Discount Diva (Zodiac Girls)

by Cathy Hopkins

  Chapter Eight

  Help!

  “Oh NOOOO!” I heard Mum cry from the kitchen.

  It was Monday evening and I was upstairs working on a secret birthday card for Dan whose birthday was coming up as like me, he is a Taurus. Art is the one thing that I am really good at and I often make my own cards for friends and family on special occasions. On hearing Mum, I raced down the stairs.

  “What? What is it?” I asked as a feeling of panic flooded through me. Mum was sitting at the kitchen table with a letter in her hand and a pile of post in front of her. She looked pale and shocked.

  She held up the letter. “I don’t believe it,” she said.

  “What? Mum! Is it Dad? Or Gran? What’s happened?”

  Seconds later, Will, Dan, Andrea, Marmite and Meatloaf piled into the kitchen too. In such a small house, nothing goes unnoticed.

  “My job,” Mum groaned. “I’ve lost my job.”

  “But why?” asked Andrea. “Mr Lowe loves you.”

  “He’s relocating to Scotland,” groaned Mum. “We knew it was on the cards but not so soon. He never said a word about it when I was in work today.”

  “Coward,” said Will. “He should have told you to your face.”

  “Mr Lowe’s not very good with people,” said Mum. “Only with animals. That’s why he’s such a good vet.”

  “But won’t he sell the clinic?” I asked. “Someone else’ll take it over surely?”

  “Yeah, someone’s got to look after all the local animals,” said Will.

  “Meow,” mewed Meatloaf as if he was agreeing with Will. Sometimes I swear that cat understands what we say.

  Mum nodded. “The letter says he has sold the clinic and the new vet is coming with his own full staff from his last place. My services are no longer required. No wonder he couldn’t tell me to my face. He does say he’s sorry though.”

  Dan went over to Mum and put his arm around her. “You can get another job,” he said.

  “Yes. Another job. Um. Let me make you some tea,” said Andrea and everyone started fussing about as if tea and toast were going to make everything all right.

  Ten minutes later, we were sat round munching toast and jam and wondering what to say.

  “This may mean that we have to move,” said Mum wearily. “I am sorry kids but… the rent went up last month and now with no job…”

  “But you’ll get another job,” said Dan again.

  “I’ll try to, love,” said Mum, “but there aren’t many around at the moment. Mrs Nesbitt next-door-but-one was only saying last week, she and her sister had been down the jobcentre and there was nothing going. Only more cleaning work for the big agencies and they take most of the proceeds and pay their workers peanuts.”

  The atmosphere around the table felt as heavy as lumpy porridge. This house was tiny for the five of us as it was.

  “We’ll think of something, Mum,” I said. “Something will turn up. When’s the rent due?”

  “Week on Saturday. I can just about manage that but after…”

  “Then we need to put our heads together and come up with a plan,” said Andrea.

  Cue for Will, Dan, Andrea and I to put our heads together. Literally. It was a family joke dating back from when we were little. Will started it and it did make Mum smile to see us all leaning over with the tops of our heads touching like we were in a rugby scrum. It didn’t help much though, and if any of us had nits we’d just passed them on! Ah, the joys of family sharing.

  Suddenly I remembered Nessa and her gang of planet people. Who or what they were, I still wasn’t sure but she did say that they were there to help.

  “I may be able to do something,” I said when we all sat down again.

  “Oh yes. How’s that?” asked Mum.

  “Er… I… er, did I tell you about…? No. Um. Probably not. Where to start? Yes. The other day… No. Shut up, Tori…”

  Everyone was staring at me as if I was mad. I had been about to tell them that I was a Zodiac Girl and had the aid of a bunch of aliens at my beck and call but then realized how totally crazy that would sound.

  “Er… just got to go and make a phone call,” I said and made a dash for the hall and up the stairs to my room where I quickly called Nessa on the magi-mobile.

  “Hey Nessa,” I said when she picked up. “I need your help.”

  “Okay. So what can I do for you?”

  “My mum. She’s lost her job. Can you get her another one?”

