Strike a Pose, Daizy Star

by Cathy Cassidy

  ‘I have a vivid imagination too,’ I say. ‘That book is horrible!’

  ‘Dad, I am not eating chicken any more,’ Pixie says. ‘It’s cruel!’

  ‘I second that,’ I say.

  Becca rolls her eyes. ‘You’d better take chicken off the menu from now on, Dad,’ she sighs. ‘This is an official protest. Right?’

  ‘Right,’ Pixie and I chime in.

  ‘I wasn’t planning to make our chickens into a pie,’ Dad argues. ‘They are young! They have years of egg laying ahead of them. But a farmer has to know about these things. Sometimes, when a hen gets old and stops producing eggs –’

  ‘No!’ I protest. ‘Whatever you are going to say … just, no!’

  Dad’s shoulders slump. ‘Right,’ he says, eyeing the chickens with regret. ‘Well, that’s OK. I can always specialize in goat’s cheese instead then. Or potatoes, because chips are practically the British national dish and there will always be a demand for spuds! It could even be nettles … nettle soup is very underrated.’

  ‘Trust me,’ I say. ‘It really isn’t.’

  It is so typical that the one crop my dad can actually grow is a weed. I have visions of the back and front gardens filled with towering nettles, and Dad inside the house making vatloads of nettle soup ready to be tinned and labelled and stacked on supermarket shelves around the country.

  I don’t think it will ever catch on.

  ‘Dad,’ I sigh. ‘You and Mum talked about this. Things are not working out. You are never going to grow enough spuds to supply the chip shops of Britain, and nobody likes nettle soup. You have to give up on this whole idea. You promised!’

  ‘Give up?’ Dad asks, as if the thought has never occurred to him. ‘No … I didn’t promise that. I said I would find a way to make it work. And don’t worry, I have!’

  My heart sinks. What now?

  It is seventeen days now since the chickens arrived, and Dad calls a family meeting. I’m immediately suspicious – he has splashed out on takeaway pizza and ice cream and red wine.

  ‘You’re taking this very well,’ Mum tells him. ‘The end of the whole chicken-and-potato-farming experiment, I mean.’

  ‘The end?’ Dad laughs. ‘It’s not the end! This is just the beginning!’

  ‘Mike,’ Mum says sternly. ‘You promised me!’

  ‘I promised I would find a solution,’ Dad corrects her. ‘Keeping chickens and a goat in the town hasn’t really worked out. So the logical thing seems to be …’

  I pull a face. My dad is not at all logical, and I dread to think what he might be planning next. I bite into a slice of pizza.

  ‘Move to the country!’ Dad announces.

  I choke on my Deep-crust Mozzarella and Pineapple Surprise.

  ‘No way!’ Pixie, Becca and I chorus. Mum says nothing, but trust me, she is not looking happy.

  ‘Hear me out, girls,’ Dad barges on. ‘Green fields, blue skies, fresh air! A little cottage with roses round the door! It was always our dream!’

  ‘That was a very long time ago,’ Mum replies. ‘Besides, Mike, dreams are just that – dreams. In the real world, somebody has to earn the money to pay our mortgage – and that person is me, because you don’t have a job any more, remember?’

  ‘I do have a job,’ Dad says. ‘I am a farmer. On a small scale, obviously, but once we have our own smallholding … well, just think! I’ve been doing some research. Looking at remote smallholdings with several acres of land. I’ve drawn up a shortlist. Take a look!’

  I wait for Mum to tell Dad not to be so ridiculous, but she just sighs, exasperated, and I watch my supermodel dreams crumble into dust. I have nothing against the countryside, I just do not want to live there. And I definitely don’t want to live in some ramshackle farmhouse with nothing but fields for miles around, while Dad tends his herds of goats and chickens and raises endless crops of nettles.

  Dad takes out a folder filled with papers, and my heart sinks.

  The first set of details show a derelict farmhouse with no roof, in the south of Ireland.

  ‘We’d get wet,’ Pixie points out. ‘And cold!’

  An old barn in Cornwall and a rusting caravan on the shores of Loch Ness get the thumbs down too, as does an ugly bungalow in Wales and a tin shed with a broken doorway on the Yorkshire Moors. ‘They looked better on the Internet,’ Dad says. ‘I mean, they do have potential, but –’

  ‘But nothing,’ Mum says. ‘This is crazy, Mike. Yes, I used to like the idea of living in the country once … but even you must see that this is a joke!’

