Brave New Girl

by Catherine Johnson

  I heard Sasha take her headphones off, and the buzz and squeak of R’n’B coming out of the tiny speakers for a few seconds before she turned her music off. Her bedside light clicked off, and the room was lit orange from the street-light outside.

  I changed and slid into bed. It was quiet. Outside somewhere, a helicopter chopped through the sky, and a police siren whizzed along the main road.

  “Seren?” Sasha was saying my name.

  I thought I’d imagined it for a minute. Then she said it again and I turned over.

  “Seren, I’m really sorry.”

  I put my hand out of the bed and she caught it in hers and squeezed. I felt her fingers, her funny double-jointed thumb, the ring she’d got from her nan. There was a lovely warm feeling bubbling up inside me.

  “Is this... did Mum put you up to this?” I said. Although, I thought, I wouldn’t have cared if she had.

  “No!” she said, and I could tell from her voice that it was true. “Look, this isn’t about Mum.” Sasha paused. “Seren, I’m sorry. I can see it now, all that stuff in the supermarket, I know it was daft. But I know you were trying to help. I mean, Jamie talked to me, Jamie Kendrick. You’ve got him to thank, really.”

  “I have?”

  “Yeah, Jamie.” I looked across at her, and even though it was dark I could see her face so happy when she said his name. “He made me see you were sticking up for me. He said he’d have done the same thing if I was his sister.”

  “He did?” I said and squeezed her hand back.

  “Well, maybe not tried to set her up with Luke Beckford,” she said.

  “No.” I said in a quiet voice. “But I was only trying to help....”

  “I know,” she said. “I shouldn’t have listened to Fay. Christina’s not a big fan of yours. I’m sorry. It was when I put that picture up on the net and I read those things they said. I knew it had all gone too far. I mean, it’s one thing me slagging you off, but seeing all those other people going at you... urgh... you didn’t deserve that.”

  “You did it?” I said.

  “Sorry. Jamie said I should apologise. He said I was lucky to have a sister who’d fight for me. I’m sorry I was mad about the job too. Your dad called, he explained it.” Another pause. “I’m sorry. I am the biggest idiot.”

  “Second biggest,” I said. I smiled. We were still holding hands. It felt so good.

  “So,” I said. “You and Jamie then? Not Luke?”

  “Luke! He thinks he’s so it! I am definitely over him. Totally. He’s only started going with Keisha Coates again. And Jamie is way cuter than Luke, believe! And about a million times sweeter....”

  I wondered whether I should tell her I saw them that afternoon… it seemed like weeks, or even months ago.

  “So, you do forgive me, Seren, don’t you?”

  I tried to stay cool. “Only if you pick the boys up from school sometimes. Oh, and do the teas and help more with the shopping.”

  “I’ve got exams!”

  “You’ll manage!” I said. “I had a talk with Mum. Some of us need to help out a bit more.”

  “Is that what happened on the bus tonight?”

  “How do you know?”

  “Carol from the buses called and was asking about it. She said Mum was for it.... She hasn’t got the sack, has she?”

  I told her the whole story. I told her about the film too.

  “Yeah, Fay was telling me her sister should have been in it.”

  “Yeah, well if Keith had any sense he should have stayed well away from me.”

  “No!” Sasha said, “You’re a million times better at acting than Christina. She looks like one of those dummies in a shop window. I mean have you seen what she does with her hands?”

  “You noticed too?”

  “Can’t help it,” Sasha said. “Anyway, of course Keith would want you in it, even without the acting, I mean, Keith’s practically family.”

  “Not any more. I ruined it. Not ruined it, lost it. All his work down the drain.”

  “What did you do?”

  It came out then that I’d seen her and Jamie, and that I’d been so scared of Sasha seeing me that I’d run.

  “So it was my fault, sort of,” Sasha said. “Can’t he do it again?”

  “He wanted to get it into this competition. I don’t know if there’s time... Sasha, it was my fault, and he hates me.”

  “I hated you!” Sasha said. “And I don’t now.”

  “That’s different,” I said.

  It was quiet. The alrm clock ticked. We lay there in the dark holding hands across the gap in the beds.

