by Holly Webb
Katie was unusually distracted during practice. She couldn’t help looking over at Mum every so often, and every time she did it made her feel irritable. About three-quarters of an hour into the session, Katie spotted the boys’ squad loping across the field towards them. Mrs Ross had noticed too, and she called the passing exercises to a halt.
“Let’s have those balls back, everybody, and then gather round – I need to pick a starting line-up.”
Swiftly she picked eleven members of the squad – a bit of a different arrangement, Katie noticed. Obviously Mrs Ross was using the opportunity of a friendly match (well, supposedly) to try out different player combinations. Katie was up front, which was good, though she was paired with Cara Peters, which wasn’t so good. Cara was a talented player, but it was hard to think of her as a team-mate when she was Amy’s best mate, and such a little rat off the pitch. Still, Katie could make the best of it. She’d save up any angst about Cara and take it out on Max – he was being a total prat as usual, gurning at her and Megan as Mr Anderson directed the boys into their positions. Then she grinned. Robin and David had caught her eye and were making the classic “he’s crazy!” gesture in perfect unison.
The two teams arranged themselves on the pitch and waited for the starting whistle. Katie took the opportunity to glance over at Mum again. Was she still watching, or had she chickened out and gone to sit in the car, out of the rain? She looked round quickly, and then did a complete double-take. Mum was there all right, but Katie’s eyes had flicked straight past her at first because she wasn’t where Katie had thought. She’d been expecting to see her still standing next to Megan’s dad, but by now dripping wet and flagging. The laughing, chatting couple sharing the huge umbrella was a nasty shock. Mum wasn’t even looking at the field – and the tall guy in the raincoat that she was smiling at so flirtily was Max Cooper’s dad.
It was unfortunate that Mrs Ross chose just then to blow her whistle for the start of the game. Katie had never been less ready to play a game of football in her life. She was so zoned out that it took Cara’s yell of “Katie – get going!” to even start her moving. Katie desperately wrenched her mind away from the pair at the side of the pitch, and tried to concentrate. It was practically impossible. Not only did her eyes seem to be magnetically pulled towards her mum and Mr Cooper – who didn’t appear to have noticed there was a problem – but whenever she was looking at the pitch, there was Max!
The ten minutes dragged on and Katie just couldn’t get into the game. The boys’ side were quick to take advantage of the hole in the girls’ attack, with Josh Matthews seeming to be here, there and everywhere. He might fancy himself, but he was good at football. The boys didn’t so much dominate the action as make the girls look as though they were standing still, and at the end of the first half they were two goals up, with only Megan’s sterling efforts having kept it from being loads more. As Mrs Ross blew the whistle to change ends, and called out the team changes she wanted to make, Katie was miserably aware that she had never played worse. She wasn’t surprised when Mrs Ross took her off, and she was too embarrassed to look at the coach – she knew that Mrs Ross would be wondering what was going on with her.
She trudged off the pitch, dodging the furious glances from her teammates. She jumped as someone suddenly thumped her on the back.
“Thanks, Katie!” Max jeered, grinning. “You played brilliantly – didn’t know you’d joined our team!”
Katie actually felt like hitting him – or screaming something along the lines of “What’s your stupid dad playing at?”, and it was an effort just to walk away. She watched the second half on her own, radiating such gloom that none of the rest of the squad came to see what the matter was. Every so often she sneaked a look at her mum and Mr Cooper. Mum waved cheerfully – she clearly hadn’t a clue that Katie had just been substituted for playing the worst match of her life. Katie dropped her eyes to the ground and stared fiercely at the grass. Was something actually going on? She so wished that Megan hadn’t said anything last week – she’d probably never have even noticed without her comment! But then Katie’s sensible side kicked in, reminding her that it would be even worse if something were going on and she hadn’t a clue… Wouldn’t it? Actually, blissful cluelessness sounded pretty good right now.
