Sasha's Secret

by Cathy Cassidy

  ‘But you will,’ Mum says firmly. ‘You’re the lead singer – they need you. Just wait till we tell your gran. She had a poster of Ked Wilder on her bedroom wall when she was a teenager! She’s not going to believe this!’

  I roll my eyes and pretend to be engrossed in the movie, but inside I’m wishing there was a black hole handy – I’d jump right in and never come back.

  Hey Sasha, all ready for the photo shoot and interview today. Where do I head for, exactly? You said the practice space is near Greystones? Is that the big mansion house across the park? Matt

  That’s the one. We could aim for one o’clock – that’d give you time to talk to Marley before practice starts. If you don’t know Greystones, I can meet you at the bandstand in the park at ten to one. Sasha x

  Cool – that way I won’t get lost! See you then! M

  5

  Say Cheese

  It’s ridiculous to get excited about meeting Matt by the bandstand, I know. It’s ridiculous to try on five different outfits, to style my hair in a ponytail, a French pleat and a messy updo before deciding to leave it down. I spend ages getting just the right understated cat’s eye with my eyeliner, endlessly trying to choose between summer sandals and Converse.

  It’s ridiculous to bargain with the universe too, to pray that I won’t blank out while Matt’s around. I bargain anyway.

  All the effort is worth it, just for the way Matt’s face lights up when he sees me.

  ‘Hey!’ he says. ‘Sasha! Thanks for agreeing to this! I’m really looking forward to meeting Marley and the rest of the band. I think I can do something really cool with this. If I get some good shots, I might try to place a couple of features in the Birmingham music mags!’

  ‘Brilliant!’ I say.

  ‘It’d be great for me too,’ Matt says. ‘It’s what I want to do – well, photography more than journalism, but it’s all linked. If the photos and interview are good, we all win, right?’

  ‘Definitely!’

  Matt looks even cooler out of uniform, lean and long-limbed in skinny jeans and a vintage T-shirt, his camera slung round his neck. We fall into step, heading across the park and along the quiet avenue that leads to Greystones as Matt chats away easily. He’s so easy to talk to – it’s like we’ve known each other for ages.

  ‘So how come your practice space is at Greystones?’ he asks. ‘Not that I’m complaining. It’ll be a great location for the photo shoot!’

  ‘Wait till you see it,’ I say. ‘You’ll love it! We used to practise in the community room at the library, but when the libraries were threatened with closure a few months back we had to look for somewhere new. Our tech guy, Jake, lives in one of the apartments at Greystones. He found us the new place.’

  Matt raises an eyebrow. ‘And that’s how you got involved in the music festival in the summer? It was all about saving the libraries, wasn’t it? I came down and took some photos – you were amazing!’

  I know he means the band, not me, but I can’t help the quick flush of pink that stains my cheeks.

  ‘It was our first gig,’ I tell him. ‘Talk about in at the deep end. But we saved the libraries and we got to meet Ked Wilder, so … well, it was pretty awesome, yeah!’

  ‘Makes a great story,’ Matt agrees. ‘You’ve done brilliantly for such a new band and I’ve got a feeling this is just the start!’

  I push open the gate at Greystones, and Matt steps on to the driveway, gazing up at the big old mansion in awe.

  ‘Wow,’ he breathes. ‘I’ve seen the place from the park, obviously, but never up close. A crazy old lady artist lives here, right?’

  I frown.

  ‘Louisa Winter’s not crazy,’ I tell him. ‘She’s kind and creative and she’s been really good to us. She was a model in the sixties, knew all sorts of cool people – and now she’s a famous painter, of course. You should write something about her for the school magazine!’

  ‘Um – maybe.’

  I shrug. ‘Anyway, we don’t practise in the house. I’ll show you …’

  I lead Matt across the grass and through the trees until we emerge opposite the old railway carriage. Marley is sprawled across the steps playing guitar, lost in the moment, and Matt halts beside me, wide-eyed.

  ‘Like it?’ I ask.

  ‘Awesome,’ he says. ‘Wow. This is where you practise? I love it! I had no idea!’

  Almost unconsciously, he raises his camera and frames the view, and that’s when Marley looks up. He doesn’t look pleased to see us.

