Life According To...Alice B. Lovely

by Karen McCombie

  She twittered on about the times of our respective after-school clubs, the addresses of our schools and what we liked for tea.

  She yakked about how good Alice B. Lovely’s references were from her neighbours.

  Through all mum’s endless talking and twittering and yakking, Alice B. Lovely sat still and wide-eyed, only interjecting with a “Yes, Mrs Henderson”, “No, Mrs Henderson”, “Please, Mrs Henderson” and “Thank you, Mrs Henderson” here and there.

  Then at one point – still hanging on Mum’s every word – she reached over to Stan’s Lego tub, which was sitting on the table next to him, rifled around in it, and pulled out a long flat red piece. As she nodded and smiled at what Mum was saying, she clipped the piece on to the chin-high set of Lego steps he’d made, automatically transforming the whole thing into a diving board. She then grabbed a chip, walked it up the steps and made it do a double somersault straight into Stan’s gaping mouth.

  Of course my little brother was going to think that was special. He was only six. He couldn’t see that down the line, she’d be as uninterested in us and as phoney with our parents as all the others.

  “Now come on, Stan. We have to stick to our plan,” I remind him. “We don’t need anyone looking after us!”

  I try to forget the blackened pan that’s now in the communal bins downstairs (no amount of soaking got the burnt bits of pasta off).

  I also try to forget the moment at the kitchen table when my mum said, “Well, I don’t know what you think, Alice, but – in answer to your Post-it note question – yes, I think you ARE the one we’re looking for!”

  Mum had beamed around at us as if she’d made a tremendously funny joke, rather than a tremendously big mistake.

  Only Tash smiled back, mainly because it wasn’t going to be HER getting picked up by a freak in fancy dress every day from school…

  “That would be lovely!” said Alice B. Lovely, blinking her sparkling eyelashes so hard that it seemed as if her eyes were actually glittering.

  “OK, Edie,” Stan says solemnly now, cuddling Arthur by the neck.

  “Just me and you against the world, remember?” I tell him, holding my pinky finger out for him to shake with his.

  “Me and you against the world!” he repeats, linking pinkies with me.

  I give him (and Arthur) another quick kiss and then head towards the living room.

  Mum is kneeling down in front of the DVD player, studying it as if it’s a bear trap. She’s never been able to understand how it works beyond sticking the DVD in.

  “Why are there so many buttons on these things?” she grumps, about to press something she shouldn’t that’ll change the neon green timer if she’s not careful.

  “Here, let me,” I say, snatching the remote from the table and activating the DVD player with a whirr and soft clink.

  Dad always had to do the techno stuff like this. He’d grumble, but I think he quite liked it, since he always moaned about Mum being a know-all when it came to everything else in our lives.

  For years, he used to say that in a gentle, teasing sort of way. But towards the end, he’d say it in a bitter and biting sort of way.

  “Thanks,” says Mum with a warm smile. “And Edie, I think this is going to turn out all right, you know.”

  “Well, of course it is. We’ve watched it already!” I say, nodding at the corny rom com she’s clutching. “I could probably recite every line in the last scene.”

  “No, not the film!” Mum laughs. “I’m talking about Alice B. Lovely. Don’t you think she’s just … I don’t know … delicious? I have this really funny feeling about her!”

  “Wow, what a coincidence.” I tell Mum through gritted teeth. “’Cause I have a really funny feeling about her as well.”

  A funny feeling that she’s going to be the most useless, weird and phoney nanny of the lot.

  “Do you, darling? Well, that’s great!” Mum beams.

  She’s obviously got her sarcasm radar switched off for the night.

  I think about bursting her bubble and pointing out how irresponsible she is to leave us with yet another stranger, especially one who’s clearly a weirdo, but I’ve run out of energy.

  Instead I flop down on the sofa and get ready to squirm at the movie, feeling as miserable and defeated as possible.

  DONG! goes the clock of doom in the hallway, striking the first of several depressing clangs to let us know it’s eight o’clock.

  And with every dull DONG! my heart sinks, sinks, sinks.

