by Judi Curtin
Chapter Seventeen
When Alice and I got outside, Bruno was sitting on the wall outside our house. He jumped up when he saw us coming, and his face, which seemed to have recovered, went all red again.
‘Bon … hello,’ he said.
‘Hi,’ Alice and I said.
Then no-one said anything for ages. Bruno played with his watch-strap, Alice fiddled with her hair, and I kicked a small pebble around on the dusty footpath. This was going to be soooo boring.
At last, Alice spoke.
‘Er, Bruno,’ she said. ‘Do you, by any chance, have a brother?’
Bruno nodded.
‘Yes. I have brother. He calls himself Serge.’
Alice grinned at me.
‘What does he look like?’
Bruno looked puzzled.
‘He look like … I know not … he has … how you say … blonde hairs.’
Now Alice looked really happy.
‘Can we get him?’ she asked. ‘Can we ask him to come on our walk?’
‘You want that Serge walk with us?’ said Bruno.
Alice nodded.
Bruno gave a big shrug and waved his hands in the air.
‘If you want.’
Alice nodded again.
‘Yes. We want. Don’t we Megan?’
By this time, what I really wanted was to be sitting under the apple tree playing Scrabble, but it was a bit late for that. So I nodded weakly.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘We want.’
When we got to the bakery, Bruno stopped at the garden wall where Alice and I usually parked our bikes.
‘You wait,’ he said. ‘I get Serge.’
So we waited. Alice was so excited she could hardly stand still.
‘We need a plan. How about if you walk with Bruno, and I walk with Serge?’ she said.
I poked her in the arm.
‘No way,’ I said. ‘We’re all walking together, or else I’m out of here.’
‘I was just kidding,’ said Alice, but I knew she hadn’t been.
After ages, the side door to the bakery opened again, and Bruno stepped outside. Alice and I both held our breath, and a second later a small, blond boy stepped out into the bright sunshine. He followed Bruno to where we were standing.
Alice couldn’t hide her disappointment.
‘Where’s Serge?’ she asked.
‘Here,’ said Bruno, pointing to the little boy. ‘This my brother Serge.’
‘But he can’t be,’ protested Alice.
I had to giggle. Poor Bruno must have thought we were totally crazy. First we thought he didn’t know his own name, and now Alice was accusing him of not knowing who his brother was.
Even though I was enjoying seeing Alice so confused, I decided I’d better step in.
‘Do you have another brother?’ I asked Bruno.
Bruno shook his head, but didn’t go red. I suppose he figured there was no point being embarrassed when he was surrounded by two crazy girls.
‘Then who … who was the boy in the garden? The boy with the book? The big boy?’
Suddenly Bruno smiled and pointed to the seat under the tree.
‘The boy who always sit himself there? The boy who read all the day?’
Alice nodded enthusiastically.
‘Yes, that’s him. Who is he?’
‘That is my cousin,’ said Bruno. ‘He calls himself Pascal. He very boring.’
Alice shook her head.
‘I bet he’s not one bit boring. I bet he’s very nice.’
Bruno shook his head.
‘No. Pascal is not nice. He spend all the days looking in the mirror. He is very not nice.’
Alice laughed.
‘He looks nice to me. Where is he?’
‘Gone away,’ said Bruno, like he didn’t care much anyway.
‘Gone away?’ repeated Alice like a parrot. ‘Is he coming back?’
Bruno nodded slowly.
‘Unhappily, yes. Pascal will come back.’
Alice smiled again.
‘That’s fantastic … I mean, when is he coming back?’
Bruno thought for a minute.
‘Tomorrow.’
Alice beamed so much that I thought her face was going to crack into tiny pieces. Then she gave a totally stupid little dance of happiness.
I smiled at Bruno.
‘Don’t mind her,’ I said. ‘She gets like that sometimes.’
Alice glared at me, but I pretended not to notice. It served her right for trying to keep Pascal for herself.
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Are we going to go on that nice walk? You said you’d like to walk with Serge, didn’t you, Alice? I think you two might have a lot in common.’
Alice gave me another evil look, but I ignored that one too, and skipped off down the street.
Chapter Eighteen
I used to think that Alice’s little brother Jamie could be a pain – but that was before I met Serge. He was a total monster who made Jamie seem like a little angel. Before we’d gone a hundred metres along the street, I heard a shriek from Alice.
I turned around to see her hopping on one leg, and trying to rub the other leg with her hand.
‘The little brat just kicked me,’ she said.
I looked at Serge who was smiling sweetly like he’d never done anything wrong in his entire life. I nearly laughed, but changed my mind when I saw Alice’s cross face.
‘Maybe it was an accident,’ I said.
Bruno shook his head.
‘I think not accident,’ he said so seriously it made me want to laugh again. I put my hand over my face and pretended to cough.
Alice caught up with us.
‘If he tries that again I might accidentally slap his cheeky little face,’ she said. ‘Now, Bruno, what’s there to see in this place?’
Poor Bruno went red again. He probably wasn’t used to being with someone who is as direct about stuff as Alice is.
‘We go see church?’ he asked.
