Читать книгу The It Girl: Superstar Geek - Katy Birchall - Страница 6

When my dad gets concerned his eyebrows become very distracting.

I mean, he was really concerned about the situation. He made me sit down and everything. Dad and I rarely have conversations where we sit each other down. We both become very awkward.

The only other times that he’s had to ‘sit me down to talk’ about something was when I signed him up to a dating website because I didn’t like his girlfriend at the time and he got all these suspicious emails that made her cry, and when I threw a pork pie at his head because he gave my Marvel comic book encyclopedia to a second hand bookshop and I happened to be holding a pork pie when he told me.

Dog later ate the pork pie, which had been cleaned up and put on a plate, because neither Dad nor I were keeping an eye on him during our ‘sitting down and talking’ moment. This just made the whole situation worse because (a) Dad had apparently been looking forward to eating that pork pie and (b) Dog decided to rub his pork-pie victory in Dad’s face by vomiting it back up over Dad’s trainers.

I don’t know why Dad was so cross. The only reason he owns trainers is so that he can leave them by the door in the hope that women might think he works out.

Anyway, both those times that he ‘sat me down’ his eyebrows were uncontrollable and I knew, as soon as he asked me to sit to discuss the fire incident and his eyebrows immediately sprung into irrepressible motion, that he was having one of those moments when he wonders whether there is actually something genuinely wrong with me.

Like I don’t question that every single day.

And honestly, I really was trying to concentrate on what he was saying but his eyebrows were jumping around all over the place. It really is fascinating how they have such agility.

Sadly, he has not passed this impressive talent down to me.

‘Are you even listening?’

‘Of course!’ I lied, unlocking my facial muscles from their state of concentration on this intricate eyebrow dance. I patted Dog absent-mindedly as he lay next to me, clearly hoping for a treat after this act of loyalty in the face of a Dad Inquisition.

Dad’s eyebrows furrowed. ‘Anastasia,’ he prompted, leaning forwards and clasping his hands together in what I guessed was an attempt at giving an air of understanding.

‘Nicholas.’ Two of us could play the I’m So Serious I’m Going to Use Your Full Name game.

Dad took a deep breath.

‘I appreciate that moving schools is an upheaval, especially for a teenager. I’m not mad at you – I know it was an accident. But if there’s anything you want to, I don’t know, discuss ?’

‘Like what?’

‘I don’t know. Teenage things?’

Oh lord. I bet he wanted feelings. This was ambitious. I wasn’t going to talk about that with my dad. It was embarrassing enough telling my two new and only friends, Jess and Danny, about each of the latest ways I had managed to embarrass myself and, by association, them too. I’d be lucky if I managed to hold on to those two for much longer the way things were going. Either way, there definitely wasn’t any sharing happening with my dad.

‘What teenage things?’

‘I don’t know!’ His eyebrows leapt frenziedly towards the ceiling. ‘Learning to be responsible?’

‘Don’t bother. I wouldn’t listen anyway.’

He narrowed his eyes. ‘Are you taking this seriously?’

‘Yes I am taking this seriously. I set someone’s hair on fire; it was dangerous and embarrassing. I will not be touching a Bunsen burner ever again without supervision. The whole school is going to hate me. I’m going to be a bigger loser than I was before. I hate my life.’

‘Well that’s what I mean,’ he said gently. Seriously, I do one tiny thing like set someone on fire and suddenly my dad feels the need to subject me to weird parental counselling. ‘It’s just . . . at the last school . . . you weren’t . . .’ He trailed off.

‘Miss Popular?’

‘That’s not what I was going to say,’ Dad said, slumping back into the armchair where he usually sits on a Sunday afternoon with his Irish whiskey. ‘You weren’t . . . settled. I just want to make sure that you’re more confident with this new place.’

I had to start a new school when we moved to London last year after Dad became a lot more in demand as a freelance journalist and he needed to be where everything was happening. Weirdly this happened after he wrote a really boring book about tanks used in the war or something which actually sold quite well. The book is dedicated to me but I’ve never read it, which really bugs him. If you ask me I should be the insulted one – yeah Dad, it’s every girl’s dream to have a book about TANKS dedicated to them.

Incredibly, somehow the serious tank book led to serious articles on famous people – and they all seem to live in London or come here a lot. But it means he is at home a lot more than he used to be which is good, although he does sometimes go to a celebrity party or whatever. Celebrities like Dad now because he writes big glossy features about them in trendy magazines rather than reporting on their sweat patches in a tiny column of a tabloid.

I think he felt pretty guilty about making me move but I didn’t mind. I didn’t really have any friends at my old school and even though I was a bit nervous about Dog settling down in London at first, he quickly made friends with a Pomeranian called Hamish down the road.

‘Thanks, Dad. I appreciate your concern. But really? You can stop worrying.’

He sighed, it being clear that I wasn’t going to divulge any of the teenage angst he was looking for. ‘Fine. Well, be more careful in future Chemistry lessons?’

‘If they let me enter a science lab again in my lifetime, yes I’ll be more careful. No Bunsen burners.’

‘I’m not going to ground you. It’s not like you ever really go out anyway.’

‘Great, good chat, Dad, thanks.’

