I wanted to carry on talking. There was so much I needed to know, like how often he’d be seeing Jasmine, and if he’d be bringing her over to ours, and if he loved her as much as he loved me and Charlie. I still found it difficult to imagine them spending time together.
“We’ll talk more later,” said Dad, reaching for his keys. “I’ll be home in time for lunch. Mum’s making a roast so she might need some help.”
I pulled a face. “Mum? Making a roast?”
“Don’t say it like that, Mads,” he laughed. “There’s a first time for everything!”
I opened my mouth and then closed it again. I was doing what I always do – expecting everything to be a certain way – the same way.
“Do you promise you’ll be back?” I said, trying not to feel jealous.
“Promise,” he said. “Cross my heart.”
Mum called me down at twelve to lay the table. I’d just about finished, and everything was ready, when Dad rung to say he was going to be late. I heard Mum say there was no hurry; it would give her a chance to put her feet up. But then he rang again at two and again at three and by that time the lunch was ruined and Charlie was out in the garden kicking a ball against the wall.
“I knew this would happen,” I said to Mum. She’d taken the roasting dish out of the oven and was trying to pick all the burned bits off from around the edges. “It was so obvious. I knew he wouldn’t be back in time…”
“You know what it’s like in hospital, Mads. Everything takes for ever. A doctor says he’ll come round to see you and you can still be waiting two hours later.”
“Yes, but why is that more important to Dad than being here with us? Why is he putting Sharon and Jasmine first?”
Mum stopped picking off the burned bits and looked up. “Maddie, my love, I know it’s difficult but you’ve got to be really grown-up about this, we all have. Sharon is very ill and the simple fact is Jasmine needs Dad more than we do at the moment.”
It was so frustrating, so difficult to express how messed up my feelings were. “I know you’re right, and I am trying. But I honestly don’t know how to stop feeling so jealous…”
Mum nodded at me, smiling. “Now that’s a feeling I do understand.”
“What do you mean? Do you feel jealous of Jasmine too?”
“Well not so much now I’ve actually met her, but seriously, Mads, those first few weeks when Dad was seeing Sharon and then getting to know Jasmine, my head was all over the place. Why do you think I ran away to Aunty Hat for the weekend? An ex-girlfriend and a new daughter – you’d have to be made of steel not to feel jealous in that situation!”
“I had no idea. I thought you just wanted to get away.”
“And talking of feeling jealous, Mads,” said Mum quietly. “There’s something else I’ve never told you.” She gave a little laugh, as if she was embarrassed. “I know it sounds ridiculous, a grown woman like me, but sometimes I used to be jealous of you and your nan.”
“Jealous of me and Nan? What do you mean?”
“Well, when you were a little girl, after Charlie was born and Nan moved in to help out, if you ever fell over, or had a bad dream, it was always your nan you cried for. She was the only one you wanted. We’d been so close before, me and you, but everything changed. The two of you were always giggling, your heads together, like you were sharing a secret joke. I remember once you were laughing about something and even when you told me what it was, I still didn’t get it, and that just made you laugh even more.”
I stared at her, amazed. I couldn’t believe it. Mum had been jealous of me and Nan.
She pushed the roasting tin towards me. “Hey, fancy some burned potato with crispy carrots?” she said, smiling again. “It tastes a whole lot better than it looks!”
We stood there picking at the food together, talking. I hadn’t really thought about how difficult it must be for Mum, how she was sharing Dad too, or how difficult it must’ve been when Charlie was little and Nan was living with us. It was probably the first time she’d ever opened up to me about her feelings, almost as if she was seeing me in a different way. “This is nice,” I said shyly, enjoying how close I felt to her.
“Really nice,” said Mum nodding. “I’ll have to make sure I burn the dinner more often!”
The next few hours seemed to crawl by in slow motion. Charlie came in from the garden and we all sat there waiting for the phone to ring. I knew Mum was right, that Dad wasn’t up at the hospital because he loved Jasmine more than he loved us, but it didn’t make it any easier. He finally called again at half past four. Mum spoke for a bit and then turned to face us.
