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“We did wait,” said Skye. “You’re late.”
“Only a few minutes. Don’t go on at me!”
“Talk about going on,” I said. “You should have heard my sister.”
Skye groaned. “Not again!”
“She’s going to burst a blood vessel one of these days if she’s not careful.”
Jem said, “Yeah?” And then, in this slightly hysterical tone of voice, “Don’t talk to me! I don’t want to know!”
“She shrivelled her shirt,” said Skye. “I’ve had to hear all about it, why shouldn’t you?”
“Cos if anyone talks to me,” said Jem, “I shall be the one that bursts a blood vessel. I don’t want to know, I don’t want to know!” She stuffed her fingers in her ears. “Just don’t talk to me!”
“No problem,” I said. “We can easily pretend you’re not here. You just hang back and—” I broke off. “Excuse me?” I turned, politely. “Did you wish to say something? Or was that a mouse squeaking?”
“Why did you shrivel her shirt?” said Jem.
Skye gave a muffled scream. “Don’t ask!”
“I thought you wanted me to hear?”
“I’ve changed my mind. Anyway, you said you didn’t want anyone talking to you.”
“I don’t,” said Jem. “I feel like I’m going to explode. Like the top of my skull’s going to burst open.” She brought her hand down, whumpff, on top of her head.
“That’s right,” said Skye, kindly. “You keep hold of it.”
Jem made a noise that sounded like aaargh and went beetling off ahead, her legs (which aren’t very long) pumping up and down, her hand still clamped to her head.
It might, I suppose, be considered cause for alarm, our best friend saying she was about to explode; but me and Skye have known Jem for too long. She is one of those up-and-down sort of people. All fizzing and bubbling one minute, then pop! The cork comes flying out of the bottle and she’s, like, climbing the walls. Or holding her head on. It’s impossible to keep up with her. At least with Angel you know she’s going to be in a rage, cos she practically lives in one. With Jem it’s like being on a mad rollercoaster.
“Fizzy Pop,” I said. I turned to Skye. “D’you remember? That’s what we used to call her.”
“That was when Mrs Fletcher told her she ought to calm down or she’d burst.”
“It was a good name,” I said. “Why did we stop using it?”
“You decided nicknames were naff.”
“I did?”
“Yes, you didn’t like being called Rumblebelly.”
“Oh. Well,” I said, “that was just rude. And it only happened once! Jem’s like fizzing and popping all the time.”
We both gazed at her small scurrying figure. She’d stopped holding her head on, but she was still whizzing along at an absurdly fast rate.
“Let’s get a move on,” said Skye. “I don’t want to miss registration!”
First period that day was geography with Mr Harper, who likes to drone on about rift valleys and things and never notices what people get up to so long as they get up to it quietly and don’t disturb anyone who might just want to hear what he’s saying.
Me and Jem sat in the back row, with Skye between us. Skye really likes to pay attention in class, so she wasn’t best pleased when Jem pushed a note in front of her and pointed at me. She thinks it is childish to pass notes. Impatiently, not taking her eyes off Mr Harper, she flicked the note towards me.
Y U shrivel shirt?
I sent a note back: Not my fault. Y U think skull going 2 burst?
Tell U ltr, replied Jem. Y not yr fault?
I was about to explain about the iron, and all the electricity rushing out of control through the mains, but I didn’t get the chance because at that point Skye wrote STOP IT! BEHAVE YOURSELVES, heavily underlined, on the back of her geography book.
She can’t help being bossy; both her mum and dad are teachers.
Second period was English with Miss Rolfe, who gave us back the essays we’d written the previous week on the subject of ‘Beginnings’. We’d had to write all about our early lives, as much as we could remember.
“On the whole,” said Miss Rolfe, “I was quite pleased with them.” Ooh! It takes a lot to please Miss Rolfe. “Daisy, could you hand these back for me? There is one that I would really love to read aloud… Jemma?”
Jem looked startled. She is not used to being singled out, unless it’s for talking, or fidgeting, or not paying attention.
“Do I have your permission?” said Miss Rolfe. “I won’t if you’d rather I didn’t.”
Jem by now was bright pillar-box red. “It’s OK,” she muttered.
“Are you sure? Maybe you’d like to read it yourself?”
Jem shook her head, violently.
“All right, then. Here we go! This is what Jemma wrote.
“My beginnings are shrouded in mystery as I was adopted when I was a baby and don’t remember anything about my life before. Some people feel sorry for me and say it must be terrible not ever having known my real mum and dad, but as far as I am concerned my mum and dad that adopted me are my real mum and dad. I don’t want any others! Maybe one day I will feel curious and want to know who my birth mother was but for the moment I am perfectly happy and anyway I would not like to upset Mum and Dad by trying to find out in case they might think I didn’t love them.
“One of the things about being adopted is that people never say to you, ‘Oh, don’t you look like your mum?’ which is what they sometimes say to my friends that aren’t adopted and my friends get really mad as for some reason they don’t seem to want to look like their mums. My mum is quite large and jolly and laughs a lot. I am rather small and not always jolly, though I do like to have a bit of a laugh. Dad is very sweet and gentle, and that is definitely not like me! I am sure if you asked my friends they would say that sweet and gentle is the last thing I am!!! I am not sure what they would say I was. A bit of a pain, probably.
“I am an only child, and only children are often said to be spoilt, but I don’t think my mum and dad spoil me. Mum is quite strict in spite of being jolly. Dad is not quite so strict as he tends to leave all the telling-off to Mum, but if she says NO he always backs her up. I feel very grateful to them for adopting me. I’m sure there were lots of other babies they could have had if they’d wanted. I think that is the BEST thing about being adopted, you know that you have been chosen and it makes you feel special.”
There was a silence as Miss Rolfe finished reading; then Skye started to clap, and all the rest of us joined in. It was so amazing! It was obvious that everyone was really moved by what Jem had written. It was just such a brave thing to do. It made me feel quite ashamed of my own essay, which had gone on at great length about Angel and her temper, and Tom being an alien. I’d never once thought to say that I loved Mum and Dad. Or Rags. Or even Angel and Tom, if it came to that. Cos I do love them, in spite of everything. I would just have been too embarrassed to say so.
“I think you’ll agree,” said Miss Rolfe, “that that was really heart-warming. Refreshingly honest. Thank you very much, Jemma, for letting me read it. Girls, I know that was the bell, but please don’t rush!”
Me