  “Get your mum a job?”

  “Yeah. You have a salon and Joe has a café and I’ve met Uri already and he has his cyber shop. Don’t any of you need shop assistants or something? Mum does cleaning too.”

  “Oh Tori darlin’, it doesn’t work like that.”

  “But I need help and you said you could help me.”

  “I will. I will ’elp you but with the aspects of your chart and ’ow to deal with it. I’m ’ere to ’elp you reach your full potential.”

  “I’m fine. It’s not me who needs help. It’s Mum.”

  “But she’s not a Zodiac Girl, Tori,” said Nessa. “You are.”

  “But she is a Zodiac Girl’s mum. And whatever affects her affects me, right? We need practical help. Not help with our aspects or potential or whatever. We might lose our home.”

  “’Old on,” said Nessa. “I’m just looking at your chart. Hmm. A couple of encounters with Uri…”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Hard to predict with Uranus. It’s the planet of the unexpected. It means that suprises can come like a bolt out of the blue, not that you’re going to run into Uri, just ’is influence. And let’s see, what else? Yeah… I did tell you that you ’ad some lessons coming up, didn’t I?”

  I vaguely remembered her saying something like that at the ball. “Yeah.”

  “So… let me see… yeah, Tori, it says you have a tough time coming up. Sorry doll, but most Zodiac Girls do. That’s partly why they get chosen. I mean what’s the point of ’elping someone whose life is going brilliantly? So you… looking at what’s in front of me, the lesson this month is to somehow pool your resources. You have to learn not to expect miracles to fall from the sky. You have to make it ’appen.”

  “Make what happen?”

  “Miracles. The solution to your problems. Make it ’appen.”

  Make it happen? I thought. What sort of advice was that? She couldn’t be vaguer if she tried.

  “You’re a Taurus,” said Nessa. “Did you know that all the different signs are either earth, water, air or fire?”

  “No,” I said. I had a feeling she was going to tell me though.

  “Well they are. All the twelve signs are either fire, air, earth or water. The fire signs are Sagittarius, Leo and Aries. The air signs are Aquarius, Libra and Gemini. The water signs are Pisces, Cancer, Scorpio and the earth signs are Capricorn, Virgo and Taurus.”

  “So I’m an earth sign. Um… that’s very nice of you to tell me Nessa but what exactly has that got to do with anything?”

  “You ’ave to learn to play to your strengths, Tori. See, the earth signs are so good at being practical. Being earth signs, that means that in many respects they are just that – earthed, grounded. They ’aven’t got their ’eads in the clouds like some signs. So what I’m saying sweet’eart is that being Taurus, you will be really good at doing practical things. I’m sure you’ll come up with something practical as a solution.”

  “But like whaaaaaat?” I asked.

  “Oh and ’old on a minute. Uri has message for you.” She was quiet for a moment and I could hear a voice in the background. “’E says inspiration will ’it you in an unexpected way. Don’t worry.”

  “So you can’t give Mum a job then?” I asked.

  “That’s not what I see ’ere,” said Nessa.

  Useless, I thought. Totally useless. “Okay. Thanks,” I said although I was thinking, thanks for nothing.

  I clicked off the phone and got up to go downstairs to j
oin the others. I felt disappointed that Nessa hadn’t been more helpful so I gave the hall cupboard a swift kick with frustration as I went past. The door flew open and one of Dan’s old Action Man toys fell out in front of me. I promptly tripped over it, went flying onto the carpet and landed on my stomach. I knelt up to shove the toy back in the cupboard but when I opened the door properly, a hundred things came spilling out on top of me.

  “Arrrgghhhhh!” I cried as old clothes, towels, toys, magazines and games became dislodged from where they had been wedged in. Books came bouncing down from the top shelf, a box of old shoes even one of my old Barbie dolls came flying down and landed on my head. “Waaaaoooooo!”

  Mum came running up the stairs. “What’s going on? Are you okay, Tori?” she asked when she saw me spread-eagled on the carpet, pinned down by a baseball bat, a Monopoly board on my chest and a “Highland Fling” Scottish Barbie sitting on my head.

