Oh no. Please. No.
I sank down in my chair and hid behind Kim.
“Amber?”
By this time I was practically under the table. Sulkily I hauled myself upright. “Yes, sir?”
“I'd like you to look after Kirandeep,” Mr. Arora said, smiling at me. “Or Kiran, as she prefers to be called. I know you'll do a good job.”
“She can sit here, next to Amber,” Kim said assertively, moving to the next chair.
“Oh, thank you,” I said, but my sarcasm went over everyone's head, except possibly Kiran's. She dragged her heavy rucksack across the room, looking as pleased as I felt.
“Do sit down,” I said silkily. “Aaaargh!”
“Sorry.” Kiran heaved her bag off my foot. “I didn't mean to drop it on you. It was an accident.”
“Really?” I said through gritted teeth, massaging my throbbing toes.
“Oh, yes,” Kiran replied cheerfully. And she had the nerve—the nerve—to grin at me.
There was no doubt that this was war.
“Kiran delivers your newspapers?” Kim beamed at me as we lined up for assembly. “So you already know each other. Isn't that great?” Her smile faltered a little as she took a look at my face. If I were a cartoon character, I'd have had steam coming out of my ears. “Well, isn't it?”
“No, Kim,” I assured her. “No, it is not great.”
I took a quick look over my shoulder. By leaping out of my seat at the first peal of the bell, dodging round Chelsea and Sharelle and sprinting to the door, I'd got away from Kiran and made it to the front of the line. She was stuck near the back.
Kim was looking bewildered. “Why not?” she asked.
“Because a rather embarrassing incident occurred
this morning,” I replied. “And before you ask, I don't want to go into details.”
Mr. Hernandez wandered over to us. “Amber, did I just experience a time warp, or did Mr. Arora ask you to look after Kirandeep not five minutes ago?”
“He did, sir,” I said, “but I didn't think I needed to hold her hand all the way to the assembly hall.”
“Then I suggest you take your duties more seriously,” Mr. Hernandez said sternly. “Go to the end of the line.”
Fuming, I stepped out of the queue and went to the back to join Kiran. Loyally, Kim followed me.
“Oh, hello,” said Kiran in a very offensive tone. “I thought you were trying to avoid me.”
“I was,” I replied.
“Well, you'd better try harder next time,” she retorted.
“Oh, that's not going to help anyone, now, is it?” Kim said sensibly. “Why don't you try to be friends?”
We both stared savagely at her.
“All right”—Kim changed tack in a hurry—“maybe not friends. But you could be polite to one another.”
“Polite people don't go around sticking newspapers down other people's sweaters,” I replied.
Kiran grinned. Shockingly, Kim did too, until I gave her a look. We marched off to the assembly hall in angry silence.
Mr. Hernandez was always late, so we were last to arrive. The other classes had left a narrow gap in the middle of the enormous hall for us to squeeze into.
While we were inching our way into position, I took a good look round. The lower school had to sit on the floor, but the upper school had chairs. There was Geena, looking very smug, with an aren't-I-lucky-I-get-to-sit-on-a-chair-now face. Her eyes almost fell out of her head when she saw Kiran next to me. Jazz had turned round and noticed too, and both of them were smirking away.
I wasn't interested in their childish reaction, though. While we waited for Mr. Morgan, the head teacher, I twisted round to locate the delightful new boy. There he was, sprawled casually on a chair at the end of a row, looking as if he owned the place. He wasn't in Geena's class, although he was in the same year. Oh, he really did have everything, I thought dreamily, feasting my eyes. Looks, class, style—
“Oof!”
“Why don't you sit still?” Kiran snapped. She was so big, she'd taken up half of my tiny bit of space, and to add insult to injury, she'd just stuck her elbow in my ear.
“Well, if you weren't such a big lump, we'd all have a bit more room!” I retorted.
It was very unfortunate for me that, about a second before I spoke, Mr. Morgan had walked into the hall: you could have heard a pin drop in the sudden silence. Well, you might have heard a pin drop if I hadn't been speaking at pretty much the top of my voice.