Sarah and Cara managed one goal between them in the second half, but the boys were jubilant at the final whistle, acting like they’d just won the Cup Final or something. The girls trooped silently off the pitch, and still no one spoke to Katie – it was as though she’d been a scapegoat for the whole disaster, even though her bad play in the first half couldn’t be blamed for everything. Megan came over and gave her an enquiring, worried look as Mrs Ross called them all together.
“Well, never mind, girls, it was only a friendly!” The coach was trying to sound cheerful. “You’ll get them next time, and it’s shown us what we need to work on, hasn’t it? OK, let’s go and get changed.”
As Megan and Katie walked over to the changing rooms, Megan was clearly worried, but at the same time she didn’t want to make Katie feel worse by asking her why she’d played so badly. Katie could see that her friend just didn’t know how to start.
“Sorry I was so useless,” she muttered.
“What was wrong?” asked Megan, gratefully seizing the opportunity. “I’m sorry, I know this sounds mean, but it was like your head wasn’t in the game at all.”
Katie shrugged. “You know what you said last week about Max’s dad and my mum looking friendly?”
“Yeah?” Megan looked enquiring.
“And I told you not to be so stupid?”
“Mmmmm…” Megan nodded.
Katie sighed a huge and miserable sigh. “I’m not sure you were being that stupid after all. They were standing together watching the game. Didn’t you see them? They looked like they were having the time of their lives. What if that’s why she came to the practice? To see him?”
“Wow.” Megan sounded gobsmacked. “You think that might really be it? What are you going to do?”
“What can I do?” Katie wailed.
“Well, you could ask her!” Megan pointed out, in a “stating the obvious” tone of voice.
“But I’m not sure if I want to know,” Katie said in a small voice.
“Hey Katie!” Running feet sounded behind them, and Robin caught the two girls up. Both Megan and Katie stiffened slightly, waiting for another mean comment about the boys’ victory, but Robin smiled at them. “That was bad luck, Katie. Never mind – it was just a practice match.”
Katie gave him a very small smile back. “Yeah, I know.”
“Um, well, OK! See you on Monday!” He dashed off to the boys’ changing rooms, leaving the two girls looking puzzled – but then they had more important things to worry about than the total weirdness of boys…
Chapter Six
After last Saturday’s practice session, Katie had wanted to talk to Bel and Becky about what she’d thought was just Megan’s crazy idea. Suddenly it didn’t seem so crazy any more, but now Katie wasn’t sure she wanted to talk to her sisters after all. Once Bel was doing her typical overreacting, and Becky was worrying the way she always did, the whole thing would be horribly real. If Katie kept the possibility to herself, she could pretend it wasn’t happening – if she tried really hard. But it was difficult not to blurt out her suspicions as soon as she got home – and that was after a practically silent drive home with Mum. Katie hadn’t known what to say, so she’d turned the radio on in the end. Luckily Mum seemed to assume she was just down because the practice hadn’t gone too well – she had gathered that much at least. Thankfully Mum had been on her own, waiting by the gate for Katie. It would have been awful to have to listen to her being nice to Max’s dad, especially if they expected her and Max to be nice to each other too.
Katie stomped up the stairs to the triplets’ bedroom, trying to banish the pictur
e of her mum smiling up at Max’s dad. Becky was sitting on the window seat next to her rats’ cage, playing with cinnamon-coloured Fang.
“Hi! How did practice go?”
“Terrible,” muttered Katie, gloomily.
Becky, who hadn’t really expected any answer but “Fine”, possibly followed by a very enthusiastic description to which she would listen with half an ear, looked up from blowing on Fang’s whiskers in surprise.
“Why? What went wrong?” She got up and came over to Katie, who was now lying flat on her back on her bed, staring miserably at the ceiling.
“It was a disaster – we had a practice match against the boys and we lost and I played really badly, OK?” Katie snapped out the end of the sentence. She knew none of this was remotely Becky’s fault, but she was feeling really upset and angry, and Becky was so terribly easy to be nasty to.