  “Just about,” I said as I rubbed my forehead.

  Mum glanced up at the now half empty cupboard and the contents spilled out all over the carpet. “I guess we have been meaning to empty that out for months now,” she said with a grin, “nice of you to remind us.”

  “Mum, I could have died just then.”

  “Yeah, right,” said Mum but she didn’t look very concerned. She was busy looking at the rubbish that had fallen out. “We really ought to get rid of all this stuff you know.”

  I could see I wasn’t going to get any sympathy now that she’d seen that I was all right. All the same I decided to lie there a second more and groan. And as I lay there, it hit me. A flash of inspiration, like a bolt of lightning.

  I sat up and removed Barbie’s right leg from my left ear. Uri had been right. And so had Nessa. Use your resources, she had said. Inspiration will hit you unexpectedly, he had said. It couldn’t be more obvious.

  “I’ve got it, Mum,” I said. “I know exactly what we can do to raise some extra cash.”

  Chapter Nine

  Making the £££

  I waited until I got downstairs to make my genius announcement. The others were going to be so impressed with my idea. Even I was impressed!

  “Tori has an idea,” said Mum to Andrea, Will and Dan who were still in the kitchen stuffing their faces with toast. “Go ahead Tori.”

  Mum, Andrea, Will, Dan, Marmite and Meatloaf looked at me expectantly.

  “Car boot sale,” I said.

  Their faces dropped and Will and Dan started chomping again. Marmite and Meatloaf looked enthusiastic though, in fact Marmite hopped onto the chair nearest to me and rubbed my hand with his nose as if to show me his approval.

  “Cat boot sale? Pff,” said Will through a mouthful of peanut buttered toast. “No. What we need is a miracle. We need to win the lottery.”

  “What star sign are you?” I asked.

  “Libra. Why?”

  “Might have known,” I said. “That’s an air sign you know. Air sign for airhead. Head in the clouds. The chances of winning the lottery are like, one in a hundred billion million. We can’t rely on that. We have to make our miracle happen and this is something we can practically do.”

  “Oo er, get her,” said Dan.

  “And how much do you think you’re going to make from a car boot sale, dozo?” Will asked. “Fifty quid tops and how long would that last for?”

  “Yeah and who would want to buy our old stuff? I bet we couldn’t even give it away,” said Andrea.

  “Fifty quid would be better than nothing,” I said. “Let’s see you come up with something.”

  “Actually,” said Mum who had been looking thoughtfully out the window after I’d made my announcement, “it’s not a bad idea at all. We have got all that stuff upstairs clogging up the cupboards. And even more in the loft and in the garage. It wouldn’t do any harm to get rid of it. Especially if we are going to have to move. It would give us some more space at least. And there’s a car boot sale in the car park every Saturday over in Osbury. I’ve been meaning to check it out for bargains for some time now but I never thought of going there to sell. Yes, Tori, I think you may be on to something.”

  “And you could bake some of your cakes, Mum,” I said. “People are bound to want a snack while they wander around.”

  Mum was beginning to look a lot more cheerful. “Yes,” she said. “Let’s go for it. Dan, get a piece of paper and let’s make a list.”

  Sorted, I thought. And it’s one to you, Nessa.

  Plans for the car boot sale went into top gear. Everybody pulled together. Andrea cleared loads of her books out, Will took out a pile of old CDs, DVDs and computer games, Dan donated games and toys he’d outgrown while Mum and I found piles of old clothes and shoes we no longer wore.

  I texted Nessa once the plan got under way and every day brought email messages of encouragement from her. They were so lovely, like works of art. Each one came on a pale blue background, the first had a wreath of white roses around the message, the second bright yellow sunflowers, the third a circle of ivy interwoven with white snow drops, the fourth was framed with a square made up of stars and planets that twinkled on the screen and the fifth and sixth had rows of tiny bluebirds that chirped around them. She must be a whiz at technology and knowing how to create these pages, I thought as I printed them out and stuck them onto my wall.

