by Sue Limb
Chapter 28
Jess woke early with cold feet. Birds were singing loudly all around the tent. Marie-Louise was getting dressed. Jess peeped out from her sleeping bag and noticed that, though when fully dressed Marie-Louise was a trifle homely, even nerdy, she seemed to be addicted to rather fabulous lacy underwear. Then Jess shut her eyes again, tight, and waited for Marie-Louise to finish dressing and leave the tent. Jess had no appetite for small talk, even about lingerie. She had noticed something else. Flora’s sleeping bag was already empty.
This could only mean one thing. Presumably Flora hadn’t slept much, tortured by thoughts of her Latin lover. She must have tiptoed out just before daybreak, probably because she had a date with Gerard, wandering hand-in-hand under the trees and listening, enchanted, to the dawn chorus.
Eventually Marie-Louise left the tent and Jess struggled heavily out of her sleeping bag, like a hippo stuck in a swamp. Well, she thought, I hope Flora’s enjoyed her last twelve hours of bliss, because today She Must Die. Jess was planning to kill Flora after breakfast – or possibly even during breakfast – with the nearest fatal implement. Has anybody ever been murdered with a non-stick spatula? Well, Flora could be the first. Strange how the arrival of a gorgeous boy could make you suddenly hate your best friend.
Jess dived into several jumpers and a fleece. These spring mornings were still kind of chilly – at least if you didn’t have a hot date to keep you warm. Then she tiptoed out of the tent, leaving Jodie still lying rolled up in her sleeping bag. Jess didn’t want to wake her. Somehow Jodie managed to convey the fact that, though asleep, she was still sulking and would continue to do so for the rest of the weekend.
Fred and Marie-Louise were fussing about around the fire. There was no sign of Gerard and Flora. Edouard was just coming out of the boys’ tent, pulling on a hoodie. He grinned and gave her the thumbs-up sign.
‘Good merning,’ he said.
‘Hi, Ed!’ said Jess. They seemed almost friends now. However, although she had been dumped on by Gerard, Jess hoped Edouard wouldn’t get any ideas. He had to be satisfied with a friendly grin. That was about as far as she wanted to take things. OK, he had already sucked on her arm. But it had been a medical procedure and in no way implied that they might become an item.
‘Well, though I say so myself, I think I’ve whipped up a fabulous little fire!’ cried Fred in a queeny swooping voice, flapping his hands about. ‘It’s a campfire, obviously, which is why it’s that wonderfully chic pink and gold colour, with sparkly bits all round the edges!’
‘Would you like ze scrambled egg, Jess?’ asked Marie-Louise. She was such a sweetheart. ‘Wiz bacon and tomates?’
‘You bet!’ said Jess. ‘Stick it in the pan. Go for it.’
Marie-Louise smiled happily. Though back home in France she only ever had a croissant in the mornings, she had taken to ‘ze English breakfast’ with gusto. And, to be honest, gutso.
‘Did you see Flora this morning?’ Jess asked Fred.
‘Strangely and bizarrely,’ said Fred, ‘I didn’t. And Gerard’s also missing. Perhaps they’ve been kidnapped by the fairies.’
‘One does hope so,’ said Jess. ‘And one can only hope they’ve turned Flora into a fat old pig with a snout covered in bristles. It’s what she so richly deserves.’
‘Jess,’ said Marie-Louise, ‘pliz could you cut up ze tomates?’
Jess and Fred helped Marie-Louise cook an enormous breakfast. Edouard went off on a little walk to collect wood, mainly because he knew there would be beetles hiding beneath every log. There was still no sign of Jodie.
‘Should we wake Jodie?’ asked Marie-Louise, as breakfast neared completion.
‘I think she’s died of disappointment,’ said Jess, gazing longingly at the creamy panful of scrambled egg. Marie-Louise was a great cook. She looked a bit worried, though.
‘Is Jodie … angry wiz Flora?’ she whispered. ‘Because of Gerard?’
Jess nodded and tried to look as if the whole thing was vastly entertaining. Secretly, of course, her own heart was breaking, but she knew she’d feel a whole lot better once she had a plateful of breakfast inside her.
‘Leave her,’ said Jess. ‘If the smell hasn’t woken her up, she doesn’t deserve any breakfast.’
Marie-Louise hesitated. She was about to divide the food. She looked around. Then she frowned and pointed down towards the stream.
