Sarah hugged me as well and told me how proud she was – without reverting to baby talk – and then she pinched my cheeks really, really hard. It was mortifying, having my mad madre gripping my cheeks while all around people snickered. One moment the champion, the next a figure of fun.
I was rescued by Bell End, who took me aside briefly. ‘And don’t think it’s only me who noticed your talent today, girl,’ he whispered darkly. Then he pointed around the hall. ‘Spies and scouts are everywhere.’
I looked around the hall where the girls and their fans were gathering their gear and preparing to leave and the boys were still fencing. That’s why I want to get going quickly, before they can get to you,’ he said, tapping his nose.
‘But why do they want to get to me? What do they want?’
‘You, Kelly. You, damn it. You might be a remarkable sabreur, but you’re not the sharpest tool in the box, are you, Kelly?’
‘But what do they want me for?’ I asked, confused.
‘Sponsorship deals, advertising. But don’t worry, they’re not going to get you. At least not today,’ he explained darkly, tapping the side of his nose again. We’ve whet their appetite, though, haven’t we, Kelly?’
‘Yes, sir,’ I agreed, putting his madness down to a long and exhaustive bout of inflicting abuse on poor Jenny and her fans.
We’ve whet their appetites good and proper.’ Then he threw his head back and laughed like a lunatic. He really had lost his marbles, poor man.
On the journey going back everyone chatted excitedly about the tournament. Bell End was especially proud of his spine-chilling attack on Jenny and her fans. He kept asking questions like, ‘And did you see their faces when I yelled, “Spit down the little weasel’s throat!”’
‘Oh yes, Mr Wellend, your imaginative bon mots really seemed to discourage the other side,’ agreed Sister.
Well, I had a fantastic back-up chorus,’ he said, giving Sister and Sarah their due. Even Portia was unusually chatty as she shared the details of her own victories and defeats. Although I had won the tournament, Portia had distinguished herself sufