Best Friends

  Auntie Karen had cut us off.

  It looked like she had cut us off for ever and ever.

  Seven

  It felt so weird being at school all by myself. Well, obviously, I wasn't literally alone. There were twenty-eight other children in our class and nearly five hundred in the whole school and any number of teachers and classroom assistants and Mr Maggs the caretaker – but it felt like it was one enormous echoing empty building without Alice.

  We'd gone to the reception class hand in hand and we'd sat next to each other in every classroom since. I couldn't bear sitting beside Alice's empty chair and desk. I turned my back on it and hunched down small until my chin rested on the table.

  Biscuits gave me a poke in the back with a giant Mars bar. 'Hey, Gemma, how come you're suddenly so little? Have you turned into the incredible shrinking girl? You'd better have a nifty nibble on my Mars bar,' he hissed.

  I turned round. I stared at him.

  My eyes burned like lasers. Biscuits looked as if he was singeing.

  80

  'What? What's up? What is it? I mean, I know you're probably feeling a bit fed up without Alice.

  Would you like me to come and sit next to you in Alice's place?'

  'No, I wouldn't! I wouldn't want to sit next to you even if you were my best friend because I'd get horribly squashed on account of the fact that you are hugely fat. But as you are now my worst ever enemy I don't even want to be in the same room as you. In the same school, street, town, country, world as you.'

  Biscuits blinked at me in astonishment, his Mars bar wilting in his hand. 'Don't call me fat! What are you on about, Gemma? We're mates, you and me. We always have been.'

  'Not any more, as of yesterday,' I said.

  'But I didn't really do anything yesterday,'

  Biscuits protested.

  'You told on us,' I said.

  'I didn't. Well. I did tell my mum your names when she asked me.'

  'Yes, and she phoned up and told our mums, as you very well know. And they came swooping off to the station and stopped us running away together.

  You ruined everything, so you can stop looking all wounded innocence because quite frankly it's a sickening expression and I might just have to punch you straight in your fat chops.'

  81

  'I said, don't call me fat! I can't help it if my mum was concerned about you. And if you try punching me I'll punch you straight back, so there.'

  'Right,' I said. 'OK. We'll fight. At play time.'

  'You think I wouldn't hit a girl but I would, if she hit me first.'

  'Yeah, and I'll hit you second and third and fourth and I'll go on hitting, just you wait and see.' I got so het up I forgot to hiss. I was practically shouting.

  'What on earth are you up to, Gemma Jackson?'

  said our teacher, Mrs Watson. 'Just pipe down, please, and get on with your work. Come along, turn round and leave Biscuits alone.'

  'With pleasure!' I muttered, and hunched back in my seat.

  Mrs Watson seemed to be keeping a special eye on me. She kept looking in my direction. Towards the end of the lesson she sidled over and peered at what I'd written in my exercise book. I held my breath. We were supposed to write a descriptive paragraph using lots of adjectives. These are describing words. I'd decided to describe Biscuits very graphically indeed. I'd been more than a little bit rude in places. I hurriedly scribbled over the worst part.

  'Too late, Gemma, I've already read it,' said Mrs Watson.

  82

  I waited for her to hit the roof. But she didn't explode upwards. She sat down beside me in Alice's empty chair.

  'It's OK,' she said softly.

  I stared at her.

  'Well, it's not OK to write a lot of abusive rhetoric in your school exercise book, especially about a nice boy like our Biscuits,' Mrs Watson corrected herself.

  I didn't have a clue what abusive rhetoric was but it seemed to sum up my Biscuits paragraph pretty neatly.

  'Biscuits isn't nice,' I mumbled.

  'Yes, he is, sweetie. Everyone loves Biscuits, including you. You're not really cross with him.'

  'Yes I am!'

  Mrs Watson leaned towards

  me and spoke in a whisper.

  'Aren't you really feeling

  miserable because Alice

  isn't here?'

  I struggled to say some-

  thing. I didn't quite manage

  it. It felt as if two hands were

  round my throat, squeezing hard. My eyes were hurting too. I blinked and two tears ran down my cheeks.

