Читать книгу The Friends Forever Collection - Jean Ure, Stephen Lee, Jean Ure - Страница 16

I could hardly wait to get round to Annie’s the next day! I was, like, jigging up and down with impatience all the time Mum was getting ready. Usually in the mornings she just grabs her bag and that’s that, we’re off! Today, wouldn’t you know it, she suddenly decides her shoes are killing her and she’s got to change into different ones. Then while she’s changing her shoes she notices this teeny little hole in her tights, and instead of sticking it up with nail varnish, which is what she’d normally do, she has to take the tights off and find herself a new pair.

I felt like screaming, “Mum! Who’s going to see them?” I mean, she works in an office, sitting at a desk. No one’s going to notice holes in her tights! Specially not ones you’d need a magnifying glass to find. But Mum likes to keep herself looking nice. She’s always very neat. Unlike Annie’s mum, who looks like a haystack! A very soft, comfortable sort of haystack; but still a haystack.

“What’s the matter?” said Mum, as I stood in her bedroom doorway, wrapping one leg round the other. “Do you want to go to the toilet?”

I said, “Muuum!”

“Well, what are you jigging about for?”

“It’s late,” I said. “You’ll be late for work!”

Mum’s never late for work; she’s a very punctual sort of person. “It’s nearly half-past nine,” I said.

“That’s all right,” said Mum. “I don’t have to be in till ten … stocktaking on Thursday, right? Late night. So I get a ten o’clock start the rest of the week! What’s your rush, anyway?”

“Got things to do,” I said.

“Oh! I suppose you want to talk to Annie about Saturday?” Mum laughed. “Come on, then! Let’s get you over there.”

I did feel a bit mean, not being more enthusiastic about Mum’s idea of letting me visit the bookroom. I knew it was a big thing for her. She is not scared of technology as she uses a computer for work; but she definitely gets twitchy when I want to do some of the things that anyone else’s mum would let them do without even winking an eyelash. Or is it batting an eyelid? (But how could you bat an eyelid? It would hurt!) I knew she’d spoken to Annie’s mum and Annie’s mum had said it would be OK, and I was quite looking forward to it; but mostly I wanted to hear what Annie had been saying to Lori. What had she been telling her about me???

When we arrived at Sylvan Close, which is the road where Annie lives, Annie’s mum and dad had already left for work and Annie was in the middle of a big shouting match with Rachel. You could hear them going at it as you went up the path.

“This sounds serious,” said Mum. “Is it safe to go off and leave them?”

“It’s OK,” I said, “they’re always having rows. They don’t do anything. They just yell.”

It was all about heated rollers, which Rachel said Annie had taken, and Annie swore she’d given back.

“I gave them back last night!”

“So where are they, then?”

“How should I know? You took them!”

“I beg your pardon, you were the one that took them!”

Rachel then shouted that she was sick of Annie just helping herself to things that didn’t belong to her and if there was any more of it she was going to put a padlock on her bedroom door. “Because you’re a thieving little toerag!”

Phew. I am sometimes quite glad that I am an only child.

“Can we go upstairs now?” I said.

“You can do whatever you like!” snapped Rachel. “I’ve washed my hands of you!”

With that she stalked off in a huff and Annie and me went up to Annie’s bedroom.

“Good riddance!” yelled Annie, as somewhere downstairs a door slammed shut. “I gave her back her stupid rollers! How should I know what she’s gone and done with them? W—”

“Oh, look, just shut up!” I begged. “I want to hear what you talked to Lori about!”

“Yes. Well!” Annie hurled herself down on to her bed. “I was telling her all about you, right? About you being a big fan, and everything. How you were doing this project for school. How you had all these books, and—”

“Yes, yes, you told her that before!” I said.

“So, OK, I told her again. I wanted her to know that you were this huge great admirer, and I said how it was your birthday on Saturday and how you really, really wanted this new book, this Feather thing—”

“Scarlet Feather!”

“Scarlet Feather, and—”

“You weren’t trying to get her to send me one?” I said, horrified.

“Why not? I thought you wanted one!”

“I do, but not like that! That’s like begging.”

“Well, it’s all right,” said Annie, “’cos she didn’t offer anyway. I thought she might have, ’cos I bet when books are published the authors get given loads of free copies, I mean like stacks and stacks, so it wouldn’t have hurt, but—”

“It would’ve hurt me!” I said.

Annie looked at me and shook her head. “You’re weird,” she said. “You know that? You’re really weird!”

“Now she probably won’t ever want to talk to me!” I wailed. “She’ll think you were just trying to get a book out of her!”

“No, she won’t,” said Annie. “I’ve got it all arranged.”

“Got what all arranged?”

Annie bounced upright, on the bed. She hugged her knees to her chest and grinned this big triumphant grin, almost splitting her face in two. “Your birthday present. I’m arranging it. Lori’s arranging it. With her mum.”

“With Harriet?”

