Polly Plays Her Part

  And I was fine. Or I would be if everyone would just leave me alone.

  I spent so much time chatting to Skye and the others in the Emerald room I hardly touched my script all week. I knew I’d be in trouble on Saturday, and even bigger trouble if Dad ever found out, but it was so exciting to see how many points I could earn. I carried on smiling and saying I was fine and pretending everything was okay and, in the meantime, I spent every spare moment hunched over the computer.

  Dad and Diane nagged me to come downstairs and join in with them but I didn’t want to, thanks very much. They were desperately trying to pretend we were one big happy family but it was such a joke. As if Diane baking a few cookies or Dad dressing up as a bear and taking us all on a bear hunt was going to make everything okay. I still hadn’t told Dad about getting the biggest part in the show. I wasn’t that bothered about it anyway.

  On Friday night I stayed up really late chatting to Skye. We only needed a few more points to reach our goal of 200 and we were discussing our avatars. Skye was going to design a cute girly avatar with a funky hairstyle and loads of jewellery, but mine was going to be different. I hadn’t decided how exactly, but it was going to be a sort of cat-girl with a studded collar and huge amber eyes. Her eyes would be so big she’d be able to “see” things before they actually happened.

  “Imagine how cool that would be,” said Skye. “You’d be able to win the lottery and stuff because you’d know exactly which numbers to pick!”

  Yeah, and you’d know your dad was going to fall in love with the neighbour and that your mum was going to scarper off to Spain for a year – so you could do something about it before it was too late.

  When I went down for breakfast the next morning, Dad was showing Diane an article in the paper about the friend2friend website.

  “Have you seen this, Polly?” he asked, passing the paper over. There was a picture of a girl who’d got into some sort of trouble on the site. I could feel myself start to burn up. I was dying to know what it said but I pushed the paper away, shaking my head.

  “Polly wouldn’t be silly enough to talk to strangers,” said Diane. “She’s far too sensible. But you do look exhausted. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. I just couldn’t get off to sleep last night.”

  “Early night then tonight,” said Dad. “And later on when you get home you can show me some of the websites you go on, just so I can make sure they’re completely safe.”

  I could see I was going to be in trouble the second I walked in to drama. Mandy was busy setting up the stage to look like Marcia’s bedroom, with a desk and keyboard and everything, and it was obvious she was planning to run the first scene.

  “Can I have a quick look at your script?” I asked Phoebe, grabbing her arm and steering her away from Mandy.

  “I thought you already knew your lines?”

  “I did learn them but that was days ago. I just want to make sure I haven’t forgotten anything.”

  Phoebe gave me her script, but it was hopeless. I didn’t know the lines well enough at all. I read through the first page and tried to memorize as much as I could, but I needed more time. I asked Mandy if I could use a script just for today but she shook her head.

  “Why don’t you have a go without it, Polly, and see how you get on? It’s the best way to feel secure with your part, you know.”

  I climbed onto the stage and sat down at the desk. Everyone else made a line of chairs on the floor, ready to watch. There’s this really long bit at the beginning where I’m playing on the computer and talking about the game, but I couldn’t even remember how it started. Mandy kept prompting me but it didn’t help. The odd word would sound familiar and I’d remember the next couple of words that came after it but then I’d go completely blank and she’d have to prompt me again.

  “Polly, you don’t seem to know it at all,” said Mandy. “What’s going on? You were so excited about getting the part, you said you were going to learn your lines the second you got home. I think you’d better come and have a chat with me in the break.”

  “Can’t I just try again?” I pleaded, blushing a bit.

  “No, just get a script for now. We need to get on and I haven’t got time to prompt you every five seconds.”

  Phoebe handed me her script and I started again but I still didn’t do it properly. I was too upset. I didn’t want Mandy to think I couldn’t be bothered or to start wishing she’d given the part to Sam or someone else, but the harder I tried to get it right the worse it seemed to get.

