Live Like Your Head's On Fire E-Book

Sally-Anne Lomas

• Herausgeber: Story Machine
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: On Fire
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 351

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

When fifteen year-old Pen Flowers climbs out of her bedroom window in the middle of the night to dance in the empty streets, she ignites a flame in herself that will change everything.

Leseprobe

LIVE LIKE YOUR HEAD’S ON FIRE

Sally-Anne Lomas

Live Like Your Head’s On Fire, copyright © Sally-Anne Lomas, 2021

Print ISBN: 9781912665310

Ebook ISBN: 9781912665051

Published by Story Machine, 130 Silver Road, Norwich, NR3 4TG;

www.storymachines.co.uk

Sally-Anne Lomas has asserted her right under Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, recorded, mechanical, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher or copyright holder.

This publication is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

To the CH girls for the blessing of lifelong friendship

‘She burns but she is not consumed.’ Scott Cairns

Prologue

The Dancing Seed

I’d never thought about being a dancer until the morning I went crazy in dance class. If I’d known that would lead to me running away from home then I wouldn’t have dared take a single step. But maybe there’s a seed inside each of us that’s going to grow the way it grows, whatever, like a daffodil bulb is destined to be a daffodil and can’t ever be a primrose. My name’s Pen Flowers. People say stupid things like – what kind of flower are you? Maybe there was always a dancer inside me just waiting for the right conditions to shoot out.

Some seeds in Australia need to be burnt alive in forest fires in order to grow, others want drowning in cold, dark water for months. There’s a rose in our garden called Penelope, same name as me, with squishy, pale peach flowers. I love to push my face into the petals and hoover up the lush smell. Rose seeds have to be scoured and flayed for them to germinate. Maybe that’s what it takes to be a dancer; fire, water and a giant cheese grater scraped over your skin. Maybe the betrayal, the shame, the overwhelming fear, had to happen – to test if I was tough enough. How else do you learn to live like your head’s on fire?

Part 1

Trial by Fire

1

We always had dance last class before lunch on Tuesdays. It wasn’t ballroom or anything awful like that, it was modern dance, you know, making up moves to music. The trouble was I really liked dancing but my best friend, Tamasin, thought it was stupid. She took dance as the soft option for PE like most of the other girls.

‘Begin.’ Mrs Hadley shouted and a high haunting bassoon solo drifted into the silence. Everyone was spread around the edges of the school hall. We were starting a new piece called First Day. The idea was that we were curled up like embryos inside eggs and Mrs Hadley wanted us to break out of our shells as if we were seeing the world for the first time.

The music was quiet and tender so I came up onto my knees, keeping my head down and rocking gently. Safe inside my shell I waited. Through the screen of my hair I watched what the others were doing. Next to me, Vivienne Cooper, with her mouth open and eyes popping, was dazzled with wonder by the sight of the school chairs stacked into piles on the opposite side of the room. Tamasin was already on her feet. She’d pulled her gym shirt over her head, and with her hands out in front of her was staggering around like a zombie. The girls near her were sniggering. She was looking my way expecting me to join in but I didn’t want to.

The music was strange, like nothing I’d ever heard before. There was a jagged edge to the notes and I liked how fierce it was. The wooden floor felt rough beneath my hands and knees. I pushed up into the middle of my back, arching as high as I could. The music was seeping into me, filling me right to the skin. As long as the chords remained slow and drawn out, I was going to keep stretching, pushing my muscles to their limit.

The tempo changed suddenly and there was an explosion of noise as the whole orchestra roared out together. I tucked my head under and rolled forwards so fast that I came up into a crouched standing position. I didn’t stop to consider what anyone else would think I just went for it. The music was harsh and fast and full of fury. I started lashing out with my arms and legs and jerking my head as I ran, leaping and slashing through the air. The music had grabbed hold of my will and I had no choice but to run and jump and punch and kick until it let me go. The school hall was barely big enough to contain me.

