CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Over the next week things stay frosty at home with Mum, which is horrible and completely the fault of that face-fungus-wearing twit who seems to be at our house every ruddy day—eating our cookies, bellowing his festive laugh, and making me heave with his naked ankles. There isn’t so much an atmosphere in the house as a twatmosphere, if you will.
But confining myself to my room helps me concentrate on writing some new stuff that I think Leo would perform really well, and at school I post them into his locker. I get quite good at slinking around the metal maze unseen, never revealing my secret identity. Like a comedy ninja.
I normally do it in the morning, while the lockers are reasonably quiet, on the way back from taking the roll to the office. Which is almost worth it just for the look on Mrs. Perkins’s face every morning when I shoot up my hand first to offer to take it. She frowns at me and you can almost see the cogs turning behind her eyes. She knows I’m up to something, but can’t put her finger on what and it’s driving her crazy. Chloe and Kas just think I’m using it as an excuse to get some extra snacks from the vending machine. I’m so desperate to hide my true motive I keep up the ruse by eating extra KitKats in front of them. Which is obviously really tough, but it’s the kind of sacrifice a true comedy ninja is willing to make for her art.
On Friday, I’m so super excited about seeing Leo perform again at the open-mic night I lose my mind a little and, caught up in the excitement, underneath my latest joke I write, stupidly,
Feel free to use any of these tonight. Looking forward to seeing your set.
But as I walk away the doubt sets in. Maybe he doesn’t want to use them at all. Maybe my notes are just annoying the crap out of him. They’re probably not nearly as funny as anything he’d write and, now I think about it, that last message telling him I’ll be there tonight might sound really creepy so he’s probably just tossed them anyway.
The evening arrives and with it a stomach filled with frantic, twitchy butterflies. Oh, why have I put myself through this? If he uses my jokes, I’m just going to explode with nerves, embarrassment, and panic that no one will actually laugh at them. If he doesn’t use any of them, I’ll finally have proof of my complete loser status, knowing that any laughing he did at those notes was not at the jokes themselves but laughter at me, the idiot who wrote such drippy, bum-gravy material and posted it through his locker like a complete, desperate twonk.
We get ready at Chloe’s apartment and both Chloe and Kas look amazing. Chloe’s in a black dress that clings to her like it’s been painted on.
“Wow—your mum lets you wear that?” Kas asks her.
“Totally—she bought it for me. And she got me this padded bra. Look—I have boobs now!” she says, bouncing them around in the air like two juggling balls. If I did that, people would get injured.
“Well, you definitely have a very pronounced bosom today, my dear,” I say in a fancy voice. “Like BOOO-SOM” I enunciate.
Kas and Chloe ignore me and continue fussing over each other’s outfits.
Kas’s look is simple, but she looks great in it—tight jeans and a little stripy tank top. If I wore that, I wouldn’t so much have a muffin top as a sack of muffins sitting on top of another sack of muffins.
I wear one of my man-sized checked shirts, sneakers, and some high-waisted jeans which come up almost to my boobs. When I do up the fly, it sounds like someone zipping up a tent.
“You look great, Pig!” says Chloe.
“Oh, shut up. I look like a cowgirl…who just ate a cow,” I say.
They laugh a little, but the truth is, standing next to them as we look in the mirror together, and knowing I’m going to see Leo later, I’ve never felt worse about my reflection. They look like beautiful women whereas I look like an overgrown, dumpy toddler. I don’t want to look like them, or dress like them. I just don’t want to look like this. Plain. Dull. Shapeless. It’s a scientific wonder that someone as large as me could look so invisible.
But then that’s what I’ve always aimed for with my clothes—to be invisible, to blend into my surroundings in the fear that if I push myself to the foreground people will laugh at me, not with me. That they’ll think, Why’s she wearing nice stuff? What the hell makes her think she’s got a body worth showing off with cool clothes?
If you’re fat and plain, you should at least have the dignity to dress like you know you’re fat and plain, to stop others feeling the need to point it out, rather than attempting a look way out of your league. But on the other hand I wish I had the guts to, I don’t know, wear a hat sometimes or a big pair of boots—just something that makes me feel a little less drab and unimportant.
