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Strawberry Crush
Jean Ure


A brand new story of crushes, first love and friendship from the original Queen of Tween – Jean Ure!When Maya falls off her bike and into the arms of Jake Harper, her cousin Mattie thinks the crush that follows will be as short-lived as the rest – especially as Maya is a Year 8 nobody and Jake is a Year 12 god. Mattie’s pretty sure that Jake's taken, anyway.But if Jake’s got a girlfriend then why does he keep offering Maya lifts around town? And why does Maya accuse Mattie of being jealous of her? Perhaps there’s more to this crush than meets the eye…























Copyright (#ulink_d15fcf65-fe85-5ca8-9e30-2e208721b336)


First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2016

HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,

HarperCollins Publishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

The HarperCollins Children’s Books website address is

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

Copyright © Jean Ure 2016

Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2016

Illustrations © Shutterstock.com

Jean Ure asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780007553969

Ebook Edition © January 2016 ISBN: 9780007554027

Version: 2016-01-29


Contents

Cover (#u868d0bd9-9691-5ab5-9d1e-cc85bb7c2549)

Title Page (#ufea82f83-7a7e-5d2b-b211-510c8472b77b)

Copyright (#u1fb25f6c-31b9-5c37-a418-1adc6fbbc083)

Chapter One (#u13a6d4e8-6553-51b2-babe-6b7dcdb85222)

Chapter Two (#u36b0769d-6c34-5e3b-a0b6-830e27633f16)

Chapter Three (#ud7eccc36-0d2f-54ed-a600-cfa044955726)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Also by Jean Ure (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)







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I was there the day it all started: the day Maya fell off her bike straight into the arms of Jake Harper.

Well, not actually straight into his arms. But practically right in front of him.

It was the start of the summer term and we were on our way back from school, cycling up Layhams Hill, two abreast cos there wasn’t that much traffic around. We were busy talking – as usual! – when Maya suddenly gave this great wobble, lurched into the kerb and slid with a startled squawk over the handlebars.

I have to admit it looked pretty dramatic, but I wasn’t particularly alarmed. Maya was always coming off her bike. Unlike me, who is quite chunky and solid, Maya is a tiny little creature, almost elfin, but she’s the one who is forever tripping over her own feet or shutting her fingers in the door. Still, we were both wearing helmets so I reckoned she couldn’t have done that much damage.

I skidded to a halt and turned back to look at her. “You OK?”

I was sure that she was. She’d already started to pick herself up, so obviously nothing was broken and I couldn’t see any blood. But then a car pulled in on the other side of the road, the driver’s door was flung open and Jake came rushing across.

“Do you need any help?”

Honestly, it was like some kind of magic spell. Some kind of automatic reaction. Before I knew it, Maya had sunk back on to the pavement and burst into heart-rending sobs. I felt so embarrassed! I mean, it was just so obvious.

“Are you OK?” Jake had squatted down beside her and put an arm round her shoulders. “That looked painful!”

Oh, please, I thought, don’t encourage her!

“Have you done any damage?”

Maya, weeping piteously, held out one of her hands. She’d grazed it on the pavement, but it was hardly gushing blood.

I shook my head. Un-be-liev-able! Shameless, in fact. Talk about a drama queen.

“Best have that looked at,” said Jake. “You could have got some dirt in it. Let’s get you into the car and I’ll give you a lift home.”

With the help of Jake’s supporting arm, Maya tottered feebly to her feet.

“Can you manage to walk?”

She sniffed, heroically. “I’ll try.”

“Well, take it slowly. Mattie, do you want to grab her bike?”

I thought, Oh, if I must.

“We can put yours in, too, if you like. I might as well give you both a lift. You’re just round the corner from each other, aren’t you?”

I was about to say, rather ungraciously, that I didn’t need a lift, we were only five minutes away, but then I thought, who in their right mind would turn down a ride in a car with the great Jake Harper? Just about the coolest boy in the school!

I wheeled both bikes across the road, pulling a face behind Maya’s back as I did so. She was really playing things for all they were worth!

“Easy does it,” said Jake, helping her into the car. Needless to say, she got the front seat. I had to sit crammed into the back, against the bikes, with my legs all curled up and handlebars digging into me.

