

‘What?’ Georgie mouths innocently.

I shake my head.

‘I’ll call you back Max, I’ve got customers,’ says the assistant, making it sound like a couple of stray animals have just wandered in.

‘We need mas
ks,’ says Georgie, ‘for a fancy-dress party.’

I sigh.

‘Yeah, that’s why most people need them. I didn’t imagine you were robbing a bank or hijacking a plane,’ responds the assistant with a yawn.

Or gatecr
ashing an animal rescue attempt.

‘What kind of party is it?’ she asks.

‘Yes, what kind of party is it?’ Georgie asks me.

How the hell do I know? I shrug helplessly. I still haven’t worked out a plan yet.

‘It’s a masquerade party is it?’ she asks, checking her text messages.

Georgie exhales loudly and says
,

‘It’s a sex orgy actually.’

She finishes typing her text and looks up swinging her long black hair to the side.

‘Oh yeah, and my boyfriend is Brad Pitt.’

She leads us to the Venetian masks and I study them with fascination.

‘This cat one is fab,’ declares Georgie. ‘I might get this one.’

I look at her despairingly.

‘Georgie, I can clearly see it is you. Th
ey have to cover our whole face. The last thing we want is for anyone to recognise you. I thought we agreed balaclavas?’

The girl gives me a funny look.

‘Balaclavas at a fancy dress? What you going as, bank robbers?’ she giggles. ‘What you need are Bauta Masks then. If you don’t want anyone to recognise you, they are the best. Everyone is wearing them for the Stantonford Young Farmers’ Christmas Ball tonight. Is that the one you’re going to? Oh no, I forgot you’re going to an orgy aren’t you?’ she laughs.

‘Farmers’ Christmas party?’ I repeat.

‘Yeah, you know as in farmers celebrating Christmas. You do know what a farmer is don’t you?’ she asks sarcastically.

‘We’re only the Wurzels’ biggest fans,’ Georgie grins.

‘This is great,’ she whispers to me. ‘We can go to the party and no one will know it is us.’

The girl pulls open a drawer and produces a dozen colourful, sequinned masks.

‘Then,’ she adds in a creepy voice, ‘the ultimate. This will certainly help you to hide your true identity and have them guessing.’

With a flick of her wrist she produces a cape which she drapes around Georgie’s shoulders. I gasp as Georgie suddenly becomes anonymous.

‘Cool,’ I say staring in awe.

‘Drives my boyfriend insane,’ laughs the assistant.

Yes, well maybe now we are getting just a little too much information.

‘Planning to pull are you?’ she asks.

‘Only a pig,’ responds Georgie, admiring herself in the mirror.

‘I know what you mean. Men they’re all the same aren’t they?’ she says, popping a stick of gum into her mouth.

‘How about guns?’ I say before I realised I have said it.

Georgie gapes at me.

‘Crikey,’ says the girl, her eyes lighting up. ‘You really are robbing a bank. Cool.’

She fidgets excitedly,

‘I get it,
Pigs
right?’ she adds, contorting her face with an exaggerated wink.

‘Oh no,’ I stammer.

‘You know what you need?’ she says, seeming not to hear me.

Our brains tested?

‘Smoke bombs.’

‘What?’ Georgie and I say together.

‘Creates a smoke screen or I can get you the ones that just create a hazy atmosphere. What bank are you robbing? I hope it’s bloody Barclays, the bastards wouldn’t give us a mortgage,’ she says with an evil glint in her eye.

Jesus, she will be telling us to do the
bank manager’s knee caps next.

Georgie winks at me.

‘It’s not a bad idea, as a pre-emptive strike against Charlie’s flares, and we can use them if things get out of hand.’

‘Out of hand?’ I squeal.

If you ask me things are already getting out of hand. There is a little tinkle as the shop door opens and an elderly couple enter.

‘My boyfriend has a gadget shop, he can get replica guns and the bombs,’ says the assistant
. ‘His smoke bombs are brill. They look like little grenades.’

‘Christ, can you keep your voice down,’ I hiss.

‘When are you doing it?’ she whispers.

‘We’re not.’

‘Yes we are,’ Georgie disagrees.

‘Not a bank,’ I argue.

‘A building society,’ cries the girl.

‘We’re not robbing anything,’ I hiss louder than I mean to and the elderly couple turn to look at us.

‘Why do you need guns then?’ asks the assistant.

God
, why does everything have to get so complicated?

‘Guns,’ say the couple in hushed tones backing slowly towards the door.

‘I told you Truro was rough,’ says the woman pulling her husband from the shop. ‘I much prefer Redruth.’

I don’t believe this. We came here to be inconspicuous. At this rate we may as well take out an ad in the local rag telling everyone we are here.

‘We’re actually activists,’ explains Georgie. ‘Well that is we’re kind of secondary activists. The first activists are coming to rescue the animals but we don’t think they should, so we’re the activists to stop the activists from committing their activist activities.’

I shake my head.

‘You what?’ asks the girl.

‘Yes Georgie
. You what?’ I mimic.

‘So what are the guns for?’ the girl asks confused.

‘So I can shoot her,’ I say pointing angrily at Georgie.

I knew I should have come alone. Twenty minutes later we set off with a box of smoke grenades and a plastic AK47 assault rifle stashed in the boot. I have no idea what we will do with them, if anything at all. Any hopes I had of staying positive had flown straight out of the shop window. I am now consumed by feelings of doom. If we can’t buy a couple of masks without problems then how on earth
can we thwart the mighty FFFAA? Georgie pushes a Cheryl Cole CD into the Jag’s music player and turns the volume up.

