My Super Sister and the Birthday Party

by Gwyneth Rees

  In memory of Harold Dawson – my very wonderful grandad

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  It’s not as easy as you might think being a nine-year-old girl with a superpower! It’s especially not easy when you have a mischievous little sister with the same superpower, who you’re supposed to keep out of trouble!

  My name is Emma and I live with my two ordinary parents, Marsha and Jim, and my six-year-old sister, Saffie. My sister and I were born with a very special gift. It’s not that we can fly, or make ourselves invisible, or read minds, or make our bodies incredibly elastic or anything like that. But what we can do is make all sorts of non-living things come to life – which Mum says is called animation. Think toys, pencils, plants, brooms, cutlery, shoes, broccoli and garden gnomes all dancing around and talking to each other and you’ll get the idea.

  This weird gift runs through my mum’s side of the family and, according to Granny, it came about when one of our ancient ancestors got struck by lightning. Apparently some of their normal DNA got mutated into super DNA or something. Of course, we don’t really know if that’s true, but what we do know is that the family gift always skips a generation, which is why it missed out Mum and jumped straight from Granny to us. (Mum has always been perfectly normal – though she says she doesn’t feel normal having us around.)

  Having superpowers can be a lot of fun. Saffie and I can make our dolls and teddy bears really talk to us – not just pretend talking – and it’s pretty cool getting to play frisbee with Granny’s garden gnomes! But the downside is that we have to keep our superpowers a secret because Mum is scared that if anyone finds out about us we’ll never be able to lead normal lives ever again.

  I’ve always been very cautious when it comes to using my power, but Saffie isn’t careful in the least and it can be really hard work keeping her out of trouble. That’s why there are times when I honestly feel like I deserve a medal for being her big sister – like last summer, when we were sent to stay with Granny and Grandpa for the holidays . . .

  CHAPTER 1

  It was first thing in the morning on the day my sister and I were going to Granny and Grandpa’s house for the summer holidays. I was pretty excited. This was going to be the first time we’d stayed there without our parents. Mum, however, was starting to get super-stressed.

  ‘Where’s Saffie?’ she asked as she watched me stuff some last-minute things into my travel bag in the hall.

  ‘Upstairs saying goodbye to her dolls,’ I said. Seeing the panic on Mum’s face I added quickly, ‘Don’t worry, Mum. She’s only saying goodbye to them in a normal way.’

  Mum looked relieved until Dad ruined it by grunting, ‘That child couldn’t do anything normal if she tried.’

  ‘Jim, would you please stop encouraging the girls to think they’re not normal!’ Mum snapped. ‘I know this is harder for you because you didn’t grow up in a family with all this . . . this . . .’

  ‘Weirdness?’ Dad supplied for her.

  ‘. . . this extraordinary behaviour taking place,’ Mum continued, scowling at him. ‘But despite that, you ought to know by now that Emma and Saffie are two perfectly normal children who need us to treat them that way.’

  Normalness is a topic that comes up a lot in relation to Saffie and me. I’m sure that if you met us you’d probably think we were both perfectly normal – or at least you’d think that until you got to know us a bit better . . .

  ‘Granny says that normal is just another word for boring,’ I informed them.

  ‘She would.’ Mum was looking even more worried. ‘Oh dear . . . I hope I’m doing the right thing sending you two girls to stay with her for the holidays.’

  ‘We haven’t really got much choice, Marsha,’ Dad reminded her gently.

  Keeping our superpowers a secret has always been difficult, but it had become ten times harder last summer. You see, at the start of the holidays our next-door neighbours had moved out and new ones had moved in – and the new ones turned out to be really nosy and super-interested in us. Mum was terrified they’d find out the truth, so Granny had come to stay with us to try and help. But that had only made things worse, so Granny then suggested that Saffie and I went to stay with her for the summer instead.

  ‘I can drive home tomorrow and get things ready, and you and Jim can bring the girls at the weekend. At least that will get them away from your neighbours for a while. And when they’re with me I can teach Saffie how to control her superpower a bit better. She’s a bright girl. I’m sure she’ll learn quickly.’ She paused. ‘And I can teach Emma a few things too.’

