Love-Struck Read online

  I swear I heard every guy in the room’s jaw drop to the floor. There she was: killer smile, hair like a shampoo advert, body of a model and the cheekbones of a pixie.

  What a cow.

  Naturally, I wasn’t bitter at all, but smiled and waved as her eyes scanned the room and fell on mine. She instantly smiled wider and gave me a little wave back.

  “Yeah,” she said, turning back to Mr Clumfield and giving him a blast of her beauty. “That’s me! Emily Drew, nice to meet you.”

  Mr Clumfield grinned at us all. “Hey, lads and ladies, we have a poet!” He turned back to Emily. “I’m Mr Clumfield, and I’ll be your form tutor until you leave Cathen Comp. This is 10B,” he said, gesturing to us lot. “They look a bit rough but they’re all right really, and I’m sure they’ll make you feel more than welcome! Take a seat.”

  Several of the boys, including James, Matt and Chris (those kind of guys who reckon they’re real lady-killers) looked like they were willing to do a little bit more than make her welcome, so before she could get stuck sitting with them and being hit on for the rest of her life, I motioned for her to come and sit in the empty seat next to me that Wes and I had strategically placed there beforehand.

  Emily replied with a warm “Thanks!” and made her way across the classroom to come and sit with us, much to the Lady-Killer Squad’s dismay.

  “Hey, Wes …” she said, sitting down in the seat. I could practically hear Wes’s mind screaming all kinds of elated, rudey words. Barbie smiled the Killer Smile. “… and … I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten your name!”

  Smile, Holly; breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth…

  My own smile threatened to break, and it was my own mind’s turn to scream expletives. This girl was not good news. She was smiling at Wes and biting her lip in a bit of a wince because she couldn’t remember my name. Apart from I bet she could. Playing up, making Wes feel special. Hmm. That’s good for him, though. But she was all long legs and an evil mind: not the kind of girl a girl wants to befriend, now I was sure. More deep breaths. Think of Jonah. The tent. Jonah, his face, those eyes…

  I was back on game.

  “It’s Holly, don’t worry, and bless, it must be horrible trying to learn so many names so quickly!”

  Oh, I’m so nice, you would almost think I was genuine.

  She smiled and nodded. “Yeah, it’s been really hard, my head’s such a mess!”

  “Yeah,” chipped in Wes, with his voice smothered in concern. “It’s hard moving places, I’m not surprised.”

  I internally raised my eyebrows. Wes has moved once in his life – from the smallest house on Millionaire’s Row to the biggest. I’m sure the change was very painful for him, moving about thirty seconds down the street.

  “It is,” she grinned, not noticing that the class had broken into a frenzied whisper to discuss her arrival. Mr Clumfield had gone back to his desk, and was looking around the room to see who was present – his own way of doing the register: he feels it’s more “foolproof” – but everyone else was stealing glances at her golden hair and bronzed skin. And most probably asking themselves why she was sat with us.

  Wes and I aren’t disliked, don’t get me wrong – most people like Wes because he’s funny and modest, with a sharp(ish) wit and cheery smile; and I am the Comic Book Kid, quite talented and lover of ice cream. We have a lot of acquaintances, but not many great friends. Unfortunately, our “closest” friends happen to be Margo and Finn, a.k.a. Stoney and Crony, who made their entrance at exactly nine a.m. – only fifteen minutes late, an improvement on last week’s twenty.

  When Margo enters a room, you know about it. She is one of those people who just gets attention everywhere she goes; she’s just like a magnet for, well, all eyes really. Her PSG (Private School Girl – she wishes!) brunette flip of hair is always straight but voluminous; she always has perfect skin and teeth (due to the fact that she has every cosmetic available to man, because of “Mother”) and would also be very pretty, if she didn’t always look like she was sniffing creosote. And the model pout that so many girls attempt in the pictures on their web homepages? Margo has it. Times four. Maybe even five. It’s fabulous, but matched with her “Darling, do not talk to me, for if you utter one syllable one shall staple your mouth shut” scowl, it’s dangerous. But exactly like Mary and her little lamb; everywhere that Margo goes, Finn is sure to follow.

