Best Friends Read online

  She's told me heaps and heaps of stuff. But now she's got this secret. She doesn't know t h a t I know she's got a secret. I found out in a bad way. I read her diary.

  I know you s h o u l d n ' t ever r e a d anyone's private diary. Especially not your best friend's. I've actually had a peep at Alice's diary several times. Not to be m e a n and sneaky. It's j u s t so i n t e r e s t i n g finding out w h a t s h e ' s thinking, like t h e r e ' s a little window in her forehead and you can peep t h r o u g h into her brain. It's usually lovely because she writes all this stuff about me.

  Gemma was so funny in class today that even Mrs watson burst out laughing Gemma and I made up our own cartoon story about all the animals in Noah's Ark and the giraffes stood up too suddenly and made a hole in the roof and it was raining hard but the elephants spread their ears to Keep Noah and his family dry. Gem gets such good ideas. . .

  18

  I w a s feeling fed up at school today because Mum won't let me have that suede jacket we saw on Saturday but Gemma shared her chocolate with me and said she 11 buy me as many suede jackets as I want when we re grown up.

  I love it t h a t she writes page after page saying I'm comical and inventive and kind. I love it t h a t she's stuck a funny photo of us with our a r m s round each other at t h e front of her diary. She's outlined it with silver pen like it's a frame and t h e n stuck her favourite stickers of flowers and dolphins and kittens and ballet dancers all over t h e page.

  This is why I took the tiniest peek at her diary yesterday. We'd had a lovely afternoon making a picture of t h e flat we're going to share together when we're old enough. Alice seemed a little odd about this at first, b u t I j u s t thought it was because she's not quite as good at drawing as I am.

  She perked up when I said we'd cut stuff out of my m u m ' s magazines. She liked

  choosing a n d cutting out our twin beds a n d our h u g e squashy

  velvet sofa and our giant fridge

  and our big white furry rug.

  She started cutting weeny

  bright hexagons out of

  the magazines in different colours to make into patchwork quilts for our beds, with matching patchwork cushions for the sofa. I enjoyed cutting out lots of food to stick into our fridge, although some of the tubs of ice cream and chocolate éclairs were so big they spilled out onto the floor. Imagine a tub of ice cream so big you could stick your whole head inside it to have a good lick; imagine chocolate éclairs so enormous you could sit astride them (though it might make your knickers a bit sticky).

  Then I inked eyes and ears and a snout and four claws on the big white furry rug, turning it into a real live polar bear for us to cuddle and take turns riding on his back.

  Alice did get a bit irritated about that. 'I thought we were going to do this properly, Gem. You're just messing about,' she said, opening and closing her little pink mouth every time she opened and closed her scissors.

  I got a bit irritated too because she spent ages and ages getting all the colours of her patchwork pieces in place and making them into a pattern.

  Alice got even more irritated when I had an itchy nose and sneezed and blew all the pieces about before she'd had a chance to stick them down.

  But that was just us, ordinary Alice-and-Gemma fuss. It wasn't like a real quarrel. We don't ever ever ever have proper quarrels. We haven't ever 20

  broken friends, not even for half a day. So why won't she tell me this terrible secret?

  Doesn't she want me to be her friend any more?

  She did act a bit weird at tea time. It was a special tea, even though it was just Mum and Alice and me.

  Dad was out in his cab working, Callum was round at Ayesha's and Jack had a tray up in his room because he couldn't be dragged away from his computer. We had Mum's spag bol and then fruit salad with that lovely squirty whippy cream out of a can and then a handful of Smarties each. I chose all the blue ones and Alice picked out all the pink.

  I ate everything up. In fact I even licked my plate when Mum wasn't watching. Alice didn't eat much at all. She's usually a bit picky about her food, but she loves spag bol and fruit and cream and Smarties as much as me, so this was definitely a bad sign. She didn't even want to have a who-can-suck-up-her-spaghetti-fastest competition. When my plate was totally empty Alice was still winding her spaghetti round and round her fork in a thoughtful way, but not actually eating it.

  'I'll eat yours if you like,' I offered, just to be helpful.

