Mega Sleepover 7

by Narinder Dhami

  Kenny grinned an evil grin. “Yeah, Lyndz is right,” she said. “Remember I said I’d got something to tell you, Frankie?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, the M&Ms are going to the tennis coaching too, aren’t they?” Kenny went on. “And they take tennis ever so seriously. That means…”

  “A chance to play a whole load of jokes on them,” I finished up.

  Kenny rubbed her hands together with glee. “Yep! Tennis might be boring, but the Sleepover Club will soon liven it up!”

  “I’m sure you’re going to have a great time, girls,” Auntie Jill said, as she turned into the college driveway. “Mark’s a fantastic coach. He’ll soon have you all playing like professionals!”

  It was the first day of our week of tennis coaching at the local college. Auntie Jill had borrowed the Proudloves’ people carrier, and had arranged to drive us to the college.

  “So that none of us can make a break for it and escape!” Kenny had moaned to me. Still, we had all decided that we would make the best of things, and it was only for a week.

  Kenny nudged me as we drove through the college grounds, then drew up outside the tennis courts.

  “Hey, everyone,” she said with a grin. “Don’t look now, or you might bring up your breakfast!”

  We all looked out of the window. Not many people had arrived yet, but guess who was there already, swanning round the tennis courts as if they owned them? The Queen and the Goblin, of course. Emma Hughes was wearing a white lacy tennis dress which was shorter than Fliss’s, if that was possible! And Emily Berryman was wearing this really tight pair of white shorts that looked truly gruesome.

  “They really think they’re something, don’t they?” Kenny said scornfully, as we climbed out of the people carrier. “I’m looking forward to annoying them!”

  The M&Ms were carrying rackets that looked really posh. I don’t know anything about tennis rackets, but these were definitely pretty flash. None of us had our own racket except Fliss, and we were all wearing different sorts of clothes. Fliss had her white tennis dress on (of course!), and Rosie, Lyndz and I were wearing trackie bottoms and T-shirts in various colours. Kenny had decided to put her Leicester City football strip on, for some reason.

  Just then the M&Ms spotted us walking towards the tennis courts. The Queen’s eyes almost fell out of her head, and she and the Goblin started nudging each other. They had these big fat smirks on their faces too.

  “I’ll go and see if I can find Mark,” Auntie Jill said, and headed off towards the changing-rooms.

  “Funny,” the Queen said in this really loud, incredibly smug voice that we were obviously meant to hear. “I thought tennis was for wimps.”

  “Yeah, for people who are too scared to play proper games,” the Goblin chimed in gruffly. Then they both laughed their heads off as if they’d just said something really funny.

  “It is,” Kenny retorted breezily. “We’re just here to help Mark out.”

  The Queen and the Goblin stopped laughing.

  “Mark?” Emma Hughes spluttered. “You don’t know Mark!”

  “We do, though,” Berryman added. “He’s one of the coaches at Green Lawns.”

  “Yes, well, he goes out with my Auntie Jill,” Fliss said, looking pretty smug herself.

  The M&Ms glared at her in disbelief – and right at that moment Auntie Jill came out of the changing-rooms with this hunky guy behind her. He looked a bit like Robbie Williams, and he was gorgeous!

  “Hi, Fliss,” he said with a smile. “And these must be your friends. Nice to see you all.” He looked at the M&Ms. “Hi, I’m Mark, the tennis coach. And you are?”

  The Queen looked a bit annoyed.

  “Emma Hughes and Emily Berryman,” she reminded him. “We go to Green Lawns.”

  “Oh, yes, sorry,” Mark said. “I’d forgotten.”

  We all tried not to snigger.

  “I’ll see you later,” Auntie Jill said, and then she left. Meanwhile, Mark took a list from his pocket and ticked our names off.

  “I’ll just go and check the others off my list,” he said. “And then we’ll get started.”

  More and more people were arriving, including Ryan Scott and Danny McCloud, two real idiots who’re in our class. Fliss started blushing, and fluttering her eyelashes, though. She’s totally in love with Ryan, but she tries to pretend she isn’t!

  The Queen and the Goblin trotted after Mark, being real creeps and asking lots of questions. Kenny pulled a face at them, and flopped down on a nearby bench.

