Girls, Muddy, Moody Yet Magnificent

by Sue Limb

  ‘I’m not taking an attitude!’ I shouted. ‘My sister’s just been taken to hospital!’

  ‘Please keep your voice down,’ he murmured menacingly. ‘You’re disturbing the other guests. I can’t have this. I’m going to have to ask you to leave in the morning. I want you out by ten. I’m not having under-eighteens in here unsupervised. It always leads to trouble.’

  And he turned on his heel and marched off, muttering, ‘Blasted kids’, before I could tell him it would be a pleasure to vacate this hellhole and I hoped his next guests would poo on the ceiling. I decided not to text Mum and Dad about us being chucked out of the B&B. They had enough to worry about already.

  I didn’t sleep very well, with tortured dreams about Beast and Tam. Chloe was snoring and slurping in her sleep and muttering things. I kept jolting awake. Then, around 3 a.m., I’d just fallen into another of my light, tormented dozes when my phone buzzed. It was a text from somebody called Harry Hawkins. Who the …? I frowned for a moment, but then realised it was, of course, Beast.

  HEY ZOE. TAM’S OK – THOUGH MINUS HER APPENDIX. SLEEP WELL.

  I heaved a huge sigh of relief. It seemed poor old Tam was going to live. I was so relieved, I had a little cry.

  At the crack of dawn (or eight thirty to be honest) I was awoken again by my phone buzzing. I grabbed it.

  ‘Zoe!’ It was Mum. ‘We’re at the hospital! Tam’s fine! She’s had her appendix out and she’s a bit groggy but she’s on the road to recovery.’

  ‘I know, yeah, thank goodness,’ I said. ‘Beast sent me a text.’

  ‘The surgeon says it was just in time,’ said Mum. ‘If it had been left any longer it could have been critical.’

  ‘God!’ I gasped. ‘Horrible!’

  ‘We’re going to have some breakfast,’ said Mum, ‘and then we’ll come round to your B&B. I don’t suppose they’ve got a spare room available, have they? Dad and I are going to need somewhere.’

  I informed Mum that the only room likely to be available was ours, as we were being thrown out and had to vacate by ten o’clock. I also confided a few choice details about the accommodation, which made her realise that she would rather sleep in a ditch than between Lord Haddock’s grim, grey, horror-film sheets.

  ‘How ghastly!’ said Mum. ‘Don’t worry. We’ll find somewhere nice. You can move in with us.’

  ‘And Chloe,’ I reminded her.

  ‘And Chloe, of course,’ confirmed Mum, giving a martyred sigh. She has this act which suggests that Chloe’s mum is totally irresponsible, and if Chloe ever manages to grow up into a civilised adult, it will be my mum’s proud achievement, not Chloe’s mum’s. ‘We’ll find somewhere,’ she said in steely mode. ‘But it might be out of town.’

  I felt so tired, I wouldn’t have cared if the accommodation was in Argentina. Mum rang off, hell-bent on locating croissants and a B&B with sanded wood floors, chic china washbasins and thick, heavy cotton sheets that smelt of lavender.

  At this moment Chloe woke up. ‘Zoe!’ she croaked. ‘Did Tam get taken off in an ambulance last night, or did I dream it?’ Before I could fill her in on the ghastly details of the last few hours, my moby buzzed again. It was a text from Tobe.

  SPENT LAST NIGHT ON THE STATION PLATFORM, it said. AVOIDING WEREWOLVES. DITCHED BY GIRLS WHEN THEY MET HANDSOMER AND RICHER GUYS. MET OLIVER WYATT IN TOWN WITH TERRIBLE GIRL CALLED MORGAN. WHAT’S THE NEWS FROM ZOELAND?

  OH NOTHING MUCH, I replied. TAM IN HOSPITAL, AND WE’VE BEEN CHUCKED OUT OF OUR B&B. BEAT THAT! Though shattered to find that Oliver had indeed brought a female companion, I was intrigued to hear that she was ‘terrible’, and I was kind of looking forward to inspecting her as soon as possible.

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  .

  36

  ‘I hate all men,’ announced Chloe as we packed our bags. ‘I knew Lord Haddock would turn out to be a total pig, just like Brendan and those horrible guys I got trapped with last night.’

  ‘What was the fight about?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, nothing,’ sighed Chloe. ‘You know. Caveman stuff. All that testosterone.’

  ‘Beast did rescue us last night, though,’ I said. ‘It was great having a kind of army of guys on our side. And he was really, really sensible and focused. He was the only person who realised how ill Tam was. And he organised getting her to hospital and everything.’ Chloe stopped packing for a minute and frowned.