  ‘I’ve saved the best till last,’ Dad argues. ‘Just give it a chance, that’s all I ask. We have to have vision!’

  ‘You must have double vision if you think we would be seen dead in these disgusting dumps,’ Becca snarls.

  Becca has a point. I expect eyesight is one of the first things to suffer when people get middle-aged. A strong pair of glasses could be the answer. Dad looks at the last few sheets, his eyes narrowing, which only confirms my whole failing-eyesight theory.

  He hands the papers to Mum, and she puts down her glass of wine and studies the details carefully.

  ‘Oh!’ she says softly, raising one eyebrow. ‘This one doesn’t look too bad. Perhaps I spoke too soon, Mike. Maybe we should take a look after all?’

  Dad slips an arm round her shoulders, and Mum smiles. She looks at Dad, and she looks at the property details, and her eyes are all faraway and dreamy.

  OK, now I really am scared.

  Dad and Mum have fallen in love with a little cottage on the Isle of Muck, way up on the west coast of Scotland. I am not impressed. I mean … Muck? Seriously? A name like that cannot be a good omen, can it?

  I have to admit that the island looks very pretty in the photographs, and that the cottage is beautiful, with whitewashed walls and red roses twining round the doorway.

  I hate it on sight.

  So what if it is pretty? So what if it has loads of land? So what if it is just two hundred metres from the beach? I don’t care.

  It is hundreds and hundreds of miles away from Brightford. This is where my friends are, and Beth and Willow and Murphy are the best friends ever. I will lose them, I know I will, if I go to live in the middle of nowhere.

  I have seen it happen. I had a friend called Hasmita Patel, and when I was in Year Three, Hasmita moved away. We promised we would keep in touch and be friends forever, but after a while we just sort of stopped writing and phoning. I think that Hasmita forgot about me, and I forgot about her.

  Perhaps Murphy, Beth and Willow will forget about me too?

  As for finding my Star Quality, I may as well forget it. The Isle of Muck is no place for a supermodel, that much is clear.

  There are some plus points to living on the Isle of Muck, I suppose.

  Buttercup the goat might like it, because she will have fields to roam across and possibly some goat friends too. Cleopatra, Esmerelda and Attila can be as free-range as they like, and nobody will mind if Attila crows from dawn until dusk because, guess what, there are hardly any neighbours to complain.

  I am not kidding. The whole island is just two miles long and one mile across, with less than forty inhabitants.

  ‘It certainly looks idyllic,’ Mum sighs. ‘I don’t see me picking up a senior nursing post out there, though!’

  ‘Take a career break,’ Dad says brightly. ‘Recharge your batteries. Decide what you really want in life. You said yourself, Livvi, that job is wearing you down!’

  ‘Yes, but –’

  ‘I’m not saying you have to stop nursing,’ Dad says. ‘You could always go back to it. But … well, there are other things you’ve always wanted to do too. Grow herbs. Learn Spanish. Paint pictures, like you used to do. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! A little cottage with roses round the door … Liv, this place couldn’t be more perfect!’

  Mum shrugs. ‘We could look at it,’ she concedes. ‘Just look, though, Mike! We would all need to be in agre
ement. And I’m not sure such a major lifestyle change would be a good idea, really.’

  ‘It would be the best idea ever!’ Dad grins. ‘I’ll make an appointment to view it right away! This cottage is available to rent, not to buy, so we could hang on to our house here until we were sure we’d made the right move.’

  ‘Really?’ Mum asks. ‘We could rent this house out for a year, treat it as a trial, a chance to live the dream. And if things didn’t work out …’

  Mum not only seems to like Dad’s crazy idea, she is actually joining in with his plans, which makes it seem a whole lot more real. And the thought of strangers living in our house while we are miles away on the Isle of Muck makes me feel sad and sick inside.

  ‘Think of it!’ Dad says. ‘We wouldn’t be needing a car any more … we could walk everywhere, or go by rowing boat. There’s a ferry to the mainland three times a week, more in the summer. What a life!’

  ‘Life?’ Becca erupts. ‘LIFE? You might as well bury us alive!’

