“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” Amber says.
“I can’t believe you’re actually going,” Mum says. “When are you moving?”
“Josh leaves in a fortnight, so pretty soon.”
Mum squeezes Chichi tightly. “And where’s his house? Is it far?”
“The other side of Collinsbrooke,” Mark says reassuringly. “Not far at all. Just a fifteen-minute bus ride.”
“Does that mean I can move into their bedroom?” Harry asks. “It’s bigger than mine.”
“Hey, I’m older, I should get it,” I protest.
“Neither of you are getting it, I’ve got big plans for that room,” Dad says. “I can turn it into a games room… or a workshop… it’s going to be brilliant.”
“We haven’t even left yet!” Amber says.
“Nobody’s having that bedroom,” Mum says. “I’m going to keep it as a nursery for the twins, so they’ll have somewhere to sleep and play when they come to stay. Which they’ll be doing a lot. Won’t they?” She looks at Amber and Mark for reassurance.
“Of course,” Mark says. “I’m sure my gorgeous girls will be here all the time. You’ll hardly even know we’ve gone. You’ve been so generous letting us stay, but it’s time to move on, and this is the only way we’re going to get our own house.”
“You’re not going to be coming back in a year’s time, are you?” Dad says.
Mark laughs. “Hopefully not. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, shall we?”
A tear drips down Mum’s nose and Amber gasps. “Mum, don’t cry!”
“I’m sorry, love, it’s just, I’ve so enjoyed having you all here… you’re absolutely right, you do need your own space, but I’ll be sad to see you go.”
Amber’s eyes also fill with tears. “Now you’re setting me off. Please don’t. We aren’t going far. And you’ll come and visit, won’t you?”
“Course I will,” Mum says.
“You promise?”
“I promise,” Mum replies, but it’s hard to make out, because ‘promise’ has turned into a snuffly-snort as both she and Amber are bawling their eyes out. I grab Chichi before they’re clinging onto each other, crying like Amber’s the one moving to Australia, not Josh.
“I’m going to miss you so much,” Mum cries.
“I’m going to miss you more,” Amber wails.
“Just another day in the Puttock household,” narrates Harry, zooming in for her close-up.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I never knew party planning could be so totally stressful.
One party would be bad enough, but two together? On the same day? Argh. It’s enough to make a person want to run away to New Zealand or something. Which I would, in a heartbeat, right now. Okay, I’ve never been there, but I’ve seen it on TV loads. It’s sunny, and has nice beaches, and whales. I bet whales wouldn’t be freaking over how to get an internationally famous band to play at their school party or bugging me about whether or not we should have Frazzles or Wotsits at an eighties party.
When Mum’s not hassling me about crisps or cakes or music or decorations I’m sure something’s going on with her. She’s playing this old Madonna song over and over again on repeat, and acts really sheepish and embarrassed whenever I walk into the room. I’d ask her about it, but I’ve got enough other things going on to wonder what she’s up to.
Even school isn’t an escape, what with trying to keep on top of all the fundraiser stuff.
“Committee meeting time?” Danny says, walking up with Millie.
“Committee meeting time,” I agree, trying not to sound like I’m being led to the electric chair. Which, quite frankly, is what these committee meetings are starting to feel like.
“What else do you think we can do to contact The Drifting?” I ask as we wait outside the drama studio. “It’s been ages and we’ve not heard from them.”
Danny looks thoughtful. “We’ve tried emailing them. You’ve tried Facebooking them –”
“And they’ve not replied to any of the messages,” I say. “What if it is because they’re splitting up, like that magazine article said?”
“You shouldn’t believe what you read in those dumb magazines,” Jamie says. “They print lies all the time.”
“Yeah, but what if it’s true? That might be why they’re not getting back to us.”
“Shhh,” Millie says. “Morgan’s coming.”
