Sleepover Girls Go Wild! (2 page)

“Man, that was a seriously good joke,” said Kenny admiringly, as we lay back on the grass verge with our ice-creams. “Imagine old Flissy coming up with a joke like that! You even had me going there for a second.”

“More than a second!” spluttered Lyndz. “Kenz, you were peeing your pants!”

“I’m pretty good at practical jokes, aren’t I?” beamed Fliss. “There was this one time…”

And off she went, rambling on about an April Fool trick she’d pulled when she’d swapped the sugar for the salt at the breakfast table and made her little brother Callum cry. Oh-oh! It was never a good idea to congratulate Fliss on anything. One sniff of a compliment and she was OFF!

But good old Kenny came to the rescue, as only Kenny knows how.

“Yeah, well,” she said, interrupting Fliss in the middle of her story. “Making a little kid cry isn’t much to be proud of, is it?”

And Fliss shut up instantly. Re-SULT!

I hadn’t been that impressed with Fliss’s so-called “joke”, to be honest. Well, how would you have felt if you thought your worst nightmare was coming true? And what if I’d had a heart condition?

Suddenly I had a wicked idea.

“So it’s the Snake House next, is it?” I asked casually.

I watched Fliss’s face with interest. I never knew a face could go from pink to green so fast.

“After all,” I added, “as I went in the Spider House, the least you can do is go in the Snake House, Fliss.”

Rosie caught on. “It’s only fair, Fliss,” she said. “You gave Frankie a serious fright in there. Maybe you should let her do the same to you!”

“Oh no!” squealed Fliss. “Not those horrible slimy things!”

I jumped to my feet. “Come on,” I said coaxingly. “I’m not going to play a trick, honest. I just think we should see them, that’s all.”

Somehow, we got Fliss to the Snake House. And double somehow, we got her through the doors. There was loads of heavy tropical foliage in there, airy glass cages with plaques that read things like “Boa Constrictor, Brazil” and “Boomslang, East Africa” – and snakes coiled up in the branches. I didn’t need to play a trick on Fliss. Just seeing her face was revenge enough!

Kenny fanned herself. “Blimey, it’s hot in here, isn’t it?”

“That’s because the snakes need to keep warm,” said a voice behind us. We swung round, to see a man with lots of curly brown hair grinning at us. His Animal World badge said “Jack”, so I guess that was his name. “They are cold-blooded, you see.”

“Cold-blooded and
murderous
,” Rosie whispered naughtily in Fliss’s ear.

Fliss looked like she was about to run for it. I
soooo
love Rosie!

“You mean like, evil?” asked Kenny, looking all keen at the idea.

“No!” Jack grinned, taking off his gloves. “Cold-blooded means they don’t have an inside radiator like you guys. When they get cold, these snakes can freeze solid!”

“Best thing for them,” muttered Fliss.

“What do you do here?” asked Lyndz shyly.

“I’m a snake handler,” said Jack.

He sounded dead casual, but – man! What a scary job! I think we all gulped more than a teensy bit!

“You
handle
them?” gasped Fliss, taking a step back from him as if he was covered in gruesome snake slime.

Jack shrugged. “It’s no big deal, honest,” he said. “They aren’t interested in eating me!”

Kenny looked enthusiastic. “What are they interested in eating, then? I heard they ate live animals.”

Lyndz gasped and looked distressed, but Jack didn’t notice.

“Yeah,” he said cheerfully. “In their natural habitat, the big ones eat wild pigs and goats and things, when they can catch them. You’d be surprised! But we feed them more regularly on smaller mammals here, like rats and rabbits.”

“Not rabbits!” said Lyndz furiously, stepping out from beside me. “That’s horrible!”

Jack looked at Lyndz sympathetically. “Not to the snakes, it isn’t,” he said. “They need to eat, just like you and I do.”

“But—” Lyndz started to say.

“Cool!” Kenny butted in, oblivious to how upset Lyndz was. “So do they eat them
reeeeally
slowly, or swallow them in one—”

“Kenny!” Rosie said sharply. Poor Lyndz looked like she was going to faint. “Stop asking such disgusting questions!”

“Hmph,” muttered Kenny, looking disappointed. Then she cheered up again. “I heard we could handle a snake here. Is that true?”

“Yes!” grinned Jack. “Come back round three-ish, and you’ll have a chance to handle old Hissing Horace!”

There was a strange, choking noise from Fliss, which we all cheerfully ignored.

“Hissing Horace?” asked Rosie.

