by Sue Limb
‘Where exactly?’ asked Mum in an alert, pouncing kind of way.
‘Oh, I’m not sure.’ Mum always wanted details, which was irritating. ‘Jack’s mum and dad are going to be there, though, so it’s nothing to worry about.’
‘But where is this? How are you going to get there?’ Mum was now on Red Alert.
‘It might begin with a D … Devon? No, ah, Dorset.’
‘Dorset!’ Granny beamed. ‘There was a wonderful murder there once. They made it look as if this chap had thrown himself off the cliff but, actually, he’d been pushed!’
Mum went pale. Jess silently cursed Granny’s ability to whip Mum up into a frenzy of survival anxiety.
‘Oh my goodness, those cliffs!’ gasped Mum. ‘When was this murder? How horrible!’ The weekend in Dorset, which had up till now seemed a heavenly prospect, was acquiring ghastly homicidal overtones.
‘It was only in a book, dear,’ said Granny soothingly. ‘One of Agatha Christie’s, I think.’
Mum didn’t look at all reassured that the clifftop plunge had only been fictional – after all, sometimes life does imitate art and Jess had always been strongly influenced by literature.
‘Who’s driving you down to Dorset?’ enquired Mum urgently, staring at Jess with panic-stricken eyes. Jess knew she had already imagined the crash site in gory detail. ‘It’s not Jack, I hope!’ One of the really cool things about Jack was that he’d passed his driving test and already had his own car, whereas Fred only had a skateboard.
‘I don’t know! Maybe! Jack’s passed his test and Flora says he’s a totally safe driver!’ Jess was beginning to get hot and bothered. She’d had five hundred versions of this conversation with her mum in the fevered privacy of her mind – she’d known it was going to be an issue.
‘Flora’s hardly a good judge!’ snapped Mum. ‘Her father thinks he’s doing Formula One!’
‘Well, if it makes you happy, I’ll go by train!’ shouted Jess. ‘Or bus!’
‘It’s only because I love you, Jess!’ Mum seized her hand, abandoning her cornflakes and giving in to a full-blown panic. Jess knew she had started imagining a train crash, or the bus brakes failing on a long hill running down to the sea.
‘I’ll walk, then!’ she yelled, though she knew even this gesture would not reassure her mother, who sometimes seemed convinced that Jess could be involved in a crash even when lying peacefully in her bed at home. Indeed whenever a plane went low over the house, Mum ran outside and looked up desperately, as if she was planning to catch it if it plummeted down, and to throw it over the fence into the Jones’s next door.
‘There’s no need to shout,’ said Mum, annoyed that her loving gesture had been rejected. ‘When is this weekend?’
‘Uhhh, I think Flo said the weekend after next.’
Mum’s brow clouded with an entirely new and perhaps more realistic anxiety. ‘But, Jess, that’s the weekend before your dinner dance!’ Jess’s heart missed a beat.
‘I know,’ she said, feeling the blood drain from her face but determined to hold steady at this slightly frightening thought.
‘Have you organised everything?’ demanded Mum.
‘Yeah, yeah, don’t worry!’ Jess had steadfastly refused to let Mum help with the organising – she was determined to prove that she could do it on her own, and though her mum had offered several times to help in any way, Jess felt that having her mother on board would make her look like a loser. Besides, she wanted to prove to her family that she really was organised and capable.
At break Jess nervously shared a chocolate bar with Flora. Already, only three weeks into the new year, she’d violated her new year’s resolution several times. But she desperately needed comfort food, because she was beginning to feel horribly uneasy about the chaos of Chaos. She hadn’t managed to see Fred yet today, as he’d been late for school and for the first double period they were in different subject groups. And now Fred had gone off to ask Mr Dickson something about chess club.
‘Oh no!’ whispered Flora. ‘Here comes Jodie! Listen, don’t mention the beach trip! Jack’s parents say there’s only room for two girls because they’ve only got one spare bedroom and that’s for you and me. The boys are going to be up in the attic dorm, but girls aren’t allowed up there – his parents are really strict. But let’s talk about something else … her latest music video is amazing, isn’t it?’
‘I think it’s a bit gross actually,’ said Jess quickly. ‘I so hate those pants she’s wearing.’