“OK?” said Jake.

I said, “Fine!” I didn’t want him thinking I was as big a wimp as Maya. A little bit of discomfort was nothing to me.

“I’d better go in first,” I said, “and tell your mum.”

Maya’s mum tends to panic. Although she and my mum are twins they are so not identical. Mum is really down to earth and practical; she takes things in her stride. I think I am a bit like her. Auntie Megs, on the other hand, is more of a nervous type. I guess that’s where Maya gets it from. I knew if I didn’t go ahead and break the news, gently, Auntie Megs would immediately think Maya was at death’s door.

But then, omigod! As I uncurled my legs and clambered my way out of the car I saw that Jake had already gone round to the passenger side and was actually preparing to carry Maya up to the house. It was like something out of a cheesy romance movie. I do actually quite enjoy cheesy romance movies – sometimes – but this was just embarrassing! Maya was being poor little fragile me, and Jake was falling for it. Maybe it made him feel … I don’t know … manly. I know some boys like to feel that, just as some girls like to play helpless. I have too much pride! I’d have managed to stagger indoors without any help even if I’d had to hop on one leg. But that is just me.

“Let me go first!”

Rudely I pushed past them and raced up to the door. Auntie Megs must have been keeping watch – waiting, in her anxious way, for Maya to arrive home – because the door flew open even before I got there.

“Mattie!” shrieked Auntie Megs. “What’s happened?”

“Nothing; it’s nothing,” I said. “She fell off her bike, but she’s perfectly OK!”

Not that it looked like it, with Jake cradling her in his arms.

“Honestly,” I said, “she’s just grazed her hand. Nothing to worry about.”

But Auntie Megs worries about everything. She has this long list of rules that are designed to keep you safe. Rule No. 1, never go anywhere near a tree if you are out in a storm in case you get struck by lightning. Rule No. 2, never get into the first or the last carriage on a train in case the train gets hit by another train. Rule No. 3, never walk under a piece of scaffolding in case it collapses on top of you. The list is endless! So naturally, seeing a limp body being carried up the garden path she feared the worst. To be fair, I expect any mum would have. Even mine might have been a little bit alarmed. It was so over the top!

Maya was obviously basking in it, and I guess Jake was, too. He carried her through the house and set her down, very gently, on the sofa.

“There you go! No broken bones, but it was a nasty tumble.”

Nasty tumble? Whoever uses the word tumble? Unless they’re talking about a tumble dryer? Unless … maybe he had chosen the word specially, so as not to cause too much alarm. Maybe he’d thought if he said “a nasty fall” Auntie Meg would fly into one of her panics.

She was going to fly into a panic anyway. As soothingly as I could I said that Maya had just come off her bike. Like she hadn’t come off it a dozen times before.

“I knew this would happen!” cried Auntie Megs. “I’ve said all along, you shouldn’t be cycling.”

“We always wear our helmets,” I said.

“I don’t care, it’s still not safe! You could still get a concussion.”

I tried exchanging glances with Jake, but he was too busy concentrating on Maya and didn’t notice. I waited while Auntie Megs fussed about, checking for concussion by holding up a finger and telling Maya to follow it, then decided I’d had enough. I was used to Auntie Megs getting in a flap but I never thought I’d see Jake going all soft and drippy. Jake Harper was one of the coolest people on the planet! He was not only a prefect, he was also captain of the school football team.

But Auntie Megs does cleaning for his mum so probably, maybe, he felt duty-bound to show concern. Just not that much! I felt like screaming, “There’s nothing wrong with her!”

“I’ll go and get the bikes,” I said.

“Hang on!” Jake came after me. “I’ll give you a hand. Let me just take Maya’s in for her then I’ll run you home.”

Well! How could I say no? I am not someone that goes soft and drippy but there’s this girl that lives in my road, Linzi Baxter, that reckons all the boys fancy her. She’s in Year Eight along with me and Maya and is a really tiresome sort of person. With any luck she might be coming back from school in time to see me getting out of the car. And see who was driving it. That would give her something to think about! There aren’t many boys at our school get to drive their own cars. She’d certainly never gone out with one.

I suppose that is a bit shallow, really, but girls like Linzi, always so full of themselves, really do my head in.