‘Flora and Gerard!’ she said. ‘Oh no! Zere is not enough breakfast …’
Flora and Gerard were indeed visible in the distance – Flora was swinging across the stream on the rope, and Gerard was waiting to catch her. Jess saw the exact moment when Flora kind of fell into his arms, and stayed there for what seemed like six years. Eventually they turned round and started walking up the hill, hand in hand.
‘They don’t deserve any stinking breakfast!’ said Jess. ‘Come on, Marie-Louise. You, me, Fred and Ed – if they want some, they can cook it themselves.’
Marie-Louise still looked guilty and anxious. Jess grabbed the pan from her and ladled out the scrambled egg on to four plates. Then she divided the bacon and tomatoes. Edouard arrived and plonked a load of logs down nearby.
‘Flora!’ called Marie-Louise, as the wandering lovers arrived. ‘Gerard! I’m sorry, I did not know … zere is not enough breakfast.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about that!’ answered Flora, smiling a secret smile and tossing her hair back like a blonde in a shampoo ad. She and Gerard were obviously too fabulously and romantically happy to need mere food. ‘We’re not hungry, are we, Gerry?’
Gerard looked a bit surprised for a moment and then shook his head. You could tell he was just dying to eat a whole raw pig and a dozen eggs straight from a hen’s bum.
‘We’ve been on a lovely walk,’ said Flora, sitting down next to Jess as if they were still best friends. Gerard sat down next to Flora on the other side. This meant Jess did not have to look at him, which suited her just fine. Once they’d sat down, Flora and Gerard started holding hands again. For a moment Jess felt a wave of nausea, but heroically she conquered it and went back to her egg.
‘Where’s Jodie?’ asked Flora, looking around.
‘Still in the arms of Morpheus, as the saying goes,’ said Fred. ‘Who was Morpheus, by the way?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Jess. ‘But he certainly gets around. Everyone’s always in his arms. Evidently a hideous flirt.’ She hoped Gerard would feel the sting of this sarcastic aside, but he was busy playing with Flora’s fingers and clearly not listening.
‘Morpheus is ze God of Sleep!’ said Marie-Louise. Though a sweetheart, she could also be something of an irritating swot.
‘Mind if I scrounge a little tiny bit of your bacon, babe?’ said Flora in an affectionate aren’t-I-cute kind of way.
‘Sure, help yourself,’ said Jess. This was a translation of: Can’t you keep your thieving mitts off anything, you tart? But of course Flora didn’t know that.
Flora broke Jess’s piece of bacon in half. (Half! Yes, a whole HALF!) Then she dipped it in ketchup, and used it to scoop up a big dollop of scrambled egg – the very bit Jess was particularly looking forward to eating.
‘Mmmmm!’ said Flora.
‘Have some more,’ said Jess. ‘Go on! Get stuck in! Don’t mind me!’ She nearly managed to make it sound like a friendly joke rather than a savage howl. But Flora didn’t notice either way. She was hardly listening, either. Nothing Jess ever said could possibly be of interest to her from now on.
Flora had taken the first bite herself; now she fed the second bit to Gerard. He opened his mouth, giving Flora an adoring sideways look. She popped the lot in his mouth, and even removed a smear of ketchup from his chin and sucked it off her finger. Gross! Jess’s own mouthful of bacon and egg started to taste like dirty socks and damp cardboard.
‘We saw some lovely birds this morning,’ said Flora. As if they were just a couple of mad birdwatchers and they’d only sneaked off before dawn to ogle thrushes
and stuff. Whereas really …
I just hope they give each other tonsillitis, thought Jess.
‘Oh, I love ze birds also!’ trilled Marie-Louise.
‘Personally I prefer the giant cane toads of Australia,’ said Fred. ‘Apparently they explode with the most delightful bang if you run over one.’
‘Ugh, Fred, shut up!’ hissed Jess. ‘Some of us are trying to eat what’s left of our breakfast!’ Jess concentrated hard on her breakfast and gobbled the rest of it up before Flora and Gerard could steal any more.
Just as she finished, Flora stood up and said she was going to nip to the loo. Jess got up, too.
‘I’ll come with you,’ she said. She urgently had to say something to Flora and when else was she going to get the chance? The girls’ tent was no good. Jodie was still in there. And Jess could see that for the rest of the day, Flora would be fastened to Gerard’s side.
They walked up the hill and past some low bushes which screened the campsite from the farmhouse. Flora had grabbed Jess’s arm and was clinging on tight. She glanced over her shoulder to make sure they couldn’t be overheard.
