Lou Out of Luck

by Nat Luurtsema

  I freeze. “What does she want?” I hiss.

  “She wants to come over,” Dad answers in a whisper, looking scared.

  “WHY?”

  Dad shrugs, and hands the phone over as if he’s glad it’s not his problem.

  “Hello?” I say nervously.

  “Hey, babes. Listen, we’re coming round.”

  “Oh God, no.”

  Mum, Lav and Dad have stopped eating and are all watching me squirm on the phone. I’m sweating like it’s my first Perf Class.

  “What?” Cammie demands.

  “Coughing, I was coughing. Um, why … are you … coming round?”

  “See you in ten.” And she hangs up.

  I put down the phone and turn to my family to tell them to brace for the worst, flee for their lives.

  “What?” says Mum.

  “Something wicked this way comes.”

  WORRY DIARY

  Cammie in my house! Everywhere I look, I see uncool things that I will be mocked for.

  Mum and Dad finish dinner and clear away the plates while I scurry around the living room, scooping up every embarrassing photo of me (which is EVERY photo of me) and shoving them under the sofa. I spot a horrible deformed clay cat with MUmMy scraped into it and hide it under a cushion.

  A sense of doom settles over me and spreads to my family.

  “Do I still have skunk hair?” Mum asks, examining her reflection in the kettle.

  “Stop. She’s just a girl from school,” Dad says. “I’m sure she’s nice deep down.”

  “Maybe she has nice bone marrow,” says Lav. “But the rest of her is a bi—”

  “Lavender.”

  I don’t know what Cammie wants from me. But whatever it is, she’ll just demand it and I’ll do it, if that wimpy little phone call is anything to go by. The doorbell rings.

  “Your friends are here!” Mum calls from the living room.

  Does no one listen to me? That is not what’s happening.

  I open the door. “Hi! Cammie. Melia. Nicole.” They push past me as if they own the place. Following behind is Hannah, mouthing, I am so sorry, and shaking her head. She hugs me, and whispers in my ear, “I didn’t think – I told them about your dad.”

  WHAT about my dad? My insides go a little watery. They don’t know that my dad is the football mascot, do they? Why would they need a big bee? Why would anyone need a big bee?

  “Mark?” Hannah calls. “Can we speak to you? Please.”

  Dad pops his head out of the living room, looking wary.

  Melia jumps in and gets down to business. “Mr Brown.”

  “Hello … uh.”

  “Melia. Hannah said you had a plan for prom.”

  “Oh! Well … I did.”

  There’s a silence. Dad examines his fingernails. “But Hannah felt my help was not wanted, so…”

  Cammie, Melia and Nicole swivel unfriendly eyes on Hannah.

  “I’m sorry, Mark,” Hannah says. He looks up.

  “And?”

  Hannah looks blank. I take pity on her and whisper something in her ear. She frowns but I shrug at her like, If you want his help.

  “And project management is an art form?”

  “Yessss.” Dad does the guns at her with his fingers and I make a mental note to die of shame later.

  “Please step into my office,” he tells them.

  WORRY DIARY

  If Cammie, Melia or Nicole breathe a word about what my dad is like at home, I will never live it down.

  “Do take a seat,” says Dad, perching on his workbench in his little shed and gesturing grandly towards paint cans on the floor.

  To my surprise, all four girls grab a paint can and sit down. They must be desperate.

  Dad gently kicks a four-pack of beer under his work bench, out of sight, unrolls his laminated prom plan and pins it on the wall. He kept hold of it. Of course he did. He’s adorable.

  Click.

  He has a little device that shines a pinprick of light at the plan. He’s using it as a pointer, though the laminate is so shiny we’re all getting lasers reflecting at our eyeballs.

  “Now, if you had accepted my help, we would have begun work in Week One.”

  I flinch from a wobbling beam of bright light. He’s not adorable; he’s incredibly annoying.

  “It is now Week Six. Can you see the problem we’re facing?”

  “Yes, Mr Brown,” says Cammie, repressing her snappy instincts admirably. I’m very impressed.

  “As you can see, the workload in Week One is light.Weeks Two to Five are heavier but manageable and then it intensifies in one final focused week. However, you rejected my offer of help in – please be quiet, Louise – in Week One and now your options are greatly reduced.”