  Henry Finn is a bit of a mystery. According to Cathen gossip, he’s supposed to be one of my closest friends, but I honestly know no more about him now than I knew when I met him a year ago. He is still hidden underneath a mop of dark blond hair, iPod earphones in, and you’re lucky if you get more than a “Yah, safe” out of him. I think he must talk to Margo, because they can’t have had a relationship for about a year and not have talked to each other at all. But then again, if I were Margo’s boyfriend, I don’t know if I would talk; I suppose it would just be easier to agree and do whatever she wanted me to do. She’s quite the little dictator.

  Bang went the door, and in she stalked – Britain’s Next Top Model. It was year ten “mock study leave” – studying in school, but not in school uniform – and so as usual, she took the rule to the extreme. In an intricately sewn summer dress, with a tiny blue beret perched on top of her voluminous mane, and eyes flashing, Margo shot a tiny smile at Mr Clumfield and drawled, “Good morning.”

  He is pretty much the only teacher she will smile at, if you can call the twitch of her mouth a smile. She just has a power that makes people do what she wants, without her batting a long, perfect eyelash. Finn floated into the room behind her like a shadow, all in black even though it was the height of summer, and shut the door silently.

  “Yes, welcome, Margaret, Henry. Thank you for gracing us with your presence this morning…”

  Margo waved her hand lazily in Mr Clumfield’s direction, as if in acknowledgement of his comment, and looked over into our corner of the classroom. As her eyes clocked Barbie, I saw them flicker. Margo would be the deciding vote on whether Emily could come into our group, therefore deciding if it would be acceptable for Wes to, in his words, “woo her”.

  God, if you’re listening? Help him.

  What flickered in her eyes? Acceptance? No, couldn’t be, not straight away. It took her a while to accept me, even though I am the Comic Book Kid and most people just accept that I’m an OK person, because my drawings are “well awesome, mate”. So even though Barbie was gorgeous and obviously rich, pretty much right up Margo’s street, it takes a long time for her to accept people, so that couldn’t have happened yet. Margo doesn’t please easily, as you may have guessed.

  Disapproval? No, Barbie was a bit too perfect to disapprove of.

  Amusement? Of course.

  Margo likes nothing more than to cause a bit of mischief. She moved like a cat trained upon a mouse, and stopped at our table and clicked her tongue neatly, once.

  “Here we go,” muttered Wes under his breath to me.

  “Darling, is this the girl you were nattering on about last night?”

  She was talking to Wes, but her eyes were fixed firmly on the Plastic. If Barbie felt uncomfortable, she didn’t show it. Or maybe it was just her all-American thick skin that protected her from Margo’s unflinching gaze.

  That’s so like Margo, she doesn’t do tact, and so poor Wes’s face crashed into freefall for a millisecond, then pulled on the emergency cord and caught itself.

  “Yeah, this is the girl we mentioned yesterday,” he said, smiling at The Girl. “This is Emily.” Margo’s face was unreadable, but I knew something was going on in that head of hers. She may look like a doll, but I know that under that gorgeous mass of hair there is a brain that calculates quicker than, well, my calculator. Wes gestured to his twin almost apologetically. “This is my twin sister, Margo, and he’s Henry Finn, mostly just known as Finn.”

  Finn br
ought up two chairs from the front with ease – he’s much stronger than he looks – and set one down in front of Margo facing the front, then sat down in his own chair. He flicked back his hair slightly so we saw a glimpse of an eye (which is more than most people get).

  Margo slithered into her chair sideways, still not taking her eyes from Emily, and rested her skinny elbow on the back of the chair, with her head in her hand. She pouted, looking like she was waiting for something.

  “Hi, both of you!” Emily beamed. “How’s it going? I just moved here from the US—”

  “We gathered, dear,” Margo cut in dryly. I could see a test forming in her eyes. “That is a rather large lifestyle change; why did you leave?”

  “Oh, my mom got offered a job here, in the city, and Daddy works here a lot anyway, so it was pretty convenient,” Emily smiled, thinly.