‘What pants? Who’s wearing them?’ demanded Jodie in her usual barging way. ‘Who are we talking about?’
‘I forget her name,’ said Jess. ‘The lead singer of the Whossnames.’
‘Who?’
‘The, um, the Part-Time Phantoms,’ said Flora, a funny little smile rippling around her mouth. You could see she was longing to laugh.
‘Never heard of them,’ said Jodie.
‘We’ve got to stop eating chocolate, Jess. Remember our resolution!’
‘Got any left?’ asked Jodie greedily. Mentioning chocolate had been a stroke of genius, distracting her from the fictional singer with the awful pants. ‘Remember I shared my pancake with you last Saturday.’
‘Sorry,’ said Jess, waving the wrapper about. ‘All gone!’
‘You two are so tight!’ moaned Jodie.
If she was like this about the chocolate, how furious would she be if she realised she was going to miss out on Dorset?
‘Oh great!’ Jodie went on. ‘Here comes Fred. I could do with a laugh.’
Jess and Flora exchanged a desperate glance. Fred was indeed approaching, but he didn’t know that nobody was supposed to mention the beach weekend to Jodie. In seconds, they would be in even hotter water than before – it would be positively boiling.
Chapter 8
‘Fred! Fred!’ called Jodie unnecessarily, as Fred was coming towards them already. ‘Have you worked out your stand-up routine for the dinner dance yet?’
‘Not quite.’ Fred went slightly pale. ‘We can’t agree on anything.’
Jess was annoyed that Jodie always seemed to think that Fred would be hosting the event on his own. But she couldn’t afford to alienate Jodie now with a stressy jealous aside. She needed her help.
‘Jodie,’ she said in a friendly, coaxing voice, ‘you remember you offered to help with the buffet? That was so, so nice of you.’
‘What?’ asked Jodie sharply. ‘I never said that!’
‘It was a few weeks ago,’ Jess went on, smiling her most charming smile and secretly praying for divine help. ‘You said you’d probably be able to help …’
‘No, no, sorry.’ Jodie backed off. ‘I’m hopeless at all that stuff, and anyway, my nan is coming for the weekend – I’ll have to spend all my time with her. Gotta go. See you!’ She strode swiftly off towards the cloakrooms.
‘Well done,’ whispered Flora. ‘That got rid of her.’
‘Fred!’ Jess grabbed his sleeve. ‘We have to get going with Chaos! It’s in three weeks’ time!’
‘I know,’ said Fred. ‘That’s why I said going to Dorset was a bad idea, remember?’
‘So what’s the latest with the bands?’ demanded Jess. Fred twitched in an uneasy way.
‘I’m, er, negotiating with Goldilocks.’
‘So nothing’s fixed yet?’ asked Jess fearfully. Fred shook his head. ‘Oh my goodness!’ Jess gabbled, her eyes wide, her heart pumping. ‘We haven’t got a band, we haven’t organised any food – we’ve seriously got to get going with this or it’ll be a disaster!’
‘I was wondering, if Goldilocks aren’t available, whether Poisonous Trash would like to reform, just for this one gig.’ Fred turned to Flora, and the look in his eyes could only be described as desperate and pleading. Poisonous Trash was a band that Mackenzie and Ben Jones had had for a while, and Flora had been lead singer. Singing was the one thing (so far – apart from art) which Flora had been rubbish at, and the band had bombed big time.
‘Hmmm.’ Fred tried to look relaxed and jokey. ‘Well, maybe we could work that into the cabaret, if you’re offering.’
‘Haven’t you fixed the music up yet?’ asked Flora nervously. She was kind of out of touch because she spent such a lot of time with Jack these days, and when she and Jess were together, they tended to talk incessantly about really important things, like the shape of their eyebrows. ‘It’s getting quite near the time now, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, we’ve got a DJ,’ said Jess hurriedly. ‘But it’s only Gordon Smith – need I say more? I mean, he’s OK for short bursts, but we must have a band!’
‘And what about the other stuff you were going to have?’ asked Flora tactlessly. ‘Fire-eaters? And lasers? And a chocolate fountain!’
Jess and Fred exchanged a panic-stricken, paralysed glance.
‘Wow! Sounds like the event of the year – not counting my annual bath,’ said Fred, putting on a wry smile even though Jess knew he was shuddering in fear. ‘I dunno. What happened about all that stuff?’