  I feel like it’s reminding me that I’m still a long way off winning the nanny wars…

  The time is one minute to humiliation.

  After-school club today has mostly consisted of Year Sevens for some reason, and I don’t care too much what they might think of me, or the freakoid nanny who’s waiting over by the gate with my little brother.

  But irritatingly, I do care what Cara Connelly, Dionne Omiata and Holly King think.

  Here are three facts you need to know about these girls:

  1)They are in sixth form (no school uniform; they’re all micro-minis, ballet pumps and a ton of make-up).

  2) They are gorgeous, in a glam way (see above).

  3) They are Big Fat Phonies (you should see how they suck up to the teachers, while treating anyone below them in school like they’re as important as dust molecules).

  The trouble is, Cara, Dionne and Holly’s opinion seems to matter to virtually everyone I know, including me. (Sad but true.)

  When I first started at secondary and was sitting in the dinner hall, getting to know my new classmates, they passed by just as someone asked what the “P” of my middle name stood for.

  “Pathetic?” one of them had giggled to another.

  I was gutted. (Also sad but true.)

  My middle name is actually Patricia, after my nana. But it might as well be P for pathetic, ’cause quite often I am, as you’ll see…

  “Hey, check out Dionne’s nails!” whispers Tash, nodding towards the gang of three as they amble elegantly out of the sixth-form block.

  “Yuck,” I mumble.

  Dionne is holding up her hands and fanning her fingers out, so her girlfriends can see her new false nails, which are very long, very colourful and very clawed. Why do people think that’s such a good look? When Linzee (nanny number four or five) used to tap hers in annoyance, all I could think of was how complicated it must be to do normal stuff like go to the loo. (“Or pick your nose,” Stan once said very sagely.)

  But I’m less horrified by Dionne’s creepy nails and more horrified because we seem to be on a collision course: me and Tash, Dionne and her mates … our paths set to merge right at the gate.

  And the only people waiting to pick up today are one Turkish granny, who’s wearing a black sail dress very similar to Mrs Kosma’s, a bored dad in a grey suit, a small boy in a blue blazer who looks a lot like Stan (because he is Stan) and a girl so bizarrely dressed she stands out like a parakeet in a flock of starlings.

  Alice B. Lovely is wearing the same furry-collared beige jacket, but her skirt this time is electric blue, with some kind of print on it that I can’t quite make out from here. Her tights are jade green, and the shoes are dark red velvet wedges. Each thing is pretty nice, maybe something you’d see in the vintage section of the huge Topshop flagship store in London. (Never been; just read about it in a magazine.)

  The thing is, the Topshop assistants who dress the dummies … they’d never put all that particular stuff together.

  And please don’t let Dionne and the others put me, Stan and Alice B. Lovely together, I stress silently.

  They’ve spotted her already, of course. Who wouldn’t? The Turkish granny is looking her up and down as if she’s found herself standing next to a martian. The grey-suited dad is a lot less bored and more confused now that he’s glanc
ed up from his phone and seen this doll-faced apparition.

  “Check out the eyelashes!” we hear Cara say, nudging Dionne, who mutters what must be the same remark to Holly.

  Oh, yes, we are close enough to see that today’s eyelashes are different from yesterday’s.

  “Purple!” squeaks Tash, spotting them too.

  (By the way, if you want a time check, it’s now two seconds to humiliation.)

  “Edie!” yelps Stan, doing his bonkers windmill act.

  Relax, I tell myself. That’s all right. That’s just a little kid shouting out. Super-cool sixth-form girls aren’t going to pay attention to that.

  But now Alice B. Lovely is lifting her hand – a hand in a silver glove, for goodness’ sake – and wiggling her fingers my way.

  OK, that’s done it.

  Three heads, with flickably long hair, swivel round to see who the freaky girl at the gate is waving at.

  And since there is only me and Tash here, and Tash isn’t the one with the bright red face, I think they have a pretty good idea that the freak belongs to me…

  There’s only one thing to do: brazen it out.