  ‘Was I asleep?’ she asked. ‘Did he see me asleep? Did I have my mouth open?’

  ‘No, no,’ I assured her. ‘We were totally concentrating on Tam, and you were right under the bedclothes, anyway, and …’

  ‘Not that I care,’ Chloe went on. ‘I’m not going to waste any time on men any more, and anyway, Beast is history.’ I couldn’t think of anything to say. ‘I’m going to give myself a makeover,’ said Chloe. ‘I’m going to become the Iron Maiden. I might even get a tattoo.’

  If Chloe was going to redesign herself, I might just have to join in. I felt deeply dissatisfied with myself. I was so unfit, for a start. I began to plan a programme of running. I wondered how long it would take me to look good in Lycra shorts. Right now, I would look like an airbag.

  We left the B&B in a taxi, and went to the hospital with all our luggage. There was nowhere else to go: we were homeless. We arrived at the hospital and found our way to Tam’s bedside, where Dad was sitting doing a crossword in a relaxed way.

  I peeped at Tam. She seemed to be dozing. Her face was pale and there were several horrid tubes coming out from under the bedclothes. Dad gave me a big hug, and then hugged Chloe as well, just to be polite.

  ‘Mum’s gone off to look for a place to stay,’ he whispered. ‘Tam’s asleep most of the time. She’s going to be fine.’

  ‘What are those tubes?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, just one to take the blood away, and one to take the pee away, and a drip line into the back of her hand to give her bacon and eggs straight into the vein – that sort of thing,’ mused Dad. ‘I expect there’s one supplying Calvin Klein as well.’

  I was so glad it was Dad on guard at Tam’s bedside. His jokes made everything just slightly less tragic and gross. Mum’s so tense, she would have increased the stress levels by cleaning the floor with wet tissues, or something.

  I stared at Tam. Her beautiful face was so white and there were shadows under her eyes. Her lips were a bit cracked and dry. There was a bruise on her hand where the drip went in. You could tell she’d been through something really awful. As I looked at her my heart kind of squeezed with anguish for a split second. My lovely sister was so fragile.

  I didn’t care any more that she was so much more beautiful than me. I didn’t care that she could be irritating, that she manipulated Mum, that she behaved irresponsibly, that she was hopeless with money and reckless in love. I just wanted her to get better and never be ill again for the rest of her life. I’d happily take on her share of illnesses in future, and I made a mental note to God to arrange this, if possible.

  ‘So what are your plans for the holiday, Chloe?’ asked Dad, putting his crossword away politely even though I knew he would much rather finish it.

  ‘I’ve got plenty of plans,’ said Chloe firmly. ‘But they most definitely do not include meeting boys.’

  ‘Oh, right,’ said Dad. ‘Reassuring, I suppose. So what are these plans, then?’

  ‘Well, for a start, I’m going to the girls-only surf school,’ said Chloe. I was startled. I didn’t know anything about this. Presumably it was something Chloe had heard about last night, behind the silver door, before the fight had broken out. I would have to make it crystal clear that when it came to big waves, I’d be watching from the beach. ‘I’m going to look into fitness and yoga too,’ she went on. ‘I’d like to do yoga on the beach; I think that’d be really cool. Plus I’m thinking about getting a tattoo.’

  Dad blinked slightly and raised his eyebrows a tad, but he didn’t comment. He was being tactful for once.

  ‘Only a henn
a tattoo,’ I added. ‘It’ll fade away in a few weeks.’

  ‘No, Zoe! A proper tattoo!’ said Chloe fiercely. I shrugged. Chloe’s mum has a tattoo, actually. She’s got the god Mercury on her left shoulder.

  ‘And what are your plans, old boy?’ asked Dad. I scratched my head.

  ‘I want to meet this girl called Morgan,’ I said. ‘Oliver Wyatt – he’s a guy from school and he was working on the farm with us – he’s got a girlfriend and apparently she’s awful.’

  ‘One can see how that might be an enjoyable project,’ said Dad. ‘But I’m not sure it’s realistic to build an entire holiday around it.’

  Poor Dad! How little he knew!

  After a while Mum reappeared, looking very tired but wearing plenty of lipstick as usual. She wears a special purplish-pink one in emergencies. She made such a fuss of me and Chloe that Tam woke up. Then Mum made a fuss of Tam, which seemed to set back Tam’s recovery for about a fortnight.

