Signs of Love: Stupid Cupid

by Melody James

  He gazes, blinking, around the foyer like a Martian in Tesco.

  ‘This way.’ I take the lead and push through the doors to the dance floor. Alex and Kenny are setting up on stage while the DJ pumps some Beyoncé into the room. Savannah and Sally are already making their way through the crowd, heading for LJ’s gang clustered at the bar.

  ‘Gemma!’ Treacle beckons from a table at the edge of the heaving dance floor.

  ‘I’ll be there in a minute,’ I mouth, pointing at my watch.

  Treacle hurries over, one eye on Will. ‘You’re going to sit with us, right?’

  ‘We’ve got a message for – er – Sam,’ I nod toward the stage. ‘Webzine stuff. We won’t be long.’

  Treacle shrugs. ‘OK.’ She waves at Jeff, who’s sitting at the table as awkwardly as a Man U supporter in Liverpool’s end of the stadium. ‘I’m going to see if I can get Jeff dancing.’ She disappears into the wall of sound and I turn back to Will.

  He’s got his hands in his jacket pocket and he’s scanning the club. ‘How do we get backstage?’ he asks.

  ‘This way.’ I lead him to the door Sam showed me last week and we burst out of the heat and darkness into the cool breezeblock corridor.

  The hairs on the back of my neck are pricking. What if Wiggins spots me? Will he remember me from last week? I suddenly wish I had worn a hat.

  I glance around. The hallway’s empty.

  ‘Which way?’ Will asks.

  ‘Here.’ I head down the corridor toward Sam’s dressing room. The door’s open and I put my finger to my lips as I lead Will past.

  I can hear Sam inside, chatting to Pete. ‘Ready?’ he says as a guitar riff rips through the air. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘Come on!’ I grab Will’s arm and drag him toward the fire door. We slip through it just a moment before Sam and Pete appear from the dressing room. They’re toting guitars and heading for the stage.

  ‘Whoa!’ Will’s staring at the stacks of boxes lining the walls.

  There are twice as many as last week.

  ‘That delivery must have arrived,’ I guess.

  ‘I wonder what’s in them.’ Will jabs a box with his finger.

  I’m scanning the corridor where it corners toward Wiggins’s office. My ears are peeled.

  In the distance I hear Sam’s band crank into action. Guitars wail and drums hammer. As Sam launches into the lyric, Will pulls a box off one of the stacks. It’s taped shut. He slides a bank card out of his pocket and uses it to slice through the tape. Then he pulls at the lid.

  As the tape rips at one end, I hear footsteps.

  Wiggins appears round the corner. His eyes pop as he spots us.

  ‘Look out!’ I grab Will’s arm. A large square man steps out behind Wiggins. He looks like a shaved gorilla.

  ‘Oi! What are you doing?’ Wiggins points at us, colour flooding his big round head. His gorilla plunges past him. I swear I feel the ground shake as he pounds towards us.

  ‘Run!’ Will pushes me ahead of him and I sprint for the fire door. I barge through it, my heart busting up into my throat. I glance back, expecting to see Will at my heels, but the gorilla’s got him and is pressing him up against a wall. Will’s dangling from his meaty fists like a beanie-baby.

  ‘Call the police!’ Will shouts to me.

  The gorilla lands a fist in Will’s stomach and Will crumples.

  Horrified, I flee.

  I race past Sam’s dressing room, blind with panic, looking for a place to shelter.

  Veering left, I scale a short staircase three steps at a time and dive past a stack of speakers.

  The world opens up around me in a blaze of noise and light.

  I blink into spotlights. A roar erupts somewhere beyond the blinding flare.

  Oh no!

  I’m on stage.

  Drums pound behind me. My eyes adjust. I make out Sam hanging on to his mic, staring at me as he mouths his song.

  Something hard jabs my back. I spin. Alex nods at me, grinning, and nudges me across the stage with his Fender. As I stumble backward, tripping over wires, Sam grabs a tambourine from the floor and shoves it into my hand.

  ‘Shake it!’ he hisses.

  Numb with shock I start tapping the tambourine against the heel of my hand. The drums are making my head rattle and my ears are ringing from the screaming guitars. Desperate to look part of the band, I chase the beat with the tambourine, searching for the riff, so disoriented by the racket that every tap is a miss-hit. A chimpanzee would be giving a better performance.

  ‘Gem!’

