Vote for Effie

by Laura Wood

  “SILLY OLD BAG!” Lennon croaks at his most loving.

  “Who are you calling old?” Iris grumbles, bustling about making cups of tea. I notice that her hair has been freshly dyed and is the same vibrant hot pink as her kitchen walls. Long strands of beads click and clack around her neck as she moves. “So today was the big vote, eh?” She settles a steaming mug in front of me and I wrap my fingers around the warm china.

  “Yep.” I nod.

  “Well?” Iris raises an eyebrow. “How did it go?”

  “It went badly,” I reply, my voice flat and low. “I lost.”

  Iris doesn’t say anything, and I feel a tear snake down my cheek.

  There’s a slight scraping noise and I look down to see her slowly pushing a dish of biscuits across the table towards me.

  I reach out and take one, dunking it carefully in my tea. It helps a bit.

  “Sorry,” I sniffle. “I’m still a bit upset about it.”

  “Don’t apologize for having feelings,” Iris says. “You should be proud of what you achieved. I bet a lot of people voted for you.”

  “Well, yes, I suppose,” I admit. “Our head teacher did say that there were less than twenty votes between us.”

  “And how many junior students are there?” Iris asks.

  “In all three years?” I say thoughtfully, doing the maths in my head. “About five hundred.”

  Iris sips her tea. “So over two hundred people who believed in you and voted for you?” She raises her eyebrows. “That’s no small thing.”

  “No,” I say, dazed. “It’s not, is it?”

  We sit quietly for a moment while I think this over.

  “Aaron actually did a surprisingly good job,” I admit, staring into my cup of tea. “Even if he totally played up to the crowd.”

  “Hmm,” Iris says again. “Well, from what you’ve told me about him, that’s a bit of a surprise.”

  I frown. “I suppose he’s not as bad as I first thought … at the school council thing, anyway. As a human being he pretty much sucks.”

  We sit in silence for a minute and I can practically feel all the events of the day whirring around and around in my head like a demented carousel.

  “We had a fight,” I say, finally.

  “Who did?” Iris asks.

  “Me and Aaron. We had a fight because I heard he was saying mean things about me and my friends.” I sigh. “The thing is –” I pick at my fingernails “– I thought we were … well … I had almost started to think we might be … friends.”

  Iris slurps her tea some more. “And this fight,” she says, “did you give him a chance to share his side?”

  “What side?” I snort.

  “You and me are quite a lot alike, Effie Kostas,” Iris says gruffly. “Always charging into battle. Now I’m not saying the boy isn’t an idiot … maybe he is. But if you thought the two of you were friends then maybe you should trust your judgement a bit more. Give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  I think about this carefully. “Hmmm, maybe,” I say finally, although I’m not convinced.

  “Anyway.” Iris’s gaze sharpens as it rests on me. “The point is, if you did your best, then win or lose, you should be proud of yourself.” Her voice is brisk.

  I snort again. “That sounds like the sort of thing you say to a real loser.”

  Iris lifts a finger warningly. “Now you listen to me, Effie Kostas,” she says. “If you had lost this election spectacularly, if you hadn’t even got a single vote, if your loss was so enormous and embarrassing—”

  “Yeah, all right,” I interrupt in alarm. “I get the picture.”

  “EVEN then,” Iris continues as though I haven’t spoken, “no one could ever think of you as a loser.”

  It’s so unexpectedly sweet that I feel my eyes tingling with tears. It’s been a strange day and I’m feeling so overwhelmed – sad and hurt and angry at the same time.

  “What you’ve done, Effie,” Iris continues solemnly, “is very brave. You didn’t let being new or being scared stop you from running. You didn’t stay quiet. You made sure people heard you. And they listened.” Her hand reaches out and squeezes mine. Her skin is papery thin, but her grip is firm and I squeeze back, gratefully. We sit like that for a couple of seconds and then she snatches her fingers away and looks at me suspiciously, as if I’ve somehow tricked her into being nice to me. “Now,” she huffs, “if you’ve quite finished feeling sorry for yourself then you can help me with this Netflix thing that your sister has talked me into getting. Looks like a lot of rubbish to me.” She sniffs derisively. “Probably full of soap operas and young people nonsense.” Her tone might be dismissive but her eyes gleam with excitement at the prospect and I can tell she’s going to be knee-deep in The Vampire Diaries before long.

  “No problem,” I smile. “I can help with that.”

  Later that evening I’m snuggled up under a blanket eating a huge plate of chocolate brownies. It wasn’t quite as bad as I thought it would be, telling my family that I had lost. They wanted me to know they were really proud of me A LOT, and Dad put on a T-shirt that said PROUD DAD on the front, just in case I wasn’t totally convinced. Lil brooded for quite a while and began asking really specific questions about Aaron’s timetable and his route home from school until I told her it wasn’t Aaron’s fault, not really.

