Worse Than Boys Page 13

  Lauren’s mother opened the door and I could see right away where Lauren got her fashion sense from. Her mother’s hair was tied up on top of her head with a multi-coloured scarf, and she was wearing some kind of flowery top, tight jeans and orange slippers. She had a wooden spoon in her hand as if she was in the middle of cooking something. Lauren came hurrying downstairs as I came in.

  Her mother swung round as Lauren tapped her on the shoulder. Then Lauren started signing to her.

  ‘I’m telling her if she’s cooking something we don’t want it,’ Lauren explained to me. ‘She always manages to drop in some strange ingredient – thinks it makes it taste better. It never does.’

  Her mother hit her with the spoon. Lauren grabbed at her head as if she was in pain, and her mother began signing at such a speed I had to laugh. Lauren laughed too.

  ‘Oh, shut up, Mum. You talk such a load of rubbish!’ Her mother kept signing away. Lauren turned to me. ‘Honestly, see when she starts with those hands of hers, you can’t get her to shut up.’

  Her dad appeared on the scene then, still in his working clothes. He was a plumber, Lauren had told me. ‘What’s all this noise?’ he said, though there was complete silence. It made me giggle. He winked at me. ‘Never marry a woman that talks as much as this! Get in that kitchen, woman, and make me a cup of tea!’

  He grabbed Lauren’s mum by the shoulder and she started hitting him with the spoon. Tapping him really. He pretended to be mortally hurt, clutched at his arm and shouted, ‘Domestic abuse! Call the police!’

  It was so crazy I couldn’t stop myself laughing.

  ‘They’re mad, Hannah. I should have warned you.’

  We managed finally to escape to Lauren’s room. The rest had already arrived and were lolling about on Lauren’s bed. She shared the room with her sister – the one who had been the waitress at the wedding, Ellen. She was getting ready to go out, slipping on a coat. She smiled a greeting to me as I came in. If she knew I’d suspected her, she didn’t show it. She told us all to have a nice night, talking in that thick way that deaf people have. ‘She makes Mother Teresa look like Adolf Hitler,’ I remembered Wizzie telling me. I felt ashamed. How could I have suspected her?

  Lauren’s room was a dream. The bedcovers and the curtains matched, pale green and cream.

  ‘Mum made them,’ she told me when I remarked on how nice they were. ‘She’s really handy. She made them for Grace as well.’

  ‘So your mother thinks we’re beneath you?’ Wizzie said, bouncing on the bed, not caring about how creamy the covers were.

  ‘Scum, I think she called you.’

  ‘So glad we’ve got a good reputation,’ she said.

  Lauren’s mother popped her head in the door and started signing again. Lauren shook her head furiously.

  ‘What was that about?’ I asked.

  ‘She’s asking if we want some cheese on toast.’

  Cheese on toast sounded nice to me. But the rest of them groaned. Wizzie pretended to be sick under the bed.

  ‘It can’t be that bad,’ I said.

  ‘The last time she made us cheese on toast, she sliced some oranges into it “to add flavour”, she said.’ Grace shivered at the memory. ‘It added something, but it certainly wasn’t flavour.’

  The wind suddenly howled through the trees outside.

  Lauren sat on the floor. ‘Who says we’ll play Light as a Feather? It’s a brilliant night for it.’

  You could have knocked me down with one. ‘You play that too?’

  ‘Thought it would be too scary for the Lip Gloss Girls,’ Wizzie said.

  ‘Bet you don’t get it to work,’ Sonya said.

  ‘Every time,’ I told them.

  ‘Bet your ghost stories are all about little girls screaming and running away from bad people and having handsome hunks save them,’ Wizzie said. And she began screaming like a tiny baby.

  ‘You’d never beat me with a ghost story,’ I said. A challenge, and I was always up for a challenge.

  The room was in darkness and the ghost stories began. Wizzie was first – liked to be first in everything, I suppose. Her story was all slash and blood and horror, about a headless zombie cannibal that kept chasing everybody and eating them. It didn’t so much scare you as make you sick.

  ‘How could it chase you if it didn’t have a head?’ Grace wanted to know. ‘It would keep bumping into things, wouldn’t it?’