When the music finally slowed into a mournful, messed up lullaby, I sank down onto my knees, rolled over onto my back, and then lay on the floor twitching. My heart was crashing so hard against my ribs I thought it might burst through. Staring up at the vaulted ceiling, I imagined the night sky, galaxy upon galaxy stretching above me. Keeping my head and shoulders on the floor, I turned myself in a circle, using just my feet, as if the world were turning under me and I was floating away into the soft, cool, darkness of outer space.

I was out at the far edge of the known universe when the bell went for the end of lesson. The music stopped and suddenly I was lying in the middle of the school hall with everyone staring at me.

What had I done? I stayed on my back and closed my eyes. I wished I could vanish, puff, gone.

Tamasin said, ‘I think Pen’s must have been a dragon’s egg.’

And Sadie Thompson, the class bitch and my vowed enemy, answered, ‘Yeh, right, some kind of reptile.’

Tamasin, annoyingly, laughed.

The room filled with chattering voices and a draught came in through the doors as the class filed out of the hall. I sat up and crawled over to the place where I’d left my bag. Vivienne was waiting there, grinning at me. I avoided looking at her.

‘That was really good, like, what you did.’

‘Yeh,’ I picked up my bag and moved away but she walked after me.

‘No – honestly, it was amazing, like freaky, but amazing. Everyone stopped dancing and watched you.’ Vivienne was dark-haired, dark-eyed, heavy, and clueless. She really did arrive at school every day as if she were new born. I knew I was in for trouble.

‘Penny,’ Mrs Hadley was calling me. She always wore the most ridiculous outfits. Today she was blinding in a neon pink playsuit. I don’t know where she got her bras from but her breasts protruded like two traffic cones. She turned and they pointed straight at me.

‘You put your heart into that Penny, well done.’

My shoulders rose up my neck and I stepped away but she moved in after me.

‘What made you respond so energetically?’

‘Don’t know,’ I managed, as she stood there with her hands on her hips smiling at me in a determined way, ‘the music?’

I tried to squeeze past her but she wasn’t going to let me go until I delivered.

‘I was thinking about how it would feel to be in your body for the first time.’

‘Oooh,’ she cooed, her mouth a little round donut. ‘I like that, I like that very much. We could work that into a solo for the dance show.’

A screeching chord crashed through my head. She had to be joking. Mrs Hadley carried on smiling as if she’d given me a present. I stared at her face. The mole on her chin had three white hairs coming out of it. Her lipstick frayed at the edges, drifting up the tiny channels that feathered out from her lips. Being in the dance show was one thing - but a solo? The idea was terrifying. Me, on my own on stage in front of hundreds of people; impossible, crazy, total insanity. I had to say ‘no’ quickly.

Mrs Hadley was watching me; waiting. The problem was, a part of me had been enchanted by that strange, angry, music. A wave was swelling up inside me and surging forward to break over Mrs Hadley’s conical breasts.

‘Okay,’ I said. And that was that, from then on, I was doomed.

2

Why had I danced like that? What had come over me? I walked slowly down the oak panelled corridor towards the changing rooms. We wore our gym kit for dance so I needed to put my uniform back on. The dinner ladies were clattering steel trays in the kitchen and the rank smell of fried mince caught in my throat. The thought of facing Sadie Thompson made me feel sick. I could wait until the lunch bell rang when the changing room would be empty but why should I have to lurk about getting cold? I carried on through the cloakrooms towards the extension where the showers were.

Kings - that’s my school - was originally a boys’ school but about a hundred years ago they added a girls’ school next door. The boys had the old building but ours was nicer with pale coloured wood and huge windows looking out over the playing fields. It’s supposedly one of the best schools in Birmingham. We used to be a grammar school but now you had to pass a special exam to get here and pay fees. Most of the girls’ parents are lawyers or doctors or company directors; posh types.

There are only four girls in our class with free places. Julia Worth who lives miles away and is unbelievably clever and comes top in everything. Then there’s Vivienne and Sadie. They’re both from Kings Heath. I think the school has to take some local girls. Vivienne’s Dad is a window cleaner and her Mum works at the chocolate factory. Sadie’s Dad’s the foreman at the car manufacturers in Rubery. If our class were a wolf pack, Sadie would be the leader and Vivienne the runt. Poor Vivienne, Sadie is always picking on her. I don’t know why Sadie is so powerful. Tamasin’s pretty and clever and funny, so of course she’s popular, but with Sadie it’s just the force of her personality. I don’t like the way she dominates so I try to stand up to her.