  83

  'Oh Gemma,' said Mrs Watson. She patted my back gently, like I was a little baby. I felt a terrible baby, crying in class. I hunched down even further, so I was practically under my desk.

  'I know you must be missing Alice very much,'

  said Mrs Watson. She gave me one last pat and then went back to her desk.

  'Missing' was the most ridiculously inadequate description. I felt as if I'd been torn apart. It was like losing half of me, an eye, an ear, one lip, half a whirly brain, an arm, a leg, a lung, a kidney and half a long long long snake of intestine.

  I wondered if Alice felt the same way. At least she wasn't stuck at school next to an empty seat.

  She was hurtling up the motorway to Scotland. It would be exciting for her, almost like a holiday. And she'd have a new house and new pets and a new school . . . and maybe even a new best friend.

  I had no one.

  I didn't know what to do at play time. I always went round with Alice, apart from the times Biscuits and I challenged each other to perform amazing feats.

  I remembered I'd challenged Biscuits to a proper fight. I clenched my fists. At least it would be something to do. I didn't think Biscuits would be very good at fighting. Not that it really mattered. He could squash me flat for all I cared.

  84

  I went looking for Biscuits. I couldn't find him anywhere. I tried the obvious place first, but he wasn't in the tuck shop queue. I trekked the length and breadth of the playground. I searched the corridors, wondering if he might be chomping chocolate in a corner, but there was no sign of him. There was only one place he could be. A place I couldn't go.

  I stopped outside the boys' toilets. I waited, arms folded, tapping my toes impatiently. I waited and waited. Boys pushed past me and said stupid things.

  I made some short sharp comments back to them.

  I wouldn't be budged, even when they barged into me.

  'What you waiting for anyway, Gemma?'

  'I'm waiting for Biscuits,' I said.

  'Oooh, fancy him, do you?'

  'I fancy sticking a skewer in him and roasting him on a spit,' I said. 'Go and tell him I want to get on with our fight.'

  'You're wasting your time, Gemma,' said Jack, one of Biscuits' mates. 'He's not in there.'

  'I bet he is,' I said.

  I had half a mind to march straight in to see for myself, but I had a feeling Mrs Watson wouldn't remain understanding if she caught me fighting in the boys' toilets. I'd be sent to Mr Beaton again. I couldn't go in. I had to winkle Biscuits out.

  85

  I caught hold of a squinty little

  kid with glasses dangling skew-

  whiff off his nose.

  'Here, you. Do you know Biscuits?

  He's that big boy forever stuffing his face who's in my class.'

  The kid nodded, trying to hitch his glasses on more securely. Everyone in the whole school knows Biscuits.

  'Well, I want you to come back and tell me if he's in the toilets, OK?'

  The kid nodded again and backed into the bogs.

  He was in there a while. He looked shifty when he came out. He was chewing several chocolate toffees, his mouth crammed so full he drooled unattrac-tively. 'He's not there,' he mumbled, slurp running down his chin.

  'Oh yes he is. He gave you those toffees as a bribe to say that, didn't he?' I said.

  'No he didn't. He gave me the t
offees because he said I'm his friend,' the little kid said proudly, and dashed off.

  I took a deep breath. 'Right, Biscuits, I know you're in there!' I yelled. 'Come on, come out, you great gutless coward!'

  I waited until the bell rang. I waited a minute after the bell rang. And then Biscuits' head peered cautiously round the edge of the doorway.

  86

  'Got you!' I shouted,

  and ran at him.

  'Help!' Biscuits

  screamed, and started

  waddling frantically down

  the corridor.

  'Stop! Come on, you

  coward, fight me!'

  'I don't want to fight! I don't like fighting. I'm a pacifist,' Biscuits burbled.

  He tried to run away but I lunged forward and caught hold of him by the waistband of his huge trousers.

  'Get off!' Biscuits yelled. 'You're pulling them down! You've gone barking mad! First you want to bash me up and now you're trying to take my trousers off. Help! I'm being attacked by a sex maniac!'

  'Billy McVitie! Gemma Jackson! What on earth are you playing at?' Mr Beaton bellowed.