“They’re ready to leave the hospital,” she explained, “but the friend who’s been looking after Jasmine is out for the evening and Dad doesn’t want to leave Jasmine on her own.”
“Tell him to bring her here then,” Charlie said straight away.
Mum looked across at me. My stomach clenched up.
“Come on, Maddie,” said Charlie. “I’ve been dying to meet her ever since we found out!”
I wanted to say no, I wanted to run a million miles away, but I nodded slowly, forcing a smile onto my face. “Okay,” I said. “I don’t mind.”
“Why don’t you bring her round here?” Mum said into the phone. Her eyes never left my face for a second. When she’d finished talking she came over and put her arms round me. “You’ve made me so, so proud,” she said. “And you, Charlie. I think you’re both fantastic.”
Charlie started to rush around like an idiot. “I need to tidy my room and we should make a welcome banner or something…”
“Calm down,” said Mum, laughing. “She’s only coming in for a cup of tea and something to eat.”
They arrived about half an hour later. I was so nervous I could barely breathe. Jasmine hung back behind Dad, looking just as scared as I was feeling. The last time we’d seen each other had been in the Blue Room with Vivian. Mum ushered them in and then went into the kitchen to put the kettle on. Sharon was much better apparently; they’d just had to wait ages for some test results before they left.
“You must be starving,” said Mum, bringing in a pot of tea with a plate of biscuits. “The lunch got burned to a crisp, I’m afraid.”
“We could always have pancakes,” said Charlie, blushing bright red. He hadn’t actually said a thing since Jasmine arrived. I think it was the first time I’d ever seen him lost for words.
“Don’t be stupid,” I said. “We never have pancakes for tea.”
“But we could,” he insisted. “It’s not like there’s a rule that says you can’t have pancakes for tea, just because we usually have them for breakfast.”
There is a rule, I thought. There are rules for everything, but no one seems to follow them any more.
“Oh I love pancakes,” said Jasmine. “I’ll help make them – if you like?”
Mum, Dad and Charlie all turned to look at me, waiting for me to say it was okay. As if they were frightened I might collapse in a heap if we did things differently for once. I didn’t want to be the one to spoil things, however anxious I was feeling; I mean, it was only pancakes.
“Come on then,” I said sticking my chin out. “Who says we can’t have pancakes for tea!”
The pancakes were a huge success. Mum made the mixture and then me, Charlie and Jasmine took turns cooking them. We made a massive pile and put every kind of topping on the table that we could think of: lemon, sugar, jam, peanut butter, cream cheese and chocolate spread. Mum even dug out some old hundreds and thousands from the cupboard to sprinkle on top.
Later on, when we’d finished eating and clearing up, Jasmine said she had some presents for us. She’d bought them ages ago; as soon as she found out she had a new brother and sister. She’d made Dad stop at her flat on the way back from the hospital so she could bring them over and give them to us this evening.
She took Charlie’s out first. It was a brand-new football and she said she couldn’t wait to see him play in
one of his school matches. Charlie had gone all shy again, blushing and saying thank you about a hundred times before he raced into the garden to try it out.
Jasmine handed me mine next. It was wrapped in purple paper with a purple satin ribbon.
“I hope you like it,” she said. “Your dad told me how much you love purple wrapping paper and ribbon so I’ve got that right at least.”
It was a beautiful, blank book with A Place to Doodle and Sketch written across the front. Just the sort of thing I love. It reminded me of Vivian’s sessions and the bright-yellow pad I’d been doodling on for the past four weeks. She’d be amazed if she could see me and Jasmine sitting in the same room together.
“Thank you,” I said, sounding just as shy as Charlie. “This is great, I love drawing. Um…I’ve got something for you too.”
I ran upstairs, grabbed the photo of Nan off my bedside table, the one of her blowing out her birthday candles, and ran back down again.