“A tame python we have,” explained Jack. “He’s a real pussycat.”

“He probably
eats
pussycats,” muttered Lyndz.

I squeezed her arm, knowing she was thinking of her pet cats back at home, Truffle, Toffee and Fudge, and her gorgeous new kitten Zebedee. When I thought of Hissing Horace eating live animals, it kind of made me feel sick too. After all, I am a vegetarian.

Jack started walking away. “See you at three then, yeah?” he said. “Back here?”

“Sure!” cried Kenny. She then swung eagerly round to us. “Three o’clock, guys, and we could be holding a
snake
!”

Rosie shuddered. “Could be holding a
séance
, you mean! Kenz, what if it bites you?”

“It won’t bite Kenny,” I said. “She’d taste too bad.”

“Cheers!” laughed Kenny. “And talking of tasting…”

“It’s LUNCHTIME!” we all yelled together – and holding hands, we ran in a human chain all the way over to the cafeteria.

Kenny flopped down on the grass and gave a huge burp.

“Euw,” said Fliss. “Kenny, you’re disgusting.”

“Hey, it was a good lunch, OK?” protested Kenny. “In some countries, it’s rude not to burp after you’ve eaten.”

We’d had a megatastic food fest in the cafeteria. Fried mushrooms and loads of garlic mayo for me, chicken nuggets for the others, a massive bowl of gorgeous multi-coloured salad and CHIPS all round. And then, since it was my birthday, my dad shipped in chocolate cake for afters!

“So, what do you want to do this afternoon, then?” asked Dad. “It sounds like you’ve done practically everything!”

“Snake-handling at three,” said Kenny at once.

Fliss groaned and hid her eyes. “Snakes, snakes, SNAKES!” she wailed. “Is that all you ever think of, Kenny?”

“Pets’ Corner,” said Lyndz hopefully. “You can cuddle lots of baby animals there!”

That sounded like it could be very cute. We all agreed we’d go there before the snake-handling.

Then Rosie sat up and pointed. “Hey, look over there, guys!”

We all looked round, to see a poster advertising face painting.

“That could be fun,” agreed Dad.

“A bit babyish,” I scoffed.

“Oh, I don’t know, Frankie!” said Dad. “I quite fancy it myself.”

Now
that
put a different light on things, because it gave me the most fantastic idea.

“OK,” I said slowly. “I’m on for it, if you’ll have your face painted too!”

Kenny laughed so much at the idea of my dad having his face painted that she did another massive fruity burp by mistake. Like, gross!

“Go on!” I wheedled. “You’d look really great, Dad!”

So would you believe it? He actually
did
it! I haven’t laughed so much in ages! He went for this really cool skull in the end – well scary! I got painted like a robot, all silvery, with rivets down my cheeks. Kenz got done up like she was off to a Leicester City football match, so no surprises there – if it came down to choosing between saving the life of her best friend and saving the life of a Leicester City striker, there’d be no contest! Lyndz looked adorable as a stripey-faced tiger, Fliss was a pretty pink flower (barfsville) and Rosie ended up as a frog.

Anyway, before we knew it, it was two-thirty.

“What was that about snake-handling at three o’clock, Kenny?” Dad asked, admiring his black and white face in the face-painter’s mirror for the gazillionth time.

So Kenny explained. Dad seemed really interested, actually. I reckon he was just as keen on the idea as Kenny.

“But let’s go to Pets’ Corner first,” begged Lyndz.

“OK,” said Dad, looking at his watch. “I’m going to wash this face off now. Imagine if one of my clients saw me! See you at the Snake House in half an hour?” And off he went, leaving us to head for Pets’ Corner together.

Pets’ Corner. Sounds pretty harmless, doesn’t it? Yeah, that’s what we thought too. But Pets’ Corner was where all the trouble
reeeally
started.

I think Lyndz must have cuddled every single animal she could get her hands on at Pets’ Corner. There were floppy-eared rabbits whose fur was so soft, you almost couldn’t feel it when you stroked them. There were hilarious guinea-pigs with all their fur going the wrong way, and chattering parakeets, and soft white ducks with amazingly downy tummies, and fat golden hamsters… Talk about Old McDonald’s Farm!

“Oh, they are so CUTE!” Lyndz kept saying, charging around from one pen to the other.

“Oh, they are so KEE-YOOT!” Kenny mimicked Lyndz’s voice. “Come on, Lyndz – we’re going to miss the snake-handling!” She kept looking at her watch, and hopping around like she had tin tacks in her trainers.