  Eventually a nurse tactfully suggested that we should push off and take our suffocating love elsewhere.

  ‘I’ve found a flat,’ said Mum as we crossed the hospital car park. ‘There was a last-minute cancellation, apparently. We’ve been very lucky.’

  She drove us across town, down through some snaky lanes and up another hillside, then out on to a cliff top with amazing views. She parked and we all got out.

  ‘Come on!’ said Mum with a grin, waving the keys. ‘It may be a bit extravagant, but I think we all need a little treat.’

  There was an apartment building on the right, glistening white in the sun, with stylish blue window frames and shutters, a bit like a house in Greece or something. And there was a sign: BLUE OCEAN FLATS.

  My heart missed a beat. These were the flats where Tam had been going to take us with her married man! I tried to catch Chloe’s eye, but she was staring at the amazing views and didn’t seem to have noticed.

  Mum led us friskily to the main door and on through into apartment No. 2. We entered and gasped. It was exactly the same one we would have stayed in! It was all there – the amazing cantilevered balcony, all metal and glass, with the stupendous view of the vast beach, where tiny people were running about like ants hundreds of feet below.

  ‘Nice kitchen,’ said Mum approvingly, stroking the granite worktops. She adores granite – sometimes I think she wishes Dad was made out of it. Dad had plonked himself down on the sofa. Thank God they didn’t seem to recognise the apartment as the one we’d originally been planning to stay in – after all, they’d only seen the briefest glimpse of the website, weeks ago.

  ‘Oh my God!’ gasped Chloe suddenly, ‘this is the apartment we were going to stay in with Tam, with Ed, before it all went wrong …’

  Trust Chloe! I tried to shush her, but it was too late. In a split second Chloe realised she shouldn’t have opened her big mouth, and clapped her hand across it, looking guilty. Mum looked up sharply. Even Dad seemed mildly interested.

  ‘Who’s this Ed?’ pounced Mum. ‘And how did it all go wrong? And how in the world were you ever going to afford this place? I can hardly afford it myself!’

  .

  .

  37

  ‘Oh, he was just some guy Tam was mixed up with,’ I said, trying to make it all sound terribly unimportant. ‘It’s over now. He dumped her.’

  ‘Who was he?’ Mum looked shocked. How could any man on earth dump her baby, especially a man who could afford a week in this palace?

  ‘Oh, some guy …’ I shrugged and strolled towards the balcony as fast as my little legs would carry me. ‘A businessman.’

  ‘How old was he?’ demanded Mum. I shrugged again. Any minute now I would sprain my shrugging muscles. ‘And why did Chloe look so guilty for even mentioning him?’ She turned on Chloe, who literally cringed. She was still covering her mouth with her hand, like somebody in a comic.

  My mind raced. I could so not tell Mum Ed was a married man. She would never give Tam any peace. I had to think of something.

  ‘Tam didn’t want you to know about him,’ I said, trying to sound casual. What could I say? There had to be something about Ed which Mum would despise. Despising is her favourite emotion. Hundreds of images flickered through my mind: glimpses of men, or types of men, my mum has despised over the years. It was quite an archive.

  The Prime Minister, paedophiles, arms dealers, mass murderers, scroungers and spongers, people who eat imported strawberries in January, show-offs who drive Porsches too fast through suburbs … men with pony tails …

  ‘It was just that Ed was a mass murderer, Mum. I mean, he was a lovely guy and everything, but there were five bodies under his patio.’ … ‘Well, it wouldn’t have mattered, as long as Tam was happy.’ … ‘But Mum, he eats strawberries in January!’ … ‘The irresponsible idiot! How could she ever get involved with anyone like that? I’m going to lock her in a tower till she’s thirty!’

  ‘He was …’ It had to be dull, too. I didn’t want Mum looking him up on the Internet. He couldn’t be an artist who made sculptures out of elephant dung. (Though I hear they’re becoming very commercial.) Suddenly I thought of it: ‘He smokes!’

  Mum’s eyes narrowed in hatred.

  ‘And drinks! – Like, for England!’

  ‘I wonder what on earth she ever saw in him, then,’ snapped Mum, losing interest nicely and sliding into comfy contempt (one of her other fave emotions). ‘How did he make his money?’ she demanded, hands on hips, her eyes swivelling all around our luxury apartment. ‘If he was going to pay for all this?’

  I shrugged again.

  ‘The Internet,’ I said. Thank God for the web! However did the cavemen manage, back in the 1950s?