“I’ll just go and tell Maya I’m off,” I said.

Jake came back in with me, wheeling the bike.

“Maya,” I said, “we’re going.”

“All right.”

She’d been sitting up but immediately flopped back down again, giving us this little trembly smile from out of her pile of cushions.

“See you tomorrow,” I said.

A sort of sigh escaped her. It was like “Mmmmmm …”

“I’m not having her back on that bike,” said Auntie Megs. “My nerves can’t stand it.”

“OK.” I shrugged. “We’ll take the bus.”

It isn’t any use trying to reason with Auntie Megs; it just gets her even more flustered. But I grumbled about it in the car.

“It’s such a drag, hanging around for the bus! Cycling’s perfectly safe, as long as you wear a helmet. It’s not like we’re in London! I could understand it if we were in London. But I mean, out here it’s, like – well! It’s just fields and stuff. Auntie Megs makes such a fuss!”

“I guess you can understand it,” said Jake. “Maya’s quite a delicate little thing, isn’t she?”

Oh, yuck!

“Not especially,” I said. “She just looks like she is. She’s actually quite tough.”

“No one would ever think it,” said Jake.

I felt like telling him that if he hadn’t been there Maya would simply have picked herself up and got back on her bike. She wouldn’t have had much choice, cos I wouldn’t have fussed and flapped over her! But I didn’t say anything, cos I didn’t want him thinking I was cold and heartless. It’s just that what with being born only weeks apart, and with our mums being twins, we’ve been brought up almost like sisters, so I really do know her inside out. It is only emotionally, like Auntie Megs, that she is a bit fragile, which is why I always feel I have to be there for her. Sometimes some of my friends get a bit impatient and say why do I bother, but it’s like a sort of duty. I couldn’t just turn my back. It was the only reason I’d agreed to get the bus instead of carrying on cycling by myself.

Linzi Baxter was unfortunately nowhere to be seen as we turned into Orchard Close. I guess it was a bit too much to hope for. She is the sort of person that is always there when you don’t want her to be and nowhere to be seen when you feel like doing a bit of showing off. Probably served me right. Showing off is very pathetic. I don’t usually stoop to it. Unlike Linzi.

I told Jake thanks for the lift, and he said no problem.

“Let me get your bike out for you … there you go!”

I hovered for a few seconds as he drove away, but there were still no signs of life from Linzi’s house. Unless perhaps she was peering from behind the curtain. I wouldn’t put it past her!

I wheeled my bike round the back and went in through the kitchen. Mum was on the phone. I heard her say, “Well, keep an eye on her. I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

“Was that Auntie Megs?” I said. “Telling you about Maya? She just fell off her bike; she didn’t do any damage. Well, apart from scraping her hand. Nothing to get fussed about.”

“No, I’m sure you’re right, but you know what your auntie’s like,” said Mum. “What’s this I hear about Jake rushing to the rescue?”

“He was just driving past,” I said. “He saw her come off so he stopped to help.”

“Actually carried her over the threshold, so I hear!”

“Yes. Well.” I pulled a face. “It was all done for show. He didn’t have to.”

“Still, good for him,” said Mum. “It’s nice to know the days of chivalry are not completely over.”

“But, Mum,” I cried, “it was so embarrassing! She got all silly and swoony and burst into tears. She wouldn’t have done it if Jake hadn’t been there.”

“Don’t be too hard on her,” urged Mum. “She’s going through a really tough time right now. So’s your Auntie Megs. They’re both missing Uncle Kev and you can’t blame them for being worried about him.”

I sighed. “I know. I do try …”

Maya’s dad, my Uncle Kev, is what my dad calls selfish and unreliable. Dad doesn’t have much patience with him. Mum, more kindly, says he’s just a bit eccentric. Actually, if you ask me he is very eccentric. I do love him, cos he’s also funny and warm-hearted and generous, but I can see why Dad accuses him of being selfish. He is one of those people that can’t ever seem to settle to anything. He was a milkman for a little while, but that didn’t work out, so then he worked in Tesco for a few months, until he got bored and decided he needed something more stimulating and became a postman, only he couldn’t manage to get up early enough in the morning and I think he probably got the sack, though Maya, who is very loyal, always said it wasn’t that at all. It was because his feet hurt.

In between working at proper jobs Uncle Kev has these brilliant ideas for inventing things. He then has to try and find people who will give him some money to start actually making the things he has invented so that he can become immensely rich and Auntie Megs will be able to stop cleaning houses for people that are already immensely rich, such as Jake’s mum and dad.

At the moment Uncle Kev was off on a world tour. It was his latest brilliant idea. He was going to see how far he could get by just walking and hitchhiking, starting with Europe, and then he was going to write a book about his adventures and sell it on Amazon so that Auntie Megs could stop cleaning houses, etc.

He had set off at the end of August and we were now halfway through September and Auntie Megs and Maya were still waiting to hear from him. He had warned them he wouldn’t be using his mobile phone except in emergencies cos he wanted to prove that life without “all this modern technology” was still possible. Typical Uncle Kev!

At least, as Mum said, no news was good news, but I did feel a bit sorry for Maya. I could understand why she was so anxious. I would be anxious if my dad suddenly took off and we didn’t know where he was or when he was coming back. Maybe I had been too hard on her.

“P’raps after tea,” I said, “I might go round and check she’s OK?”

“That would be a nice thing to do,” said Mum. “Auntie Megs would appreciate that.”

I said, “Yes, and we can decide what time we’re leaving in the morning … We’ve got to go by bus from now on. Auntie Megs says her nerves won’t stand us cycling any more.”

Mum laughed. “Well, that’s all right. Going by bus won’t hurt you.”

She didn’t suggest that I could still cycle. It was kind of taken for granted that I’d always be there to watch over Maya. I suppose on the whole I didn’t really mind. Except just sometimes I could get a bit impatient, like when I went round after tea and found her still all frail and suffering on the sofa with a great chunk of cake in her hand. Obviously nothing wrong with her appetite!

“Talk about playing it up,” I said.

She looked at me reproachfully with these enormous blue eyes that she has. Big wide-apart eyes in a tiny heart-shaped face.

“It really hurt,” she said. The tears were already welling up. I am convinced that Maya can actually make herself cry just by thinking about it. “If Jake hadn’t been there I don’t know what I’d have done.”

I was about to say she’d have got up and got back on her bike, but at that moment Auntie Megs came through from the kitchen. She must have heard Jake’s name cos she said, “That is such a lovely young man! Most of them wouldn’t have bothered.”

I thought, that was because there wasn’t anything to bother about. But it wouldn’t have been polite to say so.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said. “Eight o’clock at the bus stop?”

Maya nodded, dreamily. “Unless Jake comes by and gives us a lift.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Well … you know! If he happened to be passing,” said Maya.

I looked at her, suspiciously. She had this slightly glazed and goofy expression on her face. I knew exactly what it meant.

“You’ve gone and done it again,” I hissed, “haven’t you?”

She gazed up at me, all innocence. “What?”

“Got one of your things.” I mouthed it at her. I couldn’t say it out loud, cos of Auntie Megs being there, though sometimes I think Auntie Megs only hears what she wants to hear.

“If Jake did offer you a lift,” she said, “it would be extremely kind of him, but I don’t think you ought to expect it. Only if he offers.”

“That’s all I meant,” said Maya. “If he offers.” And she gave me this impish smile, like we were in some kind of conspiracy.

I shook my head. If Maya was about to embark on yet another of her all-consuming crushes life was going to be extremely tiresome.







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Eight o’clock next morning found us at the bus stop, glumly waiting for a bus to appear. Well, I was glum. I hate waiting for buses! I suppose I am quite an impatient sort of person.

“This is all because of you,” I grumbled to Maya. “If you hadn’t made all that fuss …”

Maya gazed at me, sorrowfully. “I couldn’t help it! You heard what Jake said … it was a really bad fall.”

“Not that bad,” I said. “You didn’t have to be such a drama queen.”

“I wasn’t! It hurt. It still does. Look!” She held out her hand, palm up, to show me. “I might have needed stitches. It could have got infected.”

I said, “Oh, please! And why do you keep peering at cars like that?”

She started, guiltily. “I’m not!”