  “Those two are going to drive me bananas!” she groaned. “Hello, what’s this?”

  There were two big Nike sports bags, by the side of the bench.

  “Those are the Queen’s and the Goblin’s,” Rosie said. “I’ve seen them at school.”

  “Oh, really,” Kenny said with an evil smile. She bounced off the bench, and bent over one of the bags.

  “Kenny, what are you doing?” Fliss hissed, in a total panic. “You can’t open their bags. If Mark sees us, we’re dead!”

  “Relax, Flissy,” Kenny said. “I wouldn’t dream of opening someone else’s bag.”

  Fliss looked relieved. “Oh, good.”

  “This one’s already open,” Kenny went on. “Look, it’s the Queen’s.” She pointed at the name written on the handle, then she put her hand into the bag and pulled out a pair of expensive-looking trainers. “Phew, these really stink!”

  “Trust the Queen and the Goblin to have special trainers for tennis,” I said.

  Fliss turned pink. “Actually,” she said, clearing her throat, “so do I!”

  “Quick,” Kenny said urgently. “Stand a bit closer so that no one can see me for a minute.”

  We all gathered round Kenny and hid her from view. By the time Mark and the others, including the M&Ms, came over, we were all sitting innocently on the bench, and the trainers were back in the Queen’s bag.

  “Right, welcome to our summer tennis school,” Mark said briskly. “A week isn’t really very long, but hopefully I’ll be able to give you some good advice to improve your game. And if you’re a beginner, well, maybe you’ll find out if you’re any good or not. And maybe you’ll find you like tennis a lot more than you thought you would!”

  Kenny rolled her eyes at the rest of us. “No chance!” she whispered.

  “Now, if you could just divide yourselves into groups of four,” Mark went on, “we’ll start off with a bit of a knock-up, and I’ll come round and see how you’re all getting on.”

  Everyone moved off in groups, and began to spread out around the courts.

  “What about us?” Lyndz asked anxiously. “There’s five of us.”

  “It’s OK,” I said, doing a quick headcount. “There’s seventeen people here, so there’ll have to be one group of five.”

  “Come on, Emily.” The Queen pushed rudely past us with her nose in the air. “Let’s change into our other trainers.”

  “Here we go!” Kenny whispered with a big grin.

  “Oh no.” The Queen’s face dropped as she pulled her trainers out of her bag. “They’re all knotted up!”

  We turned our backs, trying not to laugh. Kenny had tied the laces together with about a million knots!

  “It’s going to take you ages to undo them,” the Goblin grumbled.

  We left them to it, grabbed some rackets and balls and ran off to bag a court. We were right next to Ryan Scott and Danny McCloud, who were already belting balls around as if they were playing cricket.

  “You’re supposed to keep it inside the white lines,” Rosie shouted at them, as Ryan whacked yet another ball way over Danny’s head. Then we all jumped smartly out of the way as Danny mis-hit the next one, and it came thundering towards us.

  “Trust us to be next to those two,” Kenny grumbled, as we split up into two teams. Rosie and Fliss were on one side of the net, and Kenny, Lyndz and I were on the other. “They’re going to do us an injury at this rate!”

  Fliss
threw a ball into the air, served and smacked it down to Kenny. I don’t think Kenny was expecting Fliss to hit it quite so hard. She stuck out her racket, and the ball bounced off the frame instead of the strings. It flew off to the side at an angle, and almost took Danny McCloud’s ear off.

  “Hey!” Danny shouted indignantly. “Trust us to get landed next to those mad girls,” we heard him say to Ryan.

  Fliss changed sides, and served to Lyndz this time. She hit the ball hard again, and Lyndz gave a little yelp and jumped right out of the way. She didn’t even try to hit it.

  “Lyndz, you do know what tennis is all about, don’t you?” I said. “You have to try and return the ball.”

  “I know,” Lyndz said gloomily, “But that was scary! Fliss hit the ball too hard.”

  “Fliss is just showing off,” Kenny said to me and Lyndz in a low voice. “Let us serve this time,” she called across the net to the others. “Go on, Frankie.”