  Mr Beaton is a horrible headteacher. He's so old and crabby. He's been at our school for centuries.

  He taught my dad, would you believe! Dad said he was just as crabby then, and he used to keep a cane in his stationery cupboard. Maybe the cane is still there now.

  'Get to your classroom at once!' Mr Beaton commanded. His arm waved in the air, as if he was 87

  holding his cane and giving us a good whacking.

  I ran for it. Biscuits ran too, though his trousers were halfway down his hips so he had to hobble. He entered the classroom at least two minutes after me, purple in the face and panting.

  Mrs Watson had simply shaken her head at me but she told Biscuits off sharply. 'Why are you so exceptionally late, Biscuits? What have you been doing?'

  I held my breath. Biscuits was having difficulty finding his.

  'Sorry – Mrs – Watson,' he wheezed. 'Been –

  jogging. To – get – fit.'

  'Well, it doesn't look as if it's working just yet,'

  said Mrs Watson. 'And pull your trousers up properly, lad, they look ridiculous.'

  Biscuits grinned and adjusted his trousers by wiggling his hips like a hula-hula girl. The class collapsed. I

  found I was laughing too. Even Mrs

  Watson had to struggle to stay stern.

  'Ever the clown, Biscuits,' she said.

  'Still, perhaps we all need cheering u p today.'

  She glanced at Alice's empty seat. I did too. I wondered why I'd just been laughing when I wanted to cry and cry and cry.

  Eight

  O

  '

  h dear, what a poor little saddo,' said Grandad when he came to meet me.

  He held out his hand. I hung onto it like a little toddler. I didn't want to say anything because I was all choked up. There were heaps of kids from my school milling around us. I didn't want them to see me crying.

  I held on until we got to Grandad's block. We swooped upwards in the smelly lift and then we were in the front door and breathing in the safe lovely smell of toast and old books and peppermints.

  Grandad sat in his big soft chair and 1

  , sat on my big soft grandad. I put my head against his woolly pullover and howled.

  'There now, pet,' said Grandad,

  holding me close. 'That's it. You

  have a good cry'

  'I'm making your jumper all

  soggy,' I sobbed.

  89

  'No problem. It could do with a good wash,' said Grandad.

  He rocked me on his knee while I went on crying.

  When I reached the snorty trying-to-stop stage he found his big white hankie and let me have a huge blow of my nose.

  'I feel such a baby,' I said.

  'Nonsense! Everyone needs a good cry. I have a little snuffle myself every now and then,' said Grandad.

  'You don't cry, Grandad!' I said.

  'I do.'

  'I've never seen you.'

  'I do it in private. The first year your grandma died I reckon I cried myself to sleep most nights.'

  'Oh Grandad!' I wound my arms tight round his neck.

  I couldn't really remember Grandma. I knew she was small with silver curly hair and little silver glasses, but that was because of the photo on top of Grandad's television.

  'Can you remember your grandma?' Grandad asked.

  'Yes, of course I can,' I said, because it seemed rude to say no. You can forget some ancient old auntie but not your very own grandma.

  'You're a sweet little fibber,' said Grandad, rubbing his nose on the top of my head. 'You were 90

  only three when she died.'

  'I can so remember her,' I insisted. I racked my brains. I knew Grandma had given me my special doll, Melissa. I wished wished wished I hadn't given her to Alice now.

  I thought about dolls. 'Grandma played dolls with me. She made my Barbies dance on one leg, like can-can ladies,' I said.

  'That's right, pet!' Grandad said eagerly. 'She had a great sense of humour, your gran. And she loved her dancing. That's where we met, at a dance. Proper ballroom dancing, though we liked to jive around too. We had this special routine where I whizzed her right over my head. Everyone used to clap.'

  'I can jive too, Grandad. Callum's shown me.'

  'Then what are we waiting for? Let's boogie on down,' said Grandad, snapping his fingers. He tipped me off his lap and got to his feet. He started singing Blue Suede Shoes and jogging up and down in his Brown

  Corduroy Slippers. I jogged

  around too, waving my arms

  in the air. Grandad grabbed

  my hand and twirled me round

  and round. Then he seized hold

  of me and tried to whirl me right

  over his shoulder. He couldn't whirl me high enough and we collapsed in a heap.