  Wizzie rolled her eyes. ‘It’s a story, Grace. It doesn’t have to be logical. Anyway, how would it eat people if it didn’t have a head either! You’ve just got to use your imagination.’

  That made us all giggle, except Grace, still trying to work it out.

  Sonya told a vampire story, not very well, and Grace’s story was so mixed up she forgot the ending. Then it was my turn. I began the video story, speaking in a soft voice, full of atmosphere. I wanted them to know that I was the master storyteller, just as I had been with Erin. I drew them in, told them of the figure in the fog striding towards the shack, even mentioning Mary Brown, a real name, a real girl. I had them mesmerised, listening to my every word. I had almost reached the climax …

  ‘Then, I heard the back door of the video shop creak open …’

  All of a sudden a cupboard door in Lauren’s room flew open, and a dark hooded figure leapt out.

  Total panic! We all screamed, fell back in complete confusion. Grace was almost out of the window. Sonya was under the bed. I grabbed a lamp, ready to hurl it at whatever demon was attacking us.

  ‘What’s that?!’

  ‘Blinkin’ hell, the story come to life.’

  Lauren jumped to her feet, switched on the light. The hooded figure whipped off his mask with a flourish.

  It was Lauren’s dad.

  He was laughing so much I thought he was about to burst. ‘Gotya, lassies!’

  Lauren threw a cushion at him. ‘Dad! That could have been fatal!’

  ‘Where did he come from?’ I asked.

  In answer, her dad, still chuckling away, opened the cupboard door he had leapt from and stepped inside. He pushed another door that opened on to the landing in the hallway. ‘Gotya!’ he said again. ‘Nobody ever remembers I can get in from the landing that way! Especially on a dark night … with the lights off, and the wind blowing.’ He began to howl like a wolf.

  Grace flopped on to the bed. ‘See you, Mr Winters!’ She said it as if Lauren’s dad always got up to tricks like that.

  I hadn’t laughed like that in so long. And here I was laughing again with the Hell Cats.

  Curiouser and curiouser.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Light as a Feather was forgotten. The mood gone. Even the wind had died down.

  Lauren put on her music and we all began singing along with our favourite tunes. Wizzie was leaping about on the bed. I waited for Lauren to tell her to stop, but no one said a word to her. I’d like to see my mum allowing that!

  Then I stopped singing. I listened. One of us had a beautiful voice, and it certainly wasn’t me.

  I looked at Lauren.

  She looked back at me. Stopped singing too. ‘What?’

  ‘You’re a really good singer,’ I said.

  ‘You don’t have to sound so surprised.’

  ‘She is, isn’t she?’ Wizzie said, flopping on the bed at last. She said it as if it was something they had told Lauren lots of times. ‘Her brother’s got a band. When she’s older she’s going to sing in it. We’re always telling her to go for auditions.’

  But I had a much better idea. ‘Why don’t you go in for the school show? They’re doing Grease. You’d make a great Sandy.’

  Lauren looked at me as if I had two heads. ‘Me?’

  ‘Well, we know you can be a Pink Lady.’

  Grace interrupted. ‘What’s a Pink Lady? Is that not some kind of cocktail?’

  ‘The Pink Ladies is the name of the girl gang in the film,’ I told her. ‘They’re rough and tough and common … a bit like us.’


  Wizzie grimaced. ‘And they call themselves the Pink Ladies? That’s really rough and tough, that is.’

  I ignored her. I turned to Lauren. ‘I think you might brush up quite well and be a Sandy. Sandy’s the sweet and innocent one that ends up in the Pink Ladies.’

  Now they all laughed.

  ‘Lauren, sweet and innocent!’ Wizzie threw herself back onto the bed, holding her stomach, killing herself laughing. ‘That’s a good one!’

  ‘What’s Grease?’ It was Grace who asked.

  ‘Grease, the film. The musical. You must have seen it.’ I burst into song. ‘Summer Lovin’. Everybody knows that song. Even my out-of-tune version.

  Grace nodded at last. ‘Oh aye, I remember that one.’

  ‘Wonderful film,’ I went on. ‘Olivia Newton Mearns and John Revoltin’ are in it.’

  Wizzie’s chewing gum flew out of her mouth. Lauren swallowed hers. Sonya fell off the bed.