And finally there’s me, Penelope Flowers; most people call me Pen. We’re not really poor but without the free place we couldn’t afford this school. My Dad works for an insurance company and he’s an area manager now. I have no idea how I got the scholarship. Dad practically died of happiness. He goes around saying ‘my daughter at Kings’ until I want to tape his mouth shut.

As I reached the changing room the door closed. Inside I could hear shouting and loud guffaws of laughter. The door was painted a pale butter colour. Julia Worth came out, not a hair of her blonde bob out of place. She kept her eyes down as she passed me. Even though she was super clever Julia never opened her mouth in class. She had such a magical capacity for invisibility, sometimes I forgot she existed. Her instinct was to stay out of trouble. Unfortunately I had the opposite instinct. Trouble tracked me down. I caught the door with my foot before it swung shut and looked through.

Daisy and Flick were getting dressed at the far end of the room. When I walked in everyone went quiet and then Sadie and her gang burst into smothered giggles. They’d obviously been talking about me. I ignored them and walked over to my peg and started getting changed. A shout of laughter bounced around the tiled room and I turned. Sadie was hanging out her tongue and shaking all over. She started twitching as if she were having a fit and collapsed on the floor. People were darting sneaky looks at me. I should have ignored them but I couldn’t stop myself.

‘Aww, Sadie, I didn’t know you were epileptic - don’t bite your tongue off,’ I said.

She kept jerking about on the floor imitating the way I’d spun myself at the end of my dance. Her chorus of supporters were falling about laughing. I turned back to the wall and started to pull my tights on, putting a fingernail through the nylon and laddering them. I hated the way the shower room smelt of wet mouldy towels.

Sadie kept wriggling on the floor enjoying the reaction she was getting. Tamasin was grinning and seemed amused. Even before the dance class I’d felt wound up but now the whole of me was seething like molten lava.

‘Give over Sadie, stop that,’ I said. She twitched even more, moaning as if she was having an orgasm. I went and stood over her.

‘Stop it,’ I shouted and when she didn’t I just lost it and kicked her. I didn’t really hurt her – just tapped her leg. She stopped moving and glared at me.

‘You’re a right bitch,’ she said, ‘your dance was mental and you’re mental.’ The whole room was silent now, their eyes on me and Sadie.

I was shocked at what I’d done. This sharp vicious feeling had flared up inside me filling my mind and I’d just lashed out. My legs felt shaky and I stumbled back over to my peg and sat down quickly. Sadie deserved to be kicked but I still shouldn’t have done it. My emotions were in a whirl. I was angry and upset and ashamed at once. But I wasn’t going to cry. I clenched my jaw hard and stared at Sadie until she looked away. She muttered ‘Bitch’ again and then picked up her bag and walked out. The rest of her lot followed.

I looked towards Tamasin who’d been keeping quiet at the other side of the room. She pulled a freaked out face as if it was all a joke. She didn’t wait for me to finish changing, saying that she needed to get in the lunch queue. She had school dinners but I brought my own sandwiches because it was cheaper.

Sitting on the bench, in just my tights and shirt, I took as long as I could to tie the laces of my brogues. I bit the inside of my cheek.

Vivienne was the last to leave. She hovered by the door.

‘You ok?’ she asked.

‘Fine.’ The lunch bell was ringing. I stood up to put my skirt on, turning away from her. I heard the door close. It was kind of Vivienne to care but school was hard enough already without being associated with her.

When classes finished I couldn’t face the bus queue so I raced out and sprinted up to the High Street to get on the bus before the others. Being on the High Street is a sixth form privilege but I don’t see how they can enforce that. There’s no law that says I can’t walk up Kings Heath High Street. As a privilege it’s not up to much. There’s a Poundland, a WH Smith and a Boots and that’s about it, not even a McDonalds.

