Sunita’s Secret

by Narinder Dhami

  ‘And, Sunita’ – Mrs Bright raised her voice to stop me as I turned to leave – ‘if you really feel that things have become too difficult here, there is always the option of transferring to a different school.’

  I wondered if I was imagining that she sounded faintly hopeful.

  ‘I’ll be fine, Mrs Bright,’ I replied. I was determined that I would be fine. My mum had had to fight for a place at Coppergate for me. I wasn’t going to let her down; that was my part of the deal.

  Henry and Zara were lurking at the other end of the corridor, pretending to read the sports noticeboard, when I left Mrs Bright’s office. They rushed towards me, and I told them what had happened.

  ‘That Celina,’ Zara grumbled, knitting her dark brows together in a ferocious frown. ‘This is all her fault.’

  ‘No, it’s my fault too, for letting her wind me up,’ I said. ‘But not any more.’

  ‘It’s not fair,’ Henry chimed in. ‘Celina shouldn’t be able to say things like that to you, and get away with it.’

  ‘Maybe she won’t,’ Zara muttered. ‘I’m thinking … revenge!’

  ‘Revenge?’ Henry and I repeated. We exchanged a worried look. Zara was, we thought, pretty much capable of anything.

  ‘Yes.’ Zara stroked her chin thoughtfully. ‘I have a plan.’

  ‘Zara, will you stop acting like a villain in a Bond movie?’ I broke in. ‘To be honest, I think it would be best if I just kept away from Celina from now on.’

  ‘Ah, but that’s the beauty of my plan.’ Zara grinned. ‘We take our revenge secretly. No one knows it’s us.’

  ‘That’s a good idea, actually,’ Henry said eagerly. ‘Celina irritates loads of people, so it could be anybody.’

  ‘We could have a secret society to get revenge on people who annoy us,’ Zara went on, getting all fired up. ‘Not just Celina, but anyone. I’ve got quite a few people on my list.’

  ‘Me too,’ Henry agreed, looking excited. ‘You know, we could have calling cards. When we’ve taken our revenge on someone, we could leave a tastefully designed card behind. I could print them out on my computer.’

  ‘You have just been punished by the Masters of Revenge,’ Zara suggested. ‘Next time you’d better be more careful.’

  I laughed. Zara and Henry stared at me. I stopped laughing.

  ‘You’re serious?’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Zara nodded.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Henry.

  I blinked. The idea of getting my own back on Celina was enormously tempting. But was it worth the risk?

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ I said.

  We left it at that, and the day began. Of course, Jack, Celina and her friends weren’t going to let me forget what I had done. There were many loud comments about the damage to Celina’s designer coat, and how the daughters of thieves shouldn’t be allowed to associate with ‘normal’ people. But I closed my mouth and stopped my ears and tried hard not to get drawn into it. If I was tempted to speak, I thought of Mum and how disappointed she would be if I had to change schools. That was enough.

  I’d had enough excitement for one day, but there was so much more to come. At lunch time Henry and I were out in the playground waiting for Zara. She’d popped back to our classroom after the last lesson to collect her gloves. Henry and I were chatting, our breaths steaming in the cold air, him trying to convince me the secret revenge society idea was a goer, when Zara suddenly erupted out of school like a genie from a bottle.

  ‘You’ll never believe this!’ she gasped. The purple birthmark looked even more startling because her face was so pale. ‘Celina lent her diamond bracelet to Chloe, and the airhead’s only gone and lost it!’

  ‘No!’ I felt literally sick, and my stomach heaved. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘They’re weeping and wailing outside our classroom.’ Zara plonked herself down on the bench next to me. ‘Celina’s in hysterics, and Chloe’s not far behind. She’s hyperventilating like mad.’

  For a moment I couldn’t breathe myself. ‘This is just what Celina wanted,’ I said shakily. ‘She’ll blame me, you’ll see. She’ll say I stole it.’

  But Zara shook her head. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said, patting my arm. ‘Chloe reckons she lost it while she was in lessons this morning.’

  ‘You’re not in any of Chloe’s sets, Sunita,’ Henry added quickly. ‘You haven’t been near her all morning, so Celina can’t possibly blame you.’