  'You leave Alice's plate alone, Gemma!' said Mum. 'Just because you hoover yours up in two 21

  minutes flat! Honestly, you've got the table manners of a starving gorilla.'

  I started monkeying around then, beating my chest and smacking my lips, until Mum got cross, which wasn't really fair because she'd started the gorilla reference. Alice's spag bol was stone cold by this time so Mum tactfully removed it. Alice did eat a little fruit salad, though she just pressed one weeny dollop of cream on top. I seriously sprayed my plate, making a cream mountain, until Mum snatched the can away.

  Then we had the Smarties.

  'Remember we had Smarties stuck all round the icing on our last birthday cake?' I said. 'Hey, did you know you get a special wish every seventh Smartie?'

  'No you don't. You just made that up. You only get wishes when you cut your birthday cake,' said Alice. 'We haven't got a cake. And it isn't our birthday.'

  'We can make a wish any time we want, birthdays or unbirthdays. Come on, Alice, wish with me.'

  We always wish the same wish.

  'We wish we stay friends for ever and ever and ever,' I said.

  I dug Alice in the ribs with my elbow and then she said it too. Mumbling a little. Then she ducked her head and had a drink of juice. She coughed and 22

  spluttered and had to run to the bathroom.

  'Oh dear, poor Alice. Did she choke on a Smartie?'

  said Mum.

  'I don't think so,' I said.

  When she came back from the bathroom Alice's eyes were all red. I know your eyes water a bit if you choke. But she looked as if she'd been crying.

  I didn't think too much of it at the time.

  Alice is a bit of a crybaby. She cries at the most ridiculous things. She even cries when she's happy, like the time I gave her my grandma's china doll, Melissa. She left her to me when she died. I loved her because she was my grandma's special doll. She'd been her grandma's special doll once upon a time. Melissa was very pretty, with soft brown ringlets and shiny brown eyes with proper eyelashes. I liked flicking her eyelids up and down, making her blink very realistically. Mum got narked and said I'd poke Melissa's eyes out if I wasn't careful.

  Alice loved my doll too, especially her beautiful white dress and petticoats and her long lacy knickers (imagine wearing knickers way past your knees!). I really really wanted Melissa to play with.

  I'm not at all a girly girl but I've always liked playing games with dolls. Wild, messy, exciting games.

  My Barbies trekked through garden jungles and 23

  wrestled with earthworms and nearly drowned in torrential rain.

  I looked at pristine Melissa. Even her little pearl-buttoned suede boots were white. I knew just what she'd look like if I kept her. I suddenly knew what to do. I gave Melissa to Alice. Alice clasped her to her chest (carefully, so her clothes weren't crushed) and great fat tears spurted down her cheeks.

  I got worried in case I'd made a mistake and she didn't really like Melissa. Alice insisted she was crying for joy. I cried tears of anguish, fury and despair later that day when Mum found out. She was sooooo cross with me for giving away Grandma's doll.

  I wondered if Alice could possibly have been crying tears of joy because of our special Smartie wish but this seemed a little excessive, even for Alice.

  She seemed fine again after tea. We watched television together, and when our favourite pop programme came on we sang along too and did all the dance routines. Well, Alice danced every step correctly; I just jumped up a
nd down and waved

  my arms around.

  Callum came and

  joined in for a bit. He

  dances even more wildly

  than me. Alice gets a bit

  24

  nervous when he does his crazy jive stuff and flings us about, but I love it. Then Callum rushed off round to see Ayesha.

  Alice and I took Barking Mad for a run round the garden. We had one more go at training him to do tricks. When he was a little fluffy puppy he'd hold out his paw and shake it in this seriously cute way. I got terribly excited and thought we could train him up to be a performing Wonder Dog. Alice and I could be part of the act. I could wear a top hat and tails and give Barking Mad his orders. Alice could wear a frilly ballet frock and be my number one assistant.

  However, Barking Mad went barking mad when he got to be a teenager. He wouldn't do any tricks at all. He'd occasionally shake paws if he was in a very good mood and you bribed him with chocolate, but he absolutely refused to dance on his hind legs or turn somersaults or bark

  happy birthday. He'd bark, all right, very loudly and persistently, telling you to wool off and stop pestering him.