“Yes, you are. You’re hoping Jake’ll come by, aren’t you?”

Except she obviously couldn’t remember what sort of car he drove. I could remember. It was a Fiat! I’m quite good at recognising different makes of car. Dad and I sometimes look at car sites together on the internet, picking out ones Dad would like to drive. Dad usually goes for the big posh ones like BMW and Mercedes. I prefer the little ones cos I think they look more cosy. Like little Easter eggs on wheels. Maya’s mum and dad don’t actually have a car so she doesn’t really know anything about them. I bet all she could remember about Jake’s Fiat was that it was small and blue.

I’d obviously embarrassed her, but it didn’t stop her peering.

“Know what?” I said.

“What?”

“You’re being really obvious!”

She frowned, nibbling at a thumbnail. “What’s that s’pposed to mean?”

“You’re making it look like we’re desperate! If you’re not careful some nutter’ll pull up and tell us to get in.”

That scared her a bit. “We wouldn’t have to do it!”

“They might try and make us.”

“So we’d run!”

“I’d run,” I said. “You’d probably trip over and fall flat on your face.”

And this time Jake wouldn’t be there to pick her up.

She bit her lip.

“It’s what happens,” I said, “when people get crushes they can’t control.”

She didn’t try denying that she’d got a crush. Just as well cos I wouldn’t have believed her. I could recognise the signs when I saw them. It wasn’t the first crush she’d had. Not by a long chalk, as Dad would say. Back in Year Six she’d fallen in love with our class teacher, Mrs O’Malley. She’d trotted about after her like a little lost puppy, all beaming and trustful. It had gone on for weeks. Then last summer she’d got this massive crush on a boy called Anil, who worked at the minimart. The minimart was owned by his mum and dad, and Anil used to help out sometimes after school. Maya insisted that we call in there every single afternoon on the way home. It was like the highlight of her day – the moment she lived for. If Anil was there she was in heaven; on days when he wasn’t she was cast into the deepest depths of despair.

Needless to say we always had to buy something, like a tube of Smarties or a KitKat or something. We couldn’t just stand there gawping, though left to herself – that is, without me to hold her hand – it’s what she probably would have done. She was never brave enough to actually say anything. She just felt this desperate need to be near him for a few minutes. It seemed to satisfy her, which was just as well since Anil showed absolutely no interest in her whatsoever. Hardly surprising. He must have been at least sixteen, maybe even older, and with Maya being so tiny he probably thought she was still just a little kid at primary school.

I don’t know how long her obsession would have lasted, but at the start of the summer holidays new people took over the shop and Anil and his mum and dad disappeared and things went back to normal. It surprised me a bit cos I’d really thought Maya would be all broken up and weepy, but luckily Uncle Kev chose that moment to have one of his bright ideas: he and Maya and Auntie Megs were all going to go and live in a cottage on the Isle of Skye for a month. They were going to be entirely self-sufficient, like gas and electricity and stuff had never been invented, and then he was going to write a book about it. Another book.

Well, the book never got written and by the time they came home Maya had more or less forgotten about Anil, but it had been really tiresome while it lasted. I was just hoping this thing she was obviously getting about Jake wouldn’t develop into a full-blown crush. I wasn’t sure I could take it all over again!

She was still obsessively checking out every blue car that drove past. Big ones, small ones; just so long as they were blue. I hadn’t realised there were so many of them. Blue must be a really popular colour! (I would have red if it was me.)

“That was a Toyota,” I said as another one flashed past. “Toyota’s no good.”

From behind me came an indignant squawk: “Who says?”

I spun round. Oh, horrible! Linzi Baxter had snuck up behind us. I’d forgotten she got the bus.

“Ours is a Toyota,” she said.

I said, “Yes, well, we’re looking for a Fiat.”

“Why?” said Linzi.

“Cos it’s what Jake Harper drives.” I couldn’t resist adding, “He gave us a lift home yesterday.”

“Really?” Her eyes narrowed. She didn’t like that! I could almost hear the jealous thoughts whizzing round her brain: how come he’s giving lifts to these total nobodies?

In the distance, at the top of the hill, I could see a bus coming towards us. As it drew near Maya suddenly clutched at me.