I do think my hair looks OK though. Chloe’s done something to it with some hot roller things and drowned it in hairspray and now it falls in waves around my face. Just don’t touch them—they look good, but feel like dried seaweed.
She coils my hair up around my cheeks a little more. “There. You look great! Leo’s bound to notice you tonight.”
I just roll my eyes and smile weakly at her.
I haven’t told them about going into Leo’s house the other day. Somehow I just wanted to keep that private, like a secret date that nobody knows about but me and Leo. Pathetic, I know.
“You would look great with a bob you know—you really should think about getting your hair cut,” says Chloe, running her hands through her short blonde hair that always looks amazing.
“No, she should totally keep the long hair—it flatters the face,” says Kas.
“Don’t you mean my ‘pretty fat-girl face?’” I say, then quickly continue before they can look sad for me. “But you’re right. If I had a bob, my whole head would just look like a big bowling ball.”
We laugh.
We walk down the road with Chloe’s sister Freya and her boyfriend Sulky Jake, a persistently moody car mechanic. I can never work out if he’s genuinely depressed about something or if he’s putting on the whole pouty, deep, surly thing to try to appear sexy. Which obviously worked for Freya, but I just don’t get why anyone would want to go out with a guy who literally never smiles or laughs. I mean, I get that kissing’s important (at least I can imagine that it is) but, if you can’t have a giggle or a full-on whole-body-shaking belly laugh with someone, what’s the point? Who wants to kiss a mouth that never smiles? You might as well date a trout.
We arrive at Jake’s rickety old Ford Escort. It looks like it’s held together with duct tape and prayers. He almost proudly, though still drearily, tells us he’s, “doing it up in my dad’s garage when I have spare time between other jobs.”
Which can’t be very often, by the look of it.
Freya, tottering along the pavement in frighteningly high heels, insists she won’t travel in the back of the car because, “I’ve got a modeling job next week and sitting in the back of a car isn’t good for ya skin—all the toxins and everything come through the vents at the front of the car and gather at the back in invisible toxic clouds that seep into your pores.”
It’s the biggest load of ball-bags I’ve ever heard in my life, and I’m about to tell her as much when I realize both my friends are nodding along, wide-eyed, trying to take in every word that comes out of Freya’s perfectly pouty mouth.
“Wow, that’s really interesting,” says Kas incorrectly as both her and Chloe link arms with Freya and strut down the road with me clomping after them in my sneakers, still mud-stained from the last time I took Noah to the park.
“I know,” says Freya, “but you guys will be all right. I’ve got an amazing new homemade skin peel that’ll clean those toxins right out. You can all borrow some—it’s made out of egg whites, yogurt, sugar… Oh, what’s the other ingredient…”
“Desperation? The blood of an ugly virgin? Tears from the homeless?” I interject.
She frowns at me, trying to figure out what species I am ’cause it’s definitely not the same as hers.
“Erm, no, oh yeah, that’s i
t, vinegar and of course a few other secret bits and bobs I can’t possibly tell you about or the beauty police might arrest me!”
She giggles here and Kas and Chloe both inexplicably laugh.
“I’ll take some,” says Kas.
“Oh, me too. Thanks, sis,” says Chloe. She turns to me. “You want some, Pig?”
“Nah, I’m good. I quite like my skin, y’know, unpeeled if possible. I’ll take the eggs and sugar though—might bake myself up a toxin-fighting chocolate brownie!”
Freya stops walking as Jake carries on to his car, placing his guitar in the trunk as gently as a new father puts his newborn into a carriage. Freya whips her head around toward me and, in as serious a voice as I’ve ever heard her speak, says, “Don’t joke about chocolate, babe. Did you know that stuff’s got more toxins in it than a bottle of toilet cleaner?”
“No, I didn’t know that. Yikes. Tastes a lot better though, right?”
I can hear Chloe stifling a giggle.
Seeing I’m a lost cause, Freya tuts and trots on toward the car, dragging her minions along with her, like a high-heeled giraffe sandwiched between two adoring gazelles.
