Girl, 15: Charming but Insane (14 page)

Chapter 15

A few days later, Fred sidled up to Jess after English. The room was empty, as Mr Fothergill had lumbered off to perform some gross act in the privacy of the staffroom, possibly involving the tea urn and powdered milk. The rest of the class had similarly evaporated at speed. Flora and Mackenzie had rushed off together to find a private place in which to admire each other’s earlobes and eyelashes. Ben had gone off to a football practice. Only Jess was left, because she still hadn’t quite finished her essay about dark moments in
Twelfth Night
. ‘Although
Twelfth Night
is a comedy,’ Mr Fothergill had announced, ‘it does have its dark moments. Rather like life. Ha ha!’

‘Er . . . any chance you can do me a favour?’ said Fred.

‘A favour?’ cried Jess. ‘After what you did for me? Name it! I trust it will involve considerable pain and inconvenience.’

‘Well, yes, of course,’ said Fred. ‘Otherwise it wouldn’t be worth asking.’

‘OK, then – reveal my ordeal,’ Jess said, grinning.

Fred sat down on an adjoining desk and sort of played with his long scruffy locks of hair.

‘I do wish you’d have your hair cut, by the way,’ said Jess.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ sighed Fred. ‘I’m waiting for the right moment. Anyway, the deal is, it’s my mum’s birthday tomorrow.’

‘Oh! I adore your mum! She is appallingly delightful!’

‘Yes, well . . .’ Fred frowned a bit. ‘I don’t know what to get her. Could you possibly buy her some small token of my affection – some female-type thing, possibly adorned with lace and rosebuds? If anyone saw me buying something like that, my street cred would be at an end for ever.’ He took a crumpled twenty pound note from his pocket. ‘Be lavish,’ he said. ‘And . . .’ He hesitated, and blushed a little.

Jess was intrigued. What was coming? A guarded reference to lingerie?

‘Well, we’re having a little birthday-type tea round about six tomorrow, and she said I could bring a friend as long as it was you. Sorry to impose such a nightmare on you, but it will keep the old bat happy.’ He shrugged, and looked at Jess with his head cocked on one side and his eyes sort of shining.

‘It’s not a nightmare, you plonker! It’ll be ace!’ cried Jess. ‘I so love your mum! I’ll be there, glamorous present in hand!’

‘OK, and – well, don’t, like, mention it to anybody, yeah?’ Fred got up. ‘Not even to Flora. She’d only tell Mackenzie and . . . I don’t want everybody to know.’

‘Of course!’ said Jess. She was really looking forward to it. She had felt so happy in Fred’s house. And she was already planning to get Fred’s mum something really stunning. Twenty pounds! Fred must have been saving up, or maybe he’d raided his piggy bank, because Fred was famously always broke.

‘Gotta go now – chess club.’ Fred sidled off towards the door and briefly imitated a chimpanzee before disappearing with a strange ape-like cry. Jess returned to her essay about dark moments. Sunlight flooded the room. For once, her own life didn’t seem all that dark. She had come through the CCTV ordeal, and now things were steaming along nicely. Fred’s mum had invited her to her birthday party! How unbelievably sweet! Jess hoped there would be chocolate cake.

It was no problem, next day, keeping it a secret.

‘Doing anything after school, Jess?’ asked Flora at break.

‘No, just going to whizz off home,’ said Jess. ‘Mum’s at a librarians’ conference in Oxford and she won’t be back till late. So I’ve got to get back and keep Granny in order. Otherwise she might escape and go out on a spree, mugging young men.’ This was partly true, in fact. Jess’s mum
was
at a conference and she had asked Jess to check on Granny straightaway after school – but Jess reckoned that she’d still have time to get Fred’s mum a glamorous present and turn up at six o’clock for the birthday tea.

Jess didn’t mention Fred’s mum’s party to Flora, though. She would have kept it secret even if Fred hadn’t asked her to. If Flora knew that shopping for presents was involved, she would certainly hijack the event, and possibly tag along in an irritating way, and get invited in. Then it would be the work of a moment for Flora to fascinate Fred’s mum and replace Jess in that lovely woman’s fickle heart.

‘Yeah, I’ve gotta go home straightaway, too,’ sighed Flora. ‘My dad is being, like, so hard on me about Mackenzie. Anyone would think Mac was a drug dealer or something, rather than a small furry animal.’

Jess rather wished Flora would keep details of her love life to herself, even though it was Jess who had compared Mackenzie to a small furry animal in the first place.