He gave a last concerned eyebrow rise and then finally pulled himself up from his chair and left the room. I relaxed and traitorous Dog immediately followed him just in case he was going in the direction of the kitchen.

Sadly for Dog, Dad went to his bedroom to get ready for his big date. Recently Dad has been seeing someone new who he still hasn’t introduced me to. Not that I’m insulted.

Usually he’s never with them long enough for me to meet them. I just pick up the phone every now and then and hear a different woman go, ‘Oh hi, sweetheart, is Nick there please?’ and he makes a wild ‘say I’m not at home’ gesture in the background as I explain that he’s actually gone to Slovenia to find himself. I like to mix it up and throw in some pretty inspired reasons for his disappearance, such as he’s modelling his new line of swimming trunks in Beirut, or he’s in Peru training to be a Sherpa.

This can be risky however because if Dad overhears he throws things at me.

He’s been seeing this girlfriend for a few months now though. He’s really been quite disgusting about the whole thing. Combing his hair, wearing aftershave and dancing – dancing – as he goes around the house. Honestly, I had to ring Mum and tell her how embarrassed I was.

She was in India at the time so it was a bit crackly but I think I managed to convey my disgust. Mum is a travel journalist which means she’s away a lot but I don’t mind. Sometimes she takes me with her to these amazing places and then when she’s in England and hasn’t seen me in a while she comes to stay with us too.

Mum and Dad were never married – or even together for very long. They met when they were both junior reporters and in Dad’s words ‘Rebecca was totally in love’ with him and in Mum’s words she was ‘either very drunk, honey, or suffering from some kind of tropical disease that causes hallucinations’. Either way, I was the outcome, and luckily they’re really good friends which makes things a lot easier.

When I was younger I kept hoping they would get back together, like in The Parent Trap or whatever, but now I see that it’s actually a lot better this way. Mum says they could never be together because Dad is too opinionated and the way he sneezes creeps her out. Dad says they could never be together because Mum never washes up and once mocked John Wayne’s hat. I reckon it’s actually because they’re best friends, but hey, you’ve got to let adults believe what they want to believe.

‘It sounds like he’s in love, darling,’ Mum laughed down the phone as I explained Dad’s recent antics. ‘Be nice to him.’ I’m not sure what other advice she gave me because as she spoke there was a lot of background noise at her end and I think I could hear someone trying to sell cabbages for twenty rupees a kilogram. India seems like a very noisy place.

As Dad rummaged around in his bedroom he decided to start lecturing me from upstairs. ‘I don’t want any problems this evening. You’re to stay home and behave,’ he instructed.

I found this comment unjustified considering I am very well behaved the majority of the time. I am hardly a troublemaker and I don’t get invited to any parties so I don’t really know what he was getting so anxious about.

The most recent time that I guess I wasn’t the model of good behaviour was when he had a house-warming party for our new place in London and all these people invaded, sauntering in with their wafts of expensive perfume and bottles of Chardonnay. I had to take their coats and walk around for the evening with trays of nibbles, listening to them tell Dad how adorable I was as they ignored me and picked up mini bruschettas from the tray.

Anyway there was this actor there who I overheard saying that he couldn’t understand why Nick had that dog over there that looked like he would slobber all over the place and probably, by the look of the boy, wasn’t even a good pedigree. I accidentally let Dog chew his hat.

Dad didn’t make me sit down that time and have a talk about respecting my elders or anything, but he talked to me for about five billion hours the next day on the difference between fighter aircrafts and bomber aircrafts in the war.

I’m not sure if that was intended to be a punishment but it sure felt like one.

‘I’m just going to sit and watch movies with Dog. Have a little trust, Father.’

‘Not vampire movies?’ He snorted with laughter at his own ‘joke’.

This is not only unfunny but also grossly unfair considering he was the one who last week recommended the stupid people-slaying child-vampire movie to his fourteen-year-old daughter, alone in the house with only a Labrador for company.

It’s not as if Dog could protect me. He’s afraid of salad spoons for crying out loud. Whenever we get out the big wooden salad spoon he goes round in circles manically and barks his head off in fear. What would he do if a vampire strolled into the building? I’d had to disturb Dad on his date and make him come home and check there were no vampires around.

‘When do I get to meet this girlfriend of yours?’ I asked, ignoring the vampire movie comment and trying to change the subject.

‘Soon enough,’ he said breezily, coming back into the room. ‘She’s dying to meet you.’

‘I bet.’

Dad did a last mirror-check in the hall. ‘Not bad for an old man, eh? I reckon I could pass for early thirties.’

‘Don’t get ahead of yourself, Gramps. Anyone who talks about Eric Clapton with as much passion as you do could never be a day under forty.’

‘That’s enough from you.’ He stood over me. ‘Are you going to be all right? No fires, yes?’

‘No fires. No vampires.’

‘Call me if you need me.’ He gave my hair a ruffle and then he shot me a long, hard look as though he was trying to read my face.

‘Anna . . .’ He hesitated. ‘You do . . . you do like it here in London don’t you?’

‘Yes?’

‘And you . . . well . . . never mind. Have a nice evening. Bye, Dog.’

As the door shut, I got a very distinct feeling that my father wasn’t telling me something.