“This was our nan,” I said handing it to Jasmine. “I’d like you to have it. I really wish you’d had the chance to meet her. She was so special.”
Jasmine stayed quite late. Dad dropped her back at her flat just before ten. She told us all about her mum, and moving, and how hard she’d found it to settle into Church Vale. She said she’d started to make friends but it wasn’t easy. Mum was right, and Gemma, she seemed really nice, but I still got a funny feeling in my tummy when she left with Dad.
“You did so well,” said Mum when she came in to say goodnight. I’d been sketching in my new book. A picture of a beach covered in stones, just like the beach in Kieran’s story. “I know I said it before but I’m so proud of you, Maddie. I could see how hard it was for you, but you really made Jasmine feel welcome…”
I was proud as well. And a little bit excited. I liked Jasmine. I still couldn’t believe we were related, but it was obvious she felt lucky to have me and Charlie in her life and I think, deep down, I knew that we were lucky too. When I finished my sketch I tore it out and wrote a message on the back. It was for Vivian – to say thank you.
It was only later when I turned the light out and snuggled down to go to sleep that I realized I hadn’t checked to see if my purple ribbon was under my pillow. And then I realized something else – that when I’d unwrapped Jasmine’s present earlier, I’d scrunched up the paper and the ribbon, without giving it a second thought, and chucked the whole lot in the bin.
Vivian was right. I’d given my purple ribbon all sorts of magic powers, but I didn’t need it any more. I had my friends and my family and a new sister. I ran my hand over my tummy. No knot of anxiety, just an excited flutter at the thought of telling Gemma about my evening with Jasmine, and seeing Kieran on the way to school.
Nan was right too. It was so sad she never got to meet Jasmine – that she wasn’t here to welcome her into the family. But I know exactly what she’d say if she was. I could almost hear her saying it – looking down from heaven with a big jammy doughnut in her hand.
Sometimes, Maddie Wilkins, the scariest things really do turn out to be the best.
If you loved Tangled Secrets, you may also enjoy…
by Anne-Marie Conway
Read on for a sneak preview…
Chapter One
We’d been living in our new house in Oakbridge for just over a week and I hated everything about it. When Mum said we were moving to the country, I’d imagined a pretty, old-fashioned cottage with roses round the door – I got the old bit right, but it was dark and gloomy with massive spiders, and cobwebs so thick it was impossible to see light through them. We’d spent every spare minute trying to get it sorted, but it still gave me the creeps.
“New house, new job, new beginning,” Mum kept saying, doing her best to sound cheery. But the “new beginning” bit was hard – at least, it was for me.
It was alright for Mum – she’d lived in Oakbridge before I was born so it wasn’t really a new beginning for her anyway. But I’d barely had time to finish Year Seven before I was packing my old life up in a stack of brown cardboard boxes and leaving everything I knew behind me.
“I still don’t get why we had to move here in the first place,” I grumbled, sitting down to lunch that first week – pizza again, served on an upturned crate. We’d had pizza every day since we arrived. Hot pizza for lunch, and cold leftover pizza for tea. I never thought I could get sick of pizza – but seriously!
Mum looked across at me, frowning. “What do you mean, you don’t understand? How many times do I have to keep explaining?”
“I know, I know, ‘it’s a great job, too good to pass up’, but you were happy at your old job, weren’t you? And what about me? What am I supposed to do without Laura? And what about my wildlife photography course? You know how much I loved going…”
“Look I’m really sorry, Becky.” Mum pressed her fingers to the side of her head as if she was in pain. “I know it’s difficult for you, but I’m sure Laura will come and visit later on in the summer, and there’ll be loads more opportunities for you to take wildlife photos around here.” She started to clear away the pizza. “Jobs like this don’t come along very often, you know, not when you get to my age. I’ll be running my own department. It’s a huge step up.”
We were so busy those first few days I didn’t have much time to think about what I was going to do once Mum actually started her great new job. It was the summer holidays – the hottest July on record, the weatherman kept saying – and six empty weeks stretched out in front of me. We weren’t connected to the internet yet, and I could barely get a phone signal for long enough to call anyone. Talk about being stuck in the middle of nowhere.