  91

  'Sorry, sweetheart,' said Grandad. 'I think maybe my jiving days are over now! You'll have to stick to our Callum for a dancing partner.'

  'He dances with Ayesha now'

  'Well, yes. That figures. I don't suppose our Jack is much of a lad for dancing?'

  'As if!' I said. 'No, my dancing partner's always been Alice. Only I'm never ever going to see her again.'

  'Yes, you will, darling. You can invite her to come on a visit in the holidays.'

  'Her mum wouldn't let her come. She doesn't like me. And I bet she never invites me to stay either.

  Anyway, how can I ever go all the way to Scotland?

  The train fare's far too expensive.'

  'Well, at least it's a possibility,' said Grandad. He picked himself up and put the kettle on for a cup of tea. 'You might be able to make the trip supposing we all saved up or we won the lottery or whatever.

  Whereas I know I can't ever hop on a train up to heaven to visit your grandma. Well, one day that's exactly what I'm going to do, but that's very much single-ticket territory – no chance of a return trip.'

  'Don't, Grandad,' I said, because I can't stand it when he talks about dying, even if it's just a joke.

  'You're not ever ever ever going to die, do you hear me?'

  'I'll do my best to stick around for a bit, sweetheart. Now, are you going to join me in a cup of tea?

  92

  If you have a ferret in the fridge you might just find a little treat.'

  No iced gems today! Grandad had

  bought cream cakes. I opened the box and gazed at them in awe. There was a huge white meringue with a cherry on the top, a glossy chocolate éclair, a scarlet strawberry tart and a large slice of sponge cake oozing jam and cream.

  'Oh yummy yummy!'

  'Yummy yummy, soon to be in your tummy,'

  Grandad laughed. 'Go on, then, Gem, you have first pick. But don't tell your mum or we'll both be for it. I know it's naughty but I reckoned my little sweetheart needed cheering up today'

&nb
sp; 'I can't choose. I like them all!'

  My hand hovered over the meringue, the éclair, the tart, the sponge, circling them several times.

  'Take two,' said Grandad. 'Though for Gawd's sake eat your tea when you get home.'

  'I will, I will. Oh Grandad, help! Which two?'

  'I know,' said Grandad, selecting a knife. He cut the éclair neatly in half. Then the strawberry tart, making sure there were two and a half strawberries on each side. Then he severed the sponge into two identical slices. He had most trouble with the meringue. The cream exploded and the meringue collapsed.

  93

  'I'm making a right dog's breakfast of this,' said Grandad. 'There, you eat it all up, sweetheart.'

  So I ate the whole meringue, glace cherry and all, and then I ate half the eclair and the strawberry tart and the sponge.

  'Oh Grandad, that was the best cake feast ever!'

  I said.

  'My Lord, you must have a tummy the size of a tank,' said Grandad. 'Here, lick your lips. We don't want your mum spotting that cream.'

  'No, I don't need Mum to get any madder at me at this present moment in time,' I said, sighing.

  But when Mum came to pick me up from Grandad's she didn't have her usual fuss about food.

  She did tip my chin up and peer at me carefully, but she was looking at my eyes.

  'Have you been crying, Gemma?'

  'No,' I said firmly.

  'Mmm,' said Mum.

  Halfway home she reached out

  and put her arm round me. 'I

  know you're missing Alice a lot,'

  she said.

  'Oh, well done, Mum,' I said

  sarcastically, wriggling away from her.

  'Now then, madam, don't use that cheeky tone!

  Look, you're still in total disgrace for all your escapades yesterday.'

  94

  'I don't care. I don't care about anything any more.'

  Mum sighed. 'I know you're feeling very down.

  Look, Auntie Karen is my friend. I'm going to miss her.'

  'Not the way I'm going to miss Alice.'

  'Yes. All right,' said Mum. 'I know how much Alice means to you. In fact I've often worried about the two of you being so close. Sometimes it's more fun to have a whole bunch of friends.'

  'I don't want a bunch. I want Alice.'