Lightning Girl

by Alesha Dixon

  She got this weird misty look in her eyes as she remembered.

  “He was being chased around the park by a herd of angry alpacas which had escaped from London Zoo.”

  “WHAT?”

  “I know.” Her face broke into a grin. I felt a pang as I realized she hadn’t smiled that broadly in a long time. “He was just running around yelling as this entire herd of alpacas zoomed along after him. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “Why was he being chased by alpacas?”

  “They don’t like lilac. It’s a well-known fact in zoological circles. Alpacas absolutely cannot stand the colour lilac. And what was your father wearing that day as he took a stroll through the park? A pair of lilac shorts. The alpacas were furious.”

  “So they attacked him?”

  “They didn’t get that far. As soon as I saw the chaos, I followed the herd and your father to a quieter corner of the park and used my power of energy to slow down the alpacas and keep them under control until the zookeepers arrived to take them back.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “I broke the rules. Your father asked me how I managed to bring the alpacas under control and I was so enraptured by his honest eyes and those silly lilac shorts, I told him the truth.” She shrugged. “I told him I was a secret superhero. I just blurted it out, right there in Hyde Park, having kept this secret for years from everybody. My whole story just came tumbling out. And you know what he did?”

  “Freaked out?”

  “No, not at all. He didn’t freak out; he didn’t run away. He asked me if I’d like to go for waffles with golden syrup. So we did. And that was that.”

  She gave a sad smile.

  “Hang on,” I said. “Is that why in your wedding photos, Dad is wearing lilac shorts?”

  She burst out laughing. “Yes! And to get to the ceremony, I had a carriage drawn by alpacas. He changed into lilac shorts for the wedding reception once the alpacas had safely left the vicinity.”

  “That’s the true story, then? You didn’t actually meet through friends, like you told us. You, in fact, met Dad while saving him from an angry herd of alpacas.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, as we pulled into the drive. “Your father knew the truth about me from the moment we met and loved me anyway.”

  She turned off the ignition and I could have sworn that her eyes suddenly filled with tears, but she cleared her throat and turned to look at me brightly, all trace of sadness in her expression vanished.

  “Right, then, off you go. Great training session today and sorry again about the ice-block thing. I’ll remember to check my appearance before I turn up at your school in the future.”

  “Do you want to come in and say hi to Dad?” I asked, hopefully. “You didn’t get to talk much yesterday at the Parent-Teacher evening. Dad’s making jacket potatoes for supper, one of your favourites. He told me this morning.”

  She paused as though considering it, but then shook her head.

  “I had better not. I don’t want to disturb your dinner.”

  I said goodbye and climbed out of the car, waving her off sadly. I don’t know if it was the fact that I was super tired after my training session or whether the story about how she and Dad met had affected me somehow, but after Mum left that evening not even Dad pretending to waltz with Kimmy after dinner could cheer me up.

  Over the next few days, I tried to forget about what was going on between Mum and Dad by throwing myself into learning to control my superpowers. It was an excellent distraction and every day I got better and better at controlling the intensity of the light I created from my hands. I was constantly distracted at school because I couldn’t wait for lessons to finish, get to the warehouse and shoot light beams all over the place. Nothing compared to that amazing tingly feeling that hurtled through me like lightning when I commanded my superpowers. I could make my whole body glow and fill the warehouse with a blinding white light on command.

  It was amazing.

  But the thing was, no matter how good it felt to have superpowers, I still felt sad.

  Now that Mum had moved out, my training sessions were a nice opportunity to spend time with her, and I hated the afternoons when my phone would vibrate at school and it was Mum cancelling our training session because she had to “go stop a bad guy”. The house felt weird without Mum and, even though he tried to pretend that everything was normal, I kept catching Dad looking really down. Alexis was shutting himself away in his room more than ever. I tried asking him if he was OK but he told me he didn’t want to talk about it and then he’d turn up the volume on his headphones, signalling my cue to leave.

  “You OK about Mum and Dad, Clara?” I asked her, when we were playing with Kimmy in the garden one evening.

  “I’ve been reading a book about parental separation in an attempt to develop greater understanding and empathy,” she informed me, throwing the tennis ball across the grass and watching Kimmy race after it excitedly.

  I smiled to myself. “What does it say?”

  “That, as a family, we have to focus on self-awareness and be willing to challenge some of the ways in which we think about ourselves. We mustn’t feel as though our parents are competing for our favour. It’s all about good communication, understanding everyone’s changing needs and meeting those needs as far as possible so that we can find the benefits in the situation for each individual.”

  “Right. Wow. And what do you think?”

  Clara looked thoughtful as Kimmy dropped the ball back by her feet and wagged her tail eagerly. Clara picked up the ball and turned to face me, lifting her eyes to meet mine.

  “I think it sucks,” she sighed, throwing the ball high up into the air.

  “Me too.”

  “At least Mum takes you to ballet almost every evening,” she said. “I don’t get to see her nearly as often.”