There were two sixth-formers eating donuts at the bus stop. They ignored me and before long the bus came. I helped an old lady struggling with a heavy shopping bag get onboard and then sat down next to her. She must have bought leeks because their oniony stink was stronger than the smell of diesel. My phone bleeped. A text from Tamasin wanting to know why I’d rushed off. I didn’t reply.

Outside the street lamps had come on and the sky was turning inky. The bus pulled up at the stop opposite the school gates and I watched the fight to get on. Girls pushed and shoved their way onto the bus squealing like gulls circling a bag of old chips. The noise bulged into the downstairs silence and then trailed up to the top deck. No one noticed me.

When the bus reached Bournville, and the last of the Kings girls got off, I went upstairs and sat on the front seat. There were miles to go before my stop but I liked looking down on the dark streets, watching people shuffling along wrapped in their stories. When we pulled into Harborne High Street a girl about my age, maybe a bit older, was leaning against the bus stop. In the light of the street lamp her auburn hair blazed against the black sky. She was pretty with a soft dreamy look. What if I had a best friend like her, someone I could talk to, and who understood how I felt? Maybe I wouldn’t feel so lonely.

I leant against the window thinking about how stupid I’d been to do that mad dance, exposing myself to Sadie’s scorn and Tamasin’s laughter. What had made me do it? The music had matched a feeling trapped inside me. Perhaps I really was ‘mental’ like Sadie said. Like mother like daughter - was madness genetic? Since Dad’s promotion he’d been working in Leicester for half the week and Mum’s nervous problems had gotten worse. She’d been getting regular panic attacks. The one last night had been the worst yet. I’d calmed her down but somehow I’d got jangled up.

Maybe that was why I’d danced like that? I must have looked ridiculous leaping about going crazy. I expected to feel ashamed but I didn’t, not deep down. Instead the music rushed back into my head and a ball of fire began glowing in my chest. I wanted to get up, right there on the bus, and start dancing again. I’d do the dance solo even if that meant fighting Sadie Thompson every day for the rest of term.

3

Mum and Thomas were cuddled up on the sofa watching telly when I got in. Thomas still had his pyjamas on and his hair was sticking up in clumps. Had he managed to skive off school again? Mum’s left hand was on the go, repeatedly stroking the arm of the sofa. Her hand was like a little creature with a mind of its own and from the way her hand moved I could tell what kind of state she was in.

‘Hi,’ I announced. The local news was on, something about workers being laid off at the car factory.

‘You’re home at last,’ Mum said. With Mum she’s either like the gas fire turned up too high or else she’s when it’s about to go out, spluttering and popping. The gas was way up in Mum’s voice.

‘Normal time. I’m starving. Have you started tea?’ I asked. She obviously hadn’t.

‘We’re having fish fingers.’

‘Ok, I’ll put them on.’

‘No,’ she shouted too loudly and jumped up, flinging the blanket off her knees. ‘You’ve got homework.’

I went upstairs to change out of my uniform. I’d just pulled on my favourite jeans and was struggling into my baggy black jumper when Mum screamed in the kitchen below.

Thomas was there before me, reaching up to put his arms round her.

‘It’s ok Mum,’ he kept saying. Her hand was bleeding.

‘Stupid knife,’ she looked at me as if I’d stabbed her, ‘just slipped out of my hand.’

‘Do you need a bandage?’ I asked.

‘No I’m fine.’ She was cuddling Thomas. ‘You go back and keep warm darling,’ she told him. She’d been peeling potatoes in the sink.

‘I’ll finish these,’ I said, ‘you get the fish fingers on.’

Mum fiddled with the gas grill, her hands trembling, snapping matches as she tried to get one to light. The automatic ignition had stopped working ages ago. The gas was escaping and would explode with a massive bang when she lit it. I worried that one day she’d burn her face off and I’d have to get her to hospital with her skin hanging in strips and the bones showing through. What if I couldn’t handle it? Why did she make everything so difficult?

There was a square table in the kitchen and we each had a favourite chair. Even though Dad didn’t come home on Tuesdays, we kept to our usual places. There was no ketchup because Mum had forgotten to put it on the table. I got up.

‘Sit down Penny, you’re always jumping about.’

‘Ketchup.’ I got it out of the cupboard and sat down again.