The meeting gets going. We go over lots of bits and pieces, while everyone else sits around looking awkward, because basically the four of us are doing everything. Millie’s been telling me I should delegate, but what if things don’t get done? Besides, it’s not like people are falling over themselves to volunteer to help. I thought at least Sophie, Eve and April might want to do more.
The meetings so far have all followed pretty much the same formula. Mrs Morgan ignores us, Jade and Kara make snide comments, everyone else looks bored and Millie and I end up doing most of the work while lying our butts off about how things are going with The Drifting.
And today doesn’t seem to be much different. We get through most of the agenda, running through the various jobs and what still needs doing. Thank goodness Mrs Morgan’s turned up to this meeting – she missed the last one, and just left a list pinned to the drama studio door with instructions of what she wanted us to do.
At least Max, Zach and Ryan have designed the tickets and posters (mainly because Mrs Morgan forced them to), and they actually look fantastic. The tickets went on sale last week and there were queues all round the field to get hold of them. We raised a ton of money, although I feel seriously guilty about selling tickets under false pretences.
“So, we have some exciting news,” Jade says.
My heart sinks. What’s she up to now?
“We contacted the local paper to let them know what was happening, and they’re sending a photographer over to cover the event. Isn’t that great?” Jade continues, smiling snidely in my direction.
My heart sinks into my shoes. Every time I think things can’t possibly get any worse, they do. I can’t believe they’ve done this! Well, I can, because that’s exactly the kind of thing they would do, but now the whole town is going to hear about my humiliation. Everyone, and I mean everyone, will know.
If an immediate self-destruct button was available, I’d be pressing it around about now.
“Girls, that’s wonderful,” Mrs Morgan is saying. “That will really help get sponsors interested and increase the amount of money we’re going to make. Well done, both of you. Now, how are things going with the decorations? You’re organising that, aren’t you?”
“Yep, everything’s fine,” Jade and Kara say.
“Um, could we get a more thorough report than that, please?” Mrs Morgan says, making notes. “The PTA are keen to know where we’re up to with things.”
Jade sighs heavily. “Fine. We’re getting lights and stuff organised. There’ll be a red carpet outside for people to walk up.”
“I was doing some research and thought it might be a good idea to go to Party Props to get some things to dress the room with,” Millie says. “Have you heard of them? They’re a huge warehouse on the outskirts of Collinsbrooke, maybe you should go and check it out.”
“I don’t think so,” Kara says. “We’re very busy.”
“Okay, it’s fine, if you’ll do all the other bits, Millie and I can get the props sorted,” I say quickly. “We’ll head over to the warehouse after school tomorrow.”
I ignore the look Millie’s shooting me. At least if we’re doing things ourselves we know they’re getting done.
“Right, that’s nearly everything. We still need to get some costumes for the karaoke, and how’s it going with the band?” Mrs Morgan asks. “The PTA are keen to see some kind of formal acknowledgement they’re coming, girls. Is there someone we could talk to at the record company? Maybe their manager?”
“We got an email from them, if that helps,” Millie says, sliding
a piece of paper across the table.
I turn and stare at her, wide-eyed. We’ve got a what now? But that’s amazing! Why didn’t she say anything before?
Mrs Morgan scans the piece of paper, puts it down and smiles. “Well, that looks good to me. Excellent. See you at the next meeting, everyone.”
As soon as everyone’s gone, I start demanding answers from Millie. “You got an email from the band? That’s flipping brilliant news! Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because it wasn’t real,” Millie says sheepishly. “Sorry. I set up a pretend account and faked an email to get everyone off our backs.”
Oh. Gutted doesn’t even begin to cover it.
“But Mrs Morgan did give me an idea,” Millie continues hurriedly, seeing my disappointed face. “I don’t know why we didn’t think of it sooner. Why don’t we just ring The Drifting’s manager at the record company and ask to speak to them?”
Everyone’s silent. It can’t be that easy… can it?
“We’ll meet at lunch behind the science block,” Millie says. Nobody ever goes there because it’s so close to where the JCB dug through the sewer pipe so it still stinks.