  That did not really help. I could have spent the morning on Mars, and Celina would still say I was a thief. She could twist things. My heart pitter-pattered as Celina, Chloe, Jyoti and Danielle came out of school, all talking at once. A distraught Chloe was sobbing loudly, while Jyoti and Danielle had their arms round Celina’s shoulders. She was sniffing and dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.

  ‘How could you be so careless, Chloe?’ she wailed. ‘You knew how much that bracelet meant to me! It was a birthday present from my gran!’

  ‘S-s-s-orr-eee!’ Chloe hiccupped. Her running mascara made her look like an anorexic panda. ‘It was an acc-acc-acc-accident! You know how thin my wrists are – it must have slipped off without me noticing.’

  ‘You should have been more careful!’ Celina wept, clutching at Danielle and Jyoti for support. ‘Oh, God, my mother’s going to kill me!’

  Now this might just be me – and you know that Celina and I aren’t exactly the best of chums – but I did get the teensiest-tiniest impression that Celina was kind of enjoying the melodrama of the situation just a little bit.

  ‘Hey nobody died, you know,’ Zara called.

  I elbowed her in the ribs, but luckily Celina and Chloe were wailing so loudly, they didn’t hear.

  ‘I really don’t want to hang around waiting for Celina to start accusing me,’ I muttered. ‘Let’s go somewhere else.’

  ‘We’ve got half an hour before our lunch sitting,’ Henry said, glancing at his watch.

  ‘I know the perfect place,’ Zara said. ‘Follow me.’

  Obediently Henry and I went after her, but we were shocked when she opened the door and marched into school.

  ‘We’re not allowed inside at lunch times,’ Henry said nervously.

  ‘This is foolproof,’ Zara said with confidence. ‘Trust me.’

  She led us to our classroom, ushered us inside and closed the door. It was quiet, peaceful and, best of all, Celina-free.

  ‘What if Mr Arora comes in for something?’ I asked.

  Zara shrugged. ‘We just tell him we offered to stay in and tidy the bookshelves, and he said yes,’ she replied, a wicked glint in her eyes. ‘He’s such a zombie, he won’t remember.’

  ‘I like it,’ I said with a smile.

  ‘Maybe we’d better go and sit by the bookshelves just in case.’ Henry still sounded nervous. ‘Then it looks like we’re tidying.’

  Zara tutted loudly as she followed Henry across the room. ‘Henry, you don’t have to do everything by the rules, you know,’ she said tartly. ‘Have you ever tried living dangerously?’

  ‘I ate a chilli once,’ Henry retorted, and looked quite cross when Zara and I giggled. ‘Maybe we’d better do a bit of tidying, just in case—’ He stopped, bent over, peered closely at the floor. ‘What’s that shiny thing?’

  I bent over too, saw it, but couldn’t speak.

  ‘Celina’s bracelet,’ Zara said with enormous satisfaction. ‘Well, well, well.’

  She hooked the bracelet with her little finger, and lifted it up. It hung there like a glittering silver snake, and we all stared at it as if it was an unexploded bomb. Which, in a kind of a way, it was.

  ‘It’s the perfect, perfect moment for revenge,’ Zara whispered, laying the bracelet on the nearest table. ‘What shall we do?’

  Smash it up? Dip it in paint? Dunk it in water? What?

  ‘We could leave an anonymous note for Celina,’ Henry said breathlessly. ‘We could demand a ransom.’

  I reached out and touched the beautiful bracelet with the
tip of my forefinger. I made a decision.

  ‘You two go outside,’ I said in a low voice. ‘Leave this to me.’

  Zara looked disappointed. ‘But—’

  ‘I mean it,’ I said with determination. ‘This is between me and Celina.’

  ‘What are you going to do, Sunita?’ breathed Henry, his eyes round as round could be.

  ‘Just go,’ I said.

  I waited, not moving, until Zara and Henry had reluctantly left the classroom. I sounded so confident, so sure, that they must have thought I knew exactly what I was going to do. But I didn’t. I had a choice, of course I did, but what would I choose?

  For the first time I realized that my dad must have thought about stealing that money before he did it. There must have been a split-second when he had that choice – to take the money or not to take the money. He made his decision, and then he had to live with it. I would have to do the same.

  I reached out and picked up Celina’s bracelet.

  A few moments later I stepped out into the playground. The low-lying November sunshine hit me directly in the eyes, and I blinked.

  ‘What did you do?’

  Zara and Henry instantly surrounded me, their faces full of questions.

