Tthe Sleepover Club on the Beach

by Angie Bates

  Once Frankie gets on her high horse, it’s pointless arguing. You just have to let her run down like an old-fashioned record.

  “The thing which REALLY annoys me,” she continued, “is how the girls always get so girly and upset. And the boy with the pet rat always finds disgusting old toffees in his pockets, and they’re all fluffy and icky and I’m like – ‘DON’T put it in your mouth, Betty-Ann or whatever your silly name is. It’s got rat germs!’”

  I giggled. “He keeps the rat in his other pocket, you lamebrain!”

  “But the dopey girl EATS it,” Frankie went on. “Not only that, but she like, cheers up INSTANTLY! I mean what is IN these sweeties, Lyndz? I think we deserve to be told!”

  That did crack me up. In fact I laughed so much, I started hiccuping. Ever had hiccups while you’re still recovering from earache?

  It’s AGONY.

  “Sorry, hic (ow!) hic, Frankie,” I whimpered. “Gotta, HIC (ow!) go!”

  Snivelling with pain, I rushed to find Mum, who was helping Dad measure alcoves for shelves.

  I hate being the middle child. My parents showed me absolutely NO sympathy.

  “Oh, not again!” Dad groaned.

  “Just hold your breath,” Mum said impatiently.

  Now I am the world expert on hiccups, OK? And I’ve tried every hiccup cure going and that holding-the-breath thing never worked for me ONCE. I was getting genuinely hysterical, but then my brother Tom came up with the most ingenious hiccup remedy since hiccups began.

  He put one arm around me and drew one of his lightning-fast cartoons with his free hand. And as I watched, hiccuping miserably, Tom’s scribbles suddenly turned into a brilliant caricature of me hiccuping and going “Ouch!”.

  I giggled. “My nose isn’t that big.”

  Then I clutched my chest. “Tom! You are such a cool brother! They’ve gone!”

  “Tom Collins, Hiccup Wizard!” he joked. “That’s me!”

  “Yippee, yippee! I’m hiccup free!” I sang idiotically.

  And I flew back upstairs to finish my book. Everything Frankie said was true, but I didn’t give a hoot. I had totally fallen in love with those old stories. Actually, what I really wanted was to climb inside that world and stay there for ever.

  I was still reading when Mum came in to give me my last dose of medicine. She gave me a goodnight kiss, then firmly switched off my light.

  But I still couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for ages, trying to find a cool patch of pillow. I wasn’t depressed any more. The books had completely cured me. But I was unusually restless. Which isn’t exactly surprising. My head was filled with faithful dogs and foreign-sounding villains and flashing lights far out at sea!

  Maybe I was still feverish, or maybe Teresa’s dad’s books had cast a strange spell on me. But suddenly I found myself talking in the dark.

  “I wish all the Sleepover gang could have exciting adventures like the kids in those stories,” I said. “Though in trendier clothes, obviously,” I added hastily.

  You know what they say. Be careful what you wish for. It might happen. And it did. It happened so fast that I was still tossing and turning when Mum got her mysterious late-night phone call from a long-lost relative…

  OK, I’ll come clean. Uncle Phil isn’t exactly a long-lost rellie. But he’s terrible at staying in touch! I think maybe he has phone phobia. He and Auntie Roz been living in Australia and we hadn’t heard from him for years.

  But it turned out that recently, Auntie Roz had inherited some huge old house in Suffolk by the sea.

  Mum told us about it next morning. “They’re going to run the house as a B&B,” she explained. “They’ve been working seven days a week since they got here, getting everything straight, and they’ve invited us for the weekend.”

  But Dad is a real home bird at heart, so he came up with all these excuses. He had exam papers to mark, plus his DIY was at a crucial stage, etcetera etcetera. “You go,” he offered suddenly. “And I’ll look after the boys. How about that?”

  Mum looked seriously tempted. Not only was she keen to see her big brother, I got the sneaky feeling she was ready for a break.

  When we were alone (except for baby Spike, who doesn’t count), Mum said hopefully, “Fancy going to Suffolk this weekend, Lyndz? Bring a friend if you like. The sea air would do you good.”