  ‘What things, Granny?’ I had asked her in surprise.

  ‘Just you wait and see,’ Granny had replied, giving me one of her winks.

  But later I’d heard Mum and Granny talking about me when they thought I was asleep in bed.

  ‘Don’t push Emma too hard,’ Mum was saying as I listened from the top of the stairs. ‘Emma’s power is much weaker than Saffie’s. She’s quite sensitive about it, though she’d never say so.’

  I’d felt a bit uncomfortable hearing Mum say that. We don’t normally talk about the difference in our superpowers – the fact that I can only make small things come to life whereas Saffie can animate massive objects if she wants to. The previous week she’d brought to life both our next-door neighbours’ garden shed and a dustbin lorry.

  ‘The trouble with Emma is that she doesn’t use her power enough,’ Granny was saying. ‘Use it or lose it, that’s what she needs to understand.’

  ‘The less she uses it the better, as far as I’m concerned,’ Mum said with feeling.

  ‘That’s because you’re only concerned with keeping the girls safe,’ Granny replied. ‘But the more skilled they are at using their powers, the safer they’ll be in the long term. They have their whole lives ahead of them, remember. It’s no use you protecting them too much or they’ll never learn how to take care of themselves . . .’

  ‘Mother, they’re only children. They need protection. And if you don’t agree with that then—’

  ‘Of course I agree,’ Granny cut in impatiently. ‘I’m just saying there’s a difference between protection and overprotection, that’s all.’

  After that they changed the subject, but the next morning Mum seemed a bit more reluctant to let us go to Granny’s.

  ‘Are you sure you’ll be all right having them with you for all that time, Mother? Jim and I can come at the weekends, but I really think it might be better if I stayed during the week too.’

  But Granny had been adamant that she didn’t think that was a good idea. ‘The last thing Saffie needs while I’m teaching her how to control her superpower is you fussing over her. If you just relax and leave things to me she might even be ready to go to school with Emma by the end of the holidays.’

  Mum let out a surprised gasp. ‘Mother, do you really think so?’

  And that had settled it, because if there’s one thing guaranteed to make Mum agree to anything, it’s the prospect of not having to homeschool my little sister any longer.

  ‘Speaking of Granny, don’t we have to get going soon?’ Dad said. ‘She wanted us there in time for lunch, didn’t she?’ It was Sunday and Granny was making a roast dinner.

  ‘LOOK OUT!’ yelled a high-pitched voice and we looked up to see Saffie hurtling down the banister rail towards us. She was dressed in a yellow lon
g-sleeved leotard with a silver star on the front, a shiny red cape, a pair of stripy tights and her silver wellington boots. Her curly reddish-brown hair looked like it hadn’t been brushed in a week and she still had jam on her face from breakfast.

  ‘Oh, Saffie,’ Mum sighed as my little sister landed on her feet with a thump and flicked her red cape out of the way as she spun round to face us. ‘You wear that Supergirl outfit all the time. Why can’t you wear that pretty princess costume you got for your birthday?’

  Saffie scowled. ‘I don’t like it. It makes me look like a . . . a . . .’

  ‘Princess?’ Dad suggested with a smile.

  Saffie nodded. ‘Like a silly old princess that needs rescuing and I’m not!’ She stamped her foot to emphasize the last word.

  We all laughed and Mum said, ‘I suppose you’ve got a point there. Come on. Time to get going. Oh, and we might as well take Grandpa’s birthday present with us so that Granny can check it’s the right thing. I can’t believe he’s going to be seventy on Friday.’

  Saffie looked excited. ‘Will he have a birthday party? And a cake with seventy candles on it? And balloons . . . and a grown-up pass the parcel like we had on Daddy’s birthday, and—’

  ‘Somehow,’ Dad interrupted drily, ‘I can’t imagine your grandpa going for that idea.’

  Dad was right. Grandpa isn’t really a party person. Whenever we go there he’s nearly always out on his allotment, or shut away in his garage workshop making models. And even if he is inside the house he’s usually stuck behind his newspaper completely oblivious to everything that’s going on around him.