  ‘Tell us!’ Zara demanded.

  I shrugged. ‘You’ll have to wait and see,’ I replied.

  ‘No!’ Zara wailed. ‘You can’t do this, Sunita!’

  ‘It must be something big,’ Henry speculated.

  ‘You’ll never, ever guess,’ I replied confidently.

  Henry and Zara looked thrilled.

  ‘When will we find out?’ Zara breathed.

  ‘Before afternoon lessons,’ I said. ‘Let’s go to lunch.’

  Celina, Chloe and the others were nowhere to be seen as we queued up outside the canteen. We found out later that one of the dinner supervisors had felt sorry for the hysterical Celina, and had allowed them to have an early lunch with the Year 9s.

  ‘Typical Celina,’ Zara sniffed. ‘Trust her to get everything she can out of the situation.’

  I did not answer. I was wondering about Celina’s reaction when she found out what I’d done with her bracelet. I was already feeling slightly sick inside, trying to decide if it had, in fact, been the right thing.

  ‘Can’t you just give us a clue?’ Zara pleaded as, at last, the bell rang for afternoon lessons.

  I shook my head. ‘You’ve only got a few minutes to wait now,’ I replied. I hadn’t eaten much lunch, but I felt like I was going to be violently sick.

  ‘It must be something really big,’ Henry said excitedly.

  I swallowed. ‘Believe me, you won’t be expecting this,’ I assured him as we pushed our way into school with everyone else.

  We were coming down the Year 7 corridor when I saw, ahead of me, that Celina was already at her locker, collecting the books she needed for afternoon lessons. I took a breath. Any minute now …

  ‘Oh, my God!’

  Chloe, Danielle and Jyoti, who were standing alongside her, turned.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Danielle.

  ‘My bracelet!’ Celina screamed joyfully. ‘It’s here, in my locker!’

  ‘What?’ Chloe almost collapsed with the emotion of the situation.

  ‘Here! It’s here!’ Celina waved the bracelet in the air. ‘You must have put it back in my locker, Chloe, you idiot!’

  ‘But I didn’t,’ Chloe said earnestly. ‘I know I didn’t.’

  I had come to a full stop in the corridor when Celina screamed. Zara and Henry had stopped too, and I was fully aware that their eyes were fixed on me in bewilderment.

  ‘Well, who did then?’ Jyoti asked. ‘Maybe somebody found it and put it there.’

  ‘Check it over, Cee,’ Danielle said urgently. ‘Make sure it’s not damaged.’

  I heard Zara and Henry’s sharp intake of breath as Celina looked the bracelet over carefully.

  ‘It’s perfectly fine!’ She beamed. ‘Nothing wrong with it at all.’ She snapped the clasp open, and fastened the bracelet to her wrist. ‘I tell you what,’ she declared, glowing with relief, ‘I’m not taking this off again until I get home tonight!’

  ‘But where did it come from?’ asked Chloe, puzzled. ‘How did it get there?’

  I didn’t hear any more. Zara grabbed my arm in a vice-like grip and hustled me round the corner out of sight. The door to the girls’ toilets was open, and she dragged me inside and slammed it shut behind us.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she demanded, her eyes spitting green sparks.

  ‘Hello?’ Henry called plaintively from outside. ‘I can’t come in there, you know.’

  ‘Calm down, Zara,’ I said, attempting to take control of the situation. ‘I gave Celina her bracelet back, that’s all.’

  ‘I know that!’ Zara squealed, dancing up and down in frustration like a demented pixie. ‘But why? Why?’

  This was where it all got very tricky to explain.

  ‘I just wanted … to do the right thing,’ I said lamely.

  Zara looked more than frustrated now. She looked furious. ‘But this is Celina!’ she spluttered. ‘What about everything she’s said and done to you? Why are you being nice to her? What about our secret revenge society?’

  ‘If you let Sunita get a word in, she’ll tell us,’ Henry called through the door.

  ‘Go on then,’ Zara snapped, planting her hands on her hips. I would not have been surprised to see steam coming out of not only her ears, but everywhere.

  ‘It’s quite difficult to explain,’ I mumbled, staring down at my feet. ‘But it’s nothing to do with Celina, really—’

  ‘How can it not be anything to do with Celina?’ Zara growled.

  ‘Zara!’ invisible Henry said crossly.