  “Hey, Edie!” chirps Stan, as I reach the gate.

  “Uh-huh,” I mutter blankly, walking as fast as I can with my head held as high as it’s physically possible before it starts tilting backwards.

  “Hello,” I hear Alice B. Lovely’s little-girl-voice say.

  But her hello is somewhere behind me. I’ve already swooped past her and Stan and am stomping off down the road towards home.

  “Edie?” Stan’s confused voice calls after me, but I am not going to look back, specially not so I can see the sniffy expressions on Cara, Dionne and Holly’s faces.

  Stan and old whatshername will just have to catch up with me, like Tash has just done.

  “What are you up to?” she says breathlessly, falling into step beside me.

  I’m a bit disappointed with her question, actually. I thought she knew me well enough to feel my humiliation and spot my escape tactics. And hadn’t we spent most of our free time today talking about the weirdness of my new so-called nanny?

  “Duh! I’m going home!” I answer her, my eyes staring straight ahead.

  In the distance is the parade of shops where Mum bought us ice lollies yesterday. What a great, spontaneous surprise that had seemed. (Or rotten, phoney plot to butter me up, more like.)

  “But Edie!” Tash says urgently. “Edie, it’s Tuesday! You’re going to your dad’s tonight, remember?”

  Ugh.

  My footsteps slow down.

  I have no choice. No choice but to turn and walk the walk of shame back towards the parakeet girl and my little brother, who are standing waiting for me, one looking confused, the other … just doll-like and patient.

  Dionne’s elbow thunks mine as the three sixth formers sashay past me arm-in-arm-in-arm, sniggering.

  “See you tomorrow!” Tash calls after me.

  Yes, of course.

  Unless I curl up and die through sheer embarrassment before then…

  “Tell me something else.”

  “M&M’s! Blue ones!”

  The Tell-Me-Something-Else game has been going on all the way to Dad’s. Stan says something he likes, and Alice B. Lovely asks him to Tell Her Something Else. So far he’s mentioned Lego, Christmas, peas, Arthur, crocodiles, Horrid Henry, pass-the-parcel, pine cones, ABBA songs, Luke Skywalker, trampolines, stars, mint-choc-chip ice cream and socks with cartoon characters on them, amongst a zillion other things.

  “Hey, how about you tell me something else, Edie?” says Alice B. Lovely.

  “How can I tell you something else?” I answer, without taking my eyes off the book I’ve been reading while walking. (Not easy. I nearly tripped up a bunch of times.)

  “You just say a thing you like, Edie!” Stan encourages me, not realizing that I’m trying to make a point.

  “But I can’t say something else, Stan, can I?” I tell him firmly. “Not if I haven’t said anything in the first place, since I’m not playing.”

  I know that sounds petty and stubborn. At least I hope it sounds petty and stubborn to Alice B. Lovely, so she gets off my case with the let’s-be-friends silly games.

  “OK,” says Alice B. Lovely, in an infuriatingly untroubled way. “Back to you, Stan! Tell me something else! A colour, this time.”

  “Um … purple! Like your eyelashes!” Stan blurts out.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see Alice B. Lovely smile and bat her fluffy purple eyelashes.

  Suddenly I feel a bit cross with Stan. What’s he playing at? Is he genuinely sucking up to her? Or is he lulling her into a false sense of security, and when she least expects it, he’ll hit her with a hidden worm or scattering of spiders, maybe?

  I’d like to think it’s the second option, but it’s looking worryingly like the first, from where I’m standing.

  And I happen to be standing at the entrance to Dad’s small block of flats.

  “We’re here,” I say flatly, lifting my finger to the entry-code keypad.

  The main door is on the street side, not the canal side, so I can’t spot whatever random bits and disgusting bobs might be floating in the water.

  “Tell me something else,” Alice B. Lovely says to Stan, not acknowledging what I’ve just said. “A person, this time.”

  “Edie!” says Stan, without a moment’s hesitation, which makes me adore him all over again, despite the sucking up.

