Tthe Sleepover Club on the Beach

by Angie Bates

  On her way downstairs, she remembered something. “You can walk to the beach from here,” she called. “Just go through that old gate at the back and walk across the water meadows. Ten minutes’ walk, max.”

  Rosie hugged herself. “I can’t believe we can actually walk to the beach!” she gloated.

  “It’s not like, a pleasure beach,” I pointed out. “Just sea and sand and stones.”

  “Pooh! Who cares!” said Kenny to my surprise. “I just want to see those waves.”

  We still had to decide who was sleeping where, so we tossed for it. I scored the one by the window, heh heh heh.

  After we’d stashed our goodies out of sight we all felt distinctly peckish. So we went through the connecting door into the main cottage, and immediately got hopelessly lost. There were all these funny little steps, and rooms confusingly leading into other rooms. Eventually we just followed the smell of baking and ended up in this huge farmhouse-type kitchen.

  Mum and Uncle Phil were sitting at a big pine table, over cups of tea. Mum was showing him photographs of all my brothers.

  “Next time you must bring the whole family,” he said firmly.

  “Oh dear,” Mum laughed. “Must I?”

  It was weird. Their mannerisms were exactly the same. But my uncle was heaps older than Mum. Plus he had one of those deep Australian suntans which look like they’ll never wear off.

  He suddenly noticed us hovering. “Come in! You must be Lyndz.” He looked faintly surprised. “My word! How these old fashions come back!”

  I’d totally forgotten about my Thingybobby look!

  “It’s not exactly a fashion,” I said awkwardly.

  Mum tactfully changed the subject. “What do you girls want to do first?” she asked, as we tucked into warm scones and strawberry jam.

  “Explore this fantastic house,” said Kenny promptly.

  “If you don’t mind,” I said.

  “No, it’s perfect timing,” said Auntie Roz. “The other guests won’t get back till quite late, so you’ve got the place to yourselves.”

  She started explaining about some big do at the local manor house, but I was too busy eyeing all the home-made goodies to pay much attention!

  There were flapjacks with apricots in, chocolate brownies, plus a massive apple cake glistening with cinnamon and demerara sugar.

  But once my tum was nicely stuffed, my thoughts returned to adventures. “Auntie Roz,” I said shyly. “Have you got any secret passages in this house? Like one that leads to an old monastery or some smugglers’ caves?”

  My mates’ mouths fell open.

  “Secret passages, here?” Rosie looked around the room as if she was expecting a hidden panel to spring open there and then!

  Frankie gave one of her superior sniggers. “Lyndz, honestly, you are funny!” So the others hastily sniggered too.

  But my aunt took me perfectly seriously. “Hmmn, secret passages,” she said. “Haven’t come across any so far. But you never know.”

  “We’ve got a ghost,” my uncle said unexpectedly.

  “Oh, HOW fascinating!” said Frankie at once.

  Frankie goes a bit over the top when she’s with adults, like she’s trying to be an honorary grown-up or something.

  “Phil!” my aunt protested. “You’ll scare them.”

  My uncle shrugged. “It’s quite harmless, so they say. I haven’t seen it myself, but people in the village say it’s got some secret sorrow which won’t let it rest in peace.”

  I could see all this talk of ghosts was really freaking Fliss out.

  So could my Auntie Roz. “Oh, don’t listen to my old man,” she laughed. “Let me give you a grand tour.”

  I want to live somewhere exactly like Willow Cottage when I grow up. It’s gorgeous but totally homey. Plus every window had a view to die for.

  As we arrived back in the kitchen (by a completely different set of stairs), Uncle Phil said, “Did you tell them about the bikes, Roz?”

  We perked up. “Bikes?”

  He grinned. “Follow me.”

  Uncle Phil took us across the courtyard and unlocked an outhouse door. “Help yourselves,” he said.

  We found ourselves looking at a bunch of sturdy old-fashioned bicycles, all polished, pumped up and ready to go. One even had a basket on the front! I was totally speechless.

  Kenny was impressed too. “You mean we can like, go off all by ourselves?”

  Mum and Auntie Roz had joined us by this time.

  “If you wear a helmet,” said my aunt. “There’s not much traffic around here, but its better to be safe.”

