The Dare Game Read online

  Before I could make anything up she says, '/

  know. It's Oxfam!'

  20

  Everyone laughed again but this time it was awful so I got mad and called Roxanne various names and then she called me names and most of it was baby stuff but then she said the B word

  – and added that it was true in my case because I really didn't have a dad.

  So I had to smack her one then, didn't I? It was only fair. Only Roxanne and all her little girly hangers-on didn't think it was fair and they told Mrs Vomit Bagley and she certainly didn't think it was fair and she told Mr Donne the headteacher and, guess what, he didn't think it was fair either. He rang Cam and asked her to come to the school for a Quiet Word. I was yanked along to the study too and I said lots of words not at all quietly, but Cam put her arm round me and hissed in my ear, 'Cool it, Trace.'

  I tried. I thought c-o-o-l and imagined a beautiful blue lake of water and me swimming slowly along – but

  I was so sizzling mad the water

  started to bubble all around me

  and I ended up boiling over and

  telling the head what I thought

  of him and his poxy teachers and putrid pupils. (Get my vocabulary, Mrs V.B.!) 21

  I very nearly ended up being excluded. Which is mad. I should have been even cheekier because I don't want to go to this terrible old school.

  So I've excluded myself.

  I'm here.

  In my own secret place. Dead

  exclusive. My very own house.

  Home!

  Well, it's not exactly homely at the moment. It needs a good

  going over with a vacuum or

  two. Or three or four or five. And even though it's kind of empty it needs a spot of tidying.

  There are empty beer cans and McDonald's cartons chucked all over the place, and all kinds of freebie papers and advertising bumpf litter the hall so you're wading ankle-deep when you come in the front door. Only I didn't, seeing as it's locked and bolted and boarded over. I came in the back, through the broken window, ever so carefully.

  I went in the back garden because I was mooching round and round the streets, dying for a wee. I came across this obviously empty house down at the end of a little cul-de-sac with big brambles all over the place giving lots of 22

  cover so I thought I'd nip over the wall quick and relieve myself. Which I did, though a black cat suddenly streaked past, which made me jump and lose concentration so I very nearly weed all over my trainers.

  When I was relieved and decent I tried to catch the cat, pretending this was a jungle and the cat was a tiger and I was all set to train it but the cat went

  'Purr-lease!' and stalked off with its tail in the air.

  I explored the jungle by myself and spotted the broken window and decided to give the house a recce too.

  It's a great house. It hasn't quite got all mod cons any more. The water's been turned off and the lights won't switch on and the radiators are cold. But there's still a sofa in the living room, quite a swish one, red velvet. Some plonker's put his muddy boots all over it, but I've been scratching at it with my fingernails and I think it'll clean up a treat.

  I could bring a cushion. And a blanket. And some food. Yeah.

  Next time.

  But now it's time for me to go . . . back to Cam.

  23

  Cam is fostering me. It was all my idea. When I was back in the Children's Home I was pretty desperate to be fostered. Ugly desperate. They'd even tried advertising me in the papers, this gungy little description of me outlining all my bad points together with a school photo where I was scowling – and so no-one came forward, which didn't exactly surprise me. Though it was still awful.

  Especially when one of the kids at school brought the newspaper into school and showed everyone. That was a different school. It wasn't much cop either. But it was marginally better than this one. This one is the worst ever.

  It's Cam's fault. She said I had to go there.

  Because it's the nearest one. I knew I'd hate it from the very first day. It's an old school, all red brick and brown paint and smelly 25

  cloakrooms and nearly all the teachers are old too. They sound like they've all been to this old-fashioned elocution school to get that horrid sarcastic tone to their voices.

  You know: 'Oh, that's really clever of you, Tracy Beaker' when you spill

  your paint water (accidentally

  on purpose all over Roxanne's

  designer T-shirt!), and 'I'm

  amazed that you're the one who scribbled silly words

  all over the blackboard,

  Tracy Beaker' (wonderfully wicked words!), and 'Can you possibly speak up a bit, Tracy Beaker, I think there's a deaf old lady at the other end of the street who didn't quite catch that' (I had to raise my voice because how else can I get the other kids in my group to listen to me?).

  I hate it when we have to split up for group work. They all fit into these neat little groups: Roxanne and her gang, Almost-Alan-Shearer and the football crazies, Basher Dixon and his henchmen, Wimpy Lizzie and Dopey Dawn and that lot, Brainbox Hannah and Swotty Andrew – they're all divided up. And then there's me.

  26

  Mrs V.B. puts me in different groups each time. Sometimes I'm in a group all by myself.

  I don't care. I prefer it. I hate them all.

  Cam says I should try to make friends. I don't want to be friends with that seriously sad bunch of losers. I keep moaning to Cam that it's a rubbish school and telling her to send me somewhere else. She's useless. Well, she did try going down to the Guildhall and seeing if they could swop me somewhere else but they said the other schools in the area are oversubscribed.

  She just accepted it. Didn't make any kind of fuss. If you want anything in this world you've got to fight for it. I should know.