Becky retreated back to the window seat, wisely deciding that her sister didn’t want to talk. This left Katie feeling just as cross as before, except now she felt guilty about being horrible to Becky as well. Eventually she heaved herself up off the bed and went upstairs to the attic where they kept the computer. She flumped down on the computer chair, and turned it on, waiting as it chugged through its start-up routine. Eventually she managed to open up her email and it made a sound that was very slightly like applause. Katie clicked her tongue – Bel had been fiddling with the alert sounds again. The email was from Dad, as she’d been hoping – he generally emailed the triplets at the weekend, a separate message for each of them if he could manage it.
Hi Katie!
Hope everything’s going OK, sweetheart. How’s the football doing? Scored any more brilliant goals lately? You’ve got to email me some more pics of you playing – I want to be kept up to date with Manor Hill Junior Girls’ world-takeover bid! Things are going pretty well here, we’ve started building, finally. I’m going to be really sick of this bridge by the time it’s up. Still, it’ll feel good seeing people using it. I pulled a massive spider out of one of my boots this morning – Bel would have had a fit, especially when Becky wanted to adopt it as a pet. I’ve attached a picture of me with the foundations for the bridge – I’m the one with the big hat – it’s so hot out here. I’ve been checking the weather in Darefield on the BBC website –rain, huh? I know you’re probably hating it, but it makes me feel really homesick!
Mail me back soon, and tell your mum I said hello.
Loads of love,
Dad
Katie had felt cheered up when she saw the message from Dad, but actually it only made things worse. Katie had hated it so much when her parents split up, and now it seemed like Mum might be thinking about meeting someone new. What was she supposed to say to Dad? And how could she tell him that she’d just messed up really badly in practice when he was so proud of her? She shut down the computer and went to do some more practice against the garden wall.
She did a lot of practice that weekend. Mostly to avoid having to talk to Mum, Becky and Bel. Luckily they all seemed to think that she was going mad on ball-skills because of the disaster on Saturday. Becky and Bel seemed so romance-obsessed that right now Katie felt like she could tell them she was going on a trip to Mars and they’d just ask her to bring them back some chocolate if she went past the corner shop.
Bel had gone to the cinema in town with Josh on Saturday afternoon, and it had gone really well, apparently. He’d held her hand, and she’d spent the rest of the weekend telling every detail to anyone who’d listen – and even those who wouldn’t. By Sunday evening Katie was sick to death of Annabel’s blissed-out face.
“Did I tell you about the popcorn?” Annabel asked her urgently as Katie walked past her doing her homework (supposedly) in the middle of the stairs.
“No,” said Katie in the least encouraging way she could. It didn’t work.
“Josh bought some—”
“Wow.”
Annabel seemed not to have noticed Katie’s glower. “And then he did this thing where he chucked a bit of popcorn in the air and then caught it in his mouth. It was so funny!”
“Boring film, then…” Katie muttered sarcastically as she stepped over Annabel’s history books.
The really annoying thing was that Becky didn’t seem to mind Annabel’s constant Josh-talk – in fact, she seemed to be encouraging her! Katie knew she couldn’t stand Josh either, so why did she keep aahing at all Bel’s stories?
It felt strange to be keeping such a massive secret from Bel and Becky, though, even if they were driving her mad. By Monday morning she was desperate to talk it over with someone – she’d emailed Megan over the weekend, but it wasn’t really the same as talking it through, and she’d been worried about phoning as there was nowhere really private to do it.
When she got to school on Monday, Sarah, her team captain, was prowling round by the gates, obviously on the lookout for people. Becky nudged Annabel, and they closed in tight behind Katie – they didn’t want Sarah having a go at her. Becky had told Annabel about Katie’s horrible time at practice, although she’d had difficulty getting a word in edgeways.
Surprisingly, though, Sarah wasn’t in too bad a mood.
“Oh good! Look, Katie, we’ve got an extra practice on Tuesday at lunch – can you tell Megan?”
Katie nodded, feeling relieved. “Sure.”