  “Tell you what,” said Mum. “You girls go for a ride and work up an appetite, and when you come back we’ll get some fish and chips.”

  Fliss looked anxious. “That’s a really nice idea Mrs Collins, but we had burgers and fries at McDonalds. And we’ve just had cake and scones. That’s an awful lot of calories.”

  “Oh, a good bike ride will soon burn those off!” my aunt said cheerfully. “You’ll be famished by the time you get back.”

  So we strapped on our helmets and wheeled the bikes over the bridge, ducking slightly to avoid traily weeping willow branches.

  We hung over the bridge to look at the stream. It was flowing really fast. As we watched, a little black water bird came swimming along with her tiny babies.

  By this time I’d stopped being homesick. I was in heaven. I mean, Cuddington, where we live, is supposed to be a village, but it’s practically next door to Leicester. At night, you get that weird orange glow from thousands of street lights all like, bombarding the sky with their rays.

  But this place was totally and utterly rural! You could just tell the Thingybobby kids would feel totally at home here.

  We set off along the lane on our clunky old bikes. I’ll admit we were a bit wobbly to start with, but for me, it was a genuine Thingybobby moment. Though I did make a mental note to wear jeans, next time I rode a bike. Cycling in a skirt is très drafty.

  The rain had stopped by this time, and the sun wasn’t out exactly, but you could see it was thinking about it. Now and then little gleams of light shone up from the puddles.

  “It’s so quiet here,” said Rosie.

  “We’ll soon fix that,” grinned Kenny, and she rang the little bell on her handlebars. DINGALINGALING!

  “Hey, there’s a windmill!” Frankie yelled. “The sails are even going round, look!”

  She braked violently, took a little Polaroid camera out of her pocket and snapped a photo. Then we all cycled on again.

  “This is so ace,” said Kenny.

  “Yeah,” said Fliss. “But I hope we can go to the pleasure beach tomorrow. I really want to work on my suntan.”

  “There’s no need to whinge. My mum promised, didn’t she?” I said.

  “Oh sorree,” said Fliss huffily.

  I know I shouldn’t have snapped like that, but Fliss’s remark made me feel really crabby. I mean, we only had a weekend. We’d be lucky to fit in an adventure at ALL at this rate!

  Kenny was tinkling her bike bell, with that Young Scientist expression she gets sometimes. “Do you think they all sound the same?” she said.

  We experimented. The bells were all slightly different.

  “Coo-ell,” Kenny grinned. “We can have a wicked bike-bell orchestra!”

  And she started singing that really dumb song about a mouse in a windmill, which we had to sing in Cuddington Infants.

  We all joined in, jingling our bells loudly for the chorus. It was totally mad!

  Unfortunately, the scowling man in the Ford picked that exact moment to drive past, and we had to drag our bikes into the hedge.

  “Did you see his face?” giggled Frankie, as he roared past.

  “Did you see his sideburns, more like!” said Kenny. “Talk about stuck in a time-warp. Bet he was a big bad teddy boy back in the nineteen-fifties and he never got over it!”

  “Teddy boy?” said Rosie in amazement. “What’s
a teddy boy?”

  “They went around in gangs, picking fights and slashing cinema seats,” I said. “I have NO idea why.”

  “Stylish though,” said Fliss wistfully. “Drainpipe trousers, jackets with gorgeous velvet collars.”

  I shuddered. “You think greasy hair is stylish?”

  I still couldn’t help thinking that our surly ex-ted would make the perfect Thingybobby villain. A poacher say, or a heartless kidnapper. But I didn’t say so, in case Frankie did one of her superior sniggers.

  We came to a steep slope and went freewheeling down, truly one of the world’s great feelings!

  “Yayy!” Kenny yelled. “Sleepover girls forever!”

  But when we reached the bottom of the hill, I jammed on my brakes.

  All I could say was “Oh, oh, oh!” I was totally all of a dither.

  “What’s up?” said everyone.

  “Ssh,” I whispered. “You’ll scare it!”

  I put my bike in the hedge and tiptoed over to a low five-bar gate.

  On the other side, grazing among the buttercups, was the loveliest Arab pony I had ever seen. Everything about him was lovely – his face, his dark liquid eyes, the way he moved. He still had the gangly legs and soft faintly fuzzy coat of a foal.