Jess’s blood froze. ‘At least we haven’t mentioned those things on the posters or the tickets,’ she pointed out, trembling.
‘Don’t worry, don’t worry!’ said Fred. ‘It’ll all be all right on the night!’
‘It so won’t, unless we get our act together – and fast,’ snapped Jess, exasperated.
‘We’ll just give it everything from now on,’ said Fred. ‘We can finalise everything the weekend before – have a kind of rehearsal or something.’
‘But, Fred,’ cried Jess in dismay, ‘the weekend before is our trip to Dorset!’
‘Oh, that,’ muttered Fred. ‘Do you really think we can manage it?’
Jess felt a hot surge of anger. How could he call it ‘that’ in front of Flora? It was so rude! Flora and Jack had invited them for a whole weekend, and it was going to be utterly brilliant.
‘Maybe you can manage both,’ suggested Flora. ‘You could always sort out the final details from a distance by phone or something.’
‘Yeah, but …’ Jess was feeling queasy again ‘… we’ll be in Dorset – that’s miles away, a hundred miles, probably!’ Geography wasn’t Jess’s strong point. ‘We’ll have to have everything fixed up before we go! Argh, this is so stressful!’ Jess could feel her heart banging away against her ribs like a vicious dog trying to escape from a steel-mesh cage.
‘If you get everything organised in advance,’ said Flora gently, ‘coming to Dorset could be a wonderful break for you both after all the hassle – you can chill out and relax before the main event. Apparently sometimes they have barbecues on the beach – that must be so cool.’
‘A barbecue? In midwinter?’ queried Fred.
‘Fred!’ Jess was seriously annoyed with his attitude. It seemed as if he was dissing Flora’s house party. ‘This weekend is going to be the most awesome trip ever! Winter just makes it even better! We’re gonna have log fires and charades and it might even snow!’ Even as she produced this advert for the Dorset weekend, however, Jess’s mind was whirling. How were they going to finalise all the details for Chaos by then? How could they just drop all the organisation and take off for the beach?
Fred pulled a series of embarrassed-but-thinking faces, tossing and turning his head from side to side. ‘I’m sure we can sort it all out in time,’ he said. ‘But you’re going to have to take control. After all, as you once famously told me, I can’t organise my way out of a paper bag! See you in English!’ And he ran off along the crowded corridor.
‘Fred is so irresponsible,’ grumbled Jess as they set off towards English. ‘I have to sort all the problems out. It’s always the same. This Chaos thing is going to push me right over the edge and into total insanity. We’ve been so stupid, letting things slide. I’m such an idiot about times and dates and stuff! I’d no idea it would clash with your lovely weekend!’
‘I hate all this!’ hissed Flora. ‘I wish I’d never – oh, forget it.’
‘What?’ Jess asked suspiciously. ‘You wish what? You wish you’d never invited me and Fred?’
‘No, no, no, not that! Don’t be stupid! I wish it wasn’t the weekend before the dinner dance, that’s all.’ Flora sounded rattled.
They arrived at the English lesson, where Mr Fothergill was preparing some kind of ordeal by Shakespeare. Fred was sitting with some boys at the back. Jess didn’t look at him.
‘Right,’ said Mr Fothergill. ‘You’re going to enjoy this. This is the scene where an old man gets stabbed to death behind a tapestry.’
After a large portion of Shakespearian gore, Jess found herself walking home alone again because Fred was at a chess match against Sir John Baxter’s School, a famous toffee-nosed academy in the next town. Flora, as usual, had gone off with Jack. Jess felt tragic and self-pitying, trudging the pavements on her own. Why had Fred gone off to do stupid old chess when there was such a lot of important stuff to organise? And why hadn’t they organised it properly weeks ago? Why did the Dorset weekend have to be just before the dinner dance? Why had God got it in for her? She’d tried her hardest to avoid chocolate.
‘Good news,’ said Granny, as Jess entered the kitchen. ‘I’ve just made a chocolate cake, and it’s a belter.’
‘I was supposed to not eat so much chocolate, Granny,’ Jess reminded her. ‘I made a new year’s resolution not to eat chocolate more than twice a month because of my spots and my massive flabby hips.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about that, love,’ Granny assured her. ‘You’re the prettiest girl in the street.’