“Mattie, Mattie! Is that a Fiat?”

This time, she was right. It was a Fiat, and Jake was at the wheel. Maya was already dancing about on tiptoe, waving her arms in the air.

I made a grab at her. “Maya! Stop it!”

“But it’s Jake!”

“I know, but this is a bus lane; he can’t pull up here.”

If I hadn’t got hold of her she’d have gone running off down the road, windmilling her arms in the hope of attracting his attention. I practically had to drag her on to the bus. Linzi followed as I pushed a reluctant Maya in front of me up the stairs. The minute we reached the top deck she raced to the nearest window to watch as Jake drove past. Linzi, to my enormous joy, plonked herself down next to me on the back seat.

“What’s she up to?” she said.

“Oh!” I waved a hand. “I dunno. She thought he might give us a lift again.”

Linzi regarded Maya in silence for a few seconds. Maya was standing with her nose pressed against the glass. She looked like a child wistfully gazing into a toyshop. Linzi shook her head.

“Pathetic,” she said.

I bristled at that. It’s hardly Maya’s fault if she has a mum who is permanently anxious and a dad who is always rushing off in all directions, leaving them to cope without him. It would be enough, I should think, to make anyone pathetic.

“I don’t know how you put up with her,” said Linzi.

“She’s my cousin,” I said.

Lots of my friends wonder how I manage – on the whole! – to be patient with Maya; but they are my friends. Friends have the right to ask that sort of question. Plus they understand when I tell them about Mum and Auntie Megs being twins and me feeling the need to look out for Maya. Linzi Baxter was not my friend and I had no intention of explaining myself to her.

“Why did he give you a lift, anyway?” she said.

The cheek of it! What business was it of hers? I was still trying to think of a suitably crushing response when Maya suddenly decided to join in the conversation. She sank down into the seat in front of us and draped herself over the back, her eyes shining.

“He rescued me,” she said. “I came off my bike, and he rescued me! He was soooo sweet. He picked me up and drove us home and then he carried me into the house cos I couldn’t walk. If Jake hadn’t been there I don’t know what we’d have done. We might have had to call an ambulance! Mightn’t we?”

I shrugged. I did wish Maya hadn’t felt the need to tell everything to Linzi. She obviously wasn’t impressed. She is not the sort of girl to be impressed. She gave Maya this long unblinking stare then said, “Yeah. Right.”

Even then Maya didn’t get the message. Eagerly she said, “Lots of boys wouldn’t have bothered. I don’t know why Jake did! Just cos he’s a really nice young man, my mum says.”

“You don’t think p’raps he fancies you?” said Linzi.

She was being sarcastic. That anyone as cool as Jake Harper could possibly fancy a Year Eight nobody, especially one as small and skinny as Maya, obviously struck her as absurd. I guess it did me, too. To be honest, I hadn’t even considered it. It was only Auntie Megs being his mum’s cleaning lady that had made him stop. Cos he knew who Maya was, that was all. Nothing to do with him fancying her.

“Omigod,” said Linzi, as Maya’s face turned a bright happy scarlet, “she actually thinks he does!”

Maya at once protested that of course she didn’t. “He just happened to be there!”

That was what she said; but I could tell she was seriously taken with the idea. Trust Linzi! This was going to make matters a whole lot worse. All we needed was Maya having fantasies that Jake had as much of a crush on her as she had on him.

People like Linzi are such a menace. And I was stuck with her all the way to school! It’s not really that long a walk from where we get off the bus; it just seemed that it was, with Linzi droning on non-stop in my ear. All about boys. Boys that fancied her, boys that wanted to go out with her. Boys that she might possibly go out with, boys she wouldn’t touch with a barge pole. Nothing but boys, boys, boys the whole length of Sheepcote Road! They are her main topic of conversation. Practically her only topic of conversation. If conversation it could be called, which strictly speaking it couldn’t since I was hardly able to get a word in edgeways. Not that I tried very hard. Mostly I just tuned out, cos who’s interested in hearing about Linzi Baxter and her boring stupid love life? Not me!