“Ambajit Dhillon!” Mr. Morgan said coldly, peering at me over his half-moon glasses. “You will go and sit by your teacher. Immediately.”
Oh dear. Somehow I managed to climb to my feet in a space the size of a envelope and make my way down the row to Mr. Hernandez. I was hot and cold all over with embarrassment.
Mr. Hernandez shook his head sadly and pointed at a patch of floor right next to his chair. “Not a very favorable start to the new term, is it, Amber?” he said.
I kept my head down for the rest of assembly. There was only one more slightly embarrassing moment when Mr. Morgan extended “a warm welcome to all our new pupils,” and everyone turned to stare accusingly at me. Other than that, I was just mortified and humiliated. So, nothing too awful.
“Amber, correct me if I'm wrong,” said Mr. Hernandez as he led the way back to class after assembly, “but I sense a feeling of hostility between you and our new girl.”
“Oh, do you think so, sir?” I muttered bitterly.
“I do.” Mr. Hernandez stared hard at me. “And it would be a big mistake to let it get out of hand. After all, Mr. Arora did specifically request that you help Kiran settle in.”
“Yes, sir,” I said in a dismal voice. What he meant was that I was stuck with her.
“It wasn't really Kiran's fault,” Kim said cautiously as we collected our books for the first lesson.
“Are you saying it was mine?” I growled.
“No,” Kim said quickly. “Well, maybe if you hadn't spoken quite so loudly—”
“It was all her fault for being so big and clumsy,” I said in a five-year-old's voice. “It's not fair.”
Kiran was at the front of the classroom talking to Mr. Hernandez. I longed to flounce out of the room without her, but I wasn't quite brave enough. If I had done, Mr. Hernandez would have told Mr. Arora, and Mr. Arora would have told Auntie, and oh, there would have been far too many consequences. I was slowly beginning to realize that maybe Mr. Arora marrying Auntie wasn't going to be all sunshine and roses.
“First lesson is English, right?” Kiran came over to us, timetable in hand. She and I had almost exactly the same timetable, so I would be responsible for her practically all day, every day. Hurrah.
“Room sixteen, with Mrs. Holland,” replied Kim. I did not speak.
Kiran raised her eyebrows. “Not talking to me?” she inquired. “Well, maybe that's a good thing after what happened in assembly.”
“This way,” I said coldly, turning to the door. As far as I was concerned, my duties only extended to getting Kiran to the right classroom for the right lesson at the right time. I didn't have to spend every waking moment with her.
Mrs. Holland, however, had other ideas.
“Now, Kiran, you'll want to sit with Amber,” she said as soon as we set foot in room sixteen. “You can have these seats right here.”
Kiran and I both glared at her.
“I don't mind sitting on my own,” muttered Kiran, much to my delight.
“So can I sit with Kim?” I asked.
Mrs. Holland looked thunderous. “Well, really, Amber, I'm surprised at you!”
“Me?” I spluttered. “What have I done?”
Rolling her eyes, Mrs. Holland pointed at the two seats in front of her. Looking glum, Kiran and I sat down next to each other.
“We're reading Shakespeare's Julius Caesar this term,” Mrs. Holland explained as Kim and Chelsea handed the books out. “Amber, will you take the part of Caesar?”
I could not think of anything witty to say in reply— I know, unusual for me, wasn't it?—so I contented myself with elbowing Kiran's pencil case off the table when she wasn't looking. Childish, I guess. But it made me feel better.
I couldn't get away from Kiran all morning. At every lesson it was the same: You'll want to sit by Amber, Kiran. Is Amber looking after you, Kiran? Amber will help you, Kiran. Just ask Amber, Kiran. I was beginning to wonder if I was the victim of a teacher conspiracy.
“I don't get it,” I complained to Kim. The last lesson of the morning was chemistry, and we were on our way to the science lab. “I mean …” I checked over my shoulder to make sure Kiran wasn't behind
us. She'd disappeared into the girls' lavatories without a word to me or Kim. “Why are the teachers so worried about her settling in? She's big enough and ugly enough to look after herself.”
“Oh, hello,” said Geena, who was waiting outside the IT room with the rest of her class. “After that display in assembly this morning, Amber, I'm thinking of disowning you.”