  We didn’t say anything else about it but I hated knowing how sad Clara was. Aunt Lucinda wasn’t making things easy either, constantly butting in on every family event, just like the Parent-Teacher evening. I still hadn’t fully forgiven her for that and no amount of “but I was only looking out for you, darling” could make me forget the look on Suzie Bravo’s face when, just as we were leaving, Alfred had attempted to peck at Mr Mercury’s head.

  With my parents barely speaking, my aunt and her pet ostrich causing absolute chaos, and most of my spare time spent lighting up disused warehouses and car parks, I couldn’t wait for a day of normality at Kizzy’s birthday party. I was excited to have a chance to forget about everything else going on and just have fun with my best friend.

  But everything was about to get worse.

  10

  Kizzy could tell something was up.

  In the week leading up to her birthday party, she kept saying how I wasn’t spending any time with her after school any more and mentioned how distracted I was in lessons. My homework was way behind and I had been doing badly in tests. I kept having to come up with lame excuses as to why I couldn’t hang out with her whenever she suggested doing something nice together. She thought it was all connected with my parents’ separation, which I guess was partly right, so she didn’t have a go at me, even though I knew I kept letting her down. She just looked upset all the time.

  I wished I could tell Kizzy everything about my superpowers. I knew she’d never tell a soul if I asked her not to – she’s still never told anyone about that time she was sleeping over and I heard a weird noise, so I jumped out of bed and screamed, “WHAT DO YOU WANT, SCARY GHOST PERSON?!” and it turned out the noise was just her rolling over on the camp bed – but Mum had made me promise not to tell ANYONE about my superpowers. Not even my best friend.

  And Kizzy wasn’t the only one who picked up on something different about me. Ever since the Parent-Teacher evening, I’d noticed that I got a lot more stares at school and students whispered together when I passed them in the corridor. Mr Mercury was on my case way more than before too, no doubt because my aunt’s pet
ostrich had pecked at his head and my mum had shown up to a meeting with him sporting an ice block instead of hair.

  “Aurora Beam, if I catch you daydreaming one more time in my lesson, then I won’t hesitate to give you extra homework, is that clear?” he threatened when he worked out I hadn’t been listening to one word of his boring class. “Don’t think that because your dad is giving us a fascinating exclusive tour of the Natural History Museum soon that you are above the law. I won’t be showing favouritism.”

  “You’re going to end up with detention if you’re not careful,” Kizzy pointed out the day before her party, as we sat in the canteen eating lunch. I didn’t say anything, so she turned her attention to Suzie and Georgie who were sitting on the same table. Now that she couldn’t spend as much time with me, I’d noticed that she’d been getting closer to their group.

  “I’m excited about your birthday party tomorrow, Kizzy,” Georgie smiled, sweeping her thick, glossy jet-black hair over one shoulder. “Thanks for inviting us.”

  “Have you got a good sound system?” Suzie asked, taking out her phone. “I have some great playlists that are perfect for routines.”

  “Routines?” Kizzy shot me a worried glance.

  “Dance routines,” Suzie explained. “I have been working on a new one that I thought I could teach everyone.”

  “Uh … OK!”

  “Would you like me to bring my make-up suitcase? I could do everybody’s face glitter if you wanted,” Georgie suggested proudly.

  “You have a make-up suitcase?” I asked, impressed.

  “Duh, her mum gets sent it all for free from the BEST brands,” Suzie informed us. “Georgie is amazing at doing cool glitter patterns.”

  Georgie blushed at her friend’s compliment. I had never really heard Suzie say anything nice about anyone, but then I guess I’d never spent that much time with her before now. Maybe she wasn’t as horrible as I thought.

  “I just pretend to know what I’m doing,” Georgie laughed.

  “I would really love that,” Kizzy enthused. “I’m so excited that everybody’s coming over. My dad is baking three types of cake. He tends to get carried away.”

  “I’m going to wear my new jeans,” Suzie announced, standing up from the table to put her tray away. “Georgie personalized them for me. They look really good. Anyway, I’ve got to go and speak to Miss Nimble about my next gym competition. I’ll see you all later.”

  As she turned around to walk away, she suddenly let out such a piercing scream that Kizzy dropped her water glass and it spilt all over me and Georgie. I yelped and jumped up as the ice-cold water hit my lap, knocking into Mr Mercury who at that moment had been passing behind me with his tray of food. His plate of spaghetti and tomato sauce slid down the tray as I bumped forcefully into it, landing with a loud SPLAT against his white shirt.

  There was a collective gasp across the canteen.

  “Aurora. Beam,” Mr Mercury hissed through gritted teeth, his face turning as red as the sauce dripping down his shirt.

  “I’m s … so sorry,” I gulped, barely able to get the words out. “I … uh … I … ”

  “It was my fault!” Kizzy said quickly. “I spilt water on her when Suzie screamed and it made her jump.”

  “And the reason I screamed is all Fred’s fault!” Suzie snarled, as Fred Pepe sniggered next to her. “Look what he put on the floor right next to my shoe!”

  We all turned to look at Fred, who shrugged and proudly opened his hand to reveal a fake dollop of dog poo.

  “My bad,” he said. “I got a new prank kit and knew I could get Suzie with it. But, I must say, this all turned out better than I could have imagined.”