Morning school was uneventful. Jess was in a happy dream, trying to decide whether to buy Fred’s mum some delectable bath items in what seemed to be her favourite spicy range, or some perfume, or maybe a fabulous pair of earrings. She had a whole two and a half hours after school to nip home, make sure Granny was OK, then zoom into town on the bus and ransack the department stores and chic little boutiques. What a delightful evening this was going to be! Possibly the best this year. Nothing on earth could spoil it. Could it?

Chapter 16

The bell rang for the end of school, and Jess was out of the blocks like a sprinter whose last chance had come for an Olympic gold. She dashed home. She would spend ten seconds reassuring Granny, making sure she had her glasses, her hearing aid, the TV remote, a pile of lovely food and a blood-curdling murder mystery to read. Then Jess could quickly get changed (another ten seconds – no, say twenty, maybe) and dash off to the city centre for an hour’s frenzied shopping. She would buy Fred’s mum the best present ever, not counting an actual live puppy.

However, as Jess arrived home and pushed the front door open, she saw something strange. The hall floor was sort of shining and moving. Oh my goodness! It was covered in water! Hastily Jess removed her shoes and socks. There was a horrid cascading sound, somewhere in the kitchen.

‘Granny?’ called Jess, splashing along the hall. ‘Granny?’ There was no answer. Jess’s heart missed a beat.

She reached the kitchen. A tap was running: the kitchen sink had overflowed, and was still overflowing, a continuous curtain of water cascading on to the floor. Thank heavens Granny was not lying on the floor, drowned. Jess had heard somewhere that you could drown in a saucer of water if you were really unlucky – or really determined. She turned off the tap, and the waterfall sound began to slow down and become a little less like Niagara.

‘Granny?’ Jess called, splashing back towards Granny’s room.

A terrible fear seized her. Maybe Granny had turned on the tap, then felt a bit ill and sat down and died in her chair. She would still be sitting there like a waxwork, with her eyes kind of horribly open. It would be just like Granny to die with maximum ghoulish panache. Jess peeped round the door of Granny’s room. It was empty. Except for a sea of water swilling about on the floor, ankle deep. Granny’s knitting pattern, which had been on the floor by her chair, was floating about. Where on earth was she, though? Had she gone upstairs to escape the rising waters?

‘Granny! Granny?’ yelled Jess, racing upstairs. She looked everywhere. Nothing. No aged person. Only Rasputin looking startled and disapproving. ‘Where’s Granny, Rasputin? For goodness’ sake! Have you eaten her?’

Rasputin looked shocked and innocent. Jess paused, her mind whirling.

This was a disaster. Her mum had left her in charge and she had somehow lost Granny and flooded the house! What should she do? Should she ring the police, or was that overreacting? What if Granny had just decided to go for a walk? The police would be really cross. Although going for a walk on her own was not really Granny’s style, what with her bad knee and everything.

Suddenly, the phone rang in her mum’s study. Jess picked it up.

‘Jess? This is Mrs Phillips next door. Your grandmother is round here with us. She locked herself out earlier so we took her in until you came back from school.’

‘Is she OK?’ asked Jess.

‘Oh, yes, she’s fine!’ said Mrs Phillips. ‘We’ll bring her back round, now you’re home.’

Jess rang off, went downstairs and splashed her way to the front door. The flood water had gone down a bit, but it was still total chaos.

She opened the door just as Granny was coming up the path, accompanied by Mrs Phillips and several of her irritating small children.

‘Here we are!’ beamed Mrs Phillips.

Granny looked embarrassed. ‘The wind blew the front door shut, dear! How can I have been so silly?’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘I only went out to take something to the dustbin.’ Then Granny caught sight of the flooded hall. ‘High cockalorum!’ she cried in alarm (this was Granny’s emergency swearword). ‘What on earth’s happened?’

‘Please can we paddle? Please can we paddle?’ cried the awful Phillips children. ‘Mum! Can I get my boat? Can we get Laura’s duck?’

‘No, no, be quiet, stand still!’ said Mrs Phillips. She always grinned foolishly when her children behaved like savages. Jess had babysat for them once and they had thrown a giraffe at her and waved their bare bottoms in her face. Never again. ‘Oh dear, I wish I could help!’ said Mrs Phillips. ‘Only Archie needs changing,’ she brandished a stinking baby, ‘and Arabella will be waking up from her nap any minute now.’

‘We can manage!’ said Jess firmly. ‘Wait there, Granny! I’ll get you some wellies!’

‘Is there a burst pipe or something? Should you call a plumber?’ asked Mrs Phillips, trying to hold back her revolting offspring.

‘No, it was just a tap left on,’ said Jess, returning with the wellies, which had escaped the flood, being in a heap of stuff on a shelf on the hall stand.