There was a funny scuffling behind us.

“Hey, check
that
out!” I pointed.

A very small, very fat piglet was standing in the middle of the path, staring at us.

“A piglet!” squealed Lyndz, sounding a bit like a piglet herself. “Let’s see!”

Now, call me a pushover, but this little guy
was
pretty gorgeous. He wasn’t pink like you’d expect. Instead, he was the colour of marmalade, with pricked little ears that kind of flopped over at the top. His tail was curled up really tightly, like a corkscrew or something. He stood there and waggled his little tail, and I swear, he
smiled
at us!

“Look, he’s smiling!” cooed Lyndz, totally besotted.

“Pigs don’t smile,” pointed out Rosie.

“Yeah, and they don’t fly either,” added Kenny.

Fliss looked around. “Where do you think he’s come from?”

I shrugged. “One of the petting pens, probably.”

“No,” Rosie frowned. “I’m sure it’s just household animals in the petting pens, not pigs and stuff.”

Lyndz was crouching down now, and holding out her hand to the little piglet. It wrinkled its nose at her and wagged its head a bit, like it was nodding.

“Funny colour for a pig,” observed Kenny.

As if the piglet had suddenly decided to trust Lyndz, it trotted up and rested its snout in her palm.

Lyndz practically died with delight. “Look, he likes me!”

“He’s probably after food,” Rosie said. “Do you think he’s hungry?”

“Nah,” scoffed Kenny. “Look at how fat he is! Hissing Horace would probably like him for dinner.”

Lyndz put an arm round the piglet and glared at Kenny. “Stop making such horrible remarks, Kenny. Pigs are dead intelligent – he can probably understand you!”

“What do you think he’s called?” asked Fliss.

“Apple sauce,” said Rosie wickedly.

“What about Sausage?” suggested Kenny.

Even Lyndz had to admit that was a pretty perfect name. So we christened him Sausage – a little orange Sausage with tiny trotters and a tail that just kept waggling like a disco-dancing worm.

“But where has he come from?” Fliss asked again, looking round her.

“I bet you he
is
Hissing Horace’s dinner,” said Kenny suddenly. “They’ve been fattening him up specially. He’s obviously escaped! But they’ll catch him, and then – SSLLLURRPP!”

I swear, I thought we’d never calm Lyndz down. She burst into tears, and practically refused to come to the Snake House for the handling. Sausage wriggled so much that she had to let go of him – I didn’t see where he went. I really could have punched Kenny for saying such a thing, when she knew that Lyndz was ultra-sensitive about it. I know Kenny’s my best mate and all, but sometimes she can be really thoughtless.

“Look,” I said, trying to smooth things over, “I’m sure that’s not true, Lyndz. Come on, cheer up! We can ask the snake handler at the demonstration, if you like. And I bet you he’ll laugh and tell you it’s not true.”

“Yes, come on, Lyndz,” said Rosie kindly. “Why don’t we do that?”

“And if it’s true, we can register a complaint with the office or something,” Fliss pointed out, which practically set Lyndz off again.

Even Kenny realised she’d gone a bit too far. “I was only teasing, Lyndz,” she said with a shrug. “Don’t get in such a razz!”

Dad was very sympathetic when we finally coaxed a weepy Lyndz to the Snake House, and he patted her on the shoulder a lot. The show hadn’t started yet, so we hadn’t missed anything. But about a minute after we got there, Hissing Horace made his appearance – and we forgot all about Lyndz. Which was kind of a mistake, as it turned out.

“Urrrgghhh!” squeaked Fliss, clutching my arm so tight, I swear she left her fingerprints on my
bones
.

“Wow,” Rosie and I whispered.

Kenny was literally speechless. And that takes some doing!

You wouldn’t BELIEVE how huge Hissing Horace was. His body was like a really thick branch, and he must have been nearly three metres long – that’s practically twice as tall as any of us!

“Ladies and gentlemen,” said Jack, grinning broadly. “This is Horace. He’s a Burmese python, and he’s full-grown, though some Burmese pythons have been known to grow to as much as eight metres long.”

SERIOUS gulp. That was enormous! I could well believe that something that size would eat Sausage as a little tea-time snack!

Jack went on to tell us about Horace’s natural habitat and how he’d been with Animal World for three years. Then, when he’d finished telling us the facts, he said, “So, would anyone like to stroke him?”

Dad stepped forward eagerly, and stroked Horace on the head. We all held our breath. Visions of Dad getting bitten and swelling up like a balloon flitted through my brain. But Dad just turned and beamed at us.