  “OK,” I agreed. I’d never done it before, but if Fliss could do it, how hard could it be?

  I threw the ball up into the air, and then raised my arm above my head to smash it.

  “Hey, was that an ace?” I yelled proudly, as Fliss and Rosie stood staring at me. “The ball moved so fast, I didn’t even see it.”

  “Frankie, I think there’s something you should know,” Kenny said, pointing at my feet. I looked down. There was the ball.

  “You missed it,” Lyndz said helpfully.

  I blushed. I grabbed the ball, bounced it on the ground and just knocked it over the net. Rosie raced towards it, elbowing Fliss out of the way, and hit the ball with all her might. It soared right over the high fence that surrounded the tennis courts, and bounced into some bushes.

  “Hey, you’re supposed to keep the ball inside the courts!” Ryan Scott shouted, and he and Danny laughed themselves silly.

  “Come on,” Kenny said impatiently, “I’m getting bored with this. I want to try out my trick shots.”

  “What trick shots?” Fliss asked suspiciously, as Rosie tapped another ball over the net to Kenny. It was a lot lower and slower this time. Kenny immediately ran round the ball so that she had her back to the net. Then she scooped it up and flipped it over her head. It dropped gently over the net, and then rolled away from Fliss, who was running towards it.

  “Kenny, that’s not a proper shot!” Fliss said disapprovingly.

  “What a load of rubbish,” the Queen sniffed. She and the Goblin had come over, and had stopped to watch what we were doing. “Some people will never be good at tennis.”

  “We’ve got to play with you,” Emily Berryman said to Ryan and Danny. “There aren’t any more courts left.”

  We saw Ryan and Danny pull faces at each other.

  “OK, but don’t try to boss us around,” Ryan said shortly.

  The Queen and the Goblin started playing against each other, on the side of the court closest to us. Kenny was still messing around and having a go at all sorts of tricks, like trying to catch the ball on her racket instead of hitting it back, and trying to hit the ball between her legs. It was driving Fliss crazy.

  Anyway, I couldn’t help watching the M&Ms. To my surprise, they were pretty good. They aren’t exactly sporty types, but they looked all right at tennis. The other thing that surprised me was that Fliss was good too. Whenever she managed to get the ball, she always did something I was sure I wouldn’t be able to do myself.

  While Rosie and Fliss were collecting up the balls we’d hit all over the place, I nudged Kenny. “Have you seen the M&Ms? They’re not bad at this.”

  “What?” Kenny’s eyes almost popped out of her head. She watched the Queen and the Goblin for a few moments, and then nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, I suppose they’re OK. Sick-making, isn’t it?”

  “Fliss is good too, isn’t she?” Lyndz added.

  “Hmm.” Kenny was frowning. I knew exactly what was going through her mind. “Come on, let’s start practising. We don’t want the M&Ms getting one over on us.”

  “But I thought we were here to have a laugh?” Lyndz said.

  “Never mind that,” Kenny ordered us. “We’d better start taking this a bit more seriously.”

  Just then Mark came over to us. He’d been walking round the courts, watching everyone and talking to them, and now it was our turn.

  “Over here, girls,” he said, beckoning us over to the net. “How are you getting on?”

  “Fine,” Fliss mumbled, glaring at Kenny. I felt a bit sorry for her. She was way better than the rest of us, and she was fed up with Kenny and the rest of us messing around when she wanted to have a proper game.

  “Good.” Mark nodded. “Now, I’ve been watching you for the last few minutes, and I think you’ve got the makings of a very good forehand drive there, Kenny.”

  Kenny looked amazed. “R-really?” she stuttered.

  Mark grinned. “Yes, but I don’t think the trick shots are helping, so cut them out, OK? And Frankie – we’ll be working on our serves later, so don’t worry about that.”

  I turned red.

  “Carry on knocking up for another few minutes,” Mark said, glancing at his watch. “And then we’ll all get together for some practice shots.”

  “Come on, you lot,” Kenny shouted, herding us back on to the court. “And concentrate this time!”

  Fliss looked smug. “See?” she said. “I told you you’d enjoy it!”