  My mates can be SO sensitive sometimes. I mean, they like horses, but they’re not crazy about them like I am. But they waited with amazing patience while I tried to coax him over.

  It was pretty obvious he hadn’t been broken in, and he was really nervous and skittish. Yet the instant I saw him, I’d felt the strangest bond.

  This might sound weird, so please don’t tell the others, but he was exactly like the horses I ride in my dreams. It was like I already knew how it would feel to ride him. And it was pure magic…

  Suddenly Rosie sneezed, and the pony gave this incredible buck, kicking up clods of earth. He galloped away to the far side of his field, making scared harrumphing sounds.

  I’ll come back tomorrow, I promised him silently. I’ll come by myself and we’ll have a proper talk.

  “Erm, sorry to spoil things, Lyndz, but I’m getting hungry,” said Rosie plaintively.

  “Me too!” Fliss sounded amazed. “Actually I’m starving,” she giggled.

  “Why don’t we ask Mum if we can take our fish and chips down to the beach?” I suggested. “Like a picnic?”

  “Excellent idea,” said Kenny.

  “Won’t they get cold?” Rosie shuddered. “Cold fish and chips is icky.”

  “We can go on our bikes,” I said eagerly. “We could put them in my bike basket and pedal like the wind!”

  Did you suss that I was being a girl in a book at that moment?

  My mates gave me startled looks. But Kenny just said. “You’re on. If it’s ten minutes’ walk, we should bike it in five easily.”

  We whizzed home at top speed, standing on our pedals.

  When we got back, we quickly put on some warmer clothes. It was getting really chilly. Then Mum drove us to a tiny village. Just a street really, with a few dull-looking cottages, a pub and a tiny and very shabby looking fish-and-chip shop. It didn’t look incredibly impressive from the outside, to be honest. But Mum swore this place was famous locally for its brilliant fish and chips, so we all crowded in.

  Ohhh! It smelled wonderful. I was seriously tempted to reach over the counter and grab a handful!

  Luckily Mum had no objection to us eating ours down on the beach.

  “So long as I get to eat mine in comfort,” she yawned. “It’s been a long day, so be back by eight, OK?”

  The instant we got home, we rushed off on our bikes. I was carrying our fish-and-chip picnic in my bike basket. I’d made sure to buy a big bottle of ginger beer at the fish-and-chip shop. You can’t have a real Thingybobby picnic without gallons of ginger beer. It’s like, a law!

  It was hard work cycling through the water meadows. Plus the lovely vinegary smells wafting from the basket were driving me insane.

  We bumped and jolted through the frothy cow parsley, past streams thick with flowering rushes. Finally we’d bumped all the way to a rickety wooden stile. To be on the safe side, we hid our bikes behind a tree.

  We all scrambled over the stile and went racing breathlessly over the sand dunes, dodging between gorse bushes and springy tufts of sea lavender.

  “How come gorse blossoms smell exactly like coconut suntan oil?” I puzzled aloud.

  But at that moment Fliss squeaked, “I can hear the sea!”

  “My lips taste salty,” said Kenny, sounding surprised.

  And at that moment we reached the top of the dunes. There it was – huge and glittering and completely awesome.

  Maybe you get bored with the sea if you see it every day. But if you live in the Midlands like we do, that first glimpse is a REALLY big deal. So we got totally overexcited!

  “YAYY! Sleepover girls on the beach!” Kenny yelled suddenly.

  And we all joined in, shrieking, “Sleepover girls on the beach! Sleepover girls on the beach!”

  Then Rosie got muddled up, yelling “Beachover girls on the sleep”, and everyone collapsed into hysterics.

  We stopped yelling as suddenly as we’d begun and just gazed around us happily. It was a very pebbly beach, with patches of damp sand, and a thick scattering of seaweed – the lacy pink and green kind, plus the luscious bobbly stuff you can pop, kind of Nature’s bubblewrap!

  The tide was out, exposing weedy rocks and rock pools and the shells of tiny crabs. Several white gulls were circling overhead, making their lonely cry.

  “Our own private beach,” said Fliss dreamily. “Just like film stars.”

  Kenny had gone into her starving girl impersonation. “Food!” she said feebly, stretching out a shaking hand. “Now!”