  'You're on their waiting list,' Cam said, as if she thought I'd be pleased.

  What use is that? I've been waiting half my life to get a life. I thought my big chance had come when Cam came to the Children's Home to research this boring old article about kids in care.

  (She only got £100 for it and I was barely mentioned!) I thought she might do as a foster mum as she's a writer and so am I.

  She needed quite a lot of persuading.

  27

  But I can be pretty determined when I want.

  And I did want Cam. Badly.

  So when she said, 'Right then, Tracy, let's give it a go. You and me.

  OK?' it was more than

  OK. I was over the moon.

  Soaring straight up into the

  solar system. I couldn't wait

  to get out of the Children's

  Home. I got dead impatient

  with Elaine the Pain my

  social worker because she

  seemed to be trying to slow

  things down instead of speed them up.

  'No point in rushing things, Tracy,' she said.

  I felt there was every point. I didn't want Cam to change her mind. She was having to go to all these interviews and meetings and courses and she's not really that sort of person. She doesn't like to be bossed around and told what to do. Like me. I was scared she might start to think it was all too much hassle.

  But eventually we had a weekend together and that was great. Cam wanted it to be a very laid-back weekend – a walk in the park, a 28

  video or two, and a takeaway pizza. I said I did all that sort of stuff already at the Children's Home and couldn't we do something special to celebrate our first weekend together?

  I told you I can be pretty persuasive. Cam took me to Chessington World of Adventures and it was truly great and she even bought me this huge python with beady green eyes and a black forked tongue. She dithered long and hard about it, saying she

  didn't want it to look like

  she was buying my affec-

  tion, but I made the python

  wind round and round

  her beguilingly
. He 'told'

  her he was desperate to

  be bought because the

  shopkeeper was really mean

  to him just because he'd got a teeny bit peckish and gobbled up a furry bunny and several toy mice as a little snack.

  Cam bought him though she said she was mad and that she'd be eating bread and cheese for the rest of the week as the entry tickets and burger and chips for lunch had already cost a fortune.

  29

  I should have realized she can be a boring old meanie when it comes to money but I wanted Cam to foster me so much that I didn't focus on her bad points.

  Maybe she didn't focus on my bad points???

  Anyway, it was like we were both wearing our rose-coloured glasses and we smiled in our pink-as-petals perfect world and on Sunday evening when I had to go back to the Home Cam hugged me almost as tight as I hugged her and promised that she really wanted to go through with things and foster me.

  So she did. And that's really where my story should have ended. Happily Ever After. Only I'm not always happy. And actually I'm not even sure Cam is either.

  It was fine at first. Elaine says we went through this Honeymoon Period.

  Is it any wonder I call her a pain?

  She comes out with such yucky

  expressions. But I suppose Cam

  and I were a little bit like

  newly weds. We went every-

  where together, sometimes

  even hand-in-hand, and when-

  ever I wanted anything I

  could generally persuade her

  30

  and I was careful not to get too stroppy because I didn't want her to go off me and send me back. But after a b i t . . .

  I don't know. Somehow it all changed. Cam wouldn't always take me out for treats and buy me stuff. Stuff I seriously need, like designer clothes, else I get picked on by poisonous girls like Roxanne. Cam says she can't afford it – which can't be true. I know for a fact she gets paid a fortune by the authorities for looking after me. It's a bit of a rip-off, if you ask me. And this is all on top of what she earns from being a writer.

  Cam says she doesn't earn much as a writer.

  Peanuts, she says. Well, that's her fault. She doesn't write the right stuff. She's wasting her time writing these yawny articles for big boring papers that haven't got proper pictures. And her books are even worse.

  They're dreary paperbacks about poor women with problems. I mean, who wants to read that sort of rubbish? I wish she'd write more romantic stuff. I keep telling Cam she wants to get cracking on those great glossy books everyone reads on their holidays. Where all the women are beautiful with heaps of different designer outfits and all the men have 31

  dynamic jobs and are very

  powerful and they all get

  together in different combi-

  nations so there are lots and

  lots of rude bits.

  Cam just laughs at me and

  says she can't stick those sort of books. She says she doesn't mind not being a successful writer.

  I mind. I want a foster mum I can show off about. I can't show off about Cam because no-one's ever heard of her.

  And she's not pretty or sexy or glamorous. She doesn't wear any

  make-up and her hair's too short to style so it just sticks straight up and her clothes are awful – T-shirts and jeans all the time and they're

  certainly not designer.

  Her home is just as shabby too. I hoped I'd get to live in a big house with swish furniture and lots of fancy ornaments, but Cam lives in this poky little flat. She hasn't even got any proper carpet, she's just polished up the bare floorboards and has a few rugs scattered about. Quite good fun if I fancy a slide but they look hopeless. You should see her sofa 32

  too! It's leather but it's all cracked so she has to hide it with this old patchwork quilt and some lumpy tapestry cushions she cross-stitched herself. She tried to show me how to do cross-stitch. No wonder that's what it's called. The more I stitched the crosser I got, and I soon gave up in disgust.