  My heart totally skipped a beat. That’s what grown-ups always say at the beginning of Thingybobby stories! That’s how you know the adventure is starting! Was it possible my late-night wish could be coming true?

  Don’t be daft, Lyndz, I told myself. I shook my head wistfully. “Sorry, Mum. I can’t just take one of my mates.”

  She sighed. “You’re right. Oh, well.”

  I thought that was the end of it. But like Stu says, Mum’s like our Jack Russell, Buster. Once he gets his teeth into something, he totally won’t let go. And Mum was determined to see her brother.

  That evening, she disappeared into her bedroom with the phone. She came out all smiles. “They said yes!” she announced. “Isn’t that great?”

  I stared at her. “Huh?”

  “Your friends’ parents. They said yes,” she said impatiently.

  “Erm, did I miss something?” I said.

  ‘They agreed to me taking you all down to Suffolk, of course,” she said, as if I was being particularly slow.

  I was stunned. “You want to take the entire Sleepover Club away for the weekend? Does Uncle Phil know?”

  “He can’t wait. He says he and Roz really miss having kids around, now theirs have left home.”

  “What about school?” I was shaky with excitement. Suddenly my life seemed to be turning into a story. There had to be a hitch somewhere.

  “No problem,” Mum said absent-mindedly. “Friday’s a training day. I can’t believe you’ve forgotten that! We’ll have to make an early start. It’s a long drive to Suffolk. Where did I put that road map?”

  My head was spinning. My mates and I were going to stay with my long-lost uncle in a rambling old house by the sea, and have a thrilling adventure like the ones in Teresa’s dad’s books. And all thanks to my brilliant mum!

  But before things could get mushy, the phone rang.

  Fliss sounds just like a Munchkin when she gets excited. “Is your mum really taking us to the seaside?” she squeaked. “That is so-o cool! I’ve got the cutest bikini! It’s pink with darling little—”

  I pretended to gasp. “Pink! Wow! You don’t say?”

  My mates were on the phone all evening, babbling happily about sunbathing and candy floss and amusement arcades. But instead of getting excited with them, I started to feel slightly fed up. It didn’t seem to occur to my mates that I might have ideas of my own. I kept saying, “There’s more to Suffolk than amusements, you know.”

  “Like what?” demanded Kenny.

  Like, it’s the perfect place for adventures!

  But I just said carelessly, “Oh, Mum’s got loads of local info. There’s this old city which totally disappeared under the sea.”

  “Big hairy deal!” said Kenny scornfully. “I can’t exactly see us playing the fruit machines underwater!”

  Modern kids are so unromantic! Thingybobby kids would fall over themselves at the prospect of a drowned city.

  “Plus there’s some cliffs which are like, haunted by ghostly sweethearts,” I said eagerly. “And there’s this church where that Civil War guy Cromwell’s soldiers totally blasted the door with their muskets. And once—”

  Kenny made loud yawning sounds. “Bo-oring.”

  I sighed. Maybe when we actually crossed over the border into Suffolk, my mates would change their minds.

  I know, I thought. I’ll get Mum to pack us a picnic exactly like the ones they have in those books.

  I grabbed some scrap paper, thought for a minute, and started scribbling a list: potted shrimps, ginger beer, Spam…

  Three days later we were bowling down wide country roads with our sunroof open. I
t was horribly early still, about 8am, but it was really sunny and warm.

  Suddenly Rosie said, “Aren’t you hot in that cardi, Lyndz?”

  “No,” I said fiercely. Though actually, I was. Very.

  “Those old-fashioned hair slides look cute though,” she said quickly.

  “Not so sure about the little ankle socks,” said Kenny under her breath.

  OK, maybe I’m a really sad person, but I felt like I had to dress the part at least. I had to show a bit of faith. Otherwise how was our Thingybobby adventure ever going to materialise?

  It’s not like I was getting much support.

  Mum had totally put her foot down about the picnic. “I refuse to get up at the crack of dawn and pack a picnic,” she’d said irritably. “Anyway potted shrimps are 95% pure butter! As for Spam, who knows what they put in that stuff! And you hate milk! No, Lyndz, we’ll stop off at a McDonalds instead.”