Once through the school gates, thank goodness, we parted company. In spite of being in the same class, Linzi and I don’t really have much to do with each other. Nor, for that matter, do me and Maya. I have my friends, Maya has hers. She’d gone waltzing off to join a couple of them as soon as we’d got off the bus, leaving me on my own to suffer permanent brain damage from Linzi and her loudmouth wittering.

Fortunately on the way home that afternoon I was spared the earbashing on account of Linzi having to stay behind for something or other. All the same, I told Maya that in future, until Auntie Megs calmed down and we could use our bikes again, we were going to leave home fifteen minutes earlier. Maya immediately protested.

“I can’t! I’ll never be ready in time.”

I said, “Well, you’d better be or I’ll go without you.”

There wasn’t any reason I shouldn’t go without her. It was only habit that kept us together.

“We’ll need to be here by at least a quarter to eight.”

“But why?” wailed Maya. “We got to school in plenty of time! What d’you want us to leave earlier for?”

“You can do what you like,” I said. “I just don’t want to get stuck with Linzi again.”

“Oh,” said Maya. Her face cleared. “Is that all?”

I said, “Yes. Why?” She didn’t say anything to that, but her cheeks had gone a bright give-away pink. I knew what she’d been thinking. I can read her like a book! She’d thought I was trying to stop her cadging a lift from Jake. Like it was some jealous ploy on my part to come between them.

“Well, anyway,” I said, “it’s up to you. Either we go early or I’ll use my bike.”

Maya heaved a sigh. “Oh, all right! If I have to. But if I’m doing something for you I think you ought to do something for me.”

I was immediately suspicious. I said, “Like what?”

“I want us to join the Music Club!”

“The Music Club?”

Why on earth would she want to join the Music Club? She isn’t in the least bit musical! Nor am I, to be honest. I once tried out for the junior choir, but Mrs Morgan said I wasn’t quite ready for it. According to Mum she was just being kind. “What she really meant was, you have a voice like a screech owl!”

Well, and Maya’s not much better. Worse if anything. She sings flat.

I reminded her of this, but she said just because she couldn’t sing didn’t mean she couldn’t learn how to appreciate good music.

“You mean like classical?”

“Anything,” said Maya.

“Classical’s all they listen to,” I said. “Beethoven and stuff. It’s really boring! Emily Armstrong goes.”

Emily is this girl in our class that is really sweet but has these totally weird tastes in practically everything. She loves poetry. She adores paintings. She worships Shakespeare. She goes to the opera. If it was Linzi you’d know she was just showing off; with Emily you know it’s the real thing. She lives in a totally different world from the rest of us.

“Honestly,” I said, “you’d be bored out of your mind.”

“Mattie, please,” begged Maya. “I want to learn!”

Well, I am never against learning, cos that would just be ignorant, but I didn’t see why I had to do it. Why couldn’t she get one of her friends to go with her? Tansy or Bella, for instance. They were her best mates! Why not ask them? Maya said cos they would get silly.

“They’d only start giggling.”

I couldn’t imagine anyone actually giggling at Beethoven. Fall asleep, more like. It was only when I allowed myself to be dragged along next day during the lunch break that I discovered what it was that would have made them giggle: Jake was there, sitting next to a girl from his class. He glanced up and smiled as he saw Maya. Well, I suppose he might have been smiling at both of us, but from the way Maya turned her usual bright pink I knew she was taking it as being especially for her.

No wonder she hadn’t wanted her friends to come along! When Maya has one of her obsessions she makes it plain for all to see, and Tansy and Bella are gigglers at the best of times. I’m not above getting the occasional fit of the giggles myself, but I didn’t find this a particularly gigglesome occasion. I was quite cross with Maya. I felt like I’d been cheated. Thanks to her I was going to waste the whole of my lunch break! I really don’t know why I allow myself to be talked into these things. She is always managing to get round me. She has this way of smiling very sweetly and looking very fragile and pathetic, and I always, always fall for it.

As it was I had to sit through three quarters of an hour of mental torture. Actually, to be honest, that is not quite fair. Miss Hopwood is young and blonde and really pretty, plus she is new to teaching and still bursting with enthusiasm, so it wasn’t as bad as if it had been Mrs Morgan, who is old and boring. I don’t mean to be ageist, but sometimes old people can be boring, just like young people can, only if they’re old you’re not supposed to say so.