  Dad laughs. ‘Honestly, Becca. You’ve been looking very pale lately … life in the country would do you good – give you nice, rosy cheeks!’

  Becca is a fully-fledged Goth these days – I don’t think she wants rosy cheeks, any more than she wants wellies or a pitchfork or a straw hat.

  ‘It would be a very green way of living,’ Dad goes on. ‘There is no mains electricity on the island – everything works on windpower! You’d approve of that, Daizy!’

  ‘I would?’

  It is one thing to be green when you live in a town – it just means recycling cans and bottles and turning down the central heating. Being green on the Isle of Muck might be very different. I picture the five of us huddled round a flickering candle, picking at congealed seaweed stew. I bet they don’t have Topshop or New Look out there, either. What if I really do end up having to make my clothes out of feed sacks and potato netting?

  ‘This is getting scary,’ I whisper to my sisters, as Mum and Dad gaze, moon-eyed, at the cottage details.

  ‘It is a bit,’ Pixie says. ‘I don’t know if I want to live on an island called Muck. Although there could be mermaids …’

  ‘Don’t get your hopes up,’ I sigh.

  ‘They can’t make us go,’ Becca says darkly.

  ‘Whatever happens, we all stick together on this. Agreed?’

  ‘Agreed,’ Pixie and I chorus.

  That’s something, I guess.

  When I tell Beth, Willow and Murphy I might be moving to a remote Scottish island called Muck, they think I am joking.

  ‘Your dad is losing it,’ Willow sighs as we stand around in the playground waiting for the bell to go. ‘I have never heard of the Isle of Muck! Are you sure he isn’t just making it up?’

  ‘I’m sure,’ I say. ‘It’s real. I looked it up on the Internet. It’s a tiny, windswept island off the west coast of Scotland, with more sheep and cows than human beings. Can you believe it?’

  ‘All they need is a gang of chickens and goats to add to the population,’ Murphy smirks. ‘I wonder what you’d look like in a kilt?’

  ‘This is serious!’ I argue. ‘Mum and Dad have already fixed up a date to go and see the place. There is no escape! The fashion show is tomorrow, and I am on the brink of supermodel stardom, or a Star of the Week award at the very least. And now my whole life could be over!’

  Willow and Murphy just laugh, but Beth looks suitably upset. ‘I don’t want you to go!’ she says in a wobbly voice.

  It is good to know that at least one of my friends will miss me.

  ‘It might not happen,’ I tell her. ‘Apparently we all have to be in agreement, and I cannot see Becca agreeing to live on a tiny Scottish island, can you?’

  ‘Not in a million years,’ Murphy says.

  ‘Your dad will never go through with it, anyhow,’ Willow adds. ‘A week or so from now, he’ll have another crazy idea and forget he ever wanted to be a farmer. Trust me.’

  Deep down, I know Willow and Murphy are right. Dad’s brilliant ideas have a way of fizzling out like damp fireworks, so maybe all I need to do is stay calm and wait for the storm to blow over.

  Then again, Mum has never been keen on Dad’s ideas before …

  Beth doesn’t look convinced, either. Her eyes are solemn and serious, as if she has her own personal raincloud hovering nearby.

  Suddenly, a football crash-lands in my arms, just about knocking me over. Ethan Miller yells across the playground. ‘Hey, chuck the ball back, Daizy! You can join in the game, if you like!’

  I turn my back on him – Ethan Miller is a deeply annoying boy, and I do not want to encourage him. He likes to be the centre of attention. He will go to any lengths to ensure he makes an impression, even if it means trying to flatten someone with a football, or dropping a worm down their school sweatshirt (he did this to me in Year Three, and yes, I bear a grudge).

  Besides, it was Ethan who gave me Buttercup, and Buttercup is what got Dad started on wanting to be self-sufficient. You could say Ethan is to blame for the mess I am in right now.

  I hand the football to Beth. ‘You chuck it back,’ I say. Beth and Willow both think that Ethan Miller is the best thing since custard doughnuts – they have been crushing on him all year, which is kind of icky to see, but if anything can cheer Beth up, it has to be Ethan.

  ‘Nah,’ Beth says. She lets the ball slide to the floor, allowing Willow to scoop it up and kick it over to Ethan.