  ‘I bet I can get him to have a birthday party,’ Saffie declared.

  She had a certain look on her face, the look she gets when she’s determined to make something happen regardless of whether anyone else wants it to or not.

  ‘I don’t think so, dear,’ Mum said. ‘Grandpa can be even more stubborn than you about some things – and avoiding parties is definitely one of them.’

  But Saffie was already distracted by the large box wrapped in birthday paper, which Dad was carrying into the hall. ‘Ooh, is that his present? What is it?’ she asked excitedly.

  ‘Wait and see,’ Mum said firmly. ‘This is a very special present from us and Granny, so we have to take extremely good care of it.’

  ‘Does Grandpa know what it is?’ I asked curiously.

  ‘No, it’s going to be a big surprise – and I don’t want you girls to utter a word about it,’ Mum told us firmly.

  ‘Saffie, you can’t make someone have a birthday party if they don’t want one,’ I told her as we headed out to the car.

  I was taking care not to look in the direction of Mr Seaton, our neighbour, who was outside in bright red shorts and a T-shirt, mowing his front lawn. It hadn’t taken us long to find out that Mr Seaton worked in television, that he had a chat show called Freaky Families on the Sofa and that we would be just the type of family he would love to sniff out. To make matters worse, his wife was a scientist who specialized in studying inherited abnormalities in humans.

  I was carrying Howard, the teddy bear I was taking with me to Granny’s. Howard has always been extremely sensible when he comes to life – unlike Saffie’s dolls.

  Saffie was carrying her china doll Elvira in one hand, her frisbee under her other arm and her spotty rucksack packed with stuff for the journey on her back.

  ‘What’s that?’ I asked as I saw some strands of red woollen hair poking out the top of the rucksack. ‘Saffie, you haven’t brought Dorothy as well, have you? You know Mum said you could only bring one doll.’

  Saffie’s doll-animating had been getting a bit out of hand recently as her two favourite dolls, Elvira and Dorothy, were always fighting. Sometimes it could get quite nasty, like the day before, when they had been hurling marbles at each other.

  Saffie gave me her scowliest look. ‘I can’t leave Dorothy behind! She’ll be too upset.’

  ‘She can’t get upset if you haven’t brought her to life,’ I pointed out. ‘Dolls don’t usually have feelings, remember . . .’

  Saffie looked at me as if she thought I was being incredibly stupid. ‘What I mean is that she’ll be upset when I come home and bring her to life and she finds out I took Elvira with me and not her!’

  ‘Oh . . .’ I had to admit she had a point. Dorothy and Elvira can get extremely jealous of each other if they think my sister isn’t treating them fairly.

  I decided not to say anything to Mum, because I didn’t want to set off one of Saffie’s big strops. Besides, since I was going to Granny’s too I reckoned I’d be able to keep an eye on both dolls.

  ‘Just look at that,’ Mum said, glaring at our neighbour as she and Dad climbed into the car a few minutes later. ‘Look at the way he’s staring at us . . . and look up there . . .’ She was pointing to an upstairs window, where Mrs Seaton was standing with the curtains pulled back and a pair of binoculars trained on us. The Seatons had seen a few odd things since they’d moved in, and after Granny had come to visit (with all her garden gnomes) they had become even more suspicious. Mr Seaton had actually seen Granny’s gnomes playing frisbee with Saffie in the garden and we’d had a really hard time explaining that away.

  ‘What does she think she’s doing? Looking at animals in a zoo?’ Mum complained with a scowl.

  ‘Freaky families in their natural habitat more likely,’ Dad joked, which made Saffie and me laugh.

  But Mum wasn’t laughing. She was fuming as she said firmly, ‘The sooner we get the girls away from here the better!’

  CHAPTER 2

  ‘OK, girls, not far now,’ Dad announced two hours later as we drove past the garden centre on the main road that leads into our grandparents’ village.

  ‘One thing I’ve never understood,’ Dad said to Mum, ‘is why your father needs to grow vegetables on an allotment when they have such a large garden.’

