Find the Girl

by Lucy Connell

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE: Nina

  CHAPTER TWO: Nancy

  CHAPTER THREE: Nina

  CHAPTER FOUR: Nancy

  CHAPTER FIVE: Nina

  CHAPTER SIX: Nancy

  CHAPTER SEVEN: Nina

  CHAPTER EIGHT: Nancy

  CHAPTER NINE: Nina

  CHAPTER TEN: Nancy

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: Nina

  CHAPTER TWELVE: Nancy

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Nina

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Nancy

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Nina

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: Nancy

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Nina

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Nancy

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: Nina

  CHAPTER TWENTY: Nancy

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Nina

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: Nancy

  About the Authors

  The lovable twin duo Lucy and Lydia are well known for their eponymous YouTube channel and are steaming ahead in the digital world. Their uplifting platform features all things beauty, fashion and music related, and they’re known for their infectious enthusiasm. They regularly upload their hugely popular ‘Get the Look’ videos, which cover some of their favourite music artist looks. As a result of this successful content thread, the girls filmed an exclusive series for MTV, Lucy & Lydia: Style Sisters, which amassed an incredible 6 million views. Following this, the girls went on to do a Snapchat takeover for growing channel PopSugar, which resulted in over 1.4 million views. With a highly engaged and fast-growing audience across all their platforms, Lucy and Lydia are certainly the ones to watch. They have excellent relationships and have worked closely with brands such as Disney, Missguided and Soap & Glory.

  Find the Girl series

  FIND THE GIRL

  FIND THE GIRL: ALL THAT GLITTERS

  CHAPTER ONE

  Nina

  ‘Nina!’

  I wake with a start, rudely jolted from my dream by Nancy shouting my name. I blink sleepily as she barges into my bedroom and stands over me with her hands on her hips.

  ‘You’re hiding something from me,’ she says accusingly.

  ‘What?’ I say, completely dazed and still half asleep. ‘What’s wrong? What time is it?’

  ‘You are hiding a secret from me, Nina Palmer,’ she states, giving me a stern look. ‘My twin sense is going off like no tomorrow.’

  I reach for my phone on the bedside table and groan when I see the time.

  ‘Your twin sense is going off at six a.m.? Any chance you can turn it off for a bit, so I can get a lie-in?’

  ‘Something has been niggling at me for days and then suddenly this morning I woke up realizing why: you’re keeping a secret from me!’ she says, prodding me as I pull the duvet over my head. ‘Now, can you please tell me what it is, so we can all move on with our lives?’

  ‘I’m not hiding a secret from you,’ I lie, my voice muffled into my pillow. ‘Leave me alone.’

  I should have known she’d work it out. I’ve never been good at keeping secrets.

  If I even THINK about the secret, I blush furiously. When your cheeks go bright red for no reason, people tend to guess something is up. And it’s even worse when someone asks me directly about the secret and I’m supposed to lie. I’m a terrible liar. My brain goes completely blank.

  I know all this for a fact because last term I had to hide a HUGE secret from everyone, including my identical twin sister, Nancy. The fact that I managed to keep it as long as I did is a miracle. The thing is, now I have another secret. A new secret. And if I thought that hiding a secret from Nancy when we were barely speaking to each other was difficult, hiding one from her when we’re inseparable is near to impossible.

  ‘The niggling feeling began a few days ago,’ Nancy continues, perching on the edge of my bed. ‘You remember we were having breakfast before school? And you said, “Mum, the post is here.” Do you remember that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, you said, “Mum, the post is here”, and then do you know what happened? You went bright red. And not in the normal way that you go bright red, but in a different way. And this morning the reason why hit me. You blush a different shade when you’re keeping a secret!’

  HOW DOES SHE EVEN KNOW THIS?!

  WHY do my cheeks have a specific shade of red that gives away when I’m hiding something?! Why can’t I just blush like a normal person?

  And, seriously, the other day Nancy noticed for the FIRST TIME that we have a painting of a horse hanging by the stairs – ‘in my head, it’s been a cow all this time’ – despite the fact it’s been up on the wall since the day we moved in almost SEVEN YEARS AGO.