  Each message was simple:

  Don’t give up.

  Quitters never win and winners never quit.

  Don’t wait for your ship to come in, swim out to it.

  Fortune favours the brave.

  The longest journey starts with the first step.

  Life is what you make it.

  As the week went on, I felt as if the messages were on a loop in my head, playing over and over. Don’t give up. Don’t give up. Don’t give up. Quitters never win and winners never quit. Quitters never win and winners never quit. Quitters never win and winners never quit… I found myself getting fired up with enthusiasm and ideas.

  I so wished that I could let the other Crazy Maisies in on my plans but that would mean admitting how bad our situation was at home and I wasn’t ready for that or their pity. They were off for another movie night on Saturday evening but once again I’d had to make an excuse as I didn’t have the dosh. I’d said that Mum was taking me and the bros to a new restaurant in town. They didn’t need to know that it may well be true, we may go to the restaurant – then help her clean it! And when Georgie asked if I was free earlier in the day to go shopping with her and her mum, I said that I couldn’t because we were joining family at my uncle’s country estate for a lunch party. And it was true. They were coming to help out at the car boot sale. So the country estate was really a council estate and we were meeting at a car park round the back of Mudgen’s supermarket where lunch would probably be bacon sarnies, but no-one needed details.

  As always when I told fibs or half lies, I felt a twinge of conscience. Sometimes I wished that I could tell them the whole story but I wasn’t prepared to lose their friendship. It meant too much to me. Thankfully there were other people though who knew exactly how things were for us since Dad had left. Mum’s sisters and their hubbies. And they couldn’t have been more helpful.

  I called Uncle Kev and he agreed to drive us to the sale in his van.

  Uncle Ernie said he’d let us have some vegetables and herbs to sell on one section of the stall. His donation was on the condition that I went and helped him on his allotment some nights after school. Remembering what Nessa had said about Taureans being practical, I agreed to do it. He even said that I could have my own corner of the allotment if I wanted. I resolved to make it my new hobby for the future as I’ve always liked digging and planting and watching things grow. Since Megan had said that it was magic that stuff grows from nothing, I felt like my eyes had been opened to the natural wonder all around me. I’d always taken it for granted before. I think Uncle Ernie thought I was mad when I spent ages just staring at the petals of an apple blossom flower like I’d never
seen one before.

  Auntie Phoebe let us have a load of her old china and said anything she could do to help, she would.

  Auntie Pat (who runs a beauty salon) gave us loads of skin and hair product samples.

  By the end of the week, our downstairs rooms were chock-a-block ready for the sale. Even Dan, Will and Andrea were getting more enthusiastic.

  Uncle Kev arrived at seven in the morning on Saturday and we all piled in his van, Mum, Uncle Kev and I in the front and the boys and Andrea wedged in with the bin bags in the back. Andrea didn’t like that one bit and complained about the smell of petrol all the way there. She’s such a weed, although she did look paler than her normal lily white by the time we got there.

  When we got to the site, we got busy unloading the van.

  “So where the table?” asked Uncle Kev when the last bag had been hauled out the back onto the tarmac.

  “What table?” I asked.

  “Table to lay all your stuff out on,” he said.

  Mum and I looked at each other with horror. All around us, professional car boot people were unfolding picnic tables and setting out their stalls. In all the activity, I hadn’t thought about where we were going to put anything.

  “Haven’t got one,” I admitted shamefacedly. “What are we going to do?”

  Just at that moment, the alluring smell of frying bacon wafted towards us. Uncle Kev sniffed the air. “Yum. Bacon sarnies,” he said. “Come on lads. What we need is a full stomach and then we’ll deal with the problem in hand.”

  And off they charged without looking back! Honestly, I thought, those boys do nothing else but eat, eat, eat. But bacon sarnies? What a great idea. I could see that the lady doing the sandwiches at the back of the car park was doing a roaring trade. We had Mum’s cakes but they wouldn’t last long. I should have thought of making butties. Next time, I’ll be better prepared and made a mental note for my car boot sale list of essentials: Table. Sandwiches.