  I blink. Now I know there is definitely something very wrong – Beth is crazy about Ethan Miller. Never in a million years would she miss the chance to talk to him or chuck his football back.

  ‘What is up with Beth?’ I whisper to Willow. ‘First there was the sleepover thing, and she’s been so down in the dumps lately!’

  ‘I don’t know – she hasn’t said anything to me. Maybe she’s just stressed about the fashion show tomorrow – I don’t think she’s been looking forward to it,’ Willow says. ‘Hey, Ethan! Hang on! Murphy and I will play footy with you!’

  Willow drags Murphy off into the scrum, and I turn back to Beth. Ever since the sleepover I’ve known things weren’t right with her, but I’ve been hoping it would just blow over, sort itself out. I’ve had enough problems of my own, but I can see now that’s no excuse for ignoring a friend in need.

  ‘Beth, I know something’s bothering you,’ I say. ‘Tell me. Please?’

  She shrugs. ‘It’s just … well, one minute everything is fine, just the way it has always been. The next minute … BAM. Everything changes. You never know just what is round the corner.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ I say. ‘Living with my dad has been a bit like that just lately. But, Beth – has something happened? Is something wrong?’

  She sighs. ‘It’s nothing. I’m just feeling a bit gloomy today.’

  ‘But you’re OK?’ I check. ‘Really?’

  ‘I can’t talk about it right now,’ Beth says, and her smile is a little too bright, as though it might dissolve at any moment. ‘Thanks for caring, though, Daizy. I will tell you, I promise – soon. Don’t say anything to Willow or Murphy, OK?’

  ‘OK,’ I say uneasily.

  It turns out that Beth is right, though. You never know just what is round the corner, and this time it just happens to be Becca and her boyfriend Spike. I am walking home with Pixie and Murphy, and as we turn into Silver Street, there they are, in the middle of the pavement, talking very loudly and waving their arms about.

  ‘Be reasonable!’ Spike is saying, which makes me smile because my sister is many things, but reasonable is not one of them.

  ‘I can’t believe you won’t help me!’ Becca says, her voice rising to a howl. ‘I can’t believe you would abandon me now, in my hour of need! Drop me just when I need you most! Cast me aside and trample all over my heart with your size-nine biker boots!’

  ‘Becca, listen …’ Spike says, but my sister is way beyond listening. Tears are streaming down her face, making her black eyeliner run, and h
er voice is hurt and harsh and angry, all at the same time.

  ‘It’s all over between you and me, Sebastian Pike,’ she yells. ‘I never want to see you again. And you know what? I won’t have to. Because I will be spending the rest of my life wasting away on some muddy rock out in the ocean hundreds and hundreds of miles from here. And it will all be YOUR FAULT!’

  She runs off along the street, her crimped hair fluttering behind her in the breeze, and moments later we hear the front door of number seventeen close with an earth-shattering slam.

  Spike looks slightly shell-shocked. He blinks and frowns and finally spots us glaring at him from the corner of the street. ‘I can explain,’ he says.

  ‘Don’t even bother,’ I say loyally. ‘Come on, Pixie. Murphy.’

  I stick my chin in the air and march defiantly past, with Pixie and Murphy trailing along behind. I don’t know what Spike has done, but it must have been pretty bad for Becca to dump him.

  He may be a scary, six-foot Goth-guy with a green fringe and a pierced lip, but Becca loves him. At least … she did.

  Becca locks herself in her bedroom, crying and playing her thrash-metal-punk CDs so loudly that everyone in the house feels like crying too.

  It is not exactly a restful way to spend the evening before your big debut as a pre-teen supermodel, but I try not to be selfish. Becca’s feelings come first, obviously.

  ‘She was too young to have a boyfriend, anyway,’ Dad is saying. ‘It’s all for the best. She’d be better off concentrating on her schoolwork. And now she won’t have to worry about long-distance phone calls and visits when we go to live on the Isle of Muck.’

  ‘If we go,’ Mum corrects him. ‘Besides, Becca is fourteen. She works very hard at school, and she has to have some fun.’

  ‘Does that sound like fun?’ Dad asks, as Becca ramps up the volume on her CD player so high that a few flakes of plaster drift down from the ceiling in protest.

  ‘Spike seemed like such a nice boy,’ Mum sighs.