  “I still can’t BELIEVE I was going to let him duet with me,” she muttered darkly, and then, as if struck by a sudden thought, “HE’S LIKE A REAL-LIFE HANS!”

  It’s dark outside now and there’s a knock at the door. “Effie,” I hear Dad call. “It’s someone for you.”

  Weird.

  I stagger to my feet, brushing the chocolate crumbs from my clothes and smoothing my tangled hair.

  Standing in the doorway is Aaron Davis.

  “What are you doing here?” I blurt out.

  He looks down at the ground, scuffing his toes on the front doorstep.

  “I don’t really know,” he says, and his voice is quiet. “I just wanted to say … you know … good campaign or whatever.”

  I look at him for a moment. His cheeks are a bit pink and I realize it can’t have been easy to come here.

  “I’m sorry about yesterday,” I say, taking a deep breath. Because Iris is right. I should give him the benefit of the doubt. I don’t much feel like I need a mortal enemy any more. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you without giving you a chance to share your side of the story,” I offer.

  Aaron looks up. “I honestly don’t know what you heard,” he says quickly. “But it’s not true. I never made fun of you or your friends. I know we didn’t get on at the beginning, and I know I said some stupid things but I thought we were…” He shrugs helplessly. “You know … all right now.”

  “We are all right.” I smile weakly. “I guess we both said things. It doesn’t really matter.”

  “Cool,” Aaron says, shuffling his feet.

  “Cool,” I echo. “So, anyway … congratulations and all that.”

  “Oh. Thanks,” Aaron says awkwardly. Then he seems to take a deep breath. “Look, the real reason I came was to say that you were right. About me. About a lot of things.”

  My mouth drops open. These are the last words I expected to hear. “I’m sorry,” I say. “Could you repeat that?”

  Aaron gives me a lopsided grin. “I couldn’t stop thinking about what you said about the girls’ football team –” his voice is very serious “– about doing things that help other people, not just doing things for yourself. I hadn’t really thought about that before.” He shakes his head. “Not like I had consciously been ignoring things I could be doing as student president, exactly … more like I just hadn’t thought about them.” He frowns. “Does that make sense?”

  “Sort of,” I say.

  “Anyway –” he shrugs “– I just wanted you to know that I want to try and do things differently now. Probably not exactly how you would do them, but I want to … do more. Thanks to you.�
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  I let out a long breath. “That’s … good,” I say.

  “Yeah.” He shrugs again, not quite meeting my eye.

  “Especially because I’m going to be around to make sure you keep all your promises,” I say, my hand on my hip as I feel something big and hopeful filling my chest. “And if you let the students down then I’ll be the one leading the resistance.”

  Aaron grins now, and I can feel my face grinning back at him.

  He turns to walk back up the garden path. “We’ll see, Kostas,” he calls over his shoulder.

  “We will see, Davis!” I yell after him. “And the first thing I’m coming for is your lunch pass!”

  He raises his hand in a jaunty salute and I close the door, leaning back against it. I can hear Iris and Zo’s words ringing in my ears. My job here is far from done.

  In fact, I’m just getting started.

  Epilogue

  “Come on, Effie, you can do better than that,” Iris snaps as I push her wheelchair through the crowd. “Let’s get over there!”

  “I’m trying!” I wheeze.

  “Here, let me,” Jess says. “It’s my turn.”

  I move aside gladly, and Jess proves more nimble with the wheelchair than me, guiding us over to one side.

  “WOOOOO!” Iris cries, waving her sign in the air with both hands. The sign reads: I’M NINETY YEARS OLD AND I CAN’T BELIEVE I STILL HAVE TO PROTEST THIS STUFF. Around us a group of women cheer and laugh. A couple ask if they can take a picture of her and Iris cackles gleefully.

  “Of course you can,” she says, obviously very pleased with herself.

  Lil, dressed as Princess Leia, is getting almost as much attention. She’s holding tightly on to Dad’s hand, but in her other hand is a sign that says A GIRL’S PLACE IS IN THE RESISTANCE. We made it together, breaking out all the glitter glue.

  “This is the coolest thing I’ve ever done,” Angelika says, slipping her arm through mine and grinning at me.

  She’s so completely right. We are standing in a crowd of thousands of people, marching through the streets of London for women’s rights and equality. There are people here from all over. They are every age, every race, from everywhere, and they are singing and chanting and walking together.

  “You dropped your glove,” a voice says from beside me.

  “Thanks.” I smile, reaching out to take it.