  “I need to make it up to him,” I said.

  “So why don’t you film the stuff you lost?”

  “You don’t understand, Sasha. Keith’s got the school camera, and he’s got the ‘eye’. That’s what Miss Tunks said.”

  “OK,” said Sasha. “I’ve got a camera on my phone... and between us we’ve got plenty of eyes! We should do it, Seren. This weekend. Tomorrow! Jamie can help, he did a video for media studies.”

  “I don’t know...” I said. “A phone? The quality would be rubbish, wouldn’t it? Keith would laugh at us.”

  “Not if we did a really brilliant job,” Sasha said. “I’ll text Jamie now.” She pulled her phone from under her pillow. “We’ll have it sorted by Saturday afternoon.”

  12

  ARTHUR’S WINGS

  On Saturday morning the sun was out and everything was looking up. Sasha was speaking to me and the boys were almost behaving. I was still trying to forget that Keith hadn’t returned my calls or texts. But apart from that, it was as perfect as it gets, which is always a sign that it won’t last long.

  It didn’t.

  The phone went and I pounced on it, hoping for Keith, but getting instead Straggly-beard Man, who leads Denny’s choir, calling to remind him about a big all-day rehearsal in the Olympic stadium itself. Denny pointed out it was on the calendar, and Arthur started up saying he wanted to go to the Olympic stadium over and over again.

  “You’ll have to take me, Seren,” Denny said.

  “Why me? I can’t, Sasha and me, we’ve got stuff to do.”

  “I want to go to the st-a-d-i-um,” sang Arthur.

  Mum came downstairs in her dressing-gown and, amazingly, took control. I thought I must have woken up in a parallel universe. She told Denny she’d already done a packed lunch and that they’d be leaving in an hour.

  “And me, and me!” Arthur was jumping up and down. I knew it wouldn’t work. I imagined Arthur running wild around the Olympic site, causing Gold Medal chaos. I could see Mum was thinking this too.

  “You girls can look after Arthur,” Mum said.

  “But we’re filming!” I said.

  “I don’t wanna go with girls!” Arthur said.

  Mum made a ‘please’ look at me and Sasha. “We’ll do a proper old-fashioned Sunday dinner tomorrow, all of us.”

  I gave Mum a look that said Yorkshire pudding hadn’t done it for me since I was seven.

  Arthur was jumping up and down, singing, “Gravy! Gravy!”

  “But you have to go with the girls, love, just for today.” Mum knelt down and held Arthur by the shoulders and looked into his eyes. “Art,” she said. “I’m sorry, you can’t come with me and Den. There’s only a pass for one to go in with Den, that’s it. Arthur, you have to be really good and really grown-up for me.” She looked across at me and Sasha. “You too.”

  I knew she was right. But I knew it was going to make things a lot harder.

  We swung by Jamie’s and picked him up, and me and Arthur walked behind Sasha and Jamie.

  Arthur said, “Is it allowed for someone that tall to go out with Sasha?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Then it’s OK for Keith to go out with you even though he’s smaller than you?”

  “Arthur, you know Keith’s like my extra brother,” I said.

  “He is fun though, more fun than Denny.”


  I had tried to call Keith loads, but it was ten now and I knew he’d be off at Chinese Saturday School, and then Youth Orchestra. Keith would be cool, wouldn’t he? I took a deep breath, I really wasn’t sure.

  We got to the café, and compared to the weekday it was crowded. It still wasn’t full, but half the tables had people having their morning coffee. Worst of all, Nene was hovering by the entrance to the kitchen. I swear her face sort of curled up when she saw us.

  “Hello, Nene,” I said, nice and polite, remembering that very soon, in a month or two, I would never have to see the woman again in my whole entire life. “Is Dad around?”

  Nene shouted in Turkish into the kitchen and Dad appeared, flustered but less worried.

  “Seren, Babes! Sash and... Denny?”

  “No! I’m Arthur!”

  “But you’ve grown so big,” Dad said with a smile. “I thought you must be Denny!”

  Arthur glowed with joy.

  “Sasha! I’m sorry. You see how we suffer without you? If I could afford it I’d have you back like that.” He snapped his fingers.