  Grace just looked blank. ‘Aye, right!’ she snapped at me. ‘His name’s not John Revoltin’. You’re winding me up.’

  ‘And her name’s not Newton Mearns either, Grace. Newton Mearns is a small town near Glasgow.’

  Wizzie threw a pillow at me. ‘Show off!’

  I smiled at Grace. Didn’t want to annoy her. I was still trying to win her round, but honestly, sometimes it was such fun winding her up.

  Sonya flopped beside Wizzie. ‘Whoever heard of one of us getting a part in the school show? The teachers hate us.’

  Lauren shrugged. ‘What would be the point of going for an audition?’

  Wizzie stood up. ‘Aye, what would be the point? Whoever heard of a Hell Cat trying for the school show?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Grace agreed. ‘Would never happen.’

  ‘Never want it to happen. School show’s for muppets.’

  If there was a real edge in Wizzie’s voice, I must have missed it. Maybe I was too excited at what I was already planning. I knew I couldn’t let this pass. This just had to happen.

  I made sure I was last to leave Lauren’s that night.

  ‘You’ve got to promise me you’ll go in for the school show, Lauren.’

  She stood at the door and shook her head. ‘Me? They’d never give the part to me.’

  All Lauren needed, I was sure, was a little bit of persuasion. I’d be there to give that. ‘But you’re a great singer. I’ve never heard anybody sing as well as you.’

  And I hadn’t. Not even Rose. She thought the part was hers. She was sure of it. We all were.

  Now I intended different. And wouldn’t that be sweet revenge on Rose?

  Chapter Forty-Three

  It felt as if Lauren and I had been friends all our lives.

  I went to her house often after that first night, doing my very best to persuade her to audition for the show. I knew I was doing it behind Wizzie’s back, but Wizzie was so set against it. ‘We’re not the Lip Gloss Girls, you know,’ she would say whenever I mentioned it. So I stopped mentioning it in front of her.

  I loved going to Lauren’s. Everybody was welcomed here, even Wizzie. I loved the way her family all joked with each other. It was like walking into a comedy show every time I went there. It was the quietest house I had ever been in, yet it never felt like that. It always seemed to be filled with chatter and laughing. Why couldn’t I have fun like that with my mum? I said as much to Lauren one night.

  ‘I don’t think you give your mum a chance,’ Lauren said. ‘You’re always that serious about her.’

  ‘That’s because she’s always so serious. She’s always going on about being such a loser, nothing ever going right for her. She depresses me. She makes me feel like a loser too.’

  ‘You! You’ve got to be joking. I used to see you with Erin and them, and you were so full of it. Thought you were something. And you’re trying to tell me you felt like a loser?’

  And I remembered how confident I always felt with the Lip Gloss Girls. Sure of myself because I had my friends around me. ‘Is that how I really looked to you?’

  ‘You better believe it. That’s why none of us liked you. But it’s funny when you think about it, Hannah. I used to hate you, and now that I’ve got to know you … you and I get on really well, don’t we?’

  Who would have thought it? I remembered the fights I’d had with Lauren, the way I’d slagged off her hair, and her clothes, the insults she’d traded with me. Now, when I didn’t come to her house, we phoned each other at least ten times a night. Never ran out of things to talk about.

  Lauren went on. ‘Do you know what else I think is funny? I want to be just like my mum. And you want to be the exact opposite of yours.’

  ‘Can you blame me?’

  ‘I’ve never met your mum, but do you know what I think about her from things you tell me?’

  I didn’t want to hear this, so sure she was going to say something negative. Erin always had something negative to say about my mum. ‘I’d rather have my teeth drilled without anaesthetic than have a mum like yours,’ she had once told me. I should have known better with Lauren.

  She went on, ‘Your mum seems to be somebody who’s always trying to better herself. You’re always telling us she’s going to classes for this and that. Spanish, and painting, and aerobics.’

  ‘Trying to make up for not having friends probably.’ I regretted saying that right away. Just as bad as my mum, I thought.

  Lauren obviously thought the same thing. ‘That’s a really rotten thing to say. You told me your mum always looks for the worst in people. Well, so do you. You’ve just done it with your mum.’