‘How was school?’ Mum asked. I pushed butter into the potatoes with my fork. She used to make proper mashed potatoes but now she didn’t even do that.

‘Alright.’

Mum clattered her fork against her plate.

‘You used to be full of stories - never shut up.’

‘Had dance today and Mrs Hadley wants me to -’

‘Thomas,’ Mum shouted, ‘don’t put your knife in your mouth,’ cutting me off.

I didn’t bother carrying on. She was looking away as if someone else was going to walk into the room and then she started.

‘I could’ve been a professional dancer, after Blackpool. There was an agent wanted to take me on.’ Mum was always going on about her ballroom triumphs.

I took a bite of fish finger. It was still frozen in the middle. I spat it out.

‘These aren’t cooked,’ I said and Mum looked at me then.

‘Mine are fine,’ she said, like I was a liar. Thomas was shovelling in peas.

‘We shouldn’t eat them. I’ll put them back under the grill for a bit longer,’ I said. Mum threw down her cutlery so her knife bounced off the table smearing tomato sauce across the floor.

‘Nothing I ever do is good enough for you,’ she cried in full on drama mode then ran out of the kitchen.

I picked up the knife and wiped away the ketchup. Upstairs the bedroom door slammed. I put everyone’s fish fingers back under the grill. When they were golden brown on both sides I knew they were cooked. Thomas had gone back into the living room, so I put a plate over Mum’s dinner to keep it warm, and took mine and his through.

‘What’s the matter with Mum?’ he asked. Maybe she made him feel jumpy too.

‘She’s nervous, you know, scared.’

‘But what about?’

‘It’s just her. She’s poorly.’ I didn’t know how to explain when I didn’t really understand.

‘When will she be better?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘When is Dad coming back?’ Thomas asked.

‘Thursday as usual I think.’

‘He said he’d take me to watch City play.’

‘Do you want pudding?’ I asked.

There was only a bit of ice cream left in the tub so I gave it to Thomas then went upstairs to see Mum.

Standing outside her bedroom door I could hear her crying. I knocked and she said to come in. She was in bed in the dark with the blankets pulled up to her chin. The curtains were open so a glow of orange light came in from the street lamp. I sat down next to her and put my arm round her even though I couldn’t bear the way her body twitched. She pushed her head into my shoulder.

‘I’m sorry I upset you Mum,’ I got the words out but felt as if a bit of frozen fish finger was stuck in my throat.

‘No,’ her crazy hand clawed at my arm, ‘it’s me. I’m useless. I make a mess of everything.’

‘You’re nervous that’s all.’ I tried to be sympathetic but part of me couldn’t help agreeing with her. Why did I always end up looking after her? Why couldn’t she look after me and Thomas properly like other Mums?

‘I hate it here, I’ve never liked this house. We should never have moved.’ Mum was always miserable. I spent a lot of time worrying about how awful her life was but nothing I did made her better. She had agoraphobia which meant she was scared of going outside on her own. She wanted to go out but thought she’d die if she did. Apart from the back garden, Mum hadn’t been out on her own since Thomas was born, not once, and he was going to be ten in July.

‘Come on Mum, come down and watch television with us. Maybe you should take one of your Valium.’

‘Ok,’ she gave me a hug, ‘you’re a good girl Penny.’

Only I wasn’t. She really annoyed me.

4

We had to write an essay on the slave trade for homework. I worked in the living room to keep Mum company. She was going through her ballroom dancing scrap book, pouring over the photos, and press cuttings. I decided I’d write as if I was an African living happily in my village, but then captured by slave traders, and taken on a terrifying journey chained up in a giant smelly ship. It wasn’t the proper way of doing a history essay but I enjoyed writing it. When Mum said she was going to bed I was surprised that the time had vanished.

We always kept the landing light on because Thomas got scared. Well no, I want to be honest, it was me - I had a problem with the dark. I wasn’t scared of burglars or rapists or anything like that, not things I could fight. But what about supernatural creatures, ghosts of the dead or alien invaders who could harvest your organs while you slept? How did you deal with them?