‘Oh, wow, Jess, you’ve no idea!’ she hissed. ‘Gerard is just totally brilliant. And I know this is rubbish, but he says I’m the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen!’
Jess pulled her arm fiercely out of Flora’s grasp, stood stock-still and glared at her.
‘Do you realise that you’re totally ruining this entire weekend for everybody?’ she snapped. ‘Jodie’s, like, so furious she won’t even come out of her tent, and it’s really embarrassing for everybody the way you two keep going off together. For goodness’ sake stop that lovey-dovey stuff – at least in public. At least until the end of this camping trip.’
Flora frowned. She blushed. Her eyes, normally a gentle, transparent blue, flashed like a storm over the Mediterranean.
‘What’s got into you?’ she demanded. ‘I thought you’d be pleased for me. Jodie doesn’t own Gerard. I’ll go out with anyone I like, and if you can’t cope with that, tough!’
And she stomped off to the outdoor loo, went in and slammed the door. Jess was still full of fury. She could almost feel steam pouring out of her ears. What now? Should she march up to the loo and continue the row through the locked door? Should she tell Flora that less than twenty-four hours ago Gerard had been holding her hand?
Would it be too cruel to break Flora’s heart? thought Jess, her mind whirling. Well, why not? After all, even if she doesn’t know it, Flora’s broken mine.
Chapter 29
Seething with rage, Jess marched back down to the campfire. Marie-Louise was talking fast in French to Gerard in an intense, private kind of way. It sounded a bit like a pep talk or something. Edouard looked embarrassed and was fiddling with a beetle in a matchbox. Fred caught Jess’s eye, and pulled a face which she instantly understood. It meant: What’s going on? Do I sense tension? Is something dangerous about to happen? Why are the hairs standing up on the back of my neck?
Jess raised her eyebrows as if to say: Don’t ask me. I would never make a fool of myself with a ludicrous French lover boy. Marie-Louise stopped talking urgently to Gerard, as if she didn’t want Jess to overhear. Although in fact, Jess’s French was so poor she could more easily have understood the crazy cackling of a hyena. Jess sat down, trying to smile broadly at everybody, as if everything was totally fine.
‘Right!’ she said. ‘Great! So … what shall we do today? We’ve done hide-and-seek, we’ve done charades …’
‘How about this great new fun thing called sleep?’ said Fred. But as he said it, his face changed. He was looking over Jess’s shoulder, and he suddenly went pale, as if King Kong had loomed up behind Jess.
Quick as a flash, Jess whirled round. Jodie had just emerged from her tent. She was bundled up in a fleece and her hair was all over the place, just wild. Her eyes were flashing and her nostrils were flaring in high-voltage fury.
‘Where’s my freakin’ breakfast!?’ she roared. The empty frying pan and the empty plates told their own story. Marie-Louise looked scared, and got up to her knees.
‘I’ll cook you some, Jodie,’ she said, and started scrabbling around in the ‘food store’ – a little cluster of plastic boxes.
‘So you ate it all, you greedy pigs?’ growled Jodie, stomping towards the fire. The earth seemed to shake. Fred did a funny little pretend cringe to Jess, secretly. Gerard put on his shades and tried to look cool and uninterested. Edouard gawped, frightened to death.
‘I was woken up by the smell of bacon frying, and guess what? There’s none left!’ Jodie stood by the fire and kicked a log. The fire sort of shifted and a few sparks flew up into the smoke.
‘Oh no!’ said Marie-Louise, ransacking the stores. ‘Zere is no bacon left! But I can make you eggs and tomates, Jodie.’
‘Don’t bother!’ snapped Jodie. ‘It’s only MY field after all. This whole trip was only MY idea. The stinking bacon was only bought by MY mum. Why should I have any breakfast?’
Marie-Louise looked puzzled. She was having trouble understanding Jodie’s sarcasm. But Jodie’s mood was clear. Marie-Louise’s eyes filled with tears. Frenziedly she searched the plastic boxes, looking for some delicacy which would tempt Jodie out of her black mood and distract her from her obvious plan to eat everybody else alive.
Jess realised it was up to her to say something. The Frenchies couldn’t defend themselves because they were, well … French. Fred would never get involved in any kind of row. Right now he had rolled over on his tummy and was pretending to read his Stephen King book.
‘Chill out, Jodie,’ said Jess. ‘There’s plenty of food. My mum packed some croissants. They’re in that green tin.’