  ‘Ah,’ he says, curling his lip slightly. ‘Camera Boy. I forgot about you.’

  Matt blinks. ‘I arranged with Sasha to take some photos, do an interview –’ he begins.

  ‘For the school magazine, I know,’ Marley interrupts, faking a yawn to underline how unimpressed he is.

  ‘Marley!’ I say. ‘You agreed to this. You said it was fine! What’s the problem?’

  He puts down his guitar and stands up, stretching lazily as if this whole meeting is one big headache.

  ‘Whatever,’ he says, frowning at Matt. ‘No problem. You’re here now. May as well stick around. I’m Marley Hayes.’

  Matt drags up his best smile. ‘I know, I’ve seen you around at school – I’m Matt. I won’t get in the way. I just wanted to ask a few questions, take some shots as you practise and then set up some more styled pictures. I can guarantee you the cover slot on the next issue, and the plan is to send out some stuff to the local music mags in Birmingham, see if they’ll bite …’

  ‘The local music press?’ Marley questions. ‘Why not the nationals?’

  Matt grins. ‘Sure!’ he says. ‘Why not? I like your stuff. I’ve been following you since you played the festival in the park and I think you have massive potential. I just want to help get that message out there. I’m serious about what I do and I can see you are too. It makes sense to work together, right?’

  Marley shrugs. ‘I’ll talk to you,’ he agrees. ‘You can watch us practise, chat to the others, take as many pictures as you like. Once I’ve seen the results, I’ll tell you whether we can work together.’

  He turns and heads into the old railway carriage, and Matt and I exchange silent and slightly horrified looks.

  ‘It’ll be OK,’ I promise, with no clue whether it will be or not.

  In the end, it’s more than OK. Matt takes out a notebook and we sit on the steps while he asks me some questions, which bugs Marley enough to make him come out and sit with us. Pretty soon he’s telling Matt everything there is to know about the Lost & Found, along with his plans for world domination. By the time the others start to arrive, Matt has filled pages of his notebook and Marley’s bad mood has started to lift.

  Matt stays in the background while we practise, moving quietly around, the click of his camera lost beneath the music. Marley, hyper aware we’re being observed, pushes everyone to the limit. The result is possibly the best practice we’ve ever had, and when I glance across at Matt as I belt out the finale of ‘Setting Sun’ I can see he’s impressed.

  ‘Sasha?’

  I blink, stepping back from another black-hole moment to find everyone looking at me. Clearly my bargaining with the universe has not worked after all.

  ‘Sorry … what?’

  ‘You missed your cue,’ Marley says. ‘I wanted us to run through ‘Song for the Sea’ one more time, but you were miles away!’

  ‘Daydreaming,’ Jake says, offering me a ready-made excuse. ‘You creative types are all the same. Want a chocolate lime?’

  A wrapped sweet flies through the air and I catch it with shaking hands, try for a smile.

  Marley rakes a hand through his hair. ‘Let’s call it a day,’ he decides. ‘Well done, people – that was good work. If you can all hang around a little while, Matt here is planning on taking some more photos – everybody out!’

  ‘Well, not quite everyone,’ Matt says sheepishly. ‘I mean, we won’t need you … Jake, is it? Mr Tech Guy? Just the people actually
in the band!’

  ‘Jake’s in the band,’ Bex says. ‘Just because he’s behind the scenes doesn’t mean he’s not one of us!’

  Matt grins. ‘I know – obviously!’ he backtracks. ‘And he’s in some of the rehearsal shots, of course. But for the posed ones … just the musicians. OK?’

  ‘OK with me,’ Jake says with a shrug. ‘I can help if you like? Photographer’s assistant?’

  ‘Don’t need one,’ Matt says bluntly.

  I don’t think Matt means to be quite so dismissive, but I feel a bit sorry for Jake as he slopes off home across the grass.

  Any awkwardness is soon forgotten, though. Matt’s in his element, arranging us all on the steps of the old railway carriage, then under the trees, then clowning about in an overgrown flower bed. He lines up the band in front of the railway carriage and gets Marley, Lexie and me to go inside and lean out of the carriage windows.

  ‘Say cheese!’ Matt yells, and a cheesy chorus erupts. We’re having fun.

  Later, Marley sits on the steps and flicks through the images on Matt’s camera, his face impassive.