I ran across the landing to my bedroom and dived into bed, squeezing my eyes shut and willing myself to go to sleep. But it was no good, the bad colours started. When I closed my eyes at night, weird lights - I called them the bad colours - attacked me so I had to keep my eyes open.

A branch knocked against the window. There was an ancient lilac tree right outside my bedroom which I loved. In spring the blossom made my room smell like heaven. I opened the window and cold night poured over me. A small round moon was tangled in the bare branches of the tree. I felt as if I could lean over and untie it, set it free to float across the sky. There were billions of stars, the obvious bright ones, then behind them splatters of minute dots. Looking up at the huge sparkling stretch of space I felt tiny in comparison. I had an idea – this was obviously my day for doing mad stuff - and pulled my clothes on over my pyjamas. Our kitchen extension had a flat roof where I sunbathed in the summer. I jumped down onto it.

Walking to the edge of the roof I climbed into the heart of the lilac tree, cradling my arms around the trunk. Standing in the main fork of the tree, the dark was no longer full of horrors. This night was gentle. I laid my cheek against the knobbly bark and looked up. Now I was in the tree the moon had slid across the sky and I wanted to follow. I thought about the essay I’d written describing the slaves chained up and unable to move. Our house was so full of Mum, with her energy pinging off the walls and bouncing around, that I felt as if there was no room to breathe, that in some way I was trapped, too.

Out here was different, out here I could fill my lungs with galaxies of space. A breeze whooshed through the lilac branches making them sway. I needed to get moving, the wind was calling me. I climbed out of the tree onto the garden wall then scrambled over into the alley.

The moonlight gave everything a strange gleam. It must have been collection day because the bins were lined up outside the back gates like an alien army. I couldn’t believe how bright the moon was; just crazy beautiful. I ran along the path as fast as I could, my shadow raced beside me, flying along the back fences. If only I could soar up into the blue-black velvet sky, not a bird but a winged horse, galloping the heavens. I sprinted then jumped, dashed then exploded, pushing myself to go faster, higher. I wanted to get back the buzz I’d had in dance class. The sense that I could be and do whatever I wanted without worrying about what other people thought.

I ran all the way down the alley from the back of our house to where it comes out just before the Lordswood Road. There was absolutely no one else around, every house was in darkness. There was just me owning everywhere. I felt so free, as if I could do anything.

When I got to the junction with Lordswood I stopped. A girl was walking along the pavement on the other side of the main road singing to herself. She was the one with auburn hair that I’d seen at the bus stop. I’d never noticed her before and now she’d appeared twice in one day.

Stepping onto the main road out of the estate felt risky. I didn’t want to go any further. Instead I twirled back down the middle of our street, arms stretched out making circular leaps one after the other, until I was back at our house. Behind the closed curtains, in the upstairs front bedroom, Mum was sleeping. She’d wanted to be a professional ballroom dancer but she’d given up. I didn’t want to end up like her. What if I agreed to do the solo for the dance show and then I wasn’t any good?

5

Rain battered against the classroom window on the day I started rehearsals. I was watching two drops have a zigzag race down the glass when the desks banged. Mr Richards, our form teacher, was already out of the door, off for his break-time fag, round the back of the staff room.

The usual crowd had gathered around Vivienne’s desk. She brought in reject Creme Eggs from the chocolate factory shop that she sold at half price. For ten minutes every day, before the eggs ran out, she was the most popular girl in the class.

Sadie and Razi emerged first, peeling the foil off their eggs. At the back of the room, on Tamasin’s desk, a group had started playing cards. Tamasin and I usually sat together because our surnames followed alphabetically. This term Mr Richards had decided to change the desks around. Now I was near the window, miles away from Tamasin who was at the back on the other side of the room. Everyone loved Tamasin, with her curly blonde hair and funky green framed glasses, she was the coolest girl in the class. Effortlessly clever, she could mess around in lessons and still do well. I was about to go over but when Sadie and Razi joined her game I changed my mind.