  He clicks off his pointing light like the whole thing is a lost cause.

  “So you can’t help us?” Cammie says, betraying a hint of impatience. Dad looks into the middle distance. I imagine rock music is playing in his head.

  “Luckily for you, I’m the best of the best,” he tells the middle distance. Nicole peers out into the garden to see if there’s anything there. Nope. Nothing but Dad’s love of drama.

  “Your challenges are threefold,” Dad says, putting one foot up on a paint can and knocking Melia over with his knee. “I am so sorry.” He pulls her out of a pile of wellies.

  “You need to host a prom. You need…”

  “No, no, that’s it, Mr Brown,” says Hannah. “We just need to host a prom.”

  “Hannah, Hannah, Hannah…” Dad says shaking his head. “Challenges are just opportunities to achieve.”

  “I don’t think that makes sense,” she says stubbornly.

  “At Lou’s sixth birthday, you came dressed as a plum and wet yourself.”

  There’s a silence. Nicole tries to hide her sniggering beneath a dainty cough.

  “I don’t see how that’s relevant,” Hannah mutters.

  “It isn’t. I just wanted to share it with the room and remind you I have plenty more where that came from.”

  That shuts Hannah up.

  “You’re looking at a threefold issue: host a prom, which contains three subdivisons. Namely, find a venue for the prom, arrange transport to the prom and hire some entertainment for the prom. If you find a venue closer to town, you instantly knock one task off that list.”

  Melia and Nicole look at Cammie, who shakes her head and mumbles something.

  “What was that?” says Dad.

  “Fine,” says Cammie, ungraciously. “No Dreezy mansion.”

  “No Dreezy whatsit,” Dad agrees, chirpy at winning an early battle. “Now, this is your school.” He pins up a map next to the six-week plan and points at something in the middle. “And this is a four-mile radius around it, which I think is a reasonable distance to expect people to travel under their own steam. So let’s pick a venue within that circle and within reason. As you’re going to lose your deposit on the first place – ten miles away, woefully impractical and painfully expensive – there’s not much money left to play with. Wouldn’t have happened on my watch,” he mutters to himself.

  Cammie, Melia and Nicole get up to peer at the map. They look unimpressed.

  “Uh … Bowlarama?” says Melia, sarcastically.

  “It smells of feet but has good square footage,” Dad says.

  “I was joking,” she says.

  “Well, we don’t really have time for that, do we? Because you’re awful at project management.”

  I look at Melia silently swallowing her rage and plotting ways to make my life hell later. I spot Dad’s bee costume folded up beside me and lean forward to block it from view. Everyone looks at me, as if I’ve leaned forward with a great idea.

  “Um, the Town Hall?” I say, squinting desperately at the map.

  “Hardly cool,” tuts Dad.

  Fine. Last time I help you. “Well, this isn’t really my prom, or my problem,” I say, standing up. Hannah turns big pleading eyes on me. I sigh
and sit back down. Ugh, I hate being a nice person. If I was heartless, I’d be in my cosy bedroom watching YouTube right now, without a care in the world. Maybe unravelling the mysteries of contouring.

  “A local celebrity would also be a good idea, make an appearance sorta thing,” says Dad, twinkling at me like we share a delightful secret. No way, my stony expression says. No oversized bee is dragging his musical arse to my prom. Thankfully, the others ignore him.

  “We want somewhere impressive, somewhere with a bit of class,” says Melia, desperately.

  “Glamour!” Nicole pleads.

  “On a budget,” Hannah adds quietly.

  “Perhaps…” says Dad, staring at the map like a maverick cop who’s just about to crack a serial killer’s identity. “Just maybe…”

  There’s a long silence. Cammie massages her temples like, Am I really so desperate I’ll put up with this? Clearly she is, as the five of us stay perched on our paint cans, knees by our chins.

  “Wait here,” says Dad, and hurries out to make a call. The darkness of the garden swallows him up and we can just hear the murmuring of him talking into his mobile.

  “Thanks, Lou,” says Hannah, gratefully, and to my surprise the others murmur agreement.

  “He’ll help you,” I tell them. “But he’s going to be really annoying about it.”

  “Same,” says Melia. “My mum and aunt are catering the whole thing at cost price and I’m never going to hear the end of it.”

