Pick 'n' Mix Read Free Page B

she?”
    â€œShe’s thirteen, but—”
    â€œ Thirteen? You mean she’s Year 9 ?” Skye pulled a face. We were only Year 7 and most Year 9s, at our school at any rate, treated us like snot.
    â€œI dunno what year she’s in. She has learning difficulties so she’s more like an eight year old? She goes to St Giles.” St Giles is the special school just a bit further down the road from where we go. “I expect probably she’ll need a bit of looking after.”
    Skye said, “What kind of looking after?”
    â€œWell – you know! Just making sure she’s OK. I promised Mum we’d be responsible for her.”
    â€œ Us?” Skye was starting to sound a bit alarmed.
    â€œShe’s ever so sweet,” I said. “She won’t be any trouble.”
    â€œYou reckon?”
    â€œIt’ll just be, like, seeing her to school and picking her up again, checking she doesn’t get lost. That kind of thing. Actually,” I said, “I’m quite looking forward to it.” Well, I had been.
    Just at the moment all I could think of was what Mum was going to say.
    Jem put her arm through mine. “I don’t mind helping look after her,” she said.
    I beamed at her, gratefully; at least I had the support of one of my friends. Skye was gnawing at her lip, her forehead all crinkled. She is such a pessimist! If I listened to what she had to say I would never go anywhere or do anything. I suppose it is what comes of having this massive great brain, like a computer. Instead of just looking straight ahead, she whizzes frantically about, all up and down the side roads, in and out of blind alleys, searching for things that could go wrong. A bit too complicated for my liking. I think I am quite a straightforward type, though Mum would probably say I tend to act without thinking, which is what she said when I accidentally set fire to Dad’s garden shed and almost certainly what she was going to say when I tried to explain why I’d cut a hole in my carpet…
    I gulped as we reached Sunnybrook Gardens, which is where the three of us go our different ways.
    â€œWish me luck,” I said.
    â€œWhat for?” said Jem. “Oh! Yes. Your carpet.” She giggled. “Hope your mum doesn’t get too mad!”
    â€œBlame it on Rags,” urged Skye.
    Maybe I could. After all, it was sort of his fault. If he hadn’t chewed the fronds I could have snipped them off and nobody would ever have known. I could tell Mum that I’d cut the hole after he’d done his chewing. I could say I’d been trying to tidy things up and the knife had slipped, so then I’d thought I might as well make the hole triangle-shaped and put the cabinet on top of it. Yes! That would work.
    I crashed through the front door, all prepared with my story (in case Mum had already made the dreaded discovery and was waiting for me like a great hovering cloud at the top of the stairs). But then Rags came bounding down the hall, full of his usual doggy ecstasy at seeing me again, and I knew that I just couldn’t do it.
    â€œIt’s all right,” I whispered. “I won’t blame you!”
    While me and Rags were having a hug-in, the door of the front room opened and Mum looked out.
    â€œOh, Frankie, there you are. I’ll be with you in a minute, I’m just seeing one of my ladies. You and Angel go and make a start on your bedrooms. Tell Angel she doesn’t have to move every last item… concentrate on clothes.”
    I said, “OK.” Trying to make like it was no big deal and that my heart wasn’t already starting to sink like a lead balloon.
    Angel was in the kitchen, texting someone. She is always texting. I said, “Mum wants us to get on with moving things.”
    Angel pulled a face.
    â€œShe says not every last item. Just clothes, mainly.”
    Angel said, “If you think I’m leaving all my stuff