Vivienne had sold her stock and was counting the cash. I didn’t like Creme Eggs; the sticky white and yellow gunk felt disgusting coating my teeth. Vivienne looked up and seeing me watching her, put the coins into her purse, and walked over. She had long thick dark hair which she tied into neat pigtails. Her head was shaped like a potato with a pointed chin that seemed to have been borrowed from another face. Most people showed some of their top teeth when they smiled, but Vivienne showed all of her teeth and most of her gums too. Her square hands fiddled up and down the cord of her school purse which she wore the official way, over the shoulder and across her body. No one apart from year sevens did that. Everyone broke the cord and kept the purse in their pocket. I didn’t understand how she hadn’t noticed.

‘I’ve saved one for you,’ she took an egg out of her pocket. ‘You don’t have to pay.’

‘Thanks Viv, but I don’t like them.’

‘Me neither, I’ve like eaten so many they make me feel sick now.’ She sat on the window ledge in front of my desk looking at the rain. ‘We’ll have to stay in lunchtime. We could go to the library if you like?’

‘Can’t,’ I said, opening my desk to avoid looking at her and moving stuff around. ‘I’ve got a dance rehearsal.’

‘Are you going to be in the dance show?’ She shrieked, so everyone could hear.

‘Shhhhh.’ I tried to stop her.

‘I said you were good, didn’t I? Can I watch?’ She gushed in the loudest whisper I’d ever heard. As the bell went, she leant forward and gave me a super gummy grin. ‘Better get back to my desk, speak laters.’

I let out a long slow breath. All through the centre of me I’d contracted, a wave drawing away to sea that could now flow back over the shore. I couldn’t bear the idea of anyone watching me. I’d have to sneak away quickly at lunch time or Vivienne might follow. I hadn’t even told Tamasin I was doing the show.

Miss McBride, the history teacher, arrived and everyone went quiet instantly. She was one of the best teachers so no one played her up and everyone had their essay ready to hand in. We were doing the road to universal suffrage. We’d finished slavery and were onto working men getting the vote

She put up an illustration - crowds of working men marching towards Birmingham Town Hall surrounded by troops with guns. There was a quote. ‘It was not Grey or Althorp who carried The Reform Act but the brave and determined men of Birmingham.’ As I copied the words in my notebook I could feel tears bubbling up. For some reason anything heroic sent me watery. I wanted to find a great cause to fight for, something that really mattered.

When the bell went I raced out of the classroom first so that no one would see where I was going. Tamasin would tease me if she knew and I couldn’t handle that. Dancing mattered to me in a way I couldn’t explain. But I needn’t have worried she was already laughing at something on Sadie’s phone. She didn’t even glance in my direction.

The dance studio was at the back of the main school building. There were glass windows down one side, but as no one was using the playground in the rain I felt safe from view.

Mrs Hadley had given me a CD of Rite of Spring by Stravinsky, the music that had sent me wild in class. The piece was written for a ballet about a young girl being chosen as a sacrifice and how she danced to her death. How cool was that! As soon as the music began - I was off. The sound was like a socket with me as the plug, and once we were connected, energy charged through my body. I could have powered a train or the city centre Christmas lights. I was just getting into my groove when Mrs Hadley stopped the music.

‘Let’s pause there, Penny, the intensity is good but you need more control. You can’t just flail about – it’s got to grow.’

I felt embarrassed and stupid. This was exactly what I’d feared. I wasn’t any good. I was going to make a complete twat of myself. I should walk out now. I didn’t want to do the show anymore.

Mrs Hadley broke the music down into short sections and made me plan a series of moves and repeat the sequence until I remembered. I started to get what she was after. We were building up a pattern, like telling a story line by line. We took a simple punching movement which Mrs Hadley said was a ‘motif’ and we improvised ways of changing and adapting the move using different parts of my body. When the bell went for the end of lunch I didn’t want to stop. I was too busy having fun to worry about whether I was good or not. This was the best thing I’d done since I came to Kings by a hundred million miles.

The chords were still playing in my head as I ran back to the classroom. I had to stop myself twirling down the corridor. There was a game of volleyball going on in the classroom, using someone’s jumper tied in a ball. I dodged round to my desk. My hands were shaking as I pulled the tinfoil off my sandwiches. I was so hungry I crammed almost a whole sandwich in my mouth. Vivienne bounced over squatting down beside me, behind my open desk lid.