‘The street?’ complained Jess. ‘That’s a bit small-scale. How about the country, the world, the universe? That’s more the kind of reassurance I’m looking for.’
‘Oh, the universe, then,’ said Granny. ‘I hear those girls from Outer Space are all warts and tentacles, though, so it’s hardly much competition.’
Jess threw her school bag in the corner and got a smoothie out of the fridge. ‘Any good murders today?’ she enquired politely, though her mind was still miserably obsessed with the Chaos chaos.
‘Not really,’ said Granny. ‘Although I did watch a Miss Marple this afternoon. The Body in the Library. One of my favourites. Set by the sea down in Devon.’
‘Oh, Granny.’ Jess felt an overpowering urge to share her angst with somebody who wouldn’t be too judgemental. ‘I’ve done something stupid – that weekend in Dorset is just before our dinner dance and we haven’t really started organising it properly yet.’
‘Not started organising it yet?’ Granny looked amused. ‘Tell me all about it, dear!’
Chapter 9
Somehow Jess had hoped Granny would come up with some kind of magic solution, but all she said, after shaking her head and tut-tutting a bit, was, ‘Let me think about it, sweetheart.’
Jess knew that Granny would forget all about her Chaos crisis if there was a particularly gruesome murder on the news. She’d probably forget all about it anyway. Granny was getting a bit forgetful these days. She’d called Jess ‘Madeleine’ last week – that was Mum’s name.
‘Please, God,’ murmured Jess as she climbed the stairs, ‘don’t let Granny get dementia. And if you could possibly organise Chaos for us, that would obviously be a bonus.’ Poor God was going to have his work cut out, but when it came to organising Chaos, he’d be your obvious first choice.
Jess checked her emails and found the latest instalment of Lord of the Wrongs from Dad.
… Lord Volcano stared, baffled, at the magic shoes. He’d plugged them in and charged them overnight, but he still didn’t have the faintest idea what kind of magic shoes they were; the instructions were in Fishish, and where was he going to find a fish to translate for him? He gazed longingly at the sea below. It must be full of fish. And then a strange thought occurred to him. Why were the instructions in Fishish anyway? Fish
don’t have feet, do they? Hmmm. There was something fishy going on here …
Maybe these magic shoes weren’t really a present from his long-lost daughter Messica after all. Maybe it was a secret trap, a cruel trick being played on him by Sir Filo Pastry. Maybe they were truth shoes, and the moment he put them on, he’d blurt out all his secrets. Sir Filo Pastry, he knew, would be watching his every move on CCTV. Sir F would be waiting for him to reveal the location of his magnificent treasure, the shimmering Pot of Gold.
If they were the kind of magic shoes that enable you to jump confidently off windowsills and soar effortlessly into the clouds, he’d be able to escape right now. On the other hand, they might be the kind of magic shoes that would turn you into a silver teapot. And handsome though silver teapots can be, Lord Volcano didn’t really fancy having boiling water poured in through a hole in his head on a regular basis. It wasn’t what he would have called a lifestyle.
Thoughtfully he plucked his familiar, Donald, out of his cosy thatched matchbox.
‘Donald,’ he said, ‘I have a task for you. Go to my long-lost daughter who lives two hundred miles away through the forests of Pog, and ask her if indeed she really did send me these magic shoes and, if so, how on earth you’re supposed to switch them on.’
‘But, Master,’ said Donald with a puzzled frown, ‘I’m a snail! It’ll take me three weeks just to get down the wall of this tower!’
Jess paused in thought. It was a relief to think about something other than a dinner dance. She started to type.
‘I’ve thought of that, of course,’ said Lord Volcano with a sneer. Sometimes he wished his familiar was something intelligent and stylish, like a dolphin, but his bath, though large, really wasn’t big enough for an ocean-going mammal. ‘Donald, you’re an idiot. I’ve made a little motor for you – it’s a bit like a racing-car engine but, obviously, scaled down.’
With a few deft movements of his long webbed fingers, Lord Volcano attached the motor to the back of Donald’s shell and pressed the electronic ignition. It roared into life – in a tiny, tinkling way, a bit like a wasp in a jam jar – and propelled Donald violently across the windowsill and down the wall of the tower.