  I don’t know what things are coming to, do you? Mums in books always get up to make their children’s picnics. And OK, so I don’t generally drink milk, it’s true, but it sounds so lovely in Thingybobby books – all warm and frothy and fresh from the cow.

  But I didn’t mind SO much about the picnic. It was my mates who were really depressing me.

  I did try to get them in an adventurous frame of mind.

  “Uncle Phil’s house is really near the sea,” I babbled. “I wonder if we’ll hear the waves swooshing at night. Hey! Maybe if we hunt around, we’ll find the secret tunnels under the cliffs, where old-time smugglers stashed their loot.”

  But I might as well have been talking to myself, because my mates just gave me pitying looks, then went back to arguing about which to play first, Steps or Westlife. Then Mum said crossly, “Hey! When do I get to listen to MY music?”

  She meant it too! We actually had let her play her cheesy oldies! I didn’t know where to put myself.

  But I haven’t told you the worst thing yet.

  Fliss’s stepdad had given Fliss her very own mobile phone.

  Apparently, after she agreed to come on this trip, she went into a Fliss-style panic about being stranded miles from civilisation. So Andy bought her a phone! A seriously expensive one with about a zillion different functions. So of course Fliss had to keep taking her new toy out of its trendy little case to see if anyone was texting her.

  “Who’d send you messages at this time of day?” Frankie jeered.

  “One of my mates, of course,” Fliss said in a huffy voice.

  “But we’re here with you!” Kenny pointed out.

  “I do have other friends,” Fliss said snootily.

  “Oooh!” we chorused.

  Unfortunately Fliss reread the instruction booklet and made the discovery that you could actually change the ring tones. Only she couldn’t decide if she wanted her pride and joy to warble Jingle Bells, play the opening bars of the theme tune to East Enders, or imitate the call of a spring cuckoo. So she had the cheek to ask Mum to switch the tape off, while she experimented with all three tones again and again and…

  By the time Mum finally spotted a McDonalds, I was ready to throw Fliss and her precious phone out of the window.

  Things improved slightly after we’d stuffed ourselves with burgers and fries. But the weather was really changing for the worse. We’d just got back into the car, when splodgy raindrops started landing on the windscreen like tiny pawmarks.

  “What if it rains all the time we’re there?” I whispered to Mum anxiously.

  She laughed. “Relax! There’ll still be loads to do. I showed you that booklet, remember?”

  “My friends want to go to the pleasure beach,” I hissed. “They want to have FUN!”

  But just at this moment my friends were having a major argument.

  “Erm, Mrs Collins,” Frankie asked politely. “We are camping, aren’t we?”

  “I do hope not,” quavered Fliss.

  “Absolutely not,” said Mum firmly. “Actually, you’ll be sleeping over the stables.”

  Oh, bliss, I thought.

  But then Mum explained that the stables weren’t actual working stables, but had been converted into holiday accommodation.

  My heart sank. No picnic, no horses. This trip was a real let-down.

  “Phil hopes you won’t mind being in the annex,” Mum said breezily. “They’ve got B&B guests staying in the main house.”

  Oh great, I thought. A bunch of boring bird watchers, that’s ALL we need!

  At last we turned off the busy dual carriageway.

  Mum puffed out her cheeks with relief. “That’s more like it. Now we’re really in Suffolk!”

  Despite the rain, the scenery was getting really pretty. All the cottages were painted soft pastel colours, sugar almond pink and primrose yellow, and there were weeping willows everywhere. Plus there was loads more sky than I was used to.

  We were fed up with our tapes by this time, so Mum let Frankie twiddle the radio dial until she found a local station and we all sang along happily to S Club 7.

  But after an hour of twisty country roads, we were in a total car coma. It felt like we’d been stuck in the car our whole lives, lurching around hairpin bends and bumping over hump-backed bridges.

  Finally we reached somewhere called Pease Magna, where we parked under a dripping tree. Mum wanted to buy some goodies from a village shop, which had become a famous foodie haunt, apparently. My mates and I tottered along on our wobbly car legs too, to buy supplies for our Sleepover feast.

  On our way out of the shop, we read the ads in the window.