  ‘Think we just got ourselves an official photographer,’ he says at last, and Matt rolls his eyes and laughs.

  6

  Tea and Cake

  ‘Seriously, Mum, it’s a crazy idea,’ I argue. ‘It’s a brilliant opportunity, but dragging the whole band down for a week in Devon at half-term? With hardly any notice? I don’t think it’ll happen, that’s all!’

  Mum sighs. ‘I thought you’d be excited,’ she says. ‘I would be, in your shoes. I thought you’d be the one nagging me to let you go, not the other way round!’

  ‘I am excited,’ I say, although to be honest ‘scared’ is a far better word to describe how I’m feeling. I should be thrilled at the idea of working with Ked Wilder … but that was before little chunks of my life started disappearing, a bit at a time, always at the most awkward moment possible. How can I ‘step up to the next level’ as lead singer of the Lost & Found when I can’t even navigate my school day without looking like an idiot?

  It’s just a matter of time before the band start looking at me with the same disappointment as my teachers. And it’ll happen way faster if we’re all stuck in a studio together, practising 24/7 with pop legend Ked Wilder watching our every move. I’ve been in denial, but tonight’s meeting at Greystones is threatening to make it all too real. I don’t want to go – not to the meeting, not to Devon.

  ‘It’d be amazing,’ I tell Mum now. ‘If it happened. But Romy won’t be able to leave her mum – she’s ill a lot and totally relies on her. And Happi’s parents are super strict – I can’t see them agreeing to send her to Devon for a week. I don’t think Sami, Bex or Lexie are sure about it either, and there’s no point unless the whole band are there.’

  Mum frowns. ‘It’s not like you to be so negative, Sash,’ she says. ‘Is everything OK?’

  This is my chance, my opportunity to tell Mum what’s been happening … but how can I when I don’t understand it myself? I know it’s happened in front of my parents a few times: ‘Dreaming again, Sasha!’ they say, or, ‘Hey, are you listening?’ It probably doesn’t seem anything to worry about, just me being ditzy and dreamy again. How do you tell your mum you keep falling into a black hole and vanishing? It sounds like the plot of an especially bad sci-fi movie – she’d think I was crazy. Sometimes I think so too.

  ‘Sash?’

  ‘Everything’s fine,’ I mumble. ‘I just hope this meeting isn’t a waste of time, that’s all …’

  ‘It won’t be.’ Mum grins, grabs her best coat and chucks me my jacket. ‘We’d better go, though, or we’ll be late. Your dad’s working till eight, so he won’t make it.’

  ‘Again?’ I say. Dad seems to have been working every shift he can get lately, which makes me anxious. ‘He works too hard!’

  ‘He’s just doing the best he can for us,’ she declares. ‘C’mon – whether the trip comes off or not, we still get to meet the famous Ked Wilder and eat cake … what’s not to like?’

  I’m laughing as she bundles me out of the door.

  The meeting doesn’t pan out quite the way I imagined.

  Louisa Winter opens the door to us, looking even more dramatic than usual in a vintage emerald dress with a handkerchief hem, her auburn hair piled up on her head and secured with a couple of chopsticks.

  ‘Ooh, I love your dress!’ Mum gushes. ‘I can tell you’re a painter, Ms Winter – you have a wonderful eye for colour! I always notice these things. I’m a make-up artist, you see. I work in Barlow’s department store in town. We have some fabulous jewel-bright eyeshadows, really intense and shimmery. You’d like them!’

  ‘Perhaps I would,’ Ms Winter says graciously. ‘Maybe I’ll pop along one of these days! Come in, both of you. There’s tea and cake – and Ked’s here, of course. We’re almost ready to start.’

  The big, shabby-chic sitting room is crammed with people. I see Romy and her mum, Happi and her parents, Bex and Lexie and their foster parents – even Lexie’s grandparents. Lee’s dad is there in oil-stained overalls, and Marley and Dylan’s mum is sitting nervously on the edge of one of Louisa Winter’s squashy sofas, still in her supermarket tabard, balancing a china cup and saucer anxiously on one knee. George’s dad is wearing a tweed jacket and twiddling his moustache, and Sami’s mum and sister are chatting to a woman in a billowy Indian dress who can only be Jake’s mum.