  Nene rolled her eyes and crossed her arms more firmly. She muttered in Turkish and although I had no idea what she was saying I could tell she wasn’t dishing out the compliments.

  “And who is this young man?” Dad said.

  Jamie Kendrick put his hand out to shake Dad’s.

  “Jamie Kendrick, Mr Ali.”

  “Sasha’s friend,” I said.

  “Sasha’s boyfriend!” Arthur said.

  We explained about the filming, and Dad was cool, but there was no way we’d get the same effect with the low light and the camera on the phone which, however much Sasha and Jamie tried to big it up, was not a patch on the school one.

  Arthur didn’t help. “I’m bored,” he said. “I’m going outside with Mehmet.”

  Jamie and Sasha filmed me in tight close-up so we didn’t get any of Nene moaning on in the background, or the other diners. I tried to look lost and, what was the other word? Disorientated. But then Arthur was leaning against the plate-glass window making faces and squashing his nose flat, and it was so disgusting I just burst out laughing.

  Then Nene started getting really angry, yelling at Arthur through the glass and then at me, looking me up and down as though I was skankier than dog poo.

  “S’all right,” I said to her coolly, “I’ll have a word.”

  Nene had a look on her face like she’d swallowed something gross, but I ignored her and went outside and talked to Arthur. I looked back into the café. Jamie was filming us. I waved and Arthur waved too.

  “Look, just be good,” I said to him. “Be good for five minutes, then I’ll get my dad to bring you an ice cream, OK?”

  “OK.” Arthur nodded. “But she scares me.” He pointed inside to Nene.

  “Yeah,” I said, “you and me both.”

  Jamie showed me the film of Arthur, and somehow, through the plate-glass with the light behind him, Arthur looked completely angelic, like a curly-haired spirit, or a sprite.

  “Oh My God!” I said. “Ariel!”

  “What?” Jamie and Sasha said together.

  “Wait here. Dad, can you get these two a coffee, and an ice cream for Art? I just got to do something.”

  I ran down the street to the party shop on the corner of Dalston Lane and bought the boysiest pair of fairy wings they had. They were white and silver, and I wondered how I was going to make Arthur wear them, given that he would have finished the ice cream by the time I got back to the café.

  “Arthur,” I said, out of breath. “Put these on.”

  He gave me a look.

  “Wear these, and I’ll make Keith put you in the film,” I said. I had my fingers crossed behind my back. Keith might not even talk to me again.

  Arthur put his head on one side. “Will it be like Kutest Kiddie?”

  “No, nothing like that,” I said. “A million times better than that. And if Keith wins you might get to be on the big screen at the Rio. Ten foot tall!”

  This was true. But it did rather depend on Keith talking to me again, and then liking what we were doing, and finally, winning.

  “Like Godzilla!” Arthur said and put on the wings there and then.

  I made him stand outside and put his hands flat on the glass and look in. He looked like a child ghost, fuzzy and unreal.

  Keith would love it.

  Jamie let me film it while he and Sasha had another coffee, and gazed into each other’s eyes. I wished Keith was here to see this. I would have phoned him if he hadn’t been sitting in a hall in Soho talking Chinese.

  Nene was humphing at me all the time, and I was glad we were nearly done.

  “Thanks, Dad.” I hugged him just before we left.

  “No problem, Babes.” He ruffled my hair. “Come back soon. You too, Sasha.”

  “Goodbye, Mo,” Sasha said to my dad. Then she turned to Nene, hands on hips. “You know, you think we don’t get what you’re saying all the time? Well, we may not get the words, Mrs Ali, but your tone is crystal clear. And you know what? Now I’m not working here, I can safely say you are the rudest old lady I have ever met! You don’t deserve a granddaughter like my sister, Mrs Ali.” Sasha took Jamie’s arm and walked out.

  My mouth must have been flapping open, I was so stunned. I’d so always wanted to say that.

  Nene erupted in a volcano of what I bet was classic Turkish swearing.

  “Ohmigod! Sasha!” I put my hand over my mouth to hide my smile, and ran out after them. “She always thought we were the family from hell. Now I bet she’s sure of it.”