“Hey, girls,” he whispered. “This guy is really something! Come and feel him!”

So we did. We held him, too – and he was really heavy!

Fliss didn’t touch him, of course. She refused to have anything to do with Hissing Horace – and she wouldn’t even touch any of
us
after we’d handled him!

“I don’t want to get snake slime all over my fingers, thank you very much,” she sniffed.

And nothing in the world would convince her that Hissing Horace wasn’t slimy. I bet you thought he’d be slimy too, didn’t you? But he really wasn’t. He felt smooth and warm, kind of like the bark of a tree, only with really neat, shiny scales. Stroking him, you forgot all the horrible stuff – like how in the wild, he would have squeezed his victims to death. He didn’t seem particularly freaked at our painted faces either. I guess he was one chilled-out snake.

“It’s just as well that none of us are painted like Sausage,” joked Kenny. “Hissing Horace might try to eat us!”

I glared furiously at Kenny. That girl just didn’t know when to stop!

“Don’t listen to her, Lyndz,” I started.

But… where was Lyndz?

I looked all around the Snake House, but there was no sign of her.

“Hey, have any of you guys seen Lyndz lately?” I asked.

Fliss, Kenny and Rosie all shook their heads.

“She probably went outside for some fresh air,” suggested Dad, frowning. “She didn’t seem all that keen on the snake, did she?”

We all walked out into the sunshine, and called for Lyndz. But she was nowhere to be seen.

“I think you really freaked her, Kenny,” I scolded. “She could be anywhere now!”

Kenny looked kind of ashamed of herself. “She’ll turn up,” she said sulkily.

“Hey, we never asked the snake handler if Sausage was going to be Horace’s dinner, did we?” said Rosie all of a sudden.

We all went very quiet. We should have asked Jack as soon as we’d got into the demonstration. Lyndz was still miserable, and it was all our fault.

Just as Dad was about to go off and report her as missing to the Animal World office, Lyndz showed up. Just like that.

“Hi, guys,” she said quietly, clutching her bag tightly to her chest. “Is it time to go?” She sounded weird, kind of nervy and odd.

“Are you OK, Lyndz?” I asked.

“Look, I’m really sorry,” Kenny blurted. Kenz isn’t very good at admitting she’s wrong. She must have been feeling pretty gruesome about it to apologise like that!

“No problem.” Lyndz’s voice sounded all tight and tinny, like a Furby. It was definitely
odd
. “Is it time to go?” she asked again.

“Yes, it is,” said Dad kindly. “Home for a birthday tea!”

And we all left Animal World, piled into the car, and headed home for birthday cake and surprises.

“Hey, welcome back!” greeted Mum cheerfully as we all came through the door, wiping our feet and peeling off our coats. “Come in, come in! Did you have a good day? I wish I’d been there, but…”

“It’s OK, Mum,” I said. I think Mum feels a bit guilty sometimes, about spending more time with Izzy than me. Well, Izzy is kind of little, so I guess she needs Mum a bit more than I do. “We missed you, but it’s OK.”

“We saw the most amazing snake, Helena,” Dad started.

I glanced anxiously at Lyndz, at the mention of Hissing Horace. She was still holding on to her bag like grim death, and hadn’t said a word all the way home. She couldn’t
still
be upset about that Sausage business, could she?

“Tea!” announced Mum. “We’ve got crumpets, and cakes, and toast, and biscuits, and birthday cake, all waiting for you through here.” And she headed into the kitchen.

“Psst, Frankie!”

It was Lyndz, tugging on my sleeve. She was looking
totally
weird now, with a really crazy glint in her eye. What was
with
her?

“
What?
” I said. “Lyndz, what is going on?”

“You’ve all got to come upstairs with me, now!” Lyndz begged. Without waiting for an answer, she started heading up to my bedroom.

“But the tea…” objected Rosie.

“Come on!”

The urgency in Lyndz’s voice was unmistakable. We all followed her upstairs and into my bedroom.

“You’re acting like you’re crazy, Lyndz!” said Kenny irritably. “So what’s the big hurry? There’s a fantastic tea waiting downstairs, and my tummy doesn’t want to wait!”

Lyndz’s back was turned towards us. She seemed to be fiddling with her bag.

“Look, promise you won’t get mad?” she began.

“Mad about
what
?” demanded Fliss.

“Well, I just couldn’t leave him,” whispered Lyndz, turning round.

There, sitting on my bed among all my teddies and waggling his little tail, sat Sausage.