  I spot Savannah, leaning over the stage waving her arms toward me. Treacle’s next to her, whooping through cupped hands.

  Oh great! A fan club. I grin at them inanely, my eyes swivelling as I look for an escape route.

  ‘Tambourine solo!’ Treacle roars.

  Sam and Alex swap looks, then Sam nods at Kenny and Pete.

  They take the noise level down by about four thousand decibels, till the hopeless rattling of my tambourine stands out like a one-man-band at a wedding.

  The crowd yowl with delight as I swing the tambourine above my head and start clapping it wildly against my other hand. Savannah and Treacle are falling against each other, screaming with laughter.

  I stare pleadingly at Sam. Let me go!

  He shrugs and signals to the band with a shake of his mic and they crank up the noise once more.

  Desperate to escape, I stumble across the stage and ease myself through the gap between Pete’s bass and Kenny’s drums.

  Will’s being pulped! I’ve got to call the police. I squeeze past Pete and head for the stage wings. Sam watches me go, still working at the mic, his face baffled.

  I shrug at him apologetically and bow my way into the shadows. ‘Sorry!’ I mouth before I drop the tambourine and leap down a short staircase.

  I crouch in the pool of shadow beside the stage and pull out my phone. My hands are shaking as I dial nine-nine-nine, swallowing panic as the voice at the other end of the line makes me go through name and number until finally I blurt: ‘There’re drug dealers at Sounds nightclub! They’ve got my friend, Will. They’re going to kill him!’

  As soon as the operator has all the details I terminate the call and start fighting through a jumble of wires and boxes, trying to find my way backstage again. At last I burst out into the familiar breezeblock hallway. The fire door is to my right and I creep toward it.

  There’s nothing but boxes in the corridor behind.

  What have they done with Will?

  I push open the fire door gingerly and slip through.

  I hear Dave Wiggins’s voice echo from around the corner.

  Tiptoeing, I creep closer, then dart across the opening and duck down against the emergency exit. Leaning forward, I can see round a stack of boxes. I have a clear view along the corridor to Wiggins’s office. He’s standing outside while his gorilla holds Will in a vicious arm lock.

  ‘I’ll ask you again.’ Wiggins leans closer to Will. ‘What were you doing back here?’

  Will’s acting tough. ‘Tell your bouncer to let go and I’ll tell you.’

  Wiggins nods to the gorilla, who releases Will.

  ‘I’m with the band.’ Will rubs his arm where the gorilla gripped it. ‘They told me to come back here and get some snacks.’ He sounds indignant.

  ‘So you thought you’d rip off a few boxes while you were here.’

  ‘When I couldn’t find a vending machine I thought the snacks must be in the boxes.’ I’m impressed. Even I’m half convinced by Will’s wide-eyed act.

  Young Reporters Foil Drug Baron.

  I’m already writing the story in my head.

  Last night, two teen journalists infiltrated a local drugs ring and uncovered the biggest haul of drugs ever found.

  Wiggins is heavy-breathing in Will’s face. ‘Why would we keep snacks in sealed boxes?’ He thumps one of the stacks crowding him.

  The drug dealer, Dave Wiggins, caught
one reporter and grilled him mercilessly. But the brave reporter stayed calm under questioning until his colleague raced to the rescue.

  I try to imagine the article as it will appear in The Times and it dawns on me that I need a picture for the story.

  I grab my phone, lean around the stack of boxes and click a snapshot.

  ‘Hey, you!’ Wiggins blasts me with a shout. ‘It’s another one!’ he yells. ‘They’re like bloody rats!’

  I back away as his gorilla lunges toward me. I jump back. The handle of the emergency exit jabs my spine. I reach back and push down hard.

  It doesn’t move.

  It’s jammed.

  ‘Come here, you!’

  As the gorilla grabs my arm I swallow back a scream.

  ‘Get your hands off me!’ Fear turns to rage as the gorilla hauls me along the corridor and parks me beside Will.

  Will flashes me an apologetic look.

  I stare back defiantly. He doesn’t need to be sorry. I knew the risk I was taking.

  ‘Leave us alone,’ I shout at Wiggins. ‘We haven’t done anything!’

  ‘Oh, really?’ he sneers. ‘What about my box, you little thief?’ He points at the half-opened box Will left at the corner.