‘Tamasin asked where you’d gone,’ she whispered, ‘she wanted to play table tennis.’ My mouth was full of bread and cheese and the white pulp stuck to my palette. I felt so vulnerable about the solo and with Tamasin you had to laugh at everything. Not caring was cool. My courage was like a tiny snowdrop and if Tamasin trod on me I might not bounce back.

‘I said I didn’t know,’ Vivienne continued.

I managed to swallow the giant mouthful of sandwich.

‘Thanks Viv,’ I said.

‘I thought perhaps, you didn’t want her to know?’

Maybe Vivienne wasn’t as clueless as I thought.

‘I just feel a bit embarrassed, you know, about the show.’

‘Oh I get that – it’s like really scary what you’re doing,’ she gave me her biggest gummy smile, ‘but you’ll smash it. Mum said come to tea tomorrow, if you want?’

I felt a rush of gratitude and found myself saying without thinking,

‘Yeh, that’d be great.’

But the moment I agreed I regretted it. If the cool crowd saw me hanging out with Vivienne Cooper they’d drop me. If I wasn’t careful I’d end up being outside the pack just like Viv was.

6

The next day I played table tennis with Tamasin as usual. We were both pretty good and neither liked losing.

‘You know my birthday’s next month?’ she said as I served.

‘Uh huh.’ No way was she distracting me. I knew her tricks. At Kings we were divided into forms by date of birth. Our class were the spring babies born between February and May. The fee paying girls competed to have the best birthday party. Tamasin always won. Last year she’d had a disco with a real DJ and a glitter ball. She smashed the ball back but missed the table.

‘Mum says instead of a party I can take some friends to London. See a Show,’ she said as I served. She sliced the ball back into the far right corner and my back hand return went wide.

‘Wow! That would be so cool. Your serve, 2-3,’ I’d never been to London and was desperate to go. ‘What about that new West Side Story? The bit I saw on telly looked awesome.’

‘I’ll discuss with the Mater. She says I can take three friends,’ Tamasin fired a serve down the middle of the table which I lobbed back. She played a neat forehand into the corner but it bounced up high and I slammed it so hard she didn’t stand a chance.

‘2-4,’ I called the score.

‘Who else do you think we should take?’ Tamasin served into the net.

‘How about Vivienne?’

‘Not potato head! There wouldn’t be room in the car!’

‘That’s harsh. She’s just curvy.’

‘Yeh, and so’s the Taj Mahal!’ Tamasin expected me to laugh but I didn’t. ‘I thought about Sadie,’ Tamasin continued, giving me a sneaky look. Was she trying to wind me up? She knew me and Sadie hated each other. What was going on? The hairs on the back of my hand prickled like they did when I felt frightened.

‘3-5,’ I said without responding.

Tamasin hit the net with her return and carried on talking.

‘Sadie goes to a youth club in Kings Heath and guess who else goes?’ I waited for her to tell me. ‘Only GB!’ GB was Grant Barker, from the boys’ school, Tamasin’s latest crush. That explained why she was suddenly so interested in Sadie. ‘I’m going with her on Friday. You might like to tag along.’

As if I was some pathetic sidekick! As if I’d go anywhere with Sadie.

‘No thanks, 6-4, my serve,’ I said and she tossed me the ball. ‘‘By the way I’m in the dance show so I’ll be rehearsing most lunchtimes.’ I tried a fast slice serve and missed the table by a mile.

Tamasin made her eyes wide in mock surprise and tilted her chin up.

‘Whatever does it for you darling, I’d rather die than be seen in public in a leotard, but it’s your funeral.’ She smashed my next serve straight back at me. I blocked and my return rolled over the net and died.

‘My point,’ I said.

I didn’t mention about going to tea with Vivienne. Usually I told her everything.

The next day I hung back after school hoping that if we left late enough no one would see me going home with Vivienne. The drive had emptied by the time we emerged and I thought I was in the clear, but then Tamasin, of all people, was still standing at the gate waiting for her Mum to pick her up.

Vivienne said really loudly, for no reason, because she’d already told me.