  But when my cheeks go a very slightly different shade of pink she’s suddenly Sherlock Holmes.

  ‘You have lost your mind,’ I say as convincingly as possible. ‘I have no idea what you’re going on about.’

  ‘Why would my sister blush for no reason? That was my first clue,’ she says, combing her fingers through her shiny, blonde hair.

  Even though we’re identical twins, Nancy and I have different approaches to our appearance. Nancy is glamorous, with flawless make-up and glossy hair that always sits perfectly, however she’s styled it that day. I’m useless with make-up and, no matter how many times Nancy tries to teach me, I don’t know which brush to use for what or why there need to be so many base layers or how to use straighteners to curl my hair (which, I have pointed out to Nancy on several occasions, doesn’t even make any sense).

  ‘The next clue,’ she goes on, ‘was yesterday’s incident.’

  ‘Nancy, is there any chance we can continue this conversation at a normal hour? It is a Saturday. It’s been a long week at school, what with all the homework they’re piling on in the lead-up to our GCSEs this year, and I could do with some downtime,’ I point out, hoping that my pleas will eventually work and she’ll drop it.

  Deep down, I know that it will never work. When Nancy is on a roll, there’s no chance of stopping her.

  ‘Yesterday morning, when Mum dropped us off at school and I asked you if everything was OK because you seemed a bit distracted, you replied, “Yes, why?”’

  She watches for my reaction, her eyes wide with excitement, as though she’s just blown the case wide open.

  I sigh. ‘And?’

  ‘You said, “Yes, why?”’ she repeats, looking exasperated. ‘If you weren’t hiding something and I asked you whether you were OK, you’d reply “Yes” or “No”. But, because you’re hiding something, you added the “why” to make sure I hadn’t caught on to whatever it is you’re hiding. Do you follow?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you want to know what I think you’re keeping from me?’ she asks. ‘I think you, Nina Palmer, have been signed to a record label or something! Am I on the right lines?’

  There’s a moment’s silence before I burst out laughing.

  ‘WHAT? That is ridiculous! Why would you even think that?’ I say through giggles.

  ‘I don’t see why that’s so outrageous a theory,’ she huffs defensively.

  ‘It’s completely mad.’

  ‘As mad as you secretly dating Chase Hunter, the famous lead singer of Chasing Chords, my favourite band in the world, for months without anyone knowing, not even the press?’ She raises her eyebrows. ‘You remember that little secret of yours?’

  I hesitate. She has a point.

  I still have moments when I don’t quite believe what happened last term, as though I might have made it all up in my head. I didn’t exactly plan on falling in love with a pop star. The only reason I’d heard of Chasing Chords was because Nancy was obsessed with them and used to blare their music out on repeat all the time, not to mention the fact that she ran a fan-fiction website completely devoted to the
band.

  I, on the other hand, spent most of my time listening to my favourite composer and pianist, Austin Golding, hoping I might one day play the piano as well as he does.

  Nancy and I are VERY different, and not just when it comes to our music taste or talents with a make-up brush. She’s popular and funny, whereas I am completely useless in social situations. Up until last term, those differences meant that we barely spoke to one another, even though we were in the same class at school, and when we had to speak at home, with Mum’s ever-hopeful encouragement, it always ended in an argument.

  But then I was forced to go to a Chasing Chords gig with Nancy and I accidentally bumped into Chase Hunter, the lead singer. I’d never met a boy like him. Which isn’t exactly that surprising because, before then, I’d barely spoken to a guy before, except for my best friend, Jimmy. But I never really saw Jimmy as a boy; he’s just Jimmy. I didn’t have the confidence to talk to any boy I liked and I always got tongue-tied with new people and felt super self-conscious. Not with Chase, though.

  From the start, I felt comfortable around him; we had so much in common that the conversation just flowed without me having to think about it. Sitting there on the pavement on a random London street, I could have talked to him for hours. He was just so different from how I assumed the lead singer of a pop band would be. He wasn’t self-centred or materialistic; he was funny, smart and kind. Not to mention really good-looking.