  Mr Mercury inhaled deeply with his eyes closed and I think I heard him counting to ten under his breath. When he opened his eyes, everybody in the room was watching him expectantly in utter silence.

  “You are on your final warning, Miss Beam,” he growled. “One more strike, and I’ll not only give you detention for this term, I’ll sign you up for the rest of your school career. Got it?”

  I nodded.

  “Good. For now, you can tell your parents they’ll be receiving my dry-cleaning bill.”

  When I told Dad about the spaghetti incident that evening, he found it hilarious, but I didn’t see what was so funny. After the mortifying experience of my aunt bringing along her deranged ostrich to a school event, I’d managed to draw even more attention to myself in front of the entire student population. And not in a good way.

  So, the next day, I was looking forward to getting to Kizzy’s party as soon as possible and prove to everyone in my class that I could function as a normal human being. Or at least pretend to.

  “Are you on your way?” Kizzy asked hurriedly, when I picked up the phone.

  “Almost,” I assured her, sliding her present into my backpack. I’d got her a pretty bracelet, to match mine. After the way I’d been lately, I wanted to make sure she felt very special.

  “I’m so nervous. What happens if no one turns up?”

  “That’s not going to happen. Suzie and Georgie said they were excited to come along, and if they’re going to be there, then everyone else will be there too. Everyone loves you. Trust me, it will be the best party ever.”

  “And … you’re definitely coming?”

  I paused midway through tying the laces of my Converse. “What do you mean?”

  “It’s just –” she hesitated “– it feels like you’ve been avoiding me recently.”

  “Kizzy, no, I—”

  “I know you’ve got a lot going on with your parents and everything but we never do things any more. We don’t hang out like we used to.”

  “That’s only because—”

  “And then I got you in even more trouble with Mr Mercury and he already doesn’t like you, so that doesn’t help things.”

  “I don’t—”

  “So if you don’t want to be best friends any more, then—”

  “KIZZY!” I cried, interrupting her. “You are my best friend in the whole world. Joint with Kimmy,” I added, making her giggle. “I’m sorry, it’s just… Well, I guess I’ve had a lot on. And I don’t care what grumpy Mr Mercury thinks of me.”

  “OK,” she said, sounding relieved. “And you promise you are coming to my birthday party? Because, remember, you promised you’d come to the cinema with me last week and I was waiting there on my own… ”

  “I’m so sorry about that, Kizzy,” I said in my most sincere voice. “Like I said, something came up… ”

  I hoped she wouldn’t push for what it actually was that had come up. I couldn’t exactly tell her the truth: that I’d planned to meet her at the cinema after my training but I was doing so well that Mum and I lost track of time, and when I looked at my watch, the movie had already finished. I still felt so bad whenever I pictured Kizzy standing on her own outside the cinema waiting for me to arrive.

  “I know,” she said. “But you promise nothing will come up today? You’ll be there?”

  “It’s my best friend’s birthday party. I’ll be there.”

  I hung up, feeling terrible. I had to make it up to Kizzy, and making sure she had the best birthday ever would be a good start. I did a last-minute check in the mirror and then excitedly skipped across my room to my door and swung it open.

  I screamed as, out of nowhere, a big orange beak came right at my face.

  “Alfred!” I huffed, as he lifted his head and banged it on the lampshade hanging from the ceiling. “You have GOT to learn about personal space. Why are you here?”

  “Oh, Aurora, thank goodness!”

  Aunt Lucinda was hurrying up the stairs towards me, out of breath.

  “We have to go,” she said, grabbing my shoulders. “Now! Are you ready?”

  “I don’t need a lift to Kizzy’s, she lives on this road,” I informed her, checking my watch.

  “What? What are you talking about?” She dropped her hands and looked at me strangely. />
  “Kizzy’s birthday party. What are you talking about?”

  “Oh, darling, you don’t have time for that.” She grabbed my hand and began to drag me down the stairs behind her. “We have an emergency.”

  “Aunt Lucinda,” I said firmly, shaking my hand away as we got to the bottom and narrowly avoiding Alfred landing on top of my head as he slid down the bannister on his big feathered behind. “I can’t have a day out with you today. It’s my best friend’s birthday party and I have to be there. I promised her.”

  “Aurora,” she gasped, putting a hand on her heart and shaking her head at me. “Didn’t you hear me? This is an emergency. It’s one of the reasons I came back here from Bali; that’s how important it is. I need you!”

  “No offence, Aunt Lucinda, but needing to get last-minute reservations to a posh restaurant is not an emergency.” I dodged past her to the front door. “I gotta go.”

  “Aurora, if I could, I would ask your mum to help but she’s busy sorting out another national crisis. This really is a world emergency and I can’t do it alone, not with only my superpowers. I really need your help,” she pleaded. “I’m afraid, whether we want it or not, we were given these superpowers for a reason.”

  There was something about her voice that made me stop in my tracks. I felt like she really needed me and I was being unreasonable. I knew she was talking sense and that I couldn’t just ignore her.

  She lifted her car keys and jangled them.

  “We can go handle this and then I can drive you straight round to Kizzy’s house for her birthday party.”