Annie nodded, happily. “She’s really nice! Really friendly. Not a bit stuck up. She asked me if you’d ever met her mum, and I said no, but you would absolutely love to. I said if you could meet her it would be the most exciting thing that had ever happened to you – ’cos it would, wouldn’t it?” said Annie.

I gulped. “Yes, it would!”

“So Lori said, being as you’re such a huge great fan and you’re doing this project and everything, she’d ask her mum if it could be arranged. She’s almost sure her mum’ll say yes. So there you are!”

Annie flung her legs in the air and exultantly rolled backwards on the bed. “You’re going to meet Harriet Chance!”

“B-but … h-how?” I said.

“What d’you mean, how?”

“Well, I mean … she’s in London!”

“No, she’s not.”

“She used to be.”

“So people move! We can get to her easy as anything on the bus. I didn’t give her your address,” said Annie, “’cos I know you’re not supposed to—”

“She’s got it anyway,” I said. “I mean, Harriet has.” When I was ten I wrote her this creepy crawly fan letter, all decorated with hearts and flowers, and she wrote back, saying Love from Harriet, XXX, and I was so thrilled! I put the letter in a special frame and hung it on the wall. It’s still there, even now.

“Yes, well, this is it,” said Annie. “I probably would have given it to her if she’d offered to send you a book, but all she did was just ask what part of the country we lived, and when I said Wiltshire she said was it anywhere near Salisbury, so I said yes, and she said in that case there was no problem. She’s going to ask her mum and see when to do it. It will be your birthday treat,” said Annie, all self-important. “A special present from me to you! You might try to look a bit happy about it.”

I said, “I am happy! It would be the most brilliant birthday present I’ve ever had!”

“So why are you looking worried?”

“I’m just scared in case it doesn’t happen!”

“It will happen. Lori’s promised.”

“But why should someone important like Harriet want to see me?”

“Because you’re her number-one fan! Because you’re doing this thing about her! Because it’s your birthday. I told you I was going to give you a really good present! You didn’t believe me, did you? You thought I was going to give you something stupid, like last year.”

I bleated a protest. “I didn’t!” The reason I bleated was that I was in such a tremor my voice had gone. I’d swallowed my voice! “I didn’t,” I said, “honestly!”

“Bet you did,” said Annie.

“I did not. You always give me good presents!”

“Not as good as this. I’m your fairy godmother!” Annie sprang off the bed and did a little twirl. “I’m the one that makes your dreams come true!”

I thought that meeting Harriet really would be a dream come true. I’d read once where she’d visited a school to talk about her books, and I had just been so jealous of the people at that school. Annie couldn’t understand, as her dream would be to meet someone from her favourite band, which at that moment was Dead Freaks.

I thought Dead Freaks were really creepy! But Annie had all their albums, just like I have all of Harriet’s books, so sometimes I would listen to Dead Freaks and sometimes Annie would read Harriet Chance. That is what friendship is all about, sharing each other’s interests even if you don’t really understand them.

“When do you think we’ll know?” I said.

“Soon as Lori’s spoken to Harriet. Tomorrow, maybe? I said it would be best if it was in the afternoon, ’cos then we could go while old Bossyboots is out, so she wouldn’t be able to stop us.”

“How d’you know she’ll be out?”

“’cos she’s got this thing about one of the boys in Savemore. Tyrone.” Annie pulled a face. “He’s really gross! But she’s got the hots for him. So she has to keep going there every day to check her friend Jem hasn’t pinched him. See, they’re stacking shelves and she’s stuck here babysitting, which is why she’s in such a tetch. But it means we can go and meet Harriet and she won’t know anything about it! Well, not until we get back, and she won’t be able to say anything ’cos she’s not meant to leave us on our own. And I don’t think, probably, that we ought to say anything, either. Not even to your mum, ’cos I know what you’re like.”

I said, “What am I like?”

“You tell her everything,” said Annie.

“I don’t tell her everything.” I’d never told her about hiding in the stationery cupboard. I’d never told her about the birds’ nests.

“Well, you’d better not tell her about this,” said Annie. “Not unless you want her coming with us! She’s already going to listen in on Saturday. You don’t want her sitting there while you talk to Harriet, do you?”

I had to admit, I didn’t. I definitely didn’t! If I was going to meet Harriet I wanted it to be private. Just the two of us. Well, and Annie, of course. But I didn’t mind Annie. She’s my best friend and we don’t have any secrets. But it would be really offputting if Mum was there!

“Let’s listen to music,” said Annie; and she snatched up this one CD that is my least, least favourite of Dead Freaks as it is quite scary, well I think it is, but Annie just loves it. She doesn’t usually play it when I am around, but this time she said that I “owed her”, and I couldn’t deny it, so we were sitting there listening when the door crashed open and it was Rachel, shouting at us to “Turn that music down! They’ll complain next door, and I’ll be the one that gets into trouble!” She then added that she was going out and would be back in a couple of hours and we were to just behave ourselves or else.