  “There’s really no point in carrying on until you know it, Polly,” Mandy said in the end, calling me down from the stage. “So who has learned their lines?”

  Sam’s hand shot up in the air. “I’ve learned all of mine!” she boasted. “I know I’m only a virus but I don’t need to use my script at all.”

  So we ended up doing the scene where Sam’s character, Cydore, replicates herself to trap Marcia and Tarn. She has to stand in the middle of the stage and chant in this creepy robotic voice:

  “ONE AND THEN ANOTHER, WE COPY EACH OTHER… ONE AND THEN ANOTHER, WE COPY EACH OTHER…” And as she chants the stage fills up with more and more identical viruses who join in with the chant until it’s very loud and menacing.

  “It’s going to be amazing,” said Mandy. “The viruses will all be wearing these fluorescent green jumpsuits with green and black masks, and I’m going to hire a smoke machine so that, as the chanting gets louder, the stage will fill up with thick white mist.”

  “Golly, it’s not real smoke, is it?” said Tara, alarmed. “You know how bad my asthma gets.”

  Mandy shook her head. “Don’t worry, Tara, it’s completely safe, but it creates such a great atmosphere.”

  Sam was brilliant of course. She knew every word and she acted like a pro, while I ran around the stage with Phoebe’s script clutched in my hand, struggling to find the right place every time I had a line. Nobody laughed or anything but I felt so stupid and I knew I’d let Mandy down.

  “It’s okay,” said Phoebe, when the scene was over. “I’ll help you learn your lines at school. Why don’t you just tell Mandy about your mum leaving? I’m sure she’d understand.”

  But I didn’t want to tell Mandy about Mum going to Spain. She’d just think I was making excuses. In the end, when she came over to talk to me, I made up some nonsense about losing my script and promised her I’d find it and learn all my lines by the following week.

  “I know you can do it, Polly,” she said. “You were so good in the auditions. You just need to set aside some time and really get to grips with the part.” She peered at me closely. “You do look very tired actually. You’re not worried about anything, are you? Is everything okay at home?”

  Her face was so kind and caring and I was so tired and upset, I almost told her everything. About Mum leaving, and Cosmo hating his new home. And how I’d only wanted to get the part of Marcia in the first place because I thought it might persuade Mum to stay in England.

  “Well, there is something,” I started, looking down at the floor and blinking hard to stop myself from crying. But just then Arthur burst into the hall and Mandy swung round to face him.

  “Mandy!”

  “Arthur?”

  “So sorry to interrupt – it’s just about the dance.”

  They started to discuss whether they were going to do a tango or a Viennese waltz and I slipped away over to where Phoebe was waiting.

  “What did she say?” said Phoebe. “Did you tell her about your mum?”

  I shook my head. “She didn’t really say anything. I mean it’s not as if we’re performing next week or anything.”

  “Aren’t you worried?”

  “No, why should I be?” I shrugged. “It’s only a stupid show.”

  Phoebe gave me a funny look but I buried my head in my bag and pretended to be looking for my snack.

  “You know, Polly, I just don’t get you sometimes,” she said and walked off to the other
side of the hall.

  When break was over Mandy put us into pairs to practise our ballroom dancing. The competition was only a couple of weeks away and we still hadn’t had a single practice. For some reason she’d paired me up with Monty B – she seemed to think it would help us to bond or something. Sam was partners with Sandeep, Catharine with Adam, Phoebe with Ellie and Tara with Rachel.

  The others weren’t so keen to join in so they sat in a group at the back of the hall and went over their lines. I probably should’ve sat with them so I could start learning mine, but I was stuck with Monty B, who was trying his best to explain the difference between a drop and a drag.

  “Cheer up a bit,” he said. “You should see your face. You’re like that Russian princess who couldn’t smile.”

  “What Russian princess?”

  “You know, the tragic tale of Princess Polly who lost the ability to smile?”

  “Don’t call me that!” I snapped. “And anyway, you’re the only one around here who’s tragic. I don’t know why Mandy keeps pairing me up with you.”