At the car, Jake opens the back door which almost falls off in his hands, points at me, and says, “You go in the middle, love.”
“Why’s she got to go in the middle, babe?” says Freya.
But I noticed the car lurching to one side at the weight of the guitar going in the trunk so of course I already know why and just want us to skip past this next humiliation. As I clamber into the center of the back seat, I say, through gritted teeth, “No, it’s fine. I don’t mind the middle.” With each shuffle of my butt along the seat, the car sways from side to side like an old drunk relative at a wedding trying desperately not to keel over. Frankly, it’ll be a miracle if this jalopy heap gets us to the pub at all.
“I like the middle,” says Kas. “Pig, you sure you don’t want me to sit there? Doesn’t look like you’re fitting in all that well.”
Oh God, just get in and let this be over.
“No, really,” I say, almost hysterically, “it’s fine! I love the middle!”
“She has to sit there—suspension’s busted and we have to keep the weight even. If she sits at the side, we might not make it around corners without rolling. In the middle there, she’ll do a great job keeping us nice and stable, like the ballast tank of a ship.”
“Jake!” says Freya. “Sorry, Pig.”
“Yeah, no, it’s fine, makes total sense,” I hiss, hoping the red in my cheeks isn’t showing too much.
Kas and Chloe get in either side of me and by the time we shut the doors we’re squished together so much we’re like one giant, hideous, three-headed, six-legged teenage-girl-freak. And when we get to the pub Kas and Chloe burst out of the doors like those joke snakes from a can, and I roll along the seat and fall out after them.
“This is so exciting! An evening out in a pub—I wonder who’ll be here from school? All Leo’s cool friends, I bet,” says Chloe as we walk in.
“Look, there’s Leo—there’s Leo! Look at him, Pig! LOOK!” whisper-shouts Kas to me.
Leo is leaning up against the bar, chatting to his friends from school—Jax, Mikey, that toothy girl Keesha who’s always following him around and about six others I recognize from Leo’s year.
At the sight of him, my heart, which has already had one hell of a workout these last couple of weeks, somersaults into my throat. Just knowing he’s onstage later, knowing he might use some of my jokes…or not. Either way lies probable total humiliation. The last thing I need on top of this is Chloe and Kas going on about how much they think I luurve him—I mean, what if he hears? I really want to tell Kas and Chloe once and for all to just leave it, and that I do not “like” Leo like that, but somehow, seeing him here, the knowledge of words and how you put them together has escaped my brain.
“Yeah, I see him. Look, I don’t, there’s nothing, he’s not, I don’t, so OK?” I splutter.
Kas and Chloe laugh and grab my hand as we follow Freya and Jake to a table, right in front of a small stage covered in a spaghetti-like mess of electronic cords leading to amplifiers, a mixing-desk thing covered with lots of twiddly knobs, a microphone, and a collection of guitars. Jake gently eases his guitar out of its case and writes his name on a whiteboard list next to the stage. At the top of the list it says, “Poet? Musician? Comedian? Write your name below and perform here tonight!” There’s about seven other names up there already, including Leo’s. He’s on sixth. I can’t wait to see him, but I really wish I was hiding in a corner right now where he can’t see me, not just a few feet away from the stage.
And why oh WHY did I write that note saying I’d be here this evening? Oh God, he might work out that I’m the weird locker-note stalker! Idiot Pig.
Leo’s dad, just about the coolest parent I’ve ever seen, with dreadlocks falling down over his leather vest (which should look awful, but somehow really doesn’t), comes over to our table and says “Hey” to Jake, who’s hovering behind us, clearly nervous about his set, although he’d never admit it. They fist-bump each other and then Leo’s dad says, “Brought some under-agers in this evening then, Jakey boy?”
Chloe, Kas, and I squirm in our seats.
“Yeah, that’s my girlfriend’s little sister and her friends,” says Jake. “What can I say, they’re big fans.”
“I’m a big fan of Jake shutting the frick up, I’ll give him that,” I whisper under my breath. Kas laughs and Chloe tells me to shush.
“All right, but no underage drinking, OK? says Leo’s dad. “And I’ve said the same to my boy and his buddies. Don’t wanna lose my license, all right, girls?”
