by Sue Limb
‘Oh no!’ sighed Flora thoughtfully. ‘Do you think Mercury is retrograde or something? What else can go wrong?’
‘Plenty!’ said Jess grimly.
Flora threw back her head and stared in disbelief at the ceiling. A chandelier (Egyptian lead crystal globes, no change from £400) sparkled above her head and was reflected in her eyes. Jess noticed the sparkle and gloomily compared the effect with her own house, where dud light bulbs were often tolerated for weeks on end.
‘But Fred …’ sighed Flora, still staring at the twinkling chandelier. ‘I mean, Fred … He’s so original and strange but somehow, you know, amazing. Why don’t you just freeze him out for a couple of days and then, when he comes back on bended knee, you can make up again?’
Jess hesitated. A sudden uncomfortable thought had wormed its way into the far corner of her mind. Flora had fancied Fred once. She’d had the tiniest crush on him, just before Jess and Fred had got together. If Fred was apparently free and available now, might Flora be tempted to tempt him? Jess felt sick. She gulped hard.
‘The thing is,’ she confessed, ‘I was thinking that if Fred wanted to get back together with me, he’d have to do something really major, like one of those medieval knights on a quest, you know?’
Flora frowned slightly. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked. ‘Like, slay a dragon or something? Where’s he going to find a dragon these days?’
‘Slay a, well, a symbolic dragon, maybe.’ Jess shrugged. The truth was, she wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted Fred to do, but it just had to be massive to make up for all his recent spinelessness and selfishness. ‘Oh, I don’t know what – he’ll have to think of something heroic.’
‘Shall I … Would you like me to tell him that’s what you want?’ asked Flora, looking puzzled.
‘No!’ snapped Jess. She didn’t want Flora as a go-between: the dangers were obvious. ‘I don’t even want him to know that that’s what I’m thinking. I want him to work it out for himself. I want him to realise what he’s done and work out a way of putting it right.’
‘But, babe,’ persisted Flora uneasily, ‘what if he gives up? All that heroic stuff, that doesn’t really sound much like Fred, you know. What if he just goes back into his shell and mopes about miserably?’
‘Well, if he reacts like that,’ said Jess, horribly aware that Flora’s scenario was all too likely, ‘then my main job is to forget all about him – put him right out of my mind.’
Flora stared, speechless for a second. ‘That’s the plan?’ she asked, looking less than convinced.
Jess nodded. ‘Yes. Just get over him. I can’t spend the rest of my life being let down by Fred. I’m going to wipe him clean out of my memory banks – starting from now.’
Flora sighed, leaning back against a sofa cushion and working her way through a whole handful of chocolate peanuts. ‘This is so awful – I thought it was just a lovers’ tiff. This is the worst thing that’s happened for as long as I can remember.’ She looked sombre.
‘No need for gloom!’ Jess was determined to change the mood to positive. ‘This is the beginning of a brave new world, OK?’
Just then they heard Flora’s front door being opened, in rather a rough and stressy manner, and then there was the alarming and unmistakable sound of Flora’s mum running upstairs, crying.
Get to Know Sue Limb!
The first thing Sue ever wrote was the letter ‘S’ and it’s still her favourite letter. As a toddler she wrote on walls, but at school she was given exercise books and filled them with stories of children who lived alone on islands and had adventures with boats and dogs. Though a tomboy, Sue was also a coward and deeply scared of boats, dogs, islands and adventures, but she discovered that writing was a way of experiencing other lives while keeping your feet dry.
As a teenager she realised that if you could make people laugh they didn’t notice how nerdy you were. Sue found that comedy was a way of dealing with the bad stuff that happens in life, such as embarrassment and anxiety. Despite her love of comedy and writing, she ignored these hints from the universe and briefly attempted to be a teacher. Sue hates imposing her will on other people (even her dog had to teach himself to sit and fetch) so her days in the schoolroom were numbered and she escaped from the Ministry of Education.
