by Grace Dent
So Carrie screams, “Oh, don’t worry about it! I will! I’m leaving now! I’m going to live at Shiraz’s house!”
Then she jumps off the pool cabana table and storms upstairs and packs a wheelie suitcase full of clothes and leaves Draperville, slamming the front door. As I write this, she’s having a nap in Cava-Sue’s old room.
My mother says Carrie’s welcome to stay until things calm down. Or until she realizes that our house has no swimming pool facilities or in-room TV. Whichever is soonest.
THURSDAY 7TH MAY
Carrie is still living with us at the Wood household. It’s pretty good having her here, but she is a proper distraction schoolwork-wise. Carrie says she feels so amazingly free now she don’t have to think about English AS-Level. Carrie says it’s just enough having her whole life ahead of her with no one planning it for her! Carrie says it feels like a big weight’s been lifted off her mind and she’s going to build herself up from nothing like Tabitha Tennant did. I ask her how she’s going to do that and she says she’s still figuring it out.
Then Carrie asked to borrow three quid off me for bus fares to Saf’s house ’cos Barney has cut off the direct deposit into her savings account. Carrie only went out to Saf’s ’cos my mum was saying it was her turn to shovel up the dog turds in the backyard. Carrie don’t do dog poo.
FRIDAY 8TH MAY
Joshua Fallow and Claudia Ravenscroft’s families are both going on holiday together this July. They’re going to Claudia’s granny’s summer house in Tuscany. Joshua says he isn’t in love with Claudia because let’s face it they’re both going off to uni next year so they can’t get into anything heavy. It’s just fun for now, Joshua says.
The thing is about Claudia, Joshua says, is that she’s just cool. She just sort of gets where he’s coming from. Their familes are sort of the same, Joshua says. Joshua doesn’t say this sort of thing about Claudia directly to me. He says it to whoever is sitting beside him in English when I’m trying to concentrate on Shakespeare and not think about quitting school. School really sucks right now.
SUNDAY 10TH MAY
I went to Ilford Mall with my nan today to find her a bridal outfit. Murphy came too and went to Marks and Spencer with Clement. My mother chucked Murphy some money before they went and said, “And come back with something smart! Not something a bum would put on for a court appearance!”
I can’t believe she trusted Murphy to buy his own outfit. Then again, I suppose he has grown up a lot over the last year. He spends all his time now texting Rema and he’s even giving Delano and Meatman a wide berth. He’s actually quite mature. I can’t help thinking it was the “Naughty Babes” calendar that did it.
Nan and Clement are so in love with each other. They walk about together holding hands and they finish each other’s sentences and they just seem to know what the other one is thinking all the time. It makes me feel odd when I’m with them ’cos I feel properly on my own. My nan asked me if I wanted to bring a young man to her wedding so I have someone to dance with and carry me home when I’ve got blisters. I said I’d have a think.
Me and Nan went into Marks and Spencer to choose her hat when Clement wasn’t looking. The assistant asked her what sort of color she was looking for and Nan said, “I want something really gay!” The assistant nearly fell over backward with shock, so I explained my nan meant “lively and happy and fun” ’cos that’s what gay used to mean, last time Nan got married. I like hanging about with Nan and Clement, they’re from another world.
FRIDAY 15TH MAY
Barney Draper came to collect Carrie from our house tonight. He picked her up in his work van and took her to Spirit of Siam for some noodles. Just like they always used to do on Fridays when she was in Year Eight, Nine, and Ten, back when she was a little girl and she wasn’t out with boyfriends and she was basically Barney’s little princess and didn’t give him tons of earache all the time.
Carrie was in Cava-Sue’s old bedroom when Barney tooted the horn, packing her clothes and all her Tabitha Tennant beauty manuals into her wheelie suitcase. I told Carrie she didn’t have to go if she didn’t want to. I told her my mum was only kidding when she said she had to unblock the hair from the upstairs sink. Carrie said thanks for everything and she’s proper grateful but she’s decided to go home to Draperville to begin Stage One of her new life plan.