I have to admit that visiting churches isn’t top of my list of fun things to do on holidays, but it was a tiny village, and if Bruno didn’t show us the church, there probably wouldn’t be much left to show us. And besides, Alice was looking crosser every second, and I didn’t much like the idea of going home and restarting our game of Scrabble. So I smiled my best smile at Bruno, and said.
‘Yippee. A church – can’t wait to see that.’
Then I grabbed Alice’s arm and dragged her after Bruno.
Serge didn’t seem very pleased. I suppose visiting churches wasn’t his idea of fun either. He ran and pulled Bruno’s arm.
‘Bonbons,’ he shouted.
Bruno turned to us.
‘It mean sweets,’ he said.
Alice smiled at him.
‘Now I know three words,’ she said. ‘“Chateau”, “gateau” and “bonbons”.’
Bruno looked at her like she was a total idiot. By now Serge was throwing a tantrum, screaming loudly in French. Bruno made a face at us.
‘Serge a bit … how you say …?’
‘Spoiled?’ I suggested.
Bruno nodded.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Alice, trying to be nice at last. ‘You should meet my brother. He’s a bit of a pain too.’
She smiled at Bruno and he managed to smile back at her without going too red.
By now we were at the church. Bruno showed us the outside and then the inside. It was just another church, and not exactly the highlight of our holidays so far. As we came back out into the sunshine, Alice pulled out her phone.
‘Is that the time?’ she said, without even looking at it. ‘We ought to go, or your mum will be worried. Bye Bruno.’
Bruno looked surprised that we were going so soon. I knew how he felt. I was a bit surprised too, but as usual, I followed Alice’s lead.
‘Er, … bye,’ I said.
‘Thanks for showing us around,’ she said to Bruno. Then she leaned down and whispered to Serge, ‘Thanks
for nothing, Poo-head.’
I giggled. Luckily Bruno hadn’t heard, and Serge didn’t understand.
Suddenly Bruno smiled.
‘We go more walk tomorrow?’ he asked.
I gulped. One walk with this guy was enough for me. How were we going to get out of this without hurting his feelings? Then Alice totally surprised me by saying.
‘That would be lovely. See you here at eleven o’clock?’
Bruno just had time to smile before Alice grabbed me and dragged me towards home.
‘What’s going on?’ I asked.
Alice smiled.
‘We’re going out with Bruno again tomorrow.’
‘But why?’
She smiled again, like I was totally brainless.
‘Finish this sentence. Bruno is …?’
I sighed.
‘A total dork?’
Alice laughed.
‘OK. That too. What else?’
‘A fashion disaster?’
‘True, but that’s not what I was thinking of. Bruno is … Pascal’s cousin. And Pascal is coming back tomorrow. So we go out with Bruno, and we get to meet Pascal. Simple.’
I sighed again. But I knew there was no point in arguing. I knew we’d end up doing what Alice wanted, no matter what I said.
* * *
Mum was surprised when we got back home so early.
‘What happened?’ she asked. ‘Didn’t you get on with Bruno?’
Alice smiled at her.
‘Oh, we got on just fine,’ she said. ‘We got on so well that we’re meeting him again tomorrow morning.’
Dad looked up from the book he was reading.
‘But we’re supposed to be going to the hat museum tomorrow.’
Alice managed to look like she really cared.
‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘What a pity. We’ve already promised Bruno, so now Meg and I will have to miss the hat museum.’
Dad sighed.
‘We could put the hat museum off until the next day.’
Alice shook her head.
‘No,’ she said. ‘We couldn’t ask you to do that. You go, and when you get back you can tell us all about it.’
Then we raced out of the room so we could laugh in peace.
Chapter Nineteen
Next morning Alice and I had to spend ages getting ready again, and Dad had to go to the bakery. While he was gone, Mum gave us a big lecture.
‘I’m really not very happy about leaving you two girls on your own,’ she said.
Alice looked at her innocently.
‘You don’t have to worry about us, Sheila,’ she said. ‘You’ll only be gone for a few hours, and Meg and I will just be walking around the village with Bruno. We’ll be perfectly safe.’
Rosie came over and hugged her.
‘I want to go with Alice and Megan,’ she said.
Alice looked at me in horror. We were hoping not to have Serge around, and I could see that even a good child like Rosie might get in the way of the romantic morning she was hoping for.
Luckily Mum rescued us.
‘No, Rosie,’ she said. ‘You come with Daddy and me, and if you’re good I’ll give you an extra rice-cake after lunch. How does that sound?’
Sounded like a bad deal to me, but Rosie smiled.
‘Yay! Extra rice cake,’ she sang as she skipped out of the room.
Mum turned back to Alice and me.
‘I’m still not totally happy,’ she said. ‘You must promise to be very good.’
‘We promise,’ said Alice obediently.
Mum smiled at her.
‘And don’t go making any arrangements for tomorrow, because Dad has something special planned.’
Poor Alice smiled. Didn’t she know yet that anything my mum called special was likely to be totally boring?
Mum continued.
‘We’re going to the biggest war museum in the region. It’s going to be so exciting.’
I sighed. How could a room full of dusty old guns and stuff be exciting? Were my parents ever going to get a life.