We worked our way through all the big boxes the first weekend we arrived. We’d been unpacking for over three hours solid and I was just about ready to collapse from heat exhaustion when Mum’s old friend, Stella, popped by to help us.
“Tracy Miller, I can’t believe you’re back!” she cried, bursting in and throwing her arms round Mum. “It is so good to see you. And you must be the beautiful Becky!” She turned round to face me, grabbing hold of my hands and squeezing them tight.
I shook my head, blushing. No one had ever called me beautiful before. Neat brown hair, a turned-up nose and freckles don’t exactly add up to beautiful. Cute maybe – but not beautiful.
“We go back years, your mum and me,” Stella went on, her eyes full of mischief. “I’ve known her since primary school, can you believe…?”
I couldn’t imagine my mum at primary school. She was always so sensible and grown up. More like a head teacher than anything else. “Was she naughty?” I asked, knowing what the answer would be. “Naughty?” Stella roared. “Scared of her own shadow, your mum. Wouldn’t say boo to a goose.”
I liked Stella straight away. She was the same age as Mum but she seemed years younger. She had wavy brown hair with white-blonde streaks and she never stopped smiling. She swept into our dark, empty house, filling it with noise and laughter. When she got fed up with unwrapping cups and saucers, and cleaning out cupboards, she put on an old disco CD and danced around the room – grabbing me and Mum in turn and swinging us round until we were dripping with sweat and out of breath.
“It’s too hot, Stella,” Mum groaned, pushing her away, but I could tell she didn’t mind.
“We used to dance all night,” cried Stella. “And I don’t remember you complaining back then!”
“It was you who used to dance all night,” said Mum, laughing. “I was the one trying to drag you home! But I have missed you,” she added. “It’s been far too long.”
“I’ve missed you too, Trace,” said Stella, serious for a moment.
It was great to meet someone from Mum’s past. She’d never really talked much about why she left Oakbridge. She split with my dad and moved away before I was born, and any mention of him – or “that time” as she called it – was guaranteed to bring on one of her headaches. I know it sounds weird, but meeting Stella was like getti
ng a tiny step closer to finding out what really happened back then.
“Why don’t I ask my son Mack to show you around?” she said to me as she was leaving. “He’ll only drive me mad getting under my feet all summer if he stops at home!”
I nodded, smiling, although inside my tummy clenched up. I couldn’t imagine going off around the village with some boy I’d never met before.
There were quite a few visitors after that. Stella must’ve passed the word round that Mum was back. That’s the thing with small villages – it doesn’t take long for news to spread. At the end of the week, someone called Mrs. Wilson came by from the church. She was small and bony and all buttoned up, even though it was easily the hottest day so far.
“Are the two of you planning to come to church?” she asked primly, while Mum poured us all a cup of tea. I noticed she’d used the best cups and a proper teapot. “There’s a very nice service next Sunday if you’d like to attend.”
Mum half-nodded. “We’ll certainly do our best, although I’m due to start my new job tomorrow and what with all the unpacking and everything…” She trailed off and we sat in silence for a moment.
Mrs. Wilson gave me the creeps big time. There was something sour about her – like she’d eaten too many lemons. She kept staring at me in this really intense way, and when Mum offered her a cookie she muttered something random about gluttony and sin. I could just imagine Laura saying, What is that lady’s problem? and I had to stop myself from snorting into my cup.
“How do you think you’ll like Oakbridge, Becky?” she asked after a bit. “It’s not the most exciting place for a girl of your age.”
“She’ll be fine,” said Mum quickly. “It’s just the two of us, so Becky’s used to her own company, and she’ll soon make friends when school starts. I’ve enrolled her at Farnsbury High; it’s supposed to be very good.”
Mrs. Wilson sniffed. “There’s no discipline these days, not like when I was at school.”
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