I said to Carrie that I thought Stage One of her new plan was going to involve standing on her own two feet. Carrie said she definitely has a plan up her sleeve and it did involve all that independence-blah-blah type-thing, but there was no harm in planning it from her own bedroom in Draperville.
I gave her a hug, then I watched as she walked out of the front door and down the path. Barney got out of the van and leaned against it with his arms crossed as she sauntered toward him proper sulkily.
He picked up the pink suitcase without a word and put it into the back of his van. Then they both scowled at each other for a bit, having a sort of stand-off. Then she poked him in the stomach and he burst out laughing, then he grabbed her by the waist and swung her round and round until she started squealing with laughter, then she jumped in the passenger seat and they drove off.
I have no bloody idea what she’s going to do next.
FRIDAY 22ND MAY
OK—it’s sort of mad ’cos I honestly don’t really know how this whole thing with Wesley Barrington Bains II has started happening again, but it just sort of has.
Well, to be honest, I’m not sure it really has but everyone else in the world seems to think so, including Wesley and both of our mothers, who will have plenty to discuss on their next rendezvous in the Food Lion aisle.
I don’t remember agreeing to anything. All I said in my text was that I’d go out for a pizza with Wesley just for a chat and a laugh, just like friends would ’cos that’s what we are, good friends.
So I’m in my bedroom tonight ironing my hair and putting on lip gloss when all of a sudden there’s a right fuss going on downstairs, so I know Wesley has arrived to pick me up. Straightaway my mother is up opening the front door and my brother is outside looking at the new spoiler Wesley’s put on the car and my dad’s outside on the path looking as happy as happy can be.
And by the time I come down Wesley’s sitting in the lounge, with his feet up on the special leather ottoman that my mother bought in the DFS Furniture Showroom May Sale that’s only to be used for special occasions and he’s got a cup of tea in one hand and a handful of Cadbury’s animal crackers in the other. Everyone turned to smile at me when I walked through the door like something genuinely amazing was happening. We were only going for a pizza at Pizza Junction, not to the Registry Office!
“Ooh, Wesley’s just telling us about his condo he’s buying!” my mum was saying, “Just down the road it is! You could walk there in twenty minutes from here!”
“Mmm, I know,” I said, putting in my gold hoops.
“Well, that’s such a sensible thing to do with your money, Wesley,” my mum was saying. “Your dad would be very proud. So is it a ground-floor apartment or upstairs? I mean… could you have kids in it if you wanted at some point?”
“Come on, Wesley,” I said, dragging him out of the door.
We arrived at Pizza Junction and then we sat in the green racing car which is Wesley’s favorite ’cos when you honk the buzzer for service it plays the tune “Yankee-Doodle-Dandy.” We talked about his plumbing NVQ and some tracks he’s been laying down with Bezzie that are up on their MySpace and some big car meet that they’re both going to next weekend in Southend that I can go to if I want. We had a good time really, I suppose. And when he drove me home to Thundersley Road we sat outside for a bit and chatted and when he leaned over to give me a kiss I didn’t push him away or nothing I just let him kiss me on the mouth. It didn’t feel funny or nothing, it just felt like it always used to.
Just like we’d never ever split up.
JUNE
TUESDAY 9TH JUNE
I did an Engl
ish AS-Level exam today. Oh my days, I was bricking it before I went to school. Everybody in the family was too. I must have been giving off some serious runnybum vibes around the house. Well, in the rare moments I’ve actually been spotted over the last few weeks.
I’ve been trapped in that bloody bedroom with my head in a book for almost a fortnight solid. I’ve only been appearing to yell at Murphy about playing his Dubstep or on one occasion to cut the plug off Glo’s karaoke machine. (Saying that, it wasn’t just me upset about last Saturday night. When Glo sang “Wind Beneath My Wings” with all the windows open a lot of folks reckoned it was Bert’s wife at number 89 getting committed again.)