  “Well I wasn’t exactly begging to be your partner either, in case you were wondering, but we might as well make the best of it now. Anyway, I bet I could make you smile,” he said.

  “Bet you couldn’t. I’m not in the mood to smile, or laugh, or to dance for that matter – especially not with you!”

  He grabbed me round the waist and pulled me towards him. “Just relax and follow me,” he said. “I do the waltz with my nan all the time.”

  “There’s no point trying because we’re going to win,” Sam called out, sailing past with Sandeep. They did look good – as if they’d been dancing together all their lives, but I wasn’t about to let Sam be the best at everything.

  “Come on then,” I said to Monty B. “Show me what to do.”

  He tried to guide me round the room but I was rubbish. He said, “One, two, three, one, two, three,” over and over again, but I kept stepping on his toes, and when he tried to turn me, I fell right over his legs and landed in a heap on the floor.

  “Get up, Polly!” he moaned, pulling at me. “You’re like a sack of potatoes. We might not want to be partners but we do want to win, don’t we?”

  “It’s not me who’s a sack of potatoes,” I snapped, and pulled him down on top of me.

  “Oh my God, yeah,” said Neesha. “I know the show’s called CRASH! but I don’t think Mandy was talking about that sort of crash.”

  “Crashing is the new waltzing if you must know,” said Monty B. “It’s called the cross-body, reverse-turn spin-fall.” He hauled me to my feet. “It goes one, two, three, turn. One, two, three, spin. One, two, three, turn. One, two, three, fall.” He whisked me round and round and then tripped me up on purpose, pulling me down on top of him.

  “I bet no one else can do it as well as us,” he called out from somewhere beneath my tangled legs.

  “I bet we can,” said Sam, who couldn’t bear to be beaten at anything, and she did a strange sort of spinning leap, dragging poor Sandeep round after her. They banged straight into Phoebe and Ellie who spun round and round before falling down as well.

  “I think that’s what you call a drop and a drag,” said Monty B.

  “Goodness me,” said Arthur, who’d come in to watch. “I hope there’ll be a marked improvement by the time the television cameras are here.”

  “And I hope we get to rehearse my show at some point in the near future,” said Mandy, smiling through gritted teeth. “You know – the show that I’m supposed to be rehearsing right now?”

  I got up and pulled Monty B to his feet. “That’s the last time I’m going anywhere near a dance floor with you,” I hissed. “One, two, three, turn – one, two, three, fall.” But even though I was trying to sound cross I couldn’t help grinning.

  “Told you,” he taunted.

  “Told me what?”

  He put on a ridiculous Russian accent.

  “Zat I could make you smile ov course, Princess Polly.”

  When I got home Diane said Jake had developed a slight sniffle or something and that Dad had rushed him off to the doctor’s. I logged on and told Skye all about CRASH! and how well I was doing, and by the time Dad got back with Jake he’d forgotten all about the friend2friend scare story in the paper, and how he was going to check my laptop for dangerous sites.

  The next couple of weeks flew by. I spent more and more time chatting to Skye. We easily reached our 200-point target and we had brilliant fun in the Pearl Palace designing our avatars. The more time I spent chatting to Skye and the others the harder it was to concentrate on my lines, or my homework, or anything else I was supposed to be doing.

  Mum kept calling and she e-mailed me every couple of days, but I deleted the messages as soon as they arrived. I didn’t take her calls either. I didn’t want to know about her new job and her new friends and what a fantastic time she was having. If I didn’t speak to her I could pretend she was still down the road at number 25 instead of miles and miles away living it up in another country.

  I know she was upset, because she called Dad and tried to get him to put me on the phone, but I kept making excuses. She wanted to know why I was ignoring her, but it wasn’t my fault. She was the one who’d decided to go off without me. It was so much better chatting to Skye – telling her all about Phoebe and the brilliant times we had together. Pretending I had a twin sister was like having the closest friend ever right there with me all the time. My made-up Phoebe always wanted to do the same things as me. She never had a go at me about anything and she certainly never wanted anyone else to tag along.