“I’ve just found the number for Firefly Records,” Danny says, glancing up from his phone.
“Brilliant,” says Millie. “We’ll call the manager at lunch. This is how we’re going to get The Drifting to come to our school, Suze!”
At lunchtime, we all gather together. It’s still way whiffy round here. It’s hard not to gag.
“Who’s going to do it then?” Jamie asks.
“Not you, Jamie,” Millie says. “You mumble on the phone. Do you want to do it, Suzy?”
No. No, I don’t. I’m worried I’m going to make a complete idiot of myself and ruin our only chance.
“I’ll do it if you want me to?” Millie says.
It’s tempting. Really tempting. But I’m the one that got us into all this.
I shake my head. “I should do it. Read us the number, will you, Mills?”
My heart’s pounding as I key in the numbers. There’s a short pause and then the phone starts to ring.
“Hello, Firefly Records.”
“Er, hello,” I attempt, but my voice cracks and stutters.
“Hello?”
I try again. “Hello. I, um, I was wondering, I need to speak to The Drifting and –”
“Are you a fan?”
“Well, yes, but –”
“Then you need to contact the fan club. You’ll find the details online. Thanks for calling, bye.”
“Whoa,” I say, holding the now dead phone away from my ear.
“That was quick,” Danny says.
“Yeah, they didn’t really give me a chance to say anything,” I say.
“Try again,” urges Millie.
I press the redial button.
“Hello, Firefly Records.”
This time I’m more prepared. “Hi, I was wanting to get in touch with The Drifting. It’s about… um…” My gaze falls on a magazine sticking out of Millie’s bag. “Um, an interview,” I say, suddenly inspired. My friends nod, impressed, while Millie gives me a thumbs up.
“You need their press office, they operate out of a different building,” the voice says. “I’ll give you the number, got a pen?” He reels off a telephone number and then hangs up.
Hmmm. Getting through to their manager is proving harder than you’d think.
Nothing works.
Not pretending to be a hotel trying to get unpaid bills sorted (they directed us to an accountancy firm), or saying we need to talk to them about acoustics in their concert venues (we’d need to speak to stage management about that). Danny came up with that last one, he was dead proud of himself.
“Guys, I’m all out of ideas,” I say.
“One more try,” Millie says. “Here, let me have a go.”
I throw the phone over.
“What are you going to do?”
“Wait and see,” Millie says. “Hello?” she says a moment later. “I’m Coco, from MTV. I was wondering if you could put me through to the person who manages The Drifting, please? I’ve spoken to the publicity team already, they said you’d be able to help.” There’s a pause and then…
“I’m on hold!” she gasps. It feels like an eternity passes before she starts talking again:
“Hello, yes, are you the person that manages The Drifting? You’re not? Well, can I speak to them please? Oh. Okay. Then could you give them my details and tell them I need to talk to them? It’s urgent. Thank you.” And she leaves her fake name and phone number.
“How did you know to say that?” I gasp in awe when she’s off the phone.
“Cos I’m a genius. That was the manager’s assistant,” Millie says. “I’ve left a message, but who knows if they’ll actually call back. We’ll have to wait and see. I’ve changed my answerphone message ready, though. From now on, just call me Coco.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“Are you sure you know where we’re getting off?” I ask Millie, as the bus pulls into an area of town I’ve never been to before. We’ve been on the bus nearly an hour, heading for a trading estate on the other side of Collinsbrooke where the Party Props warehouse is situated.
“I don’t think it’s much further,” Millie said. “I’ll go and ask.”
Mr Bus Driver doesn’t appreciate Millie’s appearance by his left elbow, as he doesn’t seem to have heard her coming and jumps about a foot in the air, then shouts at her to sit down.
Despite her protestations, Millie doesn’t get the answer she needs.
“Grumpy old goat,” she mutters, flopping down into the seat next to me. “Let’s get off at the next stop.”