I could hardly speak for nerves when I got to school today. I just sat there with Uma in the common room clutching my pen and my pencil and my spare pen and my lucky fluffy hedgehog that Wesley bought me. My stomach kept on trying to make an escape through my gob so I had to sit there still with my lips tight shut. Then Joshua rolls in and he’s being his usual mega-mega-confident self, just strutting around chatting about next year when he’s doing his A2s and what him and Claudia have been up to and how he got scouted in the street the other day to be a model by Storm but he said no thanks, ’cos, like, he wants to be a politician or a PR guru like his dad or something, yada-yada-yada.
So we all went into the exam room and sat down and I was sitting next to Manpreet, so he’s setting all his pens and pencils out in dead straight lines ’cos he’s got Asperger’s (it’s finally been officially diagnosed at last), and Uma is behind me and I can hear her foot tapping and her gob chewing gum like crazy. Then I turn over the paper and the first question I see is:
“Is King Lear ‘more sinned against than sinning’?” Give examples, trying to examine the motives for each character’s behavior and judging who is the victim of each situation.
And my heart went BOOM BOOM BOOM!!! when I saw that, because I’d revised something a bit like it about five times round at Uma’s, and I know she knew it too. So I starts scribbling away like mad writing about Lear’s love test and when he was cast out into the storm and the suicide of Cordelia etc., etc., etc.
And when I look over at Josh, he’s not really writing much. He’s just staring at the paper and looking a bit annoyed. A bit flustered. Like it wasn’t a question he’s ever thought about. HA HA HA HA HA.
I mean, I’m sure he did OK in the end. But thinking that he must have got his arse kicked on that paper by “chav-scummers” like me and Uma has cheered me up no end.
FRIDAY 12TH JUNE
Today was European History AS-Level. Sigh. I think it went fine. I mean I don’t think I got an A or anything ’cos, y’know, how the hell are you meant to know every piddly little thing about a period of history?? It’s impossible. But at least there were plenty of questions about Ferdinand of Spain and about Martin Luther giving the pope an earache over his grievances, so I reckon what I did was OK.
Wesley picked me up in his car after the exam and took me for a burger. Wesley says his lawyer who is helping him buy the condo called today and said the contracts have been “exchanged.” This means the condo is 99% definitely his.
Wesley says that if I ever move in I’d love living there. Wesley says the second bedroom, that I can use for my books or something until we have kids, looks over the loading bay of the pakora factory. “So that’s pretty cool, innit?” Wesley says. “’Cos there’ll always be something interesting for us both to look at.”
WEDNESDAY 17TH JUNE
I did my Critical Thinking paper today. It wasn’t too bad. I was half expecting to turn it over and for it simply to say “PEDOS ARE OK?: DISCUSS” but it didn’t. Instead there were tons of multiple choice questions about whether cigarette advertising was responsible for lung cancer, or whether folks who treat their dogs the same as humans could be called “crazy.”
I tried to answer them my very best but to be honest my head was hurting and I was feeling proper tired and confused. I finished the exam and went over to see Carrie at Draperville and now I’m more confused than ever.
Carrie had called me after the exam in a right weird mood saying she had finally worked out Stage One of the Carrie Draper “Whole New Me” plan and she needed to tell me STRAIGHT AWAY, like NOW. So I went over not expecting too much ’cos ever since Carrie was turfed out of Mayflower Sixth Form her daily routine seems to have consisted of (a) watching Lifetime TV, (b) dehairing various parts of her legs, arms, top lip etc. and (c) lying about in a robe waiting for various nail polishes to dry.
So I get to Draperville and Carrie’s in the pool cabana and the first thing she says to me is, “What are you doing with your life, Shiraz Bailey Wood?” And I sigh and say, “Looking at someone with bleach cream on their top lip?” And Carrie goes, “No, not now face-ache, for the rest of your life? Forever?”
So I go, “Oh? That? Oh, I don’t bloody know. Stay on at school for another year I suppose? If I can. Dunno. Maybe go to uni… something like that.”