  Jake waves me over, but as I move towards him I’m distracted by a friendly nudge from someone I really didn’t expect to see. Matt Brennan grins at me, notebook and pencil at the ready, his mum perched beside him on a slightly moth-eaten chaise longue.

  ‘Sasha! I saved a space for you,’ he says, as Mum and I pick our way through the sitting room in search of the last remaining chairs. ‘Thought you weren’t coming for a minute there!’

  ‘Wouldn’t have missed it for the world,’ I tell him, and I almost mean it too, now that I get to sit next to Matt. He saved a seat for me … That has to mean he likes me, right?

  I smile apologetically at Jake, but he’s turned away already.

  ‘The cake is to die for,’ Matt whispers, as Louisa Winter approaches with a plate piled high with home-baked goodies. I choose what looks like a slice of lemon drizzle, while Matt snaffles a second piece of chocolate gateau.

  ‘Lapsang, Earl Grey, orange pekoe or squash?’ Louisa Winter asks, and I ask for squash because I have no clue what the other options might involve. We have PG Tips at home.

  ‘I didn’t know you’d be here,’ I whisper to Matt. ‘It’s a nice surprise!’

  ‘For me too,’ he replies. ‘We got the letter from Ked Wilder yesterday – how cool?’

  ‘Very,’ I agree. ‘Brilliant, in fact! Why d’you think he asked you?’

  ‘Well, it’s not like it’s just the band, is it? Jake’s going, and all he does is twiddle with the mixing desk and set stuff up, right? Ked’s probably got people to do all that already.’

  I frown. ‘Jake’s great, and he’s definitely part of the band. You’d like him, actually!’

  ‘Yeah?’ Matt says with a shrug. ‘Anyway, seems Marley wanted me to come to Devon as official band photographer, and Ked loved the idea. So here I am!’

  He winks and grins, and a flutter of butterflies start doing somersaults in my belly. Suddenly the trip to Devon seems a whole lot more appealing.

  The buzz of chatter and the clink of mismatched china teacups stills abruptly as Ked Wilder strides into the room, all long legs and black leather jacket and fedora hat. Mum, sitting across the room with George and his dad, looks bright-eyed and pink-cheeked, and she’s not the only one displaying middle-aged fangirl tendencies. I try not to cringe.

  ‘Hello!’ Ked Wilder booms. ‘Thank you all for coming along this evening, and at such short notice too. I called this meeting because I really wanted to meet you, and I wanted to explain why I’d like the kids to come down to the studio at half-term. We all know how tale
nted the Lost & Found are, but it’s a long time since I’ve seen such drive and enthusiasm in a young band.

  ‘I’ve been in this business a long time, and I believe these kids have something special – they could go all the way to the top. I want to help in any way I can, and if we can get everyone together down in Devon …’

  ‘How long are we actually talking?’ Lee’s dad wants to know.

  ‘Five or six days?’ Ked suggests. ‘We could get a lot of very useful stuff done in that time. School breaks up on the Thursday – Friday’s an Inset day it seems, so the kids can travel then. I’ll send them back the following week. Before anyone asks, I’ll be covering travel costs – a hired minibus seems the best plan – and I’ll put everybody up at my home. It’s a big house and I have a great team – we’ll make sure everyone is looked after.’

  There’s a murmur of appreciation, but not everyone is convinced.

  ‘Well,’ Happi’s mum says. ‘It’s very generous, and I don’t want to seem ungrateful, but I’m not sure I’m comfortable with my daughter going away for a week with no real supervision …’

  ‘I worry about this also,’ Sami’s mum says.

  Ked Wilder nods. ‘I’d be the first to admit that looking after a bunch of teenagers will be daunting,’ he says. ‘So I’d like to ask if any of you parents would like to come along to keep it all running smoothly. That way I can focus on what I’m good at – the music! We’ve room for three or four adult guests to accompany the band if anyone’s up for it?’

  The discussion shifts to include several parents who are offering to act as chaperones, and Ked Wilder gets out a notebook to jot down names and contact numbers.

  ‘I can’t,’ Mum whispers sadly. ‘I’d give anything to be able to go, but I’ve taken extra shifts all through half-term and your dad will still be in the middle of this new estate build. He can’t take time out.’