* * *
After breakfast, Alice and I set off to meet Bruno.
‘Does this feel like when you and Hazel were going on that date with Lee and his friend when we were in summer camp?’ I asked.
Alice went red. She hates when I mention Hazel. I know it’s because she’s still embarrassed over everything that happened.
‘No. This is different. Totally different,’ she said. ‘Anyway, do you think Bruno will wear those gross yellow shorts again?’
I knew she was trying to change the subject, but I let her away with it.
‘Dunno,’ I said. ‘And why do you care anyway?’
She laughed.
‘Because they’re the ugliest things I’ve ever seen? Because even being near them is bad for my image? Because I might just throw up if I have to look at them one more time?’
I had to laugh too. And when we turned around the next corner and saw Bruno standing in the square wearing the yellow shorts, we laughed even more.
He walked towards us.
‘You tell a joke?’ he asked.
‘Sort of,’ I said, embarrassed.
‘It wasn’t very funny though,’ said Alice, which made us laugh even more.
Luckily there was no sign of Serge. Unluckily there was no sign of Pascal either.
Alice couldn’t wait.
‘Where’s your cousin?’ she asked.
Bruno shrugged.
‘He stay with friends’ house. He not come back last night.’
Alice and I didn’t say anything.
‘Is a problem?’ asked Bruno.
There definitely was a problem. Didn’t the poor guy realise that the only reason Alice and I were there was to see Pascal? I glanced at Alice. She looked like she was ready to tell Bruno the truth.
Before she could say anything, I shook my head so hard it hurt.
‘No. There’s no problem,’ I said quickly. ‘Now, what are we doing today?’
‘Today I show you war memorial,’ said Bruno so proudly that I couldn’t say we’d already seen it about fifty times. (It would have been hard to miss it since it was right in the middle of the village.)
Alice and I followed Bruno for the five seconds it took to get to the war memorial. He stood underneath it and pointed.
‘The war memorial,’ he said, like we were blind and couldn’t figure that out for ourselves.
He climbed onto the metal railing and pointed at one name – Bruno Bermond.
‘Is my great-uncle,’ he said. ‘He die when he have only seventeen years.’
I gulped. That was only four years older than me. And for a few minutes, the three of us got kind of sad, standing there in the bright sunshine looking at the names of all the men who had died in horrible wars.
Then Bruno jumped down from the railing.
‘Was long time ago,’ he said.
We all shuffled around looked at each other for a bit.
‘I think it’s time we got back,’ said Alice suddenly. ‘Megan’s mum goes crazy if we’re late.’
She was right, Mum does go crazy if we’re late, but since we were going to be about three hours early, that wasn’t likely to be a problem.
Bruno looked disappointed.
‘We go walk again tomorrow?’ he asked.
Alice smiled at him like she meant it.
‘We’d love to,’ she said. ‘But we can’t. We’ve got to go out with Megan’s parents.’
‘The day after?’ he asked.
‘Will Pascal be back then?’ asked Alice.
Bruno shrugged.
‘I think,’ he said.
That was good enough for Alice.
‘Then we’ll definitely be free to go walking. Eleven o’clock, same place?’
Poor Bruno nodded happily, as Alice and I skipped off towards home.
As soon as it was safe to talk, Alice shrieked.
‘Have you ever seen anything as gross as
those yellow shorts?’
She was right, Bruno’s shorts were gross, but maybe that wasn’t his fault.
Maybe they were the only shorts he owned?
Maybe they’d been given to him by his ancient granny, and he didn’t want to hurt her feelings?
Or maybe yellow shorts were fashionable in France?
Before I could say anything though, Alice giggled.
‘Do think he might be wearing them for a bet?’ she asked.
It wasn’t a nice thing to say, but Alice made it sound so funny, that I couldn’t help giggling too. Then I put my arm around her and we laughed all the way home.
Chapter Twenty
The trip to the war museum with Mum and Dad was exactly as I had expected – totally, totally boring.
As we walked past the hundredth glass case stuffed with ancient old documents, Alice whispered in my ear.
‘Don’t worry, Megan. This time tomorrow we’ll be with Pascal, and this whole museum will just be like a bad dream.’
Mum saw her whispering and looked at her with a questioning look.
‘Oh,’ said Alice. ‘I was just saying that visiting this museum is like a dream come true.’
Mum smiled at her, and later I heard her whispering to Dad about what a nice, cultured girl Alice is.
Next morning Alice and I spent ages getting ready again. Once more we giggled all the way in to the village.
Once more Bruno was waiting for us alone, but easy to spot in his bright yellow shorts. I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. Maybe I’d been right. Maybe they were the only shorts he owned. Maybe his family was really poor, and couldn’t afford anything else for him to wear.
Alice wasn’t in the mood for mocking Bruno’s shorts though. She looked like she was going to cry. She almost ran over to Bruno.
‘Where’s Pascal? Isn’t he back yet?’ she asked, quite rudely I thought.
‘He come back last night.’
‘Where is he then?’ Alice’s voice was even ruder than before.
Poor Bruno backed away from her.
‘He have … how you say … a bad head?’
I giggled.