She reaches out to press the bell, and the bus jerks to a halt.
“Thank you!” I say as we climb off.
The bus driver practically slams the doors on us, such is his haste to get away.
Millie was right. He is a grumpy old goat.
But we don’t have time to worry about him right now. We’ve got a warehouse to locate. I look around us. All I can see are rows and rows of warehouses. This industrial estate is enormous.
“You do know how to find this place, right?” I say. “You looked up the directions before we left?”
Millie looks sheepish. “Um, I kind of figured it’d be easier to find than this. I thought it would be simple to spot a huge warehouse. I didn’t realise there’d be loads of huge warehouses. It won’t be far though, c’mon.”
It takes an hour before we finally find the place we’re after. As we walk towards it, the Party Props logo looms large above the entrance, complete with a picture of a large banana wearing shades, grinning broadly and holding a bunch of balloons.
Inside, there’s a bored-looking guy, about university age, sitting behind the desk. He’s got a tufty beard and greasy hair, and is fiddling with his phone. He doesn’t acknowledge us as we walk up to the desk and hover awkwardly.
Millie clears her throat.
Still no response.
“Um, hello?” she tries again.
The man raises an eyebrow, although we can hardly see it under the strands of clumped-together hair.
Ew. He’s grimmola.
“Hi,” Millie says. “We’re here from Collinsbrooke School? We’ve come to have a look at some props.”
Greasy leans forward and runs his finger down a piece of paper.
“Suzy and Millie?” Millie adds.
Greasy is starting to freak me out. What’s the deal with him? Why isn’t he speaking?
The guy eventually finds what he’s searching for and then he points at the double doors.
“Um, okay,” Millie says, her voice starting to waver.
What if this is how he lures people to their unsuspecting deaths? The thought pops into my head from nowhere and once it’s there I can’t get rid of it. There could be who knows what waiting on the other side of the door. Aaagh! Stupid thoughts like this are the reason I don’t
watch horror movies any more.
“How does all this work?” Millie asks.
The man pushes a piece of paper in her direction. “Go in there,” he mutters. “Find what you want. Write down the corresponding number. Then come back here and fill in the details of your event. You can then hire whatever it is you want for that night.”
“Okay.”
The man returns to his phone. We’ve clearly been dismissed.
“Shall we?” Millie says, tilting her head towards the double doors.
“Let’s do it,” I reply, trying to push all thoughts of murderers and axes out of my head.
We both gasp when we push the double doors open. This place is something else! The warehouse is huge, and it’s crammed with everything under the sun.
There are trees, Egyptian mummies, fake cows, cannons, phone boxes, a vintage blue car, a giraffe wearing a Stetson, pink flamingos and a whole variety of other weird and wonderful items, all with individual numbers on. There’s even an enormous Statue of Liberty tucked into one corner. It’s like I’m having the world’s craziest cheese dream.
“Whoa!” Millie says, staring around in delight. “This place is epic!”
“How are we going to know where to start?” I ask in awe. “We could be here hours.”
“Pfff, who cares?” Millie says. “I want to see everything, don’t you?” She runs over to a red-velvet chaise longue, and sprawls out, draping her hand onto her forehead dramatically as if she’s swooning.
“I wish we’d gone for a Western theme, then we could have had one of those,” Millie says, jumping up and pointing to a bucking bronco. “We could have put Jade and Kara on it at full speed. Serve the pair of them right when they got thrown off.”
“We’re not that lucky,” I point out. “Jade would probably hang on looking all sexy, boobs bouncing around all over the place, and half the boys in the school would be watching with their tongues hanging out.”
“Good point,” Millie says. “I was having delightful visions of them being flung out of the window. Your version is probably more realistic.”
Near me there’s an eighties section, which I know Mum would go nuts over if she could see it. Although the way she’s spending money lately, I’m not sure I should tell her. I hope she manages to hide the bills better than she did the ones for Amber’s wedding.
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