  He did that last night when I tried to get him to balance on a flowerpot. It was a big flowerpot. He could have done it easy-peasy if he'd wanted. But he didn't want. He got so cross about it that Jack unchained himself from his computer and came 25

  stumbling down from his bedroom to rescue him.

  'Leave him be, you little dog torturer,' he said, hauling Barking Mad away.

  'I'm simply trying to help him achieve stardom,'

  I said. 'I've even thought of a professional name for him. The Dog Star. Do you get it? There's a real Dog Star—'

  'And I wish you'd swoop off and live on it,' said Jack, dragging Barking Mad back to the house.

  I mouthed rude words behind his back. Alice giggled. Then we climbed up onto the big branch of the apple tree and traded all the really rude words we knew. I know heaps more than Alice. It was great dangling our legs from the branch. I tried bouncing up and down a bit but Alice got scared. Then she said she had pins and needles in her bottom and wanted to get down. So we did.

  Dad's been promising to make me a proper tree house for ages and ages but he never seems to have time to get so much as started on it. I know Alice would love a tree house.

  Then Mum called us indoors and we got ready for bed. We sat in our pyjamas at either end of my bed with a big bowl of popcorn between us. I played at being a sea lion, throwing pieces of popcorn up in the air and catching them in my mouth, while Alice wrote her diary. I wasn't always a very efficient sea lion, though I did my best.

  26

  'You keep jogging me, leaping about like that,'

  said Alice.

  'Well, it's difficult, catching popcorn,' I said, munching.

  'You'll choke if you're not careful,' said Alice, closing her diary. 'Stop being so piggly, Gem. I want to put nail varnish on now. Come on, I'll do your nails too.'

  'Boring,' I said. 'You'll just nag at me for smudg-ing them.'

  'So don't smudge them,' said Alice sternly. She reached for her nail varnish pot and opened it.

  'You sound just like my mum sometimes,' I said, nudging her with my toes.

  I nudged her a little too enthusiastically.

  I knocked the big bowl so

  popcorn exploded all over

  the bed. Alice jumped

  and spilled pink

  gloopy nail varnish

  all over her wrist

  and up her pyjama

  sleeve.

  'Oh Gem!' she

  shrieked. She jumped up and went to the bathroom to try to wipe it off.

  I did my best to scoop popcorn back into the bowl.

  It had wriggled its way into everything, even crack-27

  ling inside Alice's diary. I shook it out – and then had a little weeny glance at what she'd written.

  Then I read it again. And again.

  I don't Know what to do. I feel so awful I can't tell Gemma. I simply can't It has to stay a SECRET Yet it's so hard to act like normal, as if we're going to carry on in the same old way, like Gemma wished, best friends for ever

  Has Alice got a new best friend?

  Has she simply got sick of me?

  I couldn't sleep. I wriggled around miserably in the popcorn crumbs, wondering whether to wake Alice up and ask her outright. In the end I just cuddled up close to her. I twined a lock of her long hair round and round my fingers, as if I was tying her to me for ever.

  Three

  Ididn't say a word about the Secret when we woke up. Alice didn't either.

  I didn't say a word about the Secret when we went downstairs and fixed ourselves great big bowls of Frosties with extra sugar and a handful of sultanas, and those little hundreds-and-thousands cake sprinkles to make rainbow milk. Alice didn't either.

  I didn't say a word about the Secret when we watched television. Alice didn't either.

  I didn't say a word about the Secret when we acted out our favourite television programme The Story of Tracy Beaker. Alice didn't either.

  Alice hardly said anything at all, even when she was pretending to be Louise or Justine or Elaine the Pain (I always play Tracy). Still, Alice is always much quieter than me.

  I wasn't quiet. The more scared I get inside the noisier I get on the outside. Noisier and noisier, till Mum came rushing downstairs in her dressing gown, very cross.

  29

  'For heaven's sake, Gemma, stop that shrieking!

  Your dad didn't get home till two this morning.'