  “Tell me something else!” Alice B. Lovely prattles on, as the door swings open and we enter the foyer.

  “Racing Edie up the stairs!” Stan calls out, and next thing he’s flying by me, his school bag thwacking me into action.

  “Oh no, you don’t, Stanley Henderson!” I shout, hurtling after him.

  We’re both giggling and breathless when we reach the door on the second floor, but I already have the key in my hand and we fall into the hall together, deliberately trying to trip each other up as we bumble to the kitchen to dump our bags and grab some water from the tap.

  “Me first! I’m the littlest!” says Stan, pulling the arc-shaped mixer tap round towards him.

  “Sorry – me first, since I’m your elder and better!” I tell him, shoving his head away with my hand and quickly drinking from the gushing cold flow.

  “Hey, you two are fast!”

  In our bubble of silliness, I’d forgotten she was there for a second.

  And now I feel properly stupid, with my cheek, chin and shirt collar wet from the water.

  Wiping the drips from my face, I stare at Alice B. Lovely properly for the first time today.

  In Dad’s ultra modern, ultra sheeny-shiny white kitchen, with her mismatching second-hand everything, she looks even more odd than ever.

  Like someone from a different time; a long-ago decade.

  Maybe it’s the vintage pattern on her swirly electric blue skirt: I can see now that it’s made up of flamingos. Lots and lots of flamingos. A…

  “A ‘stand’ of flamingos!” Alice B. Lovely announces. “That’s how you’re meant to describe them!”

  Excuse me, but did she just read my mind? I fret, as she twists and swirls her skirt around her, and looks fondly at the ridiculously pink and gangly birds.

  “I saw you looking,” says Alice B. Lovely, flicking her eyes from her skirt and aiming her gaze straight at me.

  Do I feel better that she’s said that? Or am I a little worried that she’s just read my mind again?

  And those eyes – there’s something … odd going on with them. They’re almost as violet as her lashes. But I thought her eyes were—

  “Don’t you just love collective nouns?” she says brightly.

  Don’t you just love collective nouns? Who says stuff like that?! A total BFP, that’s who.
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  I pick my novel back up from where I dumped it by my school bag and plonk myself down on the nearest stool. It’s the vampire book I got signed by the BFP author-who-I-won’t-name. So far, it’s not very good (or maybe I’ve just decided not to like it), but anything is better than listening to Alice B. Lovely wittering away.

  “What’s a klective nine?” I hear Stan ask, as I flip to the bookmark.

  “Group names for things. They’re sometimes pretty funny,” says Alice B. Lovely, taking her jacket off to reveal a skinny-rib, ruby-coloured polo neck and a giant double cherry pendant dangling from a long silver chain.

  She strolls over to join Stan at the kitchen sink in a few dainty steps of her red velvet wedges. “Here’s one I like … a ‘glint’ of goldfish!”

  Stan grins.

  “A ‘clutter’ of spiders!” she says next.

  Stan grins some more.

  “A ‘mess’ of iguanas!”

  Stan grins till his freckles practically disappear in the crinkles round his nose.

  “A ‘charm’ of magpies!”

  Stan giggles, which is pretty amazing since he doesn’t even like birds.

  “They sound made up,” I mumble in as bored a voice as I can manage, without looking up from my book. (I quickly swivel it the right way round, and hope Alice B. Lovely doesn’t notice.)

  “Nope, they’re all real. Real as you and me,” says Alice B. Lovely, looking back over her shoulder at me and smiling.

  Real? I’m not sure Alice B. Lovely can totally describe herself that way. Those eyelashes aren’t exactly natural, for a start. Which brings me on to something else…

  “Hey, why don’t you tell us something?” I challenge Alice B. Lovely.

  “OK,” she says serenely.

  “Why have your eyes changed colour? Weren’t your eyes pale green yesterday?”

  “Yes,” she nods. “They’re coloured contact lenses. Aren’t they cool?”

  She turns to Stan and opens her eyes wide. He stares practically nose-to-nose at her pupils and wows a bit, then suddenly says, “Tell us something else!”