Writing for young people has always been a big part of Sue’s working life, mainly because she still doesn’t feel grown up. In recent years she has produced the Jess Jordan books and revisited her early childhood in the Ruby Rogers series.
Sue lives in a wild, rocky and remote part of Gloucestershire, on a farm, and when not writing she likes to be out of doors messing about with plants and animals.
A Few More Facts about Sue!
Name: Sue Limb.
Star sign: Virgo.
Favourite colour: Green.
Favourite number: Seven.
Favourite thing to do: Give my dog a bath.
Favourite food: Anything with pesto.
Where were you born? Hitchin, Hertfordshire, England.
Where do you live now? On a remote farm in Gloucestershire.
What were you like at school? A tomboy-ish nerd.
Have you got brothers and sisters? One older brother, who’s a jazz musician.
What did you want to be as a child? Secretary-General of the United Nations (I told you I was a nerd).
How did you start writing? At age two, I liked doodling the letter ‘S’. When I grew up, I tried teaching, couldn’t cope, and writing seemed to be the only thing possible.
What did you do before you were a writer? I was a teacher, screaming in vain for quiet while my classes rioted gently around me.
Where do you write? Anywhere – I particularly like writing on trains. But when I’m at home, in a room with windows opening into a wild wood.
What was your favourite book as a child? The Railway Children by E. Nesbit.
What’s your favourite children’s book now? Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak.
What’s your favourite adult book? Persuasion by Jane Austen.
What tips do you have for budding writers? Read a lot!
What’s your favourite TV programme? Frasier.
What makes you laugh? Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse as the Surgeons.
What’s your favourite movie? Some Like It Hot.
Who do you imagine playing Jess, Flora and Fred in a movie? Carey Mulligan would be Jess, Emma Watson would be Flora and Jamie Campbell Bower would be Fred.
By Sue Limb (in reading order):
Flirting for England
Charming But Insane
Absolute Torture!
Pants on Fire
Five Star Fiasco
Chocolate SOS
Party Disaster!
Girls, Guilty But Somehow Glorious
Girls, Muddy, Moody Yet Magnificent
Girls to Total Goddesses
Hi, guys!
You’re so brilliant reading this and it’s really cheered me up, as Fred is being a bit of a toad at the moment – not that he’s covered with warts and is shooting poison out of his neck (but give him time). Sometimes I feel that you’re my only friend, especially when Flora’s at orchestra practice. So please, please, do me a ginormous favour and visit my fabulous, dazzling, low-calorie, high-energy website –www.JessJordan.co.uk!!!!
I’m going to be blogging away (I wrote glogging by accident at first and I kind of like it, so I might be glogging too) and I can promise you loads of laughs, polls, quizzes, interactive stuff, downloadable goodies, plus sensational secrets that Fred, Flora, Ben, Mackenzie and Jodie have begged me to never reveal! Don’t tell them I sent you – and promise you’ll be there!
Love,
Jess
Jess Jordan’s Top Tips for How to Deal with Your Mum’s Online Dating
Hack into your mum’s profile page on the dating website and substitute her semi-glam photo for a pic of a charming hippo. (Unless she already looks like one.)
Inter
cept an affectionate email from one of your mum’s potential beaux and inform him that she has become a nun married an old rock star grown a beard.
If they arrange a date, dress in an ape suit and follow them at a discreet distance, howling at intervals and hurling custard. He’ll think you’re her jealous ex.
If all else fails, insist on a six-figure prenuptial pocket money deal.
For more top tips from Jess, visit www.JessJordan.co.uk
Bloomsbury Publishing, London, Berlin, New York and Sydney
First published in Great Britain in 2010 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP
This electronic edition published in 2012 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Text copyright © Sue Limb 2010
Revised text copyright © Sue Limb 2012
The moral right of the author has been asserted
All rights reserved
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make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means
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may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9781408812761
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www.JessJordan.co.uk
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