  “Hang on, Kenz,” I teased her. “Food is coming!”

  We hastily shared out the rations.

  Frankie’s vegetarian as you probably know, so she had veggie burgers with her chips. The rest of us had cod coated in crispy golden batter.

  They give you loads of chips at that shop. Amazingly they were still hot. A bit too hot! We kept burning our mouths. But we were so hungry, we totally didn’t care.

  When she’d finished, Rosie licked each of her fingers one by one. “We’ll definitely put them in the Sleepover Food Guide,” she mumbled.

  A worried look appeared in Fliss’s eyes. “I feel just a bit too full,” she said anxiously.

  Frankie burped. “Me too. I drank that ginger beer too fast.”

  “Let’s paddle,” I suggested. “That’ll help it go down.”

  We weighted our rubbish with pebbles, so it wouldn’t blow away while we were gone. I don’t remember the Thingybobby kids ever bothering about rubbish, but then they didn’t have to worry about the ozone layer either.

  We didn’t paddle for very long. The sun was starting to set and the sea was FREEZING, plus Suffolk pebbles totally kill your feet. So we went for an explore on the rocks instead. Bubblewrap seaweed makes great upholstery!

  After a while Rosie said reluctantly, “We should probably go back.”

  We started to pick our way through the pebbles.

  “Sunset’s so flattering, isn’t it?” said Fliss. “You’re all pink and glowing, Lyndz.”

  Frankie was looking thoughtful. “This is such a great place,” she said. “Just a teensy bit too quiet. Do you think we can liven things up a bit?”

  “Like how?” said Kenny.

  Frankie gave me a mischievous look. “An adventure maybe? What do you reckon, Lyndz?”

  I wondered if she was taking the mickey. You can never tell with Frankie.

  “Erm, don’t know really,” I said cautiously.

  Frankie sounded hurt. “Now don’t pretend you wouldn’t kill for an adventure, Lyndsey Collins. Why else did you bring those manky old adventure books on holiday?”

  Yes, my mate was definitely trying to wind me up. And I was just going to tell her to get off my case when Ken
ny broke into a huge smile.

  “Oh, I had a quick read of one this morning. Hope you don’t mind, Lyndz,” she added hastily. “I just lurve those stories. They’re so old fashioned, but you have to keep turning the pages.”

  “I know!” said Rosie. “You like, hate yourself, but you can’t help it.”

  I was stunned. Well, how about that! I thought. My mates were secret Thingybobby fans all along!

  And then it dawned on me. I mean, if Frankie despised those books as much as she said, how come she has all this expert knowledge?

  She ADORES them, I realised suddenly. She’s just worried about her street cred! This thought made me ridiculously happy!!

  Frankie beamed at me. “So how about it, Lyndz?”

  “What kind of adventure were you thinking of?” asked Rosie eagerly.

  She thought for a minute. “Erm, how about one of the guests at the B&B turns out to be a dangerous international jewel thief?”

  “No, I know,” I said. “One of us sees a frightened face at the window. Some villains are holding a millionaire’s daughter to ransom, but no-one believes us.”

  “I’d like to find treasure,” said Rosie wistfully. “Hidden treasure would be really cool.”

  Kenny put on her Young Scientist voice. “Not everyone knows this,” she said. “But sunset is the best time to find treasure on the beach.”

  “How come?” said Frankie.

  “Because you’ve got the sun behind you, so you can see all those emeralds and rubies like, sparkling madly.”

  Of course, we all started fanatically scanning the pebbles. Everyone kept spotting thrilling gleams of colour and swooping with shrieks of excitement. But when we examined our “treasure” close up, it always turned out to be bits of stone or glass.

  “That sunset theory is rubbish,” Rosie complained.

  “Yeah, wet pebbles always sparkle,” I said. “Then you get back home and they’re as dull as – as…”

  “Things which are really dull,” supplied Rosie helpfully.

  Kenny scowled. “It’s not rubbish, and it’s not a theory. It’s a well-known—”

  Her voice trailed off. She squatted down and started scrabbling madly in the sand.

  “Does this count?” Kenny’s voice was sharp with excitement. She triumphantly held up a large green bottle with a cork in it. Rolled up inside it was a scroll of stiff, ancient-looking paper.