“It wasn't my fault,” I grumbled. “It was Kiran.”
“Mr. Arora's asked Amber to look after her,” Kim added.
Geena began to chuckle. “Really? How amusing.”
“Oh, never mind her,” I said impatiently. “What details do you have on the delicious new boy?”
“Unfortunately, not much,” Geena sighed. “He's not in my class, he's in Ten K. All I've got at the moment is that his name's Ragbir Gill, but he's known as Rocky.”
“Amber!” Jazz was barreling her way down the corridor toward us, skidding on the highly polished wooden floor. “What was all that about in assembly this morning? And was that really the new papergirl?”
“I'm afraid so,” I replied. “But don't worry. I'll soon show her what's what. She might be big and ugly, but I told you before—brains over brawn every time.”
Jazz's gaze had shifted to a point beyond my shoulder. Geena and everyone in her IT class were staring in the same direction.
“She's behind me, isn't she?” I said.
Thirty-two people nodded. Slowly I turned round and came nose to nose with Kiran. However, we were only nose to nose because she was bending down quite a long way.
“So you're going to show me what's what, are you?” Kiran inquired in a not-at-all-friendly manner.
“Well.” I cleared my throat. Took a step backward. Slipped on the polished floor.
I went over backward like a skittle in a bowling alley. I landed with a thump on my bottom, and my legs flew up in the air. There were a few wolf whistles, which turned to jeers as everyone got a first-class view of my big, sensible white school pants (Auntie's choice, not mine).
Only one person—someone who happened to be walking along the corridor toward me—put out a hand to help me up.
“Hello,” said Ragbir Gill, known as Rocky, giving me a smile that could melt chocolate at twenty paces. “I don't think we've met.”
“But Amber, we can't leave Kiran on her own,” Kim twittered anxiously. “We ought to at least make sure she knows she goes to lunch now, or she'll miss the last lower-school sitting.”
“After what she did to me?” I said bitterly, following her out of the canteen. “Just an hour ago I ended up flat on the floor, giving the most gorgeous boy in the school a good view of my knickers.”
“Some people might think that's not necessarily a
bad thing,” Kim said, attempting to be a woman of the world.
“I prefer to be a bit less obvious, thank you,” I retorted, feeling a hot tide of embarrassment washing over me yet again. “Now that I've managed to sneak away from her, I want to enjoy the rest of the lunch hour in peace.”
No hope of that. We were no sooner back in the playground than Jazz detached herself from her gang of mates and rushed over. Even Geena, who was trying to look all cool and upper-schoolish, couldn't resist the opportunity to come and join us.
“Everyone's talking about you, Amber,” Jazz said gleefully. “You're getting a reputation.”
“Yes,” Geena said with a grin, “some of the girls are saying that flashing your knickers at a guy to get his attention is a bit much.”
“Oh, shut up,” I snapped. “You know it was an accident.”
“Where's your little friend?” Geena asked, looking around.
“If you mean Kirandeep Kohli,” I muttered, “we gave her the slip and went to lunch without her.”
“I still think we should have waited for her,” Kim said uneasily.
“Jazz, are you all right?” asked Geena with a frown.
Jazz was patting her hair, pulling down her school sweatshirt, hitching her skirt up higher and generally fidgeting about like a jumping bean.
“It's him!” she hissed. “And he's coming this way!”
Ragbir Gill, alias Rocky, was indeed walking purposefully in our direction.
I ran my fingers quickly through my hair and hoped I wasn't blushing. Or drooling.
“Hi.” Rocky stopped in front of us, but he was looking at me. At me “It's Amber, isn't it?”
“Yes,” I blurted out in a voice two octaves higher than normal.
“I just wanted to see if you were OK.” Rocky smiled at me, and I felt myself floating up to heaven on a silver cloud surrounded by angels. “That was quite a tumble you took.”
I tried to look pale and fragile. “Oh, I'm fine, really—”
“Don't worry about Amber,” Geena broke in. “She's as tough as old boots.” She elbowed me aside and gave him a dazzling smile. “I'm Geena, her sister. I'm in Year Ten, same as you.”