The girls’ team had a league match on Wednesday, and Katie guessed that Mrs Ross didn’t want them to go into it feeling depressed after the bad session on Saturday. She told Sarah she’d be there, and went off to find Megan. The triplets could see a group of people round the big chestnut tree, so they headed over. Katie realized gloomily when they were closer that it wasn’t just Saima, Megan and Fran – in fact, Megan wasn’t even in yet. Saima and Fran were chatting to Josh and David, and Josh and David were studiously ignoring each other. Josh seemed to have decided that as Annabel’s pretty best friend, Saima was worthy of his attention, but he was behaving as though Fran and David weren’t there. Annabel didn’t seem to notice this. She tossed back her long hair, pushed one of her butterfly-shaped clips a shade further in, and sauntered over to meet Josh, casting a rather smug glance over her shoulder to see how many people had noticed that she and Josh were together. She was rather hoping that Amy would be around to see.
Yes! Amy was leaning against the fence with Cara a bit further along. Annabel tried not to look too triumphant, but it was hard to resist – she flashed her a quick glance, and was slightly disconcerted by the malevolent glare she got in return. Wow – Amy really was jealous! Annabel grinned to herself – it was so cool being the person that every girl in her year envied! She didn’t see Amy and Cara put their heads together and snigger, though…
“Hey, Annabel.” Josh smiled lazily, and laid an arm over her shoulders.
Katie shuddered. He was like something out of a bad film! She met David’s eyes and pulled a sick face at him, which made him snort with laughter that he had to hurriedly disguise as a cough. Luckily Annabel was far too interested in what Josh was saying to notice, although Josh did give Katie and David a sharp look. He was smart enough to know that Katie didn’t like him – he just wasn’t bothered.
David gave Katie a sympathetic look and went over to Becky, and they and Fran wandered off.
Josh smiled nastily at Katie. “So, I heard there’s an extra practice for your lot tomorrow then?”
Katie shrugged. “Yeah.”
Josh just smirked, like he knew something she didn’t. Then he turned his back on her and steered Annabel with him – Katie was abandoned again.
“Have you had any more of those notes?” Megan asked, as they sat eating their lunch in the dining hall. The others were all in the art room, so it was safe to discuss Katie’s secret admirer problem.
“No, thank goodness. Maybe whoever it was has forgotten about it,” said Katie hopefully. She knew it wasn’t likely, but
still… She had enough to worry about just now. She was really nervous about the lunchtime practice the next day, and it niggled at her all through school, and the next morning as well. OK, so Sarah didn’t seem to be holding a grudge, but most of the Year Eights in the team were complete fair-weather friends. They loved Katie when she was scoring the goals for them, but when she or Megan or Cara did anything wrong, they were “those dumb Year Sevens”. And Cara wasn’t exactly holding back either. She and Amy and Emily kept very obviously stifling sniggers every time they saw Katie, and darting nasty, significant little smiles at Annabel for some reason as well.
As it turned out, Katie did get a few dirty looks, but the girls had more to worry about than getting at her. Shortly after they got on to the pitch, they had visitors. The first Katie knew of it was the little frown that developed between Mrs Ross’s eyebrows as she was explaining the warm-up exercises she wanted them to do. The coach seemed to be staring at something over the girls’ shoulders. Katie cast a quick look back, and drew in a sharp breath.
Most of the boys’ squad (David and Robin were notable exceptions) were lined up along the side of the pitch, smiling – nastily. Like they were trying to give the girls a message. Josh, of course, was right in the middle, and Max was there too, grinning his face off at Katie. The thing was, it was difficult for Mrs Ross to send them away. Friends quite often came to watch practices – in fact, Amy and Emily were taking advantage of a rare spell of sunshine at the side of the pitch as well, in theory watching Cara, but more just gossiping.
It was very difficult to do exercises and work on tactics while fifteen boys were watching you like hyenas circling a wounded animal. Soon everyone was making stupid mistakes, and Mrs Ross looked like she was considering telling the boys to get lost – that would be really embarrassing!
“Look!” It was Megan, hissing over her shoulder as she dribbled a ball past Katie. “Over there!”