“Else what?” said Annie.

“Else you’ll be in deep ****!”

The reason I have put **** is so as not to write what she actually said, as what she actually said was quite rude and I don’t think really she ought to have said it; but as she was in this strop on account of having to baby-sit for me and Annie instead of stacking shelves with Tyrone, I forgave her. The minute she’d gone, Annie turned the music up again.

“Now we can have fun!” she said.

I was in a state of jitters again next morning, desperate to get round to Annie’s and discover if she’d managed to speak to Lori again, but I did my best to contain myself as I didn’t want Mum growing suspicious, thinking I was up to something. The minute she dropped me off, we raced upstairs to Annie’s bedroom. I could see that Annie was bursting with news.

I said, “Well? Did you speak to her?”

Annie’s face broke into a big beam. “Yes! It’s all arranged. We’re going to have tea with her!”

I said, “Tea … ” I could hear my voice, all hushed and breathy, like it was going to be tea with the Queen. Only this was far more exciting! I wouldn’t have anything very much to say to the Queen. I’d got simply loads to say to Harriet!

“We’re going on Thursday,” said Annie. “I thought Friday would have been better, ’cos of being nearer to your birthday, but Lori said her mum couldn’t manage Friday. And I said we couldn’t manage Saturday ’cos of your birthday party, so she said what about Thursday, and I said Thursday would be OK, so—”

“Thursday is good!” I said. “Mum has to work late on Thursday!”

“Anyway, we’ll be back ages before then,” said Annie. “It’s only tea. What we’ve got to do, she said, is get a bus to Brafferton Bridge—”

“We go through there on the way to visit Gran!” I knew exactly which bus, and where to catch it: a number six, at the back of Market Square. “Is Brafferton Bridge where she lives?” I said, thinking that I would have to change the first bit of my biography.

“Near Brafferton Bridge. She said her mum will meet us and take us back. Lori won’t be able to come ’cos she’s already doing something else, but—”

“That’s all right.”

I didn’t care about Lori; Harriet was the one I cared about. In fact I thought I might be a bit shy if Lori were there, so I was quite glad she wasn’t going to be.

“She said maybe we could meet another time,” said Annie. “She sounds really nice! Oh, and it’s got to be kept a secret. She said her mum doesn’t usually meet her fans ’cos if she met all the people that read her books she’d never have time for writing.”

“Yes.” I nodded. I’d read that somewhere, in one of the interviews that Harriet had given. She had said that she was a very private person. She loved to hear from her readers, and she always, always wrote back; but she didn’t very often make public appearances. I could understand that! That is probably how I would be, if I were a famous writer.

“So we’ve not got to tell anybody,” said Annie. “In case it gets back to people and they all want to come.”

“Absolutely!” I said. This was my treat. I could think of several girls in our class who would be really envious … but I certainly didn’t want them intruding on my birthday present!

“I said what we’d do,” said Annie, “we’d look up the times of buses so I could tell Lori which one we were getting so Harriet doesn’t have to be kept waiting.”

I was ever so impressed! Annie isn’t normally what I would call an efficient sort of person. Mrs Glover at school once told her she was “slapdash”. But because this was my birthday present, and she did so much want me to enjoy it, she was making this huge great effort. She even knew how to look up bus timetables on the Internet!

“See, look? There’s one that gets to Brafferton Bridge at ten past two. I’ll tell her that one. Then you talk as much as you like, all about books, you could even do an interview, then we can have tea and come back home and nobody will ever know! Now you’re looking worried again. What’s the matter now?”

“How are we going to recognise her?” I said.

“Who, Harriet?”

“There aren’t any photos!”

I’d searched and searched, but being such a private person she obviously didn’t like having her photograph taken. (I agree! I don’t, either.) All these other old ugly authors had their pictures all over the place – well, they weren’t all old and ugly, but they weren’t very beautiful, either, which I suppose oughtn’t to matter as it is their books you are interested in, and not their faces, and even if Harriet turned out to be old and ugly I would still be her number one fan! But the only photographs I had been able to find were taken when she was young. I knew it was when she was young as she was holding Lori, and Lori was just a baby. Harriet had looked really pretty, then, with a nice little round squashy face and dark hair, with a fringe. I did hope she still looked like that! But I knew it was a long time ago, almost fifteen years. People could change a whole lot in fifteen years. I mean, anyone who had last seen me when I was, say, two, certainly wouldn’t recognise me as I am now. So I thought probably she was bound to look a little bit different.

“We don’t want to get in a car with the wrong person!” I said.

Annie rolled her eyes. “You are such a worrygut! Maybe she could hold a copy of one of her books? Or d’you think there might be hundreds of people waiting at Brafferton Bridge holding copies of books?”

I giggled at that.

“I’ll ask Lori,” said Annie. “Just leave it to me. And stop FUSSING!”