  “Someone’s selling a big flowery lady’s dress,” Kenny giggled. “You don’t see too many big flowery ladies these days, do you?”

  “Home wanted for adventurous kitten,” I read aloud. “Tail and whiskers slightly singed.”

  “Oh the poor thing!” said Fliss in dismay.

  It sounds really heartless, but the rest of us totally cracked up.

  Mum came up behind us, clutching packages of squishy cheese and other weird grown-up nibbles. “Come on. It’s not far now.”

  “You’ve been saying that for hours,” I moaned.

  Ten minutes after we’d left Pease Magna, Mum turned down a wiggly single-track road, with grass growing down the middle.

  Suddenly a pheasant literally fell out of a hedge in front of us. Mum braked just in time. Seconds later a bunch of speckled pheasant babies fell out of the same hedge and went poddling across the lane after their dimwitted parent.

  Kenny’s eyes gleamed. “Pity. I hear pheasant is really tasty!”

  “KENNY!” we all said at once.

  Mum was still recovering when she had to back up to let a rusty old Ford go past. But instead of waving “Thanks”, the driver just glowered at us and shot past, splattering our car with mud.

  In Thingybobby stories, country folk are pink-cheeked and friendly and sell you fresh buttermilk and brown speckled eggs at the farm gate. Not the villains obviously. They have scowling unpleasant faces and grating voices and greasy hair. Maybe the glowering Ford driver was our villain. Eek, I thought. If he was a villain, at some point we’d have to outwit him!

  The narrow lane became a primitive track, lined with ancient trees. They all leaned towards each other, forming a rather spooky green tunnel.

  I noticed Fliss nervously clutching her mobile phone. And all at once I started feeling incredibly panicky and homesick.

  We were in the middle of nowhere. There was absolutely nothing here except sky and trees. And rain and mud…

  “Oops!” said Mum suddenly. “Almost missed it.” She made a sharp turn, and suddenly we were rattling over a makeshift wooden bridge, between large weeping willows. A sign said “Willow Cottage”.

  And there in front of us, smothered with honeysuckle and rambler roses, was the oldest, loveliest, most higgledy-piggledy house I had EVER seen.

  I was terrified my mates were going to hate it.

  Any minute now they’re going to moan about it being
too far from the amusement park, I thought anxiously.

  But they didn’t. They didn’t say anything. It was like they were so stunned, they didn’t know what to say.

  Then Frankie took a deep breath. “Oh, Lyndz,” she said softly. “It’s perfect!”

  Minutes later we were looking over our new sleeping quarters, an airy upstairs room which used to be the old hayloft.

  All my mates had the biggest grins on their faces.

  “We can really stay here by ourselves?” Rosie breathed.

  I knew what she was thinking. Yippee! We can stay up all night and no-one will ever know!

  My Auntie Roz beamed at us. “We thought you girls would appreciate some privacy. You’ve got your own bathroom downstairs, but if you need us in the night, just shout.”

  There was a scrabbling of claws on the wooden stairs and a puppy appeared at the top.

  “Aaah,” said everyone.

  “That’s Gizmo,” smiled my aunt. “We haven’t had him long. He still follows me everywhere.”

  Don’t ask me what breed Gizmo was. It was something Italian that I’d never heard of. I’ll just describe him to you.

  He was the colour of vanilla ice-cream with huge feet like fluffy mules which he totally couldn’t control. One of his soft silky ears had accidentally turned inside out, giving him a puzzled expression.

  He galloped up to me, all shy and wriggly, his tail wagging.

  “That puppy doesn’t walk, he shimmies!” exclaimed Frankie,

  “Yeah, he should be a catwalk model,” Rosie giggled.

  “A dogwalk model, you mean,” Kenny corrected her.

  Fliss bent to stroke Gizmo, her fair hair swishing across her face.

  Without thinking I said, “If Fliss was a dog, that’s the sort she’d be. A gorgeous designer dog with a sexy shimmy!”

  Fliss turned bright pink. “That’s such a sweet thing to say!”

  Phew, I thought. It’s not every girl who appreciates being compared to a puppy, even one as elegant as Gizmo!

  “I’ll leave you to it,” said my aunt. “Come over for tea when you’re ready.”