To be fair the first ten minutes were quite interesting. Miss Hopwood told us about this piece of music, Pictures at an Exhibition, by someone called Mussorgsky. (I think that’s how it’s spelt.) She said it was about two men walking round a gallery looking at paintings, and she played twiddly bits on the piano by way of illustration. Like “This is them walking round” and “This is a painting called Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks”. Cool! I didn’t mind that. But then she put on a CD and she said we all had to concentrate and see if we could recognise the bits she’d played, only I couldn’t, except maybe where they were walking around. The rest was just plinking and plonking on the piano. No real tune at all.

Everybody else seemed to get it. Jake was listening really hard, you could tell, and the girl next to him looked like she was in some kind of ecstasy. Lots of people had their eyes closed. Emily not only had her eyes closed but this radiant smile on her lips. How come they all got it and not me? It made me feel I was missing something.

I stole a glance at Maya. She hadn’t got it! She was peering in a lovelorn fashion at Jake from under her lashes, trying to make like she was lost in the music, but only managing to look faintly ridiculous. All daft and soppy. Tansy and Bella would have giggled themselves inside out. I prodded at her, but she swatted me away, angrily.

In the end I started peering at Jake, as well. I had to do something to keep myself awake. He is what my mum would call “tall dark and handsome”. Definitely crush material, if you are the sort of person that indulges in crushes, but for goodness’ sake he was eighteen! Practically grown up. And the girl sitting next to him, Hope Kennedy, was really beautiful. Thick honey-coloured hair in a ponytail, with these long, long legs like a dancer’s that seemed to go on for ever. And she was in his year. And they obviously had the same taste in music.

I stole another glance at Maya. I was beginning to have bad feelings. I did so hope she came to her senses! Maddening though she could be, I would really hate for her to get hurt.







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Well! At least I’d solved the problem of how to get us to school in the morning without Maya dramatically teetering about on the edge of the pavement, peering into cars and waving her arms every time anything small and blue appeared on the horizon. Unfortunately it hadn’t solved the problem of getting back. First off she wanted to wander round the school car park, checking on the cars to see whether Jake was still there or whether he’d already left; and then when she discovered he hadn’t left she purposely dawdled all the way down Sheepcote Road to the bus stop, hoping he would come by and see us waiting there.

I lectured her about it, but there is nothing you can do when someone is in the grip of an obsession. Water off a duck’s back, as my dad would say. I’m not sure she even really listened. Or if she did she didn’t actually hear.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” I said as we finally got on the bus, “you’re not dragging me along to that music thing again.”

She turned, all innocent, her eyes wide with disbelief. “Didn’t you enjoy it?”

I immediately retorted, “Don’t pretend that you did! You just enjoyed staring at Jake.”

Pinkly, she protested, “It wasn’t anything to do with Jake! I didn’t even know he was going to be there.”

Oh, no? What did she think, I was stupid or something?

“Honestly,” said Maya, “it was the lovely music. I found it so interesting.”

“Go on, then,” I said. “Sing me some!”

Needless to say, she couldn’t. She said that she was still learning and that was why she wanted to become a member, so that she could go along every week and hear something new.

“You know you’re wasting your time,” I said.

She crinkled her nose. “How d’you mean?”

“Going all soppy over him when he’s sitting there with Hope Kennedy.”

“But they’re in the same class.”

I said, “I know they’re in the same class! And they like the same music, and she’s absolutely gorgeous!”

I knew I was being a bit mean, rubbing it in like that, but I was still feeling sore about the way she’d tricked me. Plus it was entirely for her own good. My mum is always saying that things are “for your own good” and it is extremely annoying; but just because it’s annoying doesn’t make it any less true. When Maya gets one of her crushes they take over her entire life.

She sat there beside me, fiddling with the strap of her school bag. Her face had gone all puckered, so that I immediately felt – as I so often do with Maya – that I had been too harsh. Whatever a person might think of someone else’s daydreams it is not very kind to trample on them.

“I’m just saying,” I muttered.

“Whatever.”

Maya turned, deliberately scrunching herself up against the window with her back towards me. Omigod, she was looking for Fiats again! I might just as well not have bothered.




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