  ‘Oh, well . . . that’s because Dad doesn’t feel like he can do anything in the garden without asking Walter first,’ Mum said.

  ‘Walter?’ Dad looked mystified.

  ‘Granny’s Head Gnome,’ Saffie piped up. ‘He’s in charge of all the others, plus he’s the Head Gardener as well. He always calls me “Miss Serafina”. He says everyone should call me by my proper name because it’s so pretty.’

  ‘Yes, and he calls me “Miss Emmeline”, even though I keep telling him I hate my proper name,’ I put in grumpily.

  ‘Emma thinks her real name makes her sound like someone’s smelly old great-aunt,’ Saffie piped up with a giggle.

  ‘Not smelly, just old,’ I corrected her, because Saffie always exaggerates.

  ‘Walter was my mother’s very first garden gnome,’ Mum was explaining to Dad as he started to look out for Granny’s street, ‘and she treats him a bit like he’s her Number One Son. I’m afraid he’s a bit of a bossy boots with all the others, isn’t he, girls?’

  Saffie and I both nodded.

  Dad was turning the car into the quiet road where our grandparents live on the edge of the village. Their garden backs on to a small field and then some woods.

  ‘Oh . . . my . . .’ Dad started to laugh as we drew up outside the house. ‘Looks like somebody’s got a new hobby!’

  Granny and Grandpa’s perfectly ordinary – if rather high – front hedge had been transformed into a display of different bird shapes. There was a duck, a peacock, a swan and a seagull with spread-out wings, all perfectly trimmed.

  ‘Wow!’ Saffie exclaimed. ‘How did they make it grow like that?’

  ‘They cut those shapes into the hedge, Saffie – it’s what’s known as topiary,’ Mum explained.

  Granny flung open the front door as we all climbed out of the car. Granny is quite tall, and plump in the middle, with thick hair that is almost as curly as Saffie’s. She has green almond-shaped eyes, which Dad says remind him of a cat’s, and she has round glasses that are always slipping down her nose.

  ‘My goodness, Saffie �
�� you’re not still wearing that Supergirl costume, are you?’ she exclaimed as she came down the path to greet us.

  ‘She’s been wearing it every day this week,’ I said. ‘She won’t even let Mum put it in the wash, will she, Mum?’

  Mum didn’t answer me. Instead she pointed at the front hedge. ‘Please tell me the gnomes didn’t do this, Mother.’

  ‘Of course they did it,’ Granny said. ‘Aren’t they clever?’

  ‘But what if one of your neighbours saw them?’

  ‘Oh, I doubt that,’ Granny said breezily. ‘Walter and his team completed the whole thing under cover of darkness . . . using their night-vision goggles of course.’

  ‘Night-vision goggles?’ Dad was gaping at her. ‘You’re not serious, Harriet?’

  ‘She is, I’m afraid,’ a second elderly voice broke in, and we looked across to see Grandpa standing at the side door of the garage, smiling at us. Grandpa is tall and quite thin with a round face and dark brown eyes. A long time ago he used to have very dark hair too – we’ve seen it in photos – but for as long as I can remember he’s been almost bald. He was wearing his blue workman’s overalls and wiping his hands on a paint-stained cloth. I guessed he must be in the middle of working on one of his models.

  ‘Hi, Grandpa!’ Saffie and I both called out as Mum smiled her sweetest smile and went straight over to hug him. We see a lot of Granny because she comes to visit us all the time, but since Grandpa nearly always prefers to stay at home we tend to see him a lot less. I always feel a little bit shy when I first see Grandpa again, and I think Saffie probably does too.

  ‘So, Henry,’ Dad teased. ‘I bet you thought you were going to have a nice peaceful summer, didn’t you?’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about him,’ Granny joked before Grandpa could reply. ‘He never gets any peace in any case living with me, do you, dear?’ She beckoned to all of us to follow her into the house. ‘Come on. I want to show you my new super-high fencing out the back. You really should get some for your garden, Jim. It’s ideal for obscuring the view of the neighbours – though it does rather block out the sun as well.’