“And I'm Jazz, her other sister.” Jazz jostled forward, pushing me out of the way and stepping on my toes in the process.
“You're not a sister too, are you?” Rocky laughed, turning to Kim.
“No, I'm a Kim,” Kim burbled, completely mesmerized. “I mean, I'm just a friend.”
“Nice to meet you all.” Rocky raised a hand. “See you around, girls.”
He strolled off, and we turned on each other.
“Talk about desperate!” I eyeballed Geena and Jazz
furiously. “Why didn't you both just leap on him there and then?”
“You can talk,” Geena sniffed. “Fluttering your eyelashes and trying to look all girly and wistful. It was sickening.”
“You two are such losers.” Jazz smirked. “He liked me best. I could tell.”
“He came over to talk to me,” I reminded her coldly. “Who do you think he liked best, Kim?”
“Himself, probably,” Kim replied. “He's almost too good-looking, isn't he?”
We ignored her.
“Jazz is out of it, obviously,” said Geena. “So it's between you and me, Amber.”
“Excuse me for not just lying down and letting you walk all over me,” Jazz retorted, “but exactly why am I out of it?”
Geena sighed loudly. “Oh, really, Jazz! You're far too young for him.”
“I'm nearly twelve and a half,” Jazz said indignantly. “That's practically thirteen. And I've got the biggest chest.”
“That just shows how immature you are,” I said loftily. “This is not about chest size.”
“All right.” Geena turned to me. “What do you bet he likes me best?”
“Oh, are you sure you're up for this?” I asked with a confident smile. “After all, you're going to lose.”
“We'll see,” said Geena. “Kim can make the final decision.”
“No, thanks,” Kim said firmly.
“Or we could just ask him,” I suggested.
“Fine,” Geena replied.
“Fine,” I repeated.
We stared challengingly at each other.
“What are we betting?” Geena wanted to know.
I took a Snickers bar from my pocket and began to rip it open. “Slave for a day?” I suggested.
“Nice one,” said Ge
ena. “But I must warn you that when I win, I'll be making you do all sorts of unpleasant and humiliating tasks.”
“Same here,” I replied. We'd had slave-for-a-day bets before. Last time I lost, Geena had ordered me to cut her toenails.
“I'm in this too,” said Jazz stubbornly. “Or are you scared of the competition?”
“Not at all,” Geena snapped.
“Oh, let her join in,” I said. “It'll shut her up.”
“We ought to have a deadline.” Geena frowned. “What about Auntie's wedding? That gives us until just before half-term.”
“Done,” Jazz and I agreed.
“I think you're all mad,” Kim said, with rather too much assertion, frankly.
I grinned. Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I looked round. It was Kiran. Her face was red and this time it was her turn to have steam almost coming out of her ears.
“Yes?” I said coldly.
“Why didn't you tell me I had to go for lunch half
an hour ago?” Kiran demanded. “Now I've missed the sitting.”
“Sorry,” I said, trying not to smile. I actually felt a tiny bit guilty. But not much when I remembered my big white pants disaster.
“If you go and explain to the teacher on duty,” Kim began, “I'm sure they'll let you in—”
Kiran did not answer. She leaned over, whipped the Snickers bar from my hand and walked off.
“You—you!” I spluttered. “Come back! That's stealing!”
“Go after her and take it by force, Amber,” suggested Geena. “It's the only way.”
Jazz roared with laughter while Kim looked worried.
“Not at all,” I said with dignity. “I told you, brains over brawn. I'll sort Kirandeep Kohli out my way.”
Sadly, I didn't yet know what “my way” was.
“So tell me, Amber.” Mr. Arora drove out of the school car park at a snail's pace to avoid the embarrassment of flattening any of his pupils. “How are you getting on with Kiran?”
“What?” I said absently, not listening. Mr. Arora had rounded us up at the end of the afternoon and told us that Auntie had asked him to drive us home as soon as possible, as we'd all been invited to tea with his parents. I wasn't listening because I was keeping an eye on George Botley, who was having a laugh with a couple of girls from Geena's year.
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