  I felt another pang of sorrow for Emily, because she’d left a lot behind. It must be awful to move away from everything … then I looked down at her tanned legs and all of a sudden I didn’t feel quite so sympathetic.

  Margo didn’t miss a beat and continued to talk in her brisk, emotionless manner. “Hardly convenient for you, dearest; you must be terribly lonely. Where are you living now?”

  “Whittle Lane?”

  Margo blinked. She wasn’t really expecting that. Whittle Lane is not quite Millionaire’s Row but it’s the next rung down on the ladder. This girl had some serious cash. And cash is a very good friend of Margo Stone. “It’s quite pretty, really,” Emily continued, now almost aware of the test she was taking. “Not as big as my home back in the States, but how often would I use an outdoor swimming pool or tennis court out here in your unpredictable weather?!”

  Touché.

  After two years of seeing Margo intimidate and assess people, and having had her do it to me, I know when she’s impressed. The slight eyebrow raise told me everything, and judging by the tiny exhale beside me, Wes thought so too. Margo clicked her tongue once more.

  “Quite right, darling. Holly and dearest Wes will help you to settle in.” Her eyes flicked to us for the first time. Wes smiled. “Welcome to Cathen.”

  Emily grinned at Margo, which is quite a brave thing to do, but it showed off all of her pearly whites to a T. Finn muttered something to Margo, who then nodded.

  “Yes, quite right,” she said to her boyfriend, then turned to Emily. “As you are so new in town, you simply must come to The Venue to hear a band play on Friday evening.”

  She smiled a wide, shark-like smile that was filled with a mirth that couldn’t quite reach her eyes, so her face remained cold.

  I know that smile.

  It’s the smile of a plan hatching, a plan that will lead to mischief and mishap: the smile of a puppeteer ready to make her puppets dance.

  Margo had just invited Emily to The Faeries’ gig on Friday night. It’s sold out, but Margo never needs a ticket in there; Remi lets her in on the sly, as he’s fancied her since, like, year nine. And it’s not like he’s going to refuse Blondey Long-Legs here, so she’ll get in. Emily looked at me for reassurance and I nodded, so Emily smiled and nodded.

  “Yeah, sure, why not!”

  “Oh, what fun!” Margo exclaimed, her face now a perfect mask of simple innocence. “And you should stop by the house next week! Why, you simply must come and meet Mummy!”

  My stomach turned.

  Meeting Mrs Stone?

  Never fun.

  We got off the bus and I smiled at the driver, who scowled back. Bus drivers can be mean. Very mean when you ask for a child return because you are actually under the child age limit, but the bus driver flat-out refuses to believe that you aren’t older. This one had begrudgingly given me the child ticket, though, so he deserved the smile because I only had the right change for a child ticket anyway. Margo strode ahead of us with Finn a beat behind her, floating like a ghost. I could hear her drawl of complaint from ten metres; the chauffeur was stuck in traffic an hour away, so Margo had to get the bus back, like some “godforsaken plebeian”. If I hadn’t seen Margo cry once, I would have bet every penny in my bank account (that’s six hundred and thirty four pennies, if you were wondering) that she was dead inside. Fair enough, she cried because her gold Gucci watch broke whilst we were all playing tennis, and she hit the ball with a bit too much fury – the ball went forward, the watch flew back – but it’s still tears which show she must be a little bit human in there somewhere. Somewhere deep, deep down.

  Because it wasn’t my turn to pick up Lizzy, my little sister, we’d decided to go to Wes’s. He and I ambled along to his house, keeping our distance from Margo’s tirade, and he chatted on about the newest Wonder of the World – you guessed it, Emily Drew! – while all I could think about was if my hair had gone all fuzzy at the back, and why I’d worn the home-made denim skirt that I had fashioned out of an old pair of jeans last year. This morning I’d thought it looked good in the mirror, but now I felt a bit stupid. You just don’t wear jeans to Wes’s house. At least my legs are all toned from tennis season. Tennis is about the only sport I can do. I have to do some kind of exercise so all the ice cream doesn’t come back to haunt my hips, so tennis is pretty convenient. However good my legs look, though, you just don’t wear a denim skirt to the Stone household – coming to Wes’s house is either the best thing in the world, or the worst: it depends on whether Mrs Stone is home.