  Behind her back, Cammie rolls her eyes and I realize this Prom Committee may be even less harmonious than I thought.

  Dad is still out there on his phone, and everyone is getting cold.

  “How long will he be?” Nicole asks me. I shrug. How should I know? He’s full of unpleasant surprises.

  Finally, he comes back to the shed, breathing on his hands to warm them but looking very pleased with himself. “I have a surprise for YOU!” he announces. “Just ten more minutes. Help is on its way.”

  Lav knocks on the shed door – carrying a tray. “Mum made me bring you out tea.”

  “I don’t want tea.” Cammie waves Lav away like she’s a waitress. Lav stares at her like she’s seriously considering dumping the tray on her head. Instead, she pours Cammie a large mug and says, “I. Brought. Tea.” And stomps off back to the house.

  “So, how’s swimming?” Dad asks and Hannah launches into talk about Personal Bests and resistance training, assuming he remembers it all from when I was a swimmer. Dad’s eyes glaze over, but he says, “Uh-huh… Great stuff… No way?” at various intervals and I think he gets away with it.

  There’s another knock on the shed door. “Better not be more tea,” Cammie mutters. To my surprise, the door swings open to reveal Dermot standing there.

  “What?” Melia says, looking from Dad to Dermot and back again. “What’s this?”

  “The answer to all your problems, so be polite,” Dad tells her. “Come in, son. Come in. How’s Aggy? Want to sit on a paint can?”

  “Actually, Mr Brown, my trousers don’t really bend so I’ll just lean against this if that’s all right.”

  “Against what? NO!”

  Dermot leans against a sturdy-looking sheet of MDF that instantly snaps, collapses and swallows him whole. Dust billows up and fills the shed.

  “Evacuate!”

  Spluttering, blinded by dust, we all stagger out into the garden. Dad pulls Dermot to his feet and pats his back while he coughs and spits into a flower bed.

  “I’m sorry,” he croaks. “They’re my least flexible item of clothing.”

  Once we’re all settled back in the shed and Dermot is resting semi-comfortably against the wall, Dad outlines his great plan.

  “We host the prom at Dermot’s house,” Dad beams, smugly.

  “You can’t host two hundred people in a house.” Nicole looks exasperated.

  “You can in this one,” says Dad and the Prom Committee eye up Dermot, intrigued.

  “We pay Aggy and Dermot the cost of venue hire, cheaper than Bowlarama hopefully?” Dermot nods gravely. “And you can use Aggy’s house clearance items to dress the whole thing.”

  “Mmm-yeah-no. We were going for a Nu-Grunge and bling vibe,” Cammie says.

  “Whatever you were going for, you’ve missed by some way,” Dad slaps her down. Wow, he’s really feisty when he’s project-managing. “You were going for an absence-of-any-guests-because-they’re-ten-miles-away vibe. And now you will have an antiquey … ah…”

  “Baroque,” Dermot helps him out. I’ll have to google that word later.

  “That sort of thing,” Dad concludes. “It will have the real Wow Factor.” (He has been learning new words from daytime TV.)

  Everyone ponders this. It’s actually a brilliant idea. Dad smooths his workflow spreadsheet, lovingly.

  “Do you mind people from school in your house, Dermot? What if they don’t behave?” I say, anxiously. The thought of Karl playing some cruel prank on Dermot in his own home makes me feel sick.

  “AS IF I would trust a load of teenagers to behave! No offence,” says Dad. “This is where your mother’s thuggish relatives finally come in handy.”

  I congratulate him on his cleverness and he bows. Cammie, Melia and Nicole add their praise. Hannah follows up a little more grudgingly. Dad notices.

  “Your plum costume was so heavy with wee you staggered around in circles and fell into a bush,” he reminisces.

  “DAD.”

  “Sorry. Now onto entertainment. This would have been a Week One decision, but there’s no point crying over spilt milk because you forgot to order milk.” He chuckles to himself.

  “Actually,” says Dermot, “I have one condition for using our house: we provide the entertainment.”

  I have a horrible queasy feeling I know what he’s going to say next.

  “You … and your mum?” says Nicole slowly.

  “Me and my Perf Class,” he says proudly. “We’re really good. We improvise scenarios, dance and do poetry.”

  “Oh. Oh God…” says Melia faintly.