‘This is all getting dead exciting. I’m going to enjoy tonight. Do you think Jed will be there?’

‘I haven’t said we’re going,’ I say, hearing myself sound like a party pooper.

‘What do you mean?’ she shouts above the music. ‘We’ve got the masks and we can warn them?’

The truth is now that we are here I have no clear idea what to do. I somehow hoped once I arrived a plan would miraculously form in my head.

‘I thought we were going to phone everyone?’ I argue. ‘But it’s all getting complicated.’

‘So why have we got the masks? It’s not fair to say we can’t go,’ she says, sounding like a petulant child.

‘You suggested the masks for rescuing Pepper.’

‘I don’t think Pepper will squeal on us,’ she laughs. ‘Anyway they will be wasted on a pig. Come on Ali, let’s go. It will be fun. Everyone will be there so it’s the perfect opportunity to let them all know. Just because Edward won’t be there …’

‘That’s not true. Edward has nothing to do with it. He’s in New Zealand, and anyway I’m engaged to Charlie.’

‘Oh yes, the wonderful Charlie with his perfect company pension plan.’

‘Honestly anyone would think I was marrying him for his money, which I can assure you I am not.’

‘I never said you were. Keep your Primark drawers on.’

‘I’m wearing my freebies for your information.’

‘Ooh hark at you, and I seriously think you should slow down.’

‘What
?’ I ask, fumbling in my bag for some Maltesers.

‘Slow down,’ she repeats, pointing at the speedometer
, ‘you’re doing sixty in a forty speed limit.’

I look with confusion at the speedometer. How can that be? It only feels like we’re doing about thirty. In fact, I was just about to put my foot down even more. We screech around a bend and the bag of Maltes
ers spill over my lap.

‘It’s my boots,’ I say.

‘Well, that’s the best excuse I’ve ever heard.’

‘Oh, buggeryfuck,’ she groans as we zoom past a policeman who happily snaps us with his speed camera.

‘Sod it,’ I yell pushing my foot down onto the brake but hitting the accelerator instead.

‘What in buggeration are you doing?
screams Georgie. ‘Stop, for God’s sake, stop.’

‘I’m trying to,’ I say as my legs turn to jelly.

‘You could have fooled me.’

I bring the car to a hasty halt and we sit in silence. In the rear
-view mirror I see the policeman walking towards us. The question is what do I do? I can’t possibly tell the policeman the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The shit will most certainly hit the fan if I do. There will be a raid on the farms and Charlie and his friends will all be arrested and all because of my AllSaints boots. That will teach me to be extravagant. Play it cool, that’s the best thing.

‘Oh God, what are we going to do? Shit, oh shit,’ moans Georgie.

‘I’m going to play it cool,’ I tell her.

She scoffs.

‘You’ve never played anything cool in your entire life so you can’t start now.’

She’s quite right of course.

‘Step out of the car please madam,’ instructs the young policeman and I mean
young
. Heavens, he looks like he has just left school. I’d better not flutter my eyelashes or I’ll be arrested for assaulting a minor.

‘Hello,’ I say in my friendliest voice.

‘Were you aware that you were breaking the speed limit?’ he asks in a boyish voice.

I point down to my boots.

‘I’m so sorry. It’s these silly boots. How fast was I going officer?’ I say respectfully.

He pulls his shoulders back at the word
officer
and, oh no, did I really just flutter my lashes. Honestly it comes to something when you have no control over your eyelashes.

‘According to my colleague, who clocked you five minutes ago, you were doing seventy.’

I hear Georgie gasp. Colleague? What sodding colleague? Seventy, oh my God.

‘Colleague?’ I say in a strangled voice
. ‘Seventy, are you sure?’

Oh
, what am I saying?

‘Are you disputing that?’

Georgie opens her door.

‘Officer, if I could
…’

‘Stay in the car please madam.’

‘He caught you on camera just before the bend. Can I see your licence?’

You know that feeling of doom I was talking about? Well, I feel it is about to become a reality. I fumble shakily in my handbag and finally pull out my purse. I grab the pink photo card and hand it to him. He stares it for several seconds and hands it back to me. I sigh with relief.

‘That’s a Boots Advantage card. Are you trying to be clever with me?’

Piss it.

‘Are there enough points on it to pay the fine, officer?’ I joke in a trembling voice.

‘I hope you’re not trying to bribe me
,’ he replies seriously, taking a step back.

With Boots
Advantage points? He surely cannot be serious. He is probably too young to even need razor blades.

‘No, I was just
…’

‘Step out of the car madam,’ he says angrily to Georgie.

Georgie emerges from the car looking like a terrified rabbit with eyes darting all over the place but unfortunately mostly darting towards the boot. I could gladly have murdered her. I find my licence and hand it to the officer almost curtsying as I do so.

‘I’m so sorry. They look so similar.’

Georgie rolls her eyes.

‘Is this your vehicle?’ he asks suspiciously.

At last, now I can explain why I am so nervous.

‘It’s my boyfriend’s car and, the thing is he doesn’t know I have brought it to Cornwall
…’

‘Are you saying you have stolen it?’

I never said that did I? I look to Georgie for confirmation. She shakes her head stupidly.

‘No, of course not
…’

He cocks his head.

‘Obviously I can understand why you would think that …’ I say quickly, not wanting to upset him further. If Georgie rolls her eyes much more they will disappear into the back of her head. That will teach her.

‘He has gone to Leeds on business and he said I could use the car, but only around London. We thought we would come to Cornwall for the
… for the …’