  We walked up the sweeping path that leads to Wes’s three-storey mansion – I like to call it “The Palace”, but only to my mum; if I said it to Wes he’d get a little bit huffy, like he always does when I mention the fact that he’s got more money than Bill Gates. Well, maybe not that much, but pretty damn close. The path is so wide that two cars could fit down it, side by side, and it’s covered with those little white pebbles that make everything look … glossy. So, accompanied by the perfect crunching sound of the pebbles beneath our feet, the smell of freshly mown grass, the midsummer sun gracefully warming our skin, we arrived in front of the old brick house and walked up to the large black door with a white frame (notice that Wes’s house is so perfect that it makes me burst into sensory description?! That’s how awesome it is).

  Margo had left the door open, so we wandered through into the magnificent entrance hall (you guessed it, complete with chandelier – I’m not making this stuff up!) to hear a tinkling laugh like silver bells, and the click click click of couture metal heels against a marble floor, to see a tall, dark-haired, beautiful woman glide into the room, her expression a mirror image of her daughter’s. Their faces matched to a T, even down to the dark, almost black, brown of their eyes. Wes’s eyes are like that, all dark and mysterious, but also deep: deep, warm eyes that feel like they look right inside your head and know exactly what you’re thinking. But the carbon copies Mummy and Daughter have threaten to pierce you so much sooner than invite you in.

  So when Mrs Stone flicked her eyes over the pair of us, Margo bouncing in her wake with a flow of constant glossy chatter, like one of those tiny ridiculous dogs that rich poseur heiresses own as accessories, I definitely felt their icy black chill creep up from my sandal-clad toes all the way up my bare legs to my stupid denim skirt and high-street halter top. But I like the way I look, I don’t care – it’s only when I step over that marble threshold into a house that could solve third-world debt if it was sold and all the proceeds donated that I wish I were just like the heroine in my comics: equipped with the power of invisibility.

  Wes turned to shut the door and Mrs Stone’s clear ringing tones cut through Margo’s stream of conversation.

  “Why do you have to wear those terrible tatty jeans that drag so, darling?” A sharp intake of breath came from Wes as he clicked the grand door shut. He’s a very cool and calm guy in everyday life, but the one thing that gets to him is his mother. He turned on his heel, clicking his tongue softly; the telltale sign for when Wes is trying to control his frustrat
ion. “I got you some delicious casual trousers from Ralph Lauren today; Juanita put them in your wardrobe.”

  As he started to walk over to where I was stood practically cowering in Mrs Stone’s presence, his once-white Converse (which are now exclusively decorated with cartoons of Lameboy, H’y Girl and the members of The Faeries in cartoon form) squeaked on the polished floor. I could hear the sentence before she even said it.

  “And what on earth are those on your feet? They look like a small child has scribbled all over them…” I could feel my face burn a little, and I looked down at my feet. My flip-flop-clad feet. My bare legs. My homemade denim skirt. Dammit.

  “They’re my shoes and I like them, Mother,” Wes said through a forced smile, and he arrived by my side and I could feel the tension rise. “Just like how I like my jeans. And how I like the other things I wear, and the things I do.”

  I knew what was coming this time, too. It happens every time I come here and see his mother. Mrs Stone had been ignoring me just as steadily as Wes had been ignoring her mocking tones and I had been studying my shoes. She thinks that I am a bit useless, to be honest. There’s no point in beating about the bush; it’s true. My family lacks the cash that Mrs Stone seems to deem best above all other attributes in the world, like kindness or helpfulness, and Wes was about to address it. He was just waiting for one more remark from his mother, about how she doesn’t think he presents himself like a Stone, or how he never does well enough or doesn’t do his family name justice, and then he would throw me in her face. I sometimes think I’m his little bit of rebellion, his unconventional friend and a weapon against his mum, but I know I’m not really. He just gets angry because his mum is narrow minded and he’s not, so he wants her to notice and accept me because “I’m a person too” or something. But I hate it when he does it, it’s so awkward, so I just thought I’d interrupt beforehand.