  She was so right about that. I felt guilty. ‘I wish I knew how to make her happy, Lauren. I could never understand why she did what she did.’

  Lauren knew about my mum. Didn’t everybody in the town know? I didn’t have to explain what I meant.

  ‘They say it’s a cry for help.’

  A cry for help. ‘I understand that now.’ I didn’t tell Lauren why I understood that. And Lauren didn’t ask. I could talk to her about everything, except that. That would always be my secret, a secret never to be told. There are some secrets you should never share. Perhaps that had been Erin’s mistake, sharing her secret with anyone.

  ‘Anyway, when am I going to meet her?’ Lauren asked.

  None of them had ever been to my house. I’d never had the nerve to invite them. And though she couldn’t keep me in, and didn’t really try, she still moaned constantly at me for going around with the Hell Cats. I knew it worried her.

  ‘Are you ashamed of us or something?’ Lauren asked.

  I giggled. ‘Maybe a bit.’

  ‘Your mum still not trust us, eh? But she must see you’ve never been in any trouble since you’ve gone about with us, have you? We haven’t even been in any fights.’ She giggled. ‘Mind you, the only ones we ever had real fights with were you lot … the Lip Gloss Girls.’

  That made me laugh. ‘We were the same,’ I said. ‘We’d do all the things you do, march along the waterfront, daring the other girls to break us up. They never did. We had a reputation because we were always in fights with you.’ I began to laugh. ‘How crazy is that!’

  ‘See, the Hell Cats are just a nice bunch of girls really.’ She pouted and fluttered her eyelashes.

  I laughed too, until I remembered the cloud hanging over the Hell Cats, and the old woman.

  ‘There’s something I have to ask you.’ Now, I decided, was as good a time as any. Now, when it was just me and Lauren. I wouldn’t have had the nerve if Wizzie had been there. ‘What about the old woman?’

  ‘You don’t really think we had anything to do with that?’

  ‘The police questioned you. They came to the school.’

  ‘There’s lots of girl gangs on this estate,’ Lauren said. ‘You’ve seen some of them. The police never seriously thought it was us. They questioned lots of girls.’

  ‘It was because of the knife, wasn’t it?’

  Lauren looked genuinely puzzled.
‘What knife?’

  ‘Everybody knows Wizzie carries a knife.’

  She dismissed that with a wave of her hand. ‘Have you ever seen Wizzie with a knife?’

  ‘But the scars …’

  Lauren didn’t say anything for a moment. ‘Wizzie lives in the worst part of this estate. Even I’m not allowed to go to her house. Her family have got a really bad reputation and there are some really bad gangs round her way. You’ve seen the worst of them, the Black Widows. I think that’s where she gets the scars. She’s in fights with other gangs. But she won’t tell us about it. There’s a lot of things Wizzie doesn’t tell us.’

  ‘Now that I’ve met you, I wonder why you’re so friendly with Wizzie,’ I said. ‘You’re so different.’

  ‘Wizzie and I have been mates since primary school. Wizzie was always trying to be tough. But my mum likes Wizzie. She worries about her – so do I. If she didn’t have me …’ Lauren thought about that. ‘If she didn’t have us … I’m scared she would end up in one of those other gangs.’

  ‘Do you think that could happen?’

  Lauren nodded. ‘I think she tries to impress them, show she’s every bit as tough as they are. But she’s not really. She’s a softie.’

  Wizzie a softie? No, I decided then. That I would never believe.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Only a couple of nights later, Lauren appeared at my house. She had obviously decided the time to meet my mum was now. I nearly had a heart attack when I opened the door to her. Her hair was tied up in three bunches, she was wearing a long multi-coloured cardigan that stretched down to her knees, black tights with holes in them, and a pair of ankle boots.

  Typical Lauren, but my mum had never seen her before. What kind of impression was she going to make?

  I couldn’t take my eyes off the cardigan.

  ‘Like it?’ Lauren asked. ‘My mum knit it.’

  ‘Is your mum blind as well as deaf?’

  That only made Lauren giggle. ‘You’re terrible, Hannah!’

  Mum came into the hall just then, a tray of freshly baked shortbread in her hand. She took one look at Lauren and gaped.