  I’m just imagining the Perf Class onstage, taking suggestions from the audience – all smutty, obviously. If they’re even listening. While Eli and Patrice bicker over motivation, and Star does a handstand. No way. I will talk him out of this as soon as I get him alone.

  “Lou’s in it too,” says Dermot.

  Melia, Nicole and Cammie look at me as if all their Christmases have come at once. I give them a watery smile, to match the feeling in my guts.

  WORRY DIARY

  After I’m humiliated at prom and run away to start a new life somewhere, what name shall I choose?

  Samantha Finglebrink?

  Effie Nimplestick.

  Beverly Amplebank the Fourth?

  We go to Aggy’s that weekend. She finds the whole thing hilarious. She’s delighted that the house is getting spruced up and seems unbothered by the thought of 200 teenagers trying to get drunk and get off with each other.

  “It’s too quiet, just Dermot and me,” she says with a shrug when Dad strides through her second living room, gesticulating dramatically and painting a lurid picture of vomit bouncing down the staircase, fights breaking out in the fourth bathroom and bras hanging off oil paintings.

  “All right, Mark,” Mum says, slightly alarmed as he stands on a chair to demonstrate the more dramatic parts.

  “Well,” he says, tucking his shirt back in, “I just want Aggy to be fully forewarned. Teenagers are disgusting animals— Hello, kids.”

  “Hello, Mark,” say Roman and Gabriel.

  It’s Friday after school and Dad has drawn up plans of the whole of Dermot’s house. We now have a list to take to the hardware store and we have roped everyone in to help. This was a slightly bigger job than I realized. Even Pete has agreed to come along. Not enthusiastically, sure, but he’s here. Gabriel was debating this evening but offered to cancel it for us.

  “Are you sure?” I asked. (Not that I wasn’t delighte
d.) “Don’t they need you for the semi-final, practising and stuff?”

  “Hazel keeps changing her mind as to who’s going to actually debate in the semi-finals,” Gabe said. I bet she does. I imagine that’s how she wields her power, promoting people and demoting them.

  If Hazel and Cammie ever joined forces, they’d rule the world. Let’s hope they never meet.

  I love this weary, irritable tone Gabe now gets when he’s talking about Hazel, but I wisely kept that to myself and said, “Well, if you can come, that would be great. I know Hannah will appreciate it.”

  “Oh, he’s here,” is actually what Hannah says. But I am determined I will make my boyfriend and best friend BE friends. At least I don’t have to worry about Gabe and Dermot, who get on brilliantly. Give Gabe an exquisitely detailed stuffed otter, and you’ve got a friend for life.

  When Dermot tells Roman and Gabriel about Perf Class, they struggle to keep a straight face at the thought of me being “spontaneous” and not in charge. They collapse into giggles when I tell them we’re the entertainment for the prom. I look at Pete; he refuses to make eye contact with me. But that’s cool, Dermot and I haven’t told anyone he’s in Perf Class and I’m not gonna snitch on him now. He should have a bit more faith in me!

  Me, Gabe, Pete, Lav and Roman squeeze into Pete’s Mini. It’s a tight fit. I’m spooning Lavender with a dead left leg.

  “Am I sitting on you?” Gabe asks, concerned.

  “Everyone’s sitting on me,” I reply, muffled.

  I only ever trail behind Mum and Dad in the hardware store. I’ve never had to navigate it myself, and Lavender’s never been. When we get there, she looks around in awe.

  “Wow,” she remarks, “a shop this big and there’s nothing I want to buy! Ooh, Hello Kitty doorknobs?”

  We grab a shop assistant. “What is a sprocket?” Gabe asks her, as if he’s new to the English language.

  “Does that say widget? Is that a thing?” demands Pete, pointing at Dad’s list. “If I said widget to you, what would you think?”

  We spend a hundred pounds in the hardware store, then with a groan I fold myself back into Pete’s Mini. Someone pats me comfortingly on my thigh.

  “That was me, by the way,” Lavender says.

  “Glad to hear it.”

  We drive to Dermot’s house to find that Mum’s family have already taken over. They’re moving furniture, sweeping, rewiring – I’m extremely impressed. We carry our bags through to the kitchen, where we find Aggy inexplicably charmed by my uncle Eddie, who’s explaining to her how you can build your own septic tank in a normal suburban back garden. I have no idea why.