“Don’t worry, Kingston. I’ll keep an eye on them,” says Jake with a patronizing hand on Kas’s shoulder. “And don’t talk when the acts are on, OK, kids?”
“Thanks, Jake, I don’t think we could have worked that one out ourselves,” I say. But unfortunately sarcasm seems to sail way over his head as he just nods and winks at me.
Jake gets us all Cokes and pretty soon we actually start to have a good time. We used to have family pub lunches all the time when Dad was around, but I’ve never been in one with just my friends. It feels sophisticated somehow, fantastically grown-up, which I know is a really dumb-nuts, non-grown-up thing to say, but there it is. Me, Chloe, and Kas gossip about the other kids from school in the pub, all older than us, and therefore a lot cooler than us.
“That’s Slade Smith,” Kas whispers. “He’s dead cute!”
“Not as cute as Leo though—right, Pig?” says Chloe, too loudly.
“For the last time, I just like his stand-up, that’s all, all right?” I hiss, determined not to look at him.
“Oooh—you should do a, what’s it called, a set? He’d notice you then!” says Chloe brightly.
“What? Are you kidding—what?!” I splutter. “That’s the Coke going straight to your head, Chloe, ’cause that idea’s straight out of Crazyville,” I say, my face going red at the very thought of ever walking out on a stage, let alone in front of Leo.
“No, she’s right! Why not? You’re always thinking up funny stuff. You want to be a comedy…person?” says Kas.
“Comedian. Well, yes, but no, really, really, REALLY, really, no. No. Thank you. I’m just here to enjoy—”
“—Leo,” cuts in Kas with a widening of her eyes.
“The show!” I say.
They giggle. I scowl. The show begins.
The first act is a nauseating woman called Starlight who wears a floaty dress and feebly strums a guitar. She sings in a whiney, pitchy voice and barely shuts her mouth between words or sounds so that everything is just a big vowelly nonsense.
Next up is a small guy with floppy blond hair who reads angry slam poetry from a small black notebook held up high in his outstretched arm. The names of all his poems have swear words in them.
After that, there’s a couple of guitar-playing duos who are kind of OK, and a m
an who plays the bongos while rapping over them which is just bewildering, although he manages to get the biggest applause at the end of his set just because everyone’s relieved it’s over.
Then…gulp…there’s Leo. I can’t help but stare at him as he walks up to the stage.
He passes, he turns toward me and, LITERALLY LIKE OUT OF MY DAYDREAM, his eye catches mine, and he coolly says, “Oh, hi, Pig.”
Both Kas and Chloe’s heads whip around and they stare at me, their necks extended, their mouths wide open, like an abandoned Hungry Hippos game.
“Wha—?” they start to say.
“Shh!” I say with a grin. “You mustn’t talk when the acts are on!”
Despite the worry of what Leo’s going to say up there, I feel amazing. Like my insides are glowing. After the borderline disastrous meeting at his house, I totally thought he’d just ignore me if he saw me again, but he actually said hi to me! In front of Chloe and Kas!
I don’t stop smiling as Leo’s dad announces him. “Well, for those of you who’ve been here before there’s no need to introduce this next act—he’s handsome, charming, a real chip off the old block. It’s my son, Leo Jackson!”
Whoops and cheers from his friends on the table behind ours.
Leo grabs the microphone off its stand, and I try as hard as I can not to just stare at him like last time. Especially now I know he’ll notice whether I laugh or not. Not that I need to remind myself to laugh—he’s just as funny as before, just as confident, and his timing is awesome. I make sure I laugh, but at the same time I realize he’s halfway through his set and he hasn’t used any of my jokes.
So that’s it then. He thinks the jokes suck. He thinks the person who posted them through his locker sucks. It’s over. It’s done. Why was I kidding myself I knew how to write jokes? What do I know? I’m just a stupid, spherical simpleton posting unwanted nonsense through a door, like a junkmail delivery clown.
I look down at my hands clutching the Coke glass as Leo gets more laughs and then…
Pretty Funny for a Girl Page 10