  And we were starting to enjoy it. Once we stopped messing about, and began trying harder, we got better. Fliss showed us some of her shots, and we tried to copy her. We weren’t very good, but at least we were better than before. She also showed us how to serve, and this time I actually managed to hit the ball!

  Then Mark called us all together, and began talking to us about different types of shots.

  “We’re going to start with a simple forehand,” he said, and then he told us how important it was to hold the racket properly, and have the right grip. We all had to practise holding our rackets, and swinging them at an imaginary ball. There was so much to remember, I couldn’t take it all in. It wasn’t just about how you hit the ball – you also had to follow through properly, and end up with the racket in a certain place after you’d hit the ball. Confused? I was!

  “Right, line up behind the net,” Mark called. “I want you to step forward one by one, and hit the ball back to me with your forehand. Remember what we’ve just been talking about, and try to follow through correctly. Fliss, you first.”

  Mark hit the ball over the net to Fliss, and she hit it back. It looked pretty good to me. Then Kenny stepped up.

  “Just watch her make a mess of this!” we heard the Queen whisper to the Goblin.

  Kenny didn’t say anything. She whacked the ball, and it whizzed neatly just over the net and bounced into one corner of the court.

  “Excellent, Kenny!” Mark called, and the Queen and the Goblin turned red with rage.

  Lyndz, Rosie and I didn’t do too badly either. Lyndz’s effort was a bit feeble and only just made it over the net, but Rosie and I hit ours pretty hard, even though Rosie’s was a bit high. We had another couple of goes, and then Mark came over to speak to us again.

  “Right, I want you to go back on to the courts and practise those forehands,” he said. “Oh, and before you go, I want to tell you all about the tournament we’ll be having at the end of the week.”

  Tournament? We looked at each other. That sounded interesting.

  “We’ll be finishing the summer school with a doubles tennis tournament,” Mark went on. “So you’ll need to get into pairs, and let me know who you’ll be playing with. Now off you go.”

  The Queen and the Goblin were looking smugly at each other.

  “I reckon we’ve got a great chance of winning that, Emily,” the Queen said gleefully. “There’s no one here who’s as good as we are.”

  “We’ll walk it!” the Goblin chortled. “Especially as we’ll be able to practise at Green Lawns every afternoon.”


  Kenny turned to the rest of us, as the M&Ms went off, grinning from ear to ear. “Did you hear that?” she said urgently. “We can’t let them win!”

  “We’d better start practising then,” Rosie said. “Because at the moment, Fliss is the only one of us who’s any good.”

  “Hang on a minute,” I cut in. “We’ve got another problem to sort out first.”

  “What’s that?” Fliss asked.

  “It’s a doubles tournament, and we need to get into pairs,” I pointed out. “Do the maths. There’s five of us…”

  Everyone’s faces dropped.

  “Maybe one of us could play with someone else,” Lyndz said hopefully.

  I shook my head. “No, remember I said that there were seventeen of us? That means one person’s always going to be left over.”

  “And it looks like that’s going to be one of us,” Kenny said gloomily, “because everyone else is already in twos.”

  “What are we going to do?” Fliss asked.

  “I’ll drop out,” Lyndz offered bravely. “I’m rubbish anyway.”

  “You’re no worse than me,” Rosie argued.

  “Or me,” I said.

  “We could spin for it,” Fliss suggested, twirling her tennis racket on the ground to show us what she meant. “That’s the fairest way to choose the lucky four.”

  We all nodded. So we gathered round in a circle, and Fliss spun her racket. It came to a stop, pointing at Lyndz.

  “OK, Lyndz, you’re in,” said Kenny. “And now for your partner.”

  The next spin left the racket pointing at Rosie.

  “You two are a team then,” said Fliss. She looked really envious. I was pretty jealous too because I really wanted to play. Once we’d stopped messing about and started playing properly, I was surprised by how much I’d enjoyed myself.

  “Lyndz, you spin it now,” Kenny said. “And then it’ll be fair.”

  Lyndz spun the racket, and it ended up pointing at Fliss. Fliss tried not to look too pleased.

  “So it’s between me and Frankie,” Kenny said.

  My heart was pounding as Lyndz spun the racket again. It stopped really slowly, and pointed straight at…