  Not like my real friend Phoebe, who was always nagging me to learn my lines or to call Mum or to tell Mandy why I was having such a hard time. And if I ever suggested spending time on our own, she nearly always asked Monty B to come along, or Ellie and Sam – so it was more or less impossible to spend any time with her by myself.

  At drama, the ballroom dance contest was looming and everyone was busy selling tickets to their friends and family. I didn’t even mention it to Dad and Diane. I mean there was no way I wanted them there watching me make an idiot of myself with Monty B. I was still struggling with my lines. I kind of knew Act One just about well enough to keep Mandy happy, but I hadn’t even looked at Act Two.

  “Why don’t you just tell her you don’t want to do it?” Phoebe asked me at school one lunchtime. We were actually by ourselves for five minutes because Ellie and Sam had detention for giggling all the way through science.

  “I do want to do it – you don’t understand. I just wish my mum was here.”

  “But she’s not here, so why don’t you tell Mandy before it’s too late? It’s selfish in a way, you know, Polly, because there are other people who really wanted that part.”

  “What, like Sam you mean? Why are you so worried about Sam, anyway?”

  Phoebe took a deep breath. I could see how fed up she was getting. “I’m not worried about Sam,” she said slowly. “Why should I be? I just don’t get what you think is going to happen.”

  “What are you on about? You don’t get what I think’s going to happen?” I was getting fed up as well.

  “Look, Polly, Marcia’s part is huge. And if you don’t know it properly, and no one else is learning it just in case, then the whole show’s going to be ruined.”

  “So basically you’re saying that I’m going to ruin the whole show.”

  “Stop twisting everything!” she shouted. “I’m just trying to be your friend and help!”

  She stormed off, shaking her head. She was always walking off these days. I bet my twin Phoebe would never walk off and leave me by myself in the playground. She’d understand exactly how I was feeling about Mum and everything.

  As soon as I got home I dumped my bag and ran down the road to find Cosmo. He still preferred to hang about outside number 25 and it still upset me to see him sitting there every day, waiting for me. I collapsed down on the doorstep and was just getting ready for a
big cuddle when the door swung open behind me. I leaped straight back up and Cosmo went shooting under a car parked in front of the house.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to scare him. You’re Polly, aren’t you? We met that time I came to look round the house.”

  It was Mrs. Bay, the woman who’d rented the house from Mum.

  “He can’t get used to his new house,” I said. I knelt down by the curb and tried to coax Cosmo back out. “Cats are like that.”

  “Some people are like that too,” she said kindly. “I still miss my old house. Why don’t you sit there for a minute and I’ll bring you a drink and a biccy and then I’ll make myself scarce. He’ll soon come out once I’ve disappeared.”

  She came back with some chocolate digestives and a tall glass of juice. After a bit, Cosmo crawled out and I told him all about Phoebe and my lines and how she just didn’t understand. Cosmo curled up on my lap and I buried my face in his neck. I loved sitting with him on the doorstep. It was the only time we got to have a proper cuddle these days.

  I was chatting to Skye later on, telling her all about Cosmo and how special he was, when a message popped up in my mailbox.

  “Well done,” it said. “You only need 400 more points to reach your 1000-point target. Once you reach your target you’ll be able to enter the Diamond Den – but from now on you must earn the points alone and not as part of a team.”

  “What’s the Diamond Den?” I asked Skye.

  “Not sure exactly,” she said. “But it’s supposed to be really cool!”

  We carried on chatting for ages and when she said she was going to bed I begged her to carry on. I still needed another 360 points and I really wanted to find out what was in that room.

  I stayed up chatting until really late and then, in the morning, I dragged myself out of bed and logged straight back on. I went into the Ruby room but Skye wasn’t there, so I chatted to some other people in the Emerald room, keeping an eye on my points to see how close I was getting to my target.