Best Friends Rock! Read Free

the question at the top of her screen. Almost any other subject would have been fine, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to examine friendship at the moment. It was a bit too close to what she was going through with Hannah. She rummaged in her bag and checked her phone. No messages, and unless the flight had been held up, Hannah would certainly be airborne by now.
    She picked up the pencil next to her laptop and sucked the end of it. If the quiz had been about clothes, or make-up, animals, music…anything else would have been fun. But this…still, she couldn’t back out now. She put the pencil down again and read what was on her screen.
    To follow the Heart magazine template she had to choose ten questions. There would be three possible answers to each question, and in the end, the readers should be able to tell if they were:
    A. Real Softies
    B. Well Balanced
    C. Tough Cookies
    Could she do this without ending up feeling really down? Of course no one was supposed to take these quizzes too seriously. They were supposed to be fun, to be done over lunch with a gaggle of friends. But her friend wasn’t around to giggle with, and Ellie felt sure that compiling this particular quiz was going to make her feel uncomfortable and force her to re-examine her own behaviour. But then she remembered her mantra, and told herself not to be such a wimp. She simply needed to swallow her personal feelings and get on with it!
    She took a deep breath, opened the folder of questions and clicked on the “Friends” file. There were loads of questions and answers, so all she had to do was choose ten, and rephrase them. She picked one and studied it. You and your best friend have applied for tickets for your fave TV programme. She gets one but you don’t. What do you say to her? That was easy. She freshened it up by making it tickets for a sell-out gig instead. And it was simple to fiddle with the answers to make them work. It was going to be okay.
    â€œDon’t make a mess of updating. It would be just like you,” said Piano.
    Ellie looked towards her crossly. “I won’t!”
    Piano didn’t sound convinced. “Only, loads of our readers turn to the quiz page first. I don’t want you ruining the magazine for them by making it too childish.”
    Francesca didn’t look up from her desk, but she must have been listening. “Give Ellie a break, Piano,” she said mildly.
    Piano scowled, but said no more. Ellie sorted out a couple more questions and felt pretty pleased with herself. It was going well. Then she came across one that didn’t need much updating. Your best friend asks you to go on holiday with her, but you’ve already said you’ll do something else .
    She stared at the words in front of her and gave a huge sigh. Oh dear. What should she have said?
    Do you:
    A. Agree straight away and cancel your other plans.
    B. Tell her that you’d love to another time.
    C. Say you have more important things to do.
    She was very afraid that the answer she’d given to Hannah fell under the category of “C”.
    Ellie stifled a groan. She risked a glance in Piano’s direction, but Piano was hard at work on her article and hadn’t noticed Ellie’s distress. Well, thank goodness for that! Ellie reached into her bag and brought out her phone. There was still no text. By now, surely, Hannah’s plane would be far away. Ellie looked out of the window. As she gazed at the sun shining on buildings she saw a plane in the distance. It must have just taken off from the airport, because it was climbing steeply up into the sky. She could have been doing that, instead of sitting here.
    Piano’s voice jerked her out of her reverie. “I suppose you’ve forgotten the coffee run, as usual.”
    Ellie summoned up as much dignity as she could, turned away from the window and stared at Piano. “Of course I haven’t.” She