  'I'm being Tracy Beaker, Mum. I've got to shriek.

  And stamp. And kick. And whirl about,' I said, demonstrating.

  Mum seized hold of me. 'Will you stop it!' She gave me a little shake. Mum never smacks me but I think she

  often wants to. She rolled her eyes at Alice. 'Why do you like being friends with our Gemma?'

  'I don't know. Auntie Liz. I just

  do,' said Alice – and then she burst into tears.

  'Oh darling, don't cry!' said Mum. 'I'm not cross with you.'

  'I don't want you to be cross with Gemma either,'

  Alice wept.

  'Well, I'm not really cross. Just a little bit agitated. I'm afraid that's a permanent state round our Gemma,' said Mum. She ruffled my hair ruefully. 'Look at you, Gem! Your hair's sticking straight up like a lavatory brush.'

  'Well please don't shove me down the toilet, Mum,' I said.

  Mum was busy mopping Alice's face with kitchen towel. Alice usually cries just a little bit, tears delicately dripping down her pink cheeks. But now it 30

  was as if she'd sprung a leak: tears spurted, her nose ran, her mouth dribbled. She looked almost ugly, utterly unlike Alice.

  'Oh please don't cry, Alice,' I said.

  I hugged her and started howling myself.

  'Oh for heaven's sake,' said Mum. 'You girls! Don't be so silly. I give up. There's nothing to cry about.' She flicked us both lightly on our runny noses with the towel and then went upstairs to the bathroom.

  I looked at Alice. She looked at me. I gave a huge sniff and wiped my nose with the back of my hand.

  'Yuck,' said Alice. She got some kitchen towel and blew delicately. 'Gem,' she said, in a sad little whisper. 'Gem, there is something to cry about.'

  'I thought there might be,' I said. I felt as if I was standing on Grandad's window ledge, about to be pushed out into great grey emptiness.

  'I don't know how to tell you,' said Alice.

  'Just spit it out,' I said, touching her lips, trying to make her mouth move. She pretended to bite my fingers.

  'I'm not very good at spitting. Unlike you,' she said. (I had once been the undisputed champion of the splashiest spit competition held behind the bike sheds at school.)

  We both giggled feebly even though we were still crying.

  31

  'Shall I spit it out for you? You don't want to be my best friend any mo
re,' I said.

  'No, it's not that!' said Alice, but she looked stricken.

  'It's OK. Well, it's not one bit OK, but I do understand. I'm not sure I'd want to be my best friend.

  I'm noisy and silly and messy and I break things and I get on everyone's nerves.'

  'You don't get on my nerves. I want you to be my best friend for ever and ever, only . . . only . . .'

  'Only what? What is this great big secret, Alice?

  Come on, you've got to tell me.'

  'How do you know there's a secret?'

  'Look, I'm ever so sorry and I know it's a totally sneaky thing to do and you really won't want to be friends with me now, but I read your diary. Just a line or two. Last night. Well, maybe I've had one or two peeps in the past but you never wrote anything secret before—'

  'Gem, stop burbling,' said Alice. She took hold of my hand. 'I do still want to be friends. Though don't you dare read my diary again, you nosy pig! But I swore to my mum and dad that I

  wouldn't tell anyone, not even you, not till it was all settled. But you'll find out soon enough anyway. The

  thing is, I think we're moving.'

  32

  'You're moving?' I said. I felt as if the tightest belt in the world had suddenly unbuckled and set my tummy free. 'Is that all? Oh Alice, that's OK.

  Where are you moving? Don't worry, if it's right the other side of town I'll get Dad to give me a lift to your new place in the taxi – it couldn't be simpler.'

  'We're moving to Scotland,' said Alice.

  'Scotland? But that's hundreds of miles away!'

  She could just as easily have said Timbuktu. Or the Gobi Desert. Or Mars. The belt rebuckled, tight-ening until I could barely breathe.

  'But how will I see you?'

  'I know, I know, it's so awful, isn't it,' said Alice, crying again.

  'What about school?'

  'I've got to go to a new school and I won't know anyone. I won't have any friends,' Alice wailed.