‘I don’t want stinking croissants!’ snapped Jodie, still standing over them. ‘They make me feel SICK!’
Sitting down, Jess felt at a disadvantage. It was like being bombed. She got up.
‘There’s no need to be so angsty about it!’ said Jess. ‘It’s only breakfast! If it’s bacon you want, I’m sure we can get some more. Your auntie probably has some.’
‘I don’t want to DISTURB my auntie!’ said Jodie. ‘I don’t want to be CADGING STUFF off her all the time. She’s got a MEDICAL CONDITION!’ Jodie glared at Jess as if it was Jess’s fault that the auntie was unwell.
‘For goodness’ sake, relax!’ shouted Jess. She decided not to ask about Aunt Rose’s medical condition, in case it was embarrassing or something. ‘Have some toast, some beans, whatever!’
Marie-Louise was actually crying now. Gerard got up and strolled off down the field.
‘Jodie,’ Jess went on, more quietly, ‘you’re upsetting everybody! Come on, get a grip! We’re supposed to be the hosts and stuff! You’ve upset Marie-Louise!’
‘I’M UPSET!’ roared Jodie, so loudly you could hear the spit boiling in her throat. ‘What about ME?’
At this point Flora returned from the loo, looking sour and rebellious. Jodie turned on her.
‘Ah, the divine FLORA!’ she yelled. ‘I hear you ate all my stinking breakfast, you greedy PIG!’ Flora looked startled but indignant.
‘I so didn’t!’ she snapped. ‘Ask Jess. I had literally like NO breakfast at all. Gerard and I didn’t feel like any. Tell her, Jess!’
‘Well, I wouldn’t say you had NO breakfast, as such,’ said Jess. She was feeling angry with Flora as well as Jodie. ‘I seem to remember you nicking quite a lot of mine.’
‘I so didn’t!’ snarled Flora. ‘It was a tiny piece of bacon and a microscopic bit of egg about the size of a pea.’
‘It was half a rasher of bacon and a huge dollop of egg!’ said Jess.
Suddenly Fred closed his book and jumped to his feet. He pretended to be holding a microphone and facing a TV camera.
‘Hostilities broke out here in the early hours following a dispute over supplies,’ he said in a breathless reporter’s voice. ‘The Red Cross have asked for a ceasefire at 10.30 to bury the dead, evacuate the wounded a
nd so that everyone can go to the loo. This is Fred Parsons in the war zone at Walnut Farm, handing you back to the studio.’
‘Shut up, Fred. You’re an IDIOT!’ yelled Jodie.
‘Fred’s not an idiot!’ shouted Jess. ‘You’re the one who’s behaving like an idiot!’
‘Yes!’ Flora added. ‘We’re supposed to be looking after Marie-Louise and Ed and Gerry, not giving them a hard time!’
‘Gerry?!’ said Jodie, in a taunting voice. ‘Who on earth is Gerry?’
‘Gerard,’ said Flora. ‘It’s just a nickname. What’s your problem?’
‘Honestly! Chill out, both of you,’ said Jess. ‘This is supposed to be a fun weekend, not some kind of international incident!’
‘I don’t care!’ shouted Jodie. ‘I hate France anyway!’
‘Jodie! I have found some more bacon!’ pleaded Marie-Louise, from a pile of ransacked plastic boxes. She held out a little parcel of bacon, wrapped in clingfilm. ‘Shall I cook it for you?’
‘Get lost!’ shouted Jodie. ‘I don’t want any stinking bacon! You can shove it up your FAT FRENCH BOTTOM!’ And she stomped off in the direction of her auntie’s house.
There was a brief silence, during which Edouard scrambled to his feet and walked off towards the hedge and the infinitely preferable company of insects. You could tell he was trying not to run.
‘Phew!’ said Fred. ‘What’s got into her?’
Jess could hardly believe that Fred didn’t realise what was bothering Jodie.
‘Headache,’ said Jess, giving Flora an accusing look.
Marie-Louise wiped her eyes.
‘Take no notice of Jodie,’ Jess said to Marie-Louise. ‘She always has these flare-ups.’
‘Flare-ups?’ said Marie-Louise, in a trembly voice. ‘What is zat?’
Suddenly, abruptly, Flora walked off. Gerard was down by the river now, leaning against a tree and staring into the water. Maybe he was planning to do the decent thing and throw himself in. Flora was evidently rushing off to be with him, even though her own French exchange partner was in tears. Jess put her arm round Marie-Louise.