  I've got my own bedroom but it's not a patch on my room at the Children's Home. It's not much bigger than a cupboard. Cam's so mean too. She said I could choose to have my bedroom exactly the way I wanted. Well, I had some great ideas. I wanted a king-size bed with a white satin duvet and my own dressing table with lights all round the mirror like a film star and white carpet as soft and thick as cat fur and my own computer to write my stories on and my own sound system and a 33

  giant white television and video and a trapeze hanging from the ceiling so I could practise circus tricks and my own ensuite bathroom so I could splash all day in my own private bubble bath.

  Cam acted like I was joking. When she realized I wasn't joining in the general laughter she said, 'Come on, Trace, how could all that stuff ever fit in the box room?'

  Yeah, quite. Why should I be stuck in the box room? Am I a box? Why can't I have Cam's room? I mean, she's got hardly any stuff, just a lot of books and a little bed. She could easily fit in the box room.

  I did my best to persuade her. I wheedled and whined for all I was worth – but she didn't budge. So I ended up in this little rubbish room and I'm supposed to think it a huge big deal because I was allowed to choose the colour paint and pick a new duvet cover and curtains. I chose black to match my mood.

  I didn't think Cam would take me seriously but she gave in on that one. Black walls.

  Black ceiling. She suggested luminous silver stars which are kind of a good idea. I'm not too keen on the dark. I'm not scared. I'm not scared of anything. But I like to look up from 34

  my bed and see those stars glowing up above.

  Cam hunted around and found some black sheets with silver stars and made curtains to match. She's pretty useless at sewing and the hems go up and down a bit but I suppose she was trying her best. She calls my black room the 'bat cave'. She's bought me several little black velvet toy bats to hang from the ceiling.

  They're quite cute really. And my python lies on the floor by the door and acts like a draught excluder and

  attacks anyone who dares try to

  barge in on us.

  Like Jane and Liz. I can't

  stand Jane and Liz. They are

  Cam's friends. They keep

  coming over and sticking their

  noses in. I thought they were

  35

  OK at first. Jane is big (you should see the size of her bum!) and Liz is little and bouncy.

  Jane took me swimming once (she's not a pretty sight in her swimming costume) and it was quite good fun actually. There was a chute into the water and a wave machine and Jane let me ride on her shoulders and didn't get huffy when I pretended she was a whale.

  She even spouted water for me. But then she came over one day when Cam and I were having this little dispute – well, kind of mega-argument when I was letting rip yelling all sorts of stuff – and later when I was sulking in my bat cave I heard Jane telling Cam that she was daft to put up with all my nonsense and she knew I had had a hard time but that didn't give me licence to be such a Royal Pain in the Bottom. (A pain wouldn't have a chance attacking her bottom.)

  I still thought Liz was OK. I was worried at first because she's a teacher but she's not a bit like Mrs V.B. She knows all these really rude jokes and she can be a great laugh. She's got her own rollerblades and she let me borrow them which was great, I was great too.

  I simply whizzed around and didn't fall over once and looked seriously cool – but then 36

  when I started getting on to Cam that it was time she bought me

  my own rollerblades seeing I was so super-skilled Liz got a bit

  edgy and told me that Cam

  wasn't made of money.

  I wish!

  Then Liz started off this boring old lecture about Caring not being the same as Spending Money and it was almost as if she'd morphed into Mrs Vomit Bagley before my very eyes!

  I still thought Liz was kind o
f cool though but then one evening she came round late when I was in bed in the Bat Cave and I think maybe Cam was crying in the living room because we'd had some boring old set-to about something . . . I forget what. Well, I don't forget, I happened to have borrowed a tenner out of her purse – I didn't steal it – and anyway if she's my foster mum now she should fork out for me, and she's so mean she doesn't give me enough pocket money, and it was only a measly ten-pound note – I could have nicked a twenty – and why did she leave her purse lying around if she gets so fussed about cash going missing? – she's not part of the real 37

  world, old Cam, she wouldn't have lasted five minutes in the Children's Home.

  Anyway, Liz came round and I slithered round my door like my

  python so I could hear what they were saying. I figured it would be about me. And it was.

  Liz kept asking Cam what this

  latest crisis was all about and Cam kept quiet for a bit but then out it all came: naughty little Tracy is a thief. Cam started on about some other stuff too. OK, I borrowed one of her pens – well, several – and some silly old locket that her mum had given her. I didn't mean to buckle it. I was only trying to prise it open to see what she had inside.

  I felt Cam was being a mean old tell-tale –

  and Liz was encouraging her for all she was worth, saying it was good for her to let it all out and have a moan and howl. Liz came out with all this s-t-u-p-i-d stuff that I was just nicking for affection and attention. All these teachers and social workers have got their heads full of this rubbish. I nicked the stuff because I was short of cash and needed a pen and . . . well, I just wanted the locket. I 38

  thought I could maybe put a

  picture of my mum in it. My real mum. I've got a photo, and she's looking dead glamorous, a true

  movie star, smiling and smiling.

  Guess what she's smiling at!

  This little baby in her arms