So Carrie goes, “Yeah, you sound proper THRILLED about that.” And I say, “Hmm, you know I’m not thrilled. I’m bored sick of being locked in that room studying. And I ain’t got no choice really but to carry on ’cos if I don’t I’m going to end up living behind an Indian food factory with Wesley Barrington Bains II.” So Carrie goes, “Hang on? So are you officially back together with Wesley then?” And I go, “Hmm, sort of. Wesley just acts like we never even split up. He won’t talk about Joshua. He just calls it “those months when Shiraz had the hump.”
There was a long silence while we both sat for a bit watching Alexis the dog rolling about on the lawn.
“He loves me, y’know?” I said to Carrie after a while, knowing how crap that made me sound.
“Oh, Shiraz,” said Carrie. Then she got a glossy magazine out of her bag. It had a picture of Tabitha Tennant on the front dressed in a white coat. The title of the brochure was:
BUTTERZ BEAUTY ACADEMY COVENT GARDEN LONDON WC1 OFFICIAL PROSPECTUS
“That’s Tabitha Tennant’s beauty school, isn’t it?” I said.
“Yeah!” smiled Carrie, almost fizzing with happiness.
“Eh? Have you applied to go?” I said.
“I applied three weeks ago. When I moved from your house back to here,” Carrie said. “I talked my dad into lending me the money for my course fees!”
“Oh my God!” I said.
“And I didn’t want to say anything,” said Carrie. “’Cos if it all went wrong I’d look even more stupid… But I had my final interview yesterday. And I got in, Shiraz! I bloody got in! I’m moving to London! I’m going to be a trainee at Tabitha Tennant’s Butterz Beauty Academy! I’m so excited! I can’t believe it!”
I just stared at her with my gob open.
I felt well happy for her but also a bit shocked and a little tiny bit sad too.
“You’re moving to London!?” I said.
“Yeah! In a few weeks’ time!” she said.
“But… but…!” I started to stutter, but my head was proper racing. I was starting to feel a bit jealous now too. Imagine actually moving to London? Imagine having your own place and being right in the middle of everything? You could stand on Waterloo Bridge every day if you liked! And if you wanted to paddle in the Trafalgar Square fountains and go to the club every night, you could! Imagine that though? Imagine that?????
I’ve been imagining that for months and months.
“Come with me, Shiraz,” she said.
“What?” I said. “How? I can’t!”
“What do you mean, you can’t?” she said.
“I can’t just leave Goodmayes! I can’t,” I said.
“Yes you can!” said Carrie, “Come with me and we’ll get a little apartment and you can get a job and I’ll go to Butterz Beauty Academy and we can have a walloping big adventure!”
“But—” I said.
“Oh come on, Shizza, there’s nothing round here for us! Nothing. I’m sick of going to the same places all the time. I’m s
ick of seeing Saf all the time too. That’s all getting way too bloody serious. I want to have some fun!”
“But I can’t just leave,” I said. “I can’t do something like that.”
Because I can’t do that. Can I?
Can I???
JULY
FRIDAY 3RD JULY
You wouldn’t think an almost seventy-four-year-old woman would end up with a right old rowdy hen night, but when it comes to my family nothing is ever quiet.
“Ooh, I don’t want no fuss!” my nan kept saying, but I think deep down she did really. Well, least I hope she did ’cos as soon as my Aunty Glo got her beak in we ended up with a roped-off bit of Goodmayes Social for Nan and me, Carrie, Mum, Glo, Betty, Peggy, and all the other old girls from Nan’s Wednesday club.
Everyone was chatting and laughing and drinking cocktails with rude names and wearing tiaras and line-dancing and making a right old fuss.
I’ve got to admit, when Glo said she had a couple of very special surprises for Nan and that Nan had to “bring her best glasses ’cos it was going to be quite a sight,” I thought, “Oh my days, no, Glo, what have you done?!” And sure enough, she never let me down.
’Cos at about 9PM, with the drinks and silliness in full flow, this young bloke appears wearing a funny wig and glasses and a sparkly jacket dressed a bit like that singer Elton John. Then he sits down at the piano and we’re all staring at him thinking, “’Ere, mate, you weren’t invited!” then he starts to play and sing that well-serious song by Elton John called “Rocket Man.”