  “No worries,” Aaron replies, returning my smile. “Thanks for bringing me today,” he says, looking around him. “This is awesome.”

  “I’m glad you came,” I say. And I realize that I really am.

  I remember what Iris told me once, about feeling part of something bigger than yourself. Of feeling like you were in the middle of something important. That’s how I feel now. It’s a feeling that is so big it seems almost impossible to keep it inside, and so I shout and sing along as loud as I can. I look around at my friends, who have all come to march. They’re waving signs and laughing together. I know I’m so lucky to have them, and that they help me feel part of something too.

  “SHOUT UP, SHOUT OUT, SHOUT LOUD!” the crowd chant. “TOGETHER WE WILL CHANGE THE WORLD!”

  I really couldn’t agree more.

  READING Questions:

  I hope that you enjoyed reading Effie’s story as much as I enjoyed writing it. Effie loves having conversations with people and asking important questions, so I know she would be really happy if this book got readers talking. Hopefully you can come up with some questions of your own, but here are a few to get you started.

  Effie campaigns for issues like recycling and libraries. Aaron campaigns for pizza. What issues would you campaign for in your school? What would you like to see change?

  Aaron and Effie argue throughout the book. Do you think they will ever be able to work together?

  Aaron wins the presidential campaign. Do you think he has changed over the book? Will he be a different president now?

  Have you ever lost a competition? How did you pick yourself up afterwards?

  What are the qualities that make a good leader?

  In the book Effie is often told that she’s being too loud or too opinionated. What do you think about her response?

  What job would you want on Effie’s campaign team?

  USEFUL Links:

  If you’re feeling inspired by Effie and her friends, or if there were issues in the book that you want to learn more about, then these are some different websites that you might find interesting. There are lots of ways that you can make a difference.

  obama.org/globalgirlsalliance/

  assembly.malala.org/

  girlup.org/take-action/be-a-leader/girl-up-clubs/

  amightygirl.com

  girlguiding.org.uk/social-action-advocacy-and-campaigns

  womensmarchlondon.com/bring-the-noise

  lettoysbetoys.org.uk/letbooksbebooks

  thisgirlcan.co.uk

  sciencegrrl.co.uk

  pbskids.org/scigirlsengineergirl.org

  banbossy.com

  fawcettsociety.org.uk

  stemettes.org

  friendsoftheearth.uk

  wastebuster.co.uk

  bulliesout.com

  youngminds.org.uk

  Acknowledgements

  I love this book a lot and it came about because of a conversation with my agent Louise Lamont and my editor Gen Herr about the amazing kids we were encountering, and the terrible sadness we felt about the state of the world, and what work we could make that was hopeful and honest in the face of these things. We worked together to come up with Effie Kostas and her friends and so the first thanks must go to them, my collaborators and my friends.

  My incredible editor Sophie Cashell was Effie’s number one cheerleader. She literally cut out yearbook photos of Amy Poehler and marched into acquisitions telling them why we needed to make this book. She waved banners, she bought cakes. Her notes were, as always, frustratingly spot on and her enthusiasm and sense of humour made working on this book such a joy. Thank you so much, Sophie!

  To the rest of the team at Scholastic, I can’t thank you enough for continuing to support me – I have always felt like I am in the safest possible hands with you. I still can’t believe that I get to work with such an incredible, passionate, dedicated group of people. You have genuinely made my dreams come true!

  To my friends and family who have been a constant source of love and support even when I have been moaning over deadlines and weeping over my computer screen. Thank you for putting up with me! Thank you to my niece Imogen and my nephew Alex for being my continuing source of inspiration. I am a very proud auntie thanks to these two incredible young people. Thank you to my lovely friend Lynda for lending me her parrot… I’m sorry I made him so badly behaved, the real Lennon is very polite! Special thanks, love, and lemon juice to my pal, Chris Yiannitsaros. And as always the biggest thank you to Paul for being my best friend and the very kindest person I know, and for blaming the patriarchy whenever necessary.

  And thank you, thank you, thank you, to you. Thank you for reading and for caring. Thank you for being the person you are and for taking up space. Now, I hope you feel inspired and, as Effie would say, I hope you go out there and make some noise!

  Scholastic Children’s Books

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  SCHOLASTIC and associated logos are trademarks and or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

  First published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2019

  This electronic edition published by Scholastic Ltd, 2019

  Text copyright © Laura Wood, 2019

  Cover illustrations © Emma Trithart, 2019

  Inside illustrations © Mirelle Ortega, 2019

  The right of Laura Wood and Mirelle Ortega to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work has been asserted by them.
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br />   eISBN 978 1407 19462 2

  A CIP catalogue record for this work is available from the British Library.

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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