  ‘We weren’t stealing,’ I snap. ‘We wanted to see the dru—’

  Will silences me with a kick. ‘OK, so we thought we’d steal some of your snack stock,’ he confesses. ‘We were just after some crisps for the after-gig party and we figured we’d find some back here. Call the police and have us arrested!’ As he gives Wiggins a challenging stare, the fire door bangs open.

  There’s the sound of boots stomping up the corridor. Two policemen come skidding round the corner.

  ‘Let go of those kids!’ one of them shouts.

  The gorilla loosens his grip and I dart toward the police. ‘He’s dealing drugs!’ I say, pointing at Wiggins.

  ‘The club is just a cover.’ Will grabs a box and drops it at the policeman’s feet. ‘Open it and see for yourselves.’

  The policeman looks curious. ‘Well, well, Wiggins,’ he growls. ‘Have you been upping your game?’

  Will nudges me. ‘Get a picture, Gemma.’

  I flick out my camera and prepare to take a shot as the policeman bends down and tears open the box.

  I click a snapshot as the police pulls something out.

  Something ginger.

  And hairy.

  Wiggins snatches it off the policeman. ‘Drugs?’ He’s outraged. ‘What do you think I am? These are rugs! Not drugs?’

  Rugs? I stare at the hairpiece dangling from his hand like a dead rat and my mind whirs and clicks into place. Rugs! Wigs! Dave Wiggins has been selling wigs on the side.

  The policeman smiles at me. ‘I’m Officer McDonald.’ He nods toward his colleague. ‘And this is Officer Benbow.’

  Officer Benbow takes a handful of wigs from the box. ‘Dave Wiggins,’ he grins. ‘Rug-lord.’ He slides a notebook from his pocket. ‘Where exactly did you purchase these wigs, Mr Wiggins?’

  Wiggins backs away. ‘I can explain.’

  ‘Have you got receipts?’ Officer McDonald blocks the gorilla as he tries to sidle away.

  ‘I’ve lost them,’ Wiggins mumbles.

  ‘Well, well, well.’ Officer McDonald takes off his helmet.

  Officer Benbow taps his notebook. ‘We had a report of a warehouse raid last month. Apparently the haul included a shipment of wigs.’

  I snap another photo as he closes in on Wiggins.

  Will puts his hand on my shoulder and steers me away. ‘Go on, Gemma,’ he says gently. ‘I’ll give our evidence to the policemen. You might as well keep out of it.’

  I glance at Officer McDonald.

  ‘It’s just paperwork from now on, love,’ he tells me. ‘You go back to the gig.’

  Paperwork? I feel disappointed. As adrenaline stops swamping my thoughts, I realize that our huge drugs bust has turned out to be petty theft.

  The policeman holds out his hand. ‘Thanks for the tip-off, love.’

  I shake it and smile. I guess it’s not bad for a first case.

  I’m trembling as I push through the fire door and head back to the dance floor. I let the music and warmth warp around me while I deep-breathe my way back to calmness. Then I scan the crowd for Treacle and Savannah.

  LJ and his crowd are still hanging by the bar, but there’s no sign of Savannah. And the table where Treacle and Jeff were sitting is filled with other kids. I weave through the crowd till I bump into Sally.

  She jumps like I stood on her tail. ‘Gemma!’ Her greeting is bright – and guilty. Like I’ve just caught her copying my homework.

  ‘Where’s Sav?’

  She glances toward the entrance. ‘Dunno.’

  I’m suspicious, but I don’t question her. Instead I follow her nervous gaze and push through the door into the foyer.

  Savannah and Marcus are huddled in a corner. Savannah’s head is bowed on to Marcus’s shoulder. As Marcus spots me he murmurs something into her ear.

  Savannah snaps away from Marcus like he’s on fire. ‘Hi, Gem!’ she cries in the same über-bright voice as Sal.

  ‘What’s up?’ I ask. As usual I start guessing headlines.

  Schoolgirls in Nightclub Cover-up. Teens Caught in Dance-floor Shocker.

  ‘You look like you’ve murdered Treacle and are trying to hide the body,’ I joke.

  Savannah pulls a guilty face. ‘It’s worse than that.’ She steers me away from Marcus.

  ‘You sold her to the Russian mafia?’ I’m trying to keep joking, but the serious look on Savannah’s face is starting to worry me.

  She whimpers pitifully. ‘OhGodohGodohGod!’ She’s jabbing her finger into her temples like her brain’s trying to escape.

  ‘What?’ I can’t stand it any longer.