  “That woman!” Sasha said. “She slags you off something rotten when you’re not around, and I bet she was doing it just now, in Turkish. All those sly little looks. You deserve better. I’m not having someone bad-mouth my sister, even if I can’t understand what she’s saying.”

  I hugged Sasha hard. It felt so good to have a sister again.

  We got to the estate and filmed a bit more, with me and with Arthur as Ariel, leading me through the concrete and out to the canal. As we walked along the towpath, we could see the stadium, and Jamie said how he and his football team were doing a display in there, and how much he was looking forward to it.

  “Have you been inside yet?” I said.

  “Nah... it’s not been open to the public,” he said.

  “Denny’s in there today,” Arthur said. “He’s in there with Mum.”

  “Do you think we could get in?” I said. “If we could film me in the dress, and Arthur in his wings inside the site, Keith would be so impressed....”

  “Would he like that?” Arthur said.

  “Yeah, I think he would.”

  “Well, come on.” Arthur pulled on my arm. “Let’s have a look then.”

  The main entrance was so wide you could have driven two lorries through it sideways. The ‘Avenue of Champions’, Jamie said the school coach had called it, planted with spindly, brand-new trees. But there was a gate, or not so much a gate but one of those poles that comes down, and a guard in a box.

  It was obvious he wasn’t going to let anyone through.

  Sasha did her best. “It’s my brother, he’s singing in the rehearsal.” She looked at her watch. “We were supposed to meet him inside.” She had her worried face on.

  The guard wasn’t having it. “Sorry, love. Passes only.”

  Sasha stuck her bottom lip out so far you could have used it as a bookshelf for really heavy books. “Please?”

  The guard turned away and went back inside his box. Sasha shrugged.

  Arthur was hanging on the pole, still wearing his wings.

  “Film that, Jamie,” I said.

  The guard noticed his pole wobbling, and then noticed Jamie filming, and was suddenly out again. “No filming on site.”

  “It’s only a phone.”

  “And you!” He was shouting at Arthur. “Stop that, now!”

  The guard started walking towards Arthur
, and Arthur jumped down off the pole and ran. Straight down the Avenue of Champions towards the stadium.

  “Arthur!” I said.

  “Go after him!” Jamie whispered. “Go on!”

  The guard was talking into his radio and Arthur was disappearing away down the main road. I ducked under the pole and legged it after him, and caught hold of him just in time.

  “Arthur! What are you doing? They could have tazers or anything!”

  I could see a sort of golf buggy thing with guards heading towards us so I pulled Arthur along and ran back towards the entrance and under the pole. Then Jamie scooped Arthur up and we didn’t stop running until we’d made it over the little bridge across the canal and back into the estate.

  Mum and Denny were already back, sitting in the front room eating pizza in front of the telly.

  “There’s some for you in the oven,” Mum said. “Denny was fab, weren’t you, love? And the stadium! You should’ve been there! Anyway,” she went on, wiping her fingers on a bit of kitchen roll. “What have you lot been up to? You look like you’ve escaped from the circus!”

  All four of us were red in the face from running and laughing, I was wearing the grey spangly dress over my school trousers, and Arthur had on a pair of white and silver wings.

  I turned my phone back on after we’d eaten the pizza. I’d had it turned off most of the day because of the filming. There were about a million messages and texts, all from Keith. I read the first one. SRY, it said. The second one said, REALLY SRY. The third one, FOUND MMRY STK SRY AGN.

  The tenth one said, TALK TO ME PLS!!!!!

  I was so happy I almost pressed redial right away. But then I had a much better idea.

  I downloaded what we’d filmed on Jamie’s phone, and sent it to Keith on the computer, and then went straight round.

  He was sitting on the wall outside his shop, waiting.

  “Did you see it?” I said. “Have you seen it?”

  “The memory stick? I’m really sorry. It was in the bag all the time. I am an idiot.”

  “Yes,” I said. “So is the film all there? Everything, the stuff in the Cave?”

  Keith nodded. He put out his hand for me to shake, but I bent down and hugged him until he almost choked.