  I don’t know why someone like him would be the least bit interested in someone like me in the first place, but somehow he was. That night we met, when I had to rush off without giving him my number, he started this huge campaign on social media to track me down using #FINDTHEGIRL. Thanks to me dropping my purse, all he knew were the details on my bank card: Miss N. Palmer.

  Secretly spending time with him was amazing, but things got bad because Nancy believed she was the girl Chase was looking for. Even though we weren’t exactly friends, I still couldn’t bear the idea of hurting her by telling her the truth. It got harder to find the right time to tell her as the term went on because we started to hang out again, and I was terrified that if she knew about Chase she’d hate me again.

  I still feel a stab of pain in my stomach if I think about the day she found out about us at school. The paparazzi had got a photo of Chase and me on a date without us knowing and it spread over social media like wildfire. Nancy looked so betrayed when she saw it. We had a huge fight when Mum was driving us home, which I can’t remember all that well because someone bulldozed through a red light straight into our car.

  Nancy doesn’t like talking about the accident.

  Whenever it comes up in conversation, she gets this funny look on her face and changes the subject as quickly as possible. I think Nancy found it all much harder to deal with than me. As the other driver went into my side of the car, I took most of the hit and ended up being put into a medically induced coma. I guess, for me, it was like being in a really deep sleep, whereas Nancy was conscious of everything and had to see me like that.

  While I was recovering, she went into protective-older-twin overdrive and barely let me out of her sight, sorting everything on my behalf and telling me what to wear so I wouldn’t be cold. Honestly, it was hilarious, but it was also really nice because it was exactly how we used to be before we let ourselves grow apart. Growing up, Nancy was the confident, outgoing one and I would hide behind her, letting her take charge and calming her when she got too silly.

  The truth is, the accident brought us closer together. I guess the idea of losing one another made us realize just how lucky we were. Now, we love how we’re so different and I can’t seem to do anything without checking Nancy’s opinion first. I couldn’t be without her.

  Although I could probably do without the early-morning wake-up calls.

  ‘I know what you’re not telling me!’ Nancy suddenly cries, clicking her fingers. ‘Chase said the L-WORD! Oh my god, Nina, tell me everything! How and when did he say it and did you say it back?’

  ‘Wait, what? No!’ I protest, almost choking on my own spit. ‘He hasn’t said –’ I lower my voice to a whisper – ‘the L-word. Neither of us have.’

  ‘There’s no need to whisper like he might overhear us, Nina. He’s a hundred miles away in London, so I think we’re safe,’ she says, rolling her eyes. ‘What’s the big deal about telling him you loooooove him?’

  ‘It isn’t a big deal,’ I say, trying to act casual but fully aware that my cheeks are glowing red. ‘He just hasn’t said it yet. So, I haven’t either.’

  I want to ask Nancy whether she thinks it’s weird that he hasn’t said it yet, but it’s just so embarrassing talking about it. It’s not like I haven’t thought about it. I’ve almost said it several times, at the end of phone conversations or at the end of our dates. Once, I was looking into his beautiful blue eyes and admiring his long dark eyelashes, and was so distracted that I started blurting the first bit out and had to change the sentence into something else: ‘I love … pens,’ I’d said quickly, which was so stupid, but I’d panicked and it was the first thing that came into my brain. Chase had looked at me strangely and then said that he too loved pens, so I think I got away with it.

  Still, he has said he’s fallen for me before and he definitely acts like he’s in love with me.

  But it would be nice for him to actually say it. Then I could say it back and stop worrying about saying it accidentally.

  Unless, he’s not in love with me and that’s why he’s not saying it.

  ‘Nina, pay attention! You’re in a weird daze,’ Nancy says, making herself comfortable on the bed. ‘So, if it’s not a record label deal or Chase saying the L-word, then what is this big secret? I’m not going to leave your bedroom until you tell me.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ a voice says from the doorway.