  ‘Oh, look! There’s a pair of binoculars,’ said Dad, suddenly leaping up and heading for a shelf. Dear old Dad. Trust him to change the subject from things uncomfortably near home to things far away – so far away, you need binoculars.

  We all went out on to the balcony and scanned the beach in turn. I was hoping for a glimpse of Oliver on the arm of a fat tyrant but I couldn’t see anybody who even looked like anybody I knew.

  My phone bleeped. It was a message from Beast. WHERE ARE YOU? I WENT BACK TO B&B AND SATAN SAID YOU’D LEFT. My heart started to race. A wave of totally new, thrilling excitement swept through me. He had called at the B&B, hoping to see us! How soon could I get him here? I knew Mum and Dad would want to thank him for helping last night, so I had the perfect excuse to invite him.

  Hastily, with trembling fingers, I composed a reply. MY PARENTS HAVE RENTED AMAZING APARTMENT No. 2 BLUE OCEAN FLATS. GREAT VIEW. JUST PAST THE BIG GREEN CINEMA. COME UP AND SEE US! (NOW IF POSS?)

  An answer whizzed back right away. GOT A BEACH RUGBY MATCH THIS MORNING — MAYBE CATCH YOU LATER. I felt my stomach sink with disappointment. This was so, so weird. Just yesterday I was hoping to avoid bumping into Beast, now I’d kill to get a glimpse of him across a crowded room.

  When I told Chloe there was a beach rugby match scheduled, her eyes lit up. ‘Let’s go!’ She grinned. ‘I love to watch guys beating one another into a pulp!’

  I was relieved that she wanted to go down and watch the match. It was good to see her cheerful and full of beans again after so much heartbroken sulking. But I was going to have to keep quiet about my feelings for Beast, for a while at least – until I’d got used to them, if nothing else.

  We checked our make-up, fired off a text to Toby and Fergus to meet us on the beach, and headed out. The parents stayed behind, planning to doze and chill out after their long drive through the night.

  The beach was awesome: a huge bowl of brilliant light, towering cliffs on all sides, and surfers riding the waves and toppling in with graceful crashes. It wasn’t the rocky little beach by the harbour where I had met Beast on the previous day. It was a vast airy space of thundering waves and rainbow spray and ripping wind which thrashed against our bodies, making us scream in delight. Toby and Fergus appeared in the distance – a dot and a little dot.
Toby rang me on my moby. ‘I’m on the beach!’ he yelled.

  ‘I can see you, you moron!’ I yelled back. We met with much hugging and I was glad to find the boys no longer smelt of urine. One’s always grateful for those little courtesies.

  ‘Ferg and I are going to learn to surf, but not till tomorrow!’ shouted Tobe, as the wind ruffled all the little golden tips of his sticking-up hair. ‘First I have to learn to embroider cushions and make strawberry jam!’

  ‘WeJustSawBeastAndHisTeam,’ said Ferg. ‘The Antelopes!’

  ‘The game starts in five!’ said Toby. ‘Come on, let’s get back there!’

  My heart started racing in a mad, giddy way. In just a couple of minutes I was going to see Beast again. I tried to control my emotions, but it was impossible. I had fallen for him with a truly deafening crash, but it was all so painful: I knew that I was the one girl on earth he would never, ever ask out. If only I could go back in time, I would act so very differently. But what could I do? Short of starting all over again, what hope was there? We set out, walking into the wild wind, towards the crowds of guys about three hundred metres away. I couldn’t see which was Beast, but I knew he was there. I had to find a way of starting over again. There had to be a way.

  ‘Hey, Zoe!’ I turned, and with a strange, jarring jolt I saw Oliver, with a girl wrapped round him, her dark hair streaming in the wind. ‘Morgan,’ said Oliver. ‘This is Zoe and Chloe and Toby and Fergus. Guys, this is Morgan.’

  Morgan wasn’t exactly the girlfriend I would have selected for Oliver. I would have chosen a lardass or Miss Potato Head or somebody with an extensive handlebar moustache. Morgan was petite and her dark shiny hair was snaking about in the wind, and her eyes were huge and melting like a puppy’s.

  ‘Hi, guys!’ Morgan smiled, fastening herself even more closely to Oliver’s torso. She was as completely wrapped round him as a tortilla around some refried beans. Oliver looked slightly uneasy, and, to be honest, cheesy. This was wonderful. I had fallen out of love with him just in the nick of time.

  ‘Oh, hi, Morgan! Are you going to watch the rugby?’ asked Chloe.