  ‘It’s about me,’ I went on, fumbling for the words I needed. ‘I’m not a bad person, whatever my dad’s done. Doing the right thing makes me feel better.’ I stared defiantly at Zara. ‘And I do feel better.’

  ‘I can see that,’ Zara retorted. ‘You’ve got this silly little smile on your face. And I can tell you, it’s really annoying me.’

  ‘Look, I know it doesn’t make sense,’ I said, ‘but what I’ve done makes me feel generous. It makes me happy that I didn’t do something mean. I don’t want to do bad things, even to Celina. I want to like myself again.’

  ‘You’d have felt a lot better if you’d made Celina’s life hell,’ Zara retorted, reaching for the door handle. I could see she was still furious. ‘Or at the very least, you could have given the bracelet back to her and made her feel awful for the way she’s treated you.’

  ‘Look, it doesn’t matter if Celina knows it was me who returned the bracelet or not,’ I went on hesitantly. ‘It’s about me and the way I feel. My mum can’t speak to our neighbours yet, but she’s secretly been doing little things for them, and that makes her feel better—’

  ‘Oh, so now you’re doing the same,’ Zara jeered, wrenching the door open. ‘I’ll have to call you Saint Sunita from now on.’ She pushed her way past Henry and stomped off round the corner.

  I sighed. I was no saint, far from it. At the moment I was feeling a bit of a fool. But inside me there was still a small secret glow. I’d done the right thing.

  ‘I suppose you think the same?’ I asked.

  Henry shrugged. ‘Not really,’ he said carefully. ‘It was brave of you to give the bracelet back.’

  ‘Do you get why I did it?’ I asked.

  Henry nodded. ‘I think so. Because of what your dad did, you kind of feel like you’ve got to prove that you’re a good person. No—’ He stopped for a moment, thinking. ‘You feel like you’ve got to be even better than that.’

  Henry had understood exactly what I’d been trying to say. Suddenly I felt enormously fond of him. ‘Thanks,’ I said, touching his arm. ‘You’re a good friend.’

  ‘We’d better get to class.’ Henry spoke very matter of factly, but I could tell he was pleased. ‘Do you want me to talk to Zara?�
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  ‘I don’t think Zara will be talking to either of us,’ I predicted.

  As I’d imagined, Zara was sitting at our table, tight-lipped, when we walked into class. On the other side of the room Celina, surrounded by Jyoti, Danielle and Chloe, was still rejoicing over the recovery of her bracelet and waving her wrist around to show it off.

  Zara raised her eyebrows at me. See what you’ve done? her look said. She didn’t speak to me for the rest of afternoon lessons.

  But apart from Zara sulking, everything seemed better. Different. I felt as if, suddenly, I could breathe again. I’m not sure I felt totally happy, but I didn’t feel totally miserable either. Life suddenly appeared to be a little worthwhile after all.

  ‘Are we still friends?’ I asked Zara bluntly as Henry and I followed her out of school at the end of the day. ‘If not, tell me now.’

  ‘I suppose we are,’ Zara snapped, not looking at me. ‘No one else would put up with your ridiculous behaviour.’

  ‘Look who’s talking,’ Henry remarked, then his mouth fell open at his own bravery. I laughed and even Zara’s lips twitched slightly.

  ‘All right,’ she snapped. ‘I’m still your friend. Even though you’re obviously raving mad. But I just don’t get it.’

  ‘All right.’ I thought for a minute. ‘Forget Celina. Imagine doing a secret good deed for one of your friends. Henry here, for instance.’

  Zara raised her eyebrows. ‘What, if he loses his bracelet, you mean?’

  Henry chuckled.

  ‘No, of course not.’ I punched Zara lightly on the arm. ‘Something else. Say you knew Henry was worrying about his science project, and you wanted to help him out. You could slip some notes secretly into his locker.’

  ‘Or I could just give them to him,’ Zara pointed out tartly.

  ‘Sure you could.’ I shrugged. ‘But this is much more fun. Imagine how pleased Henry would be. And that would make you happy too.’

  For the first time since that afternoon, Zara looked a bit uncertain. ‘All right,’ she admitted, ‘I can see the point of that, doing things for people you like. But Celina—’

  She gritted her teeth as, just then, Celina barged her way past us, flirting outrageously with Jack Browning, fluttering her eyelashes and waving her braceleted wrist under our noses.