  I groan as Mum comes into my room, plonking herself on the end of my bed and planting a kiss on Nancy’s forehead.

  She smiles. ‘I didn’t expect you to be up at this time on a Saturday,’ she says.

  ‘Neither did I,’ I grumble.

  ‘My twin senses were going,’ Nancy explains as I roll my eyes.

  ‘Oh, how exciting!’ Mum gasps, leaning forward eagerly. ‘What were they telling you?’

  Mum is the biggest believer in the idea that twins have a special telepathic connection. Whenever she catches Nancy and me looking at each other in a certain way, she’ll yell, ‘You’re doing the twin thing! Right now! I can see it happening!’ She even thinks we can read each other’s mind when we’re not in the same room. The other day when I was in the kitchen and Nancy was in her room, she asked me what Nancy wanted for dinner.

  ‘I’m not sure – you want me to go upstairs and ask?’ I said.

  ‘No, no,’ she replied, before her eyes went all wide. ‘Why don’t you do your twin thing? Can’t you sense what she wants?’

  I had to go into a long explanation about how we couldn’t ACTUALLY read each other’s mind, but she refused to believe me.

  ‘My twin senses were telling me that Nina has a big secret and she was just about to tell me what that is,’ Nancy says matter-of-factly.

  ‘I’m just in time then!’ Mum beams at me. ‘What’s your secret, Nina? Are you dating another famous pop star? Or perhaps a Hollywood actor this time. Maybe both!’

  ‘Very funny.’ I sigh, as Nancy and Mum giggle together. ‘No, Mum, I’m still dating Chase. He’s actually coming over this evening for dinner, if that’s OK?’

  ‘How very un-scandalous of you. But of course he’s always welcome here; you don’t need to ask. Go on then – tell us what’s going on. Nancy’s twin senses are never wrong. Although –’ she pauses, holding up her hand and changing to her serious-Mum voice – ‘if you don’t want to tell us, then you don’t have to. There’s no pressure. You are entitled to your privacy.’

  ‘Oh, really? I’m entitled to my privacy, am I? Nancy has been on at me to tell her my secret for the past half-hou
r.’

  ‘AHA!’ Nancy cries. ‘So you admit you have a secret!’

  I let out a long sigh. It is time to admit defeat.

  ‘Fine – you win. There is something I’m not telling you.’

  I reach under my pillow and pull out an unopened envelope addressed to me. They both stare at it with eager curiosity. The envelope is expensive, thick paper and my name is written across the front in swirling letters.

  ‘Oh my god, what’s that?’ Nancy asks, her eyes widening. ‘Are you … are you going to HOGWARTS?’

  Mum bursts out laughing at Nancy’s joke.

  ‘Thank you for appreciating my comic genius, Mum,’ Nancy says, ignoring my unimpressed expression. ‘But seriously, Nina, what is it? It looks important.’

  ‘It’s a letter I’ve been waiting for. It arrived yesterday morning.’

  ‘That’s why you blushed when you asked about the post the other day! And why you were so distracted yesterday! I REALLY AM A GENIUS!’ Nancy declares. ‘My twin senses are out of control. I should have my own show.’

  ‘You really should, darling,’ Mum agrees sincerely. ‘What’s the letter, Nina?’

  I take a deep breath. ‘It’s from Guildhall School of Music and Drama. I found out that they’ve introduced a weekend music programme that runs through the term. It’s a sort of introductory course to their summer school programme. It starts next week. Anyway, I auditioned last minute and –’

  ‘What?’ Nancy interrupts, looking stunned. ‘You auditioned? When?’

  ‘Just after New Year. Chase took me. It’s not that I didn’t want you to come,’ I say quickly. ‘Chase was the one who told me about the course in the first place and then he practically dragged me to the audition, and I made him promise not to tell anyone because I knew I wouldn’t get a place.’

  Nancy smiles. ‘OK, that’s very … Nina of you,’ she says. ‘Was it scary?’

  I nod, thinking back to that day. When Chase pointed out the course to me, I couldn’t believe it. It looked amazing and, more than anything, I wanted to get a place on it.