  ‘I’m soooooo sorry,’ Savannah whines. ‘Please don’t kill me.’

  ‘I will if you don’t tell me what’s going on.’

  Marcus is looking shifty in the corner. Is he her accomplice?

  Savannah pulls in a deep breath and lets it out slowly.

  ‘What’s the matter, Savannah?’

  She blabbers it out in a rush. ‘I’vefallenforMaracusand hekindoffeelsthesamewayaboutme.’

  Fortunately, I speak fluent Savannese. I translate into Slow-speak. ‘You’ve fallen for Marcus and he feels the same way about you.’

  She nods wretchedly. ‘I’m really sorry, Gem. I know you like him but it was just like . . . he suddenly . . . and I . . .’ She covers her mouth with her hands. ‘I’m so sorry.’ The words are muffled by her fingertips.

  I’m jubilant. It’s all I can do not to run a winning circuit round the foyer. I stand there grinning like an idiot while Savannah slips into Super-explanation Mode.

  ‘You see, Gem. I overhead LJ talking to his friends and he was making fun of me.’

  My smile dies.

  ‘I know,’ she says seriously. ‘He was actually making fun of me because I liked him. He was talking like I was a pre-schooler or something and I was just so upset.’ Her eyes start brimming at the memory. She flashes them toward Marcus. ‘And he was so kind.’

  ‘Who? Marcus?’

  ‘Well, duh!’ Savannah gives me an idiot look. ‘Did you think I meant LJ? He’s, like, the opposite of kind. He’s horrible. I don’t know what I ever saw in him. I can’t believe Jessica Jupiter was right again. I shouldn’t have been chasing the American Dream when I’ve got a perfect English Muffin right in front of my eyes.’ She gazes goofily at Marcus, who blushes. Then she remembers the terrible crime she’s committed.

  ‘Oh God, Gem. I’m sooooooo sorry.’

  I hug her. ‘You idiot.’

  She looks at me, stunned.

  ‘Do you remember I told you I wasn’t interested in Marcus?’ I tell her.

  She nods dumbly.

  ‘That’s because I wasn’t interested in Marcus.’

  ‘Really?’ She’s catching up. ‘But why
not? He’s wonderful!’

  ‘I know.’ I gently turn her round and push her toward him. ‘You’re wonderful too, Sav. You’re made for each other.’

  She sighs happily as she melts into his arms. ‘We’re a match made in heaven.’

  Marcus winks at me. ‘Thanks for being cool about it, Gemma.’

  ‘No problem.’ I watch them wander dreamily out of the club.

  ‘Are you coming?’ Sav calls over her shoulder.

  ‘I want to find Treacle.’ I wave them away, feeling like a mother hen marrying off another chick.

  I feel so happy all of a sudden I want to swing from the glitter ball. Jessica is a brilliant matchmaker and I’m a fabulous journalist. So what if it was wigs not drugs; I still helped to nail a bent businessman. Not bad for a first assignment.

  ‘Gemma!’ Treacle blares like a foghorn behind me. ‘There you are!’ The door to the dance floor is still swinging as she bursts from it, Jeff on her tail. ‘You were brilliant!’

  My brain wheel-spins, trying to catch up. Has she found out about the Wiggins story already? How did she know it was me who unmasked his dodgy scam?

  ‘I was so psyched when you came out on the stage!’ Treacle hangs off my arm. ‘With the tambourine? You were great! I didn’t know you were part of the band! How did that happen?’

  I thread my arm through hers. ‘It’s a long story.’

  Jeff jumps ahead and opens the door for us as we head out into the night. Savannah and Marcus are already at the bus stop, nuzzling each other like shy deer.

  ‘What’s that all about?’ Treacle gasps.

  I tug her arm. ‘You really need to keep up, Treacle,’ I laugh. ‘Things move fast round here.’

  I fly through Double Maths on Monday afternoon. I can’t wait to get to the editorial meeting and bask in the glory of our scoop. I mailed Will the photos I’d snapped and my notes and he wrote up the article. It’ll have hit Cindy’s inbox by now.

  My mind is buzzing with questions. What if the story is picked up by the local newspaper? What if it goes national?

  My imagination takes over. Suddenly, I’m back in the London newsroom, waiting for the call. Gemma Stone, youngest ever winner of the World News Prize.

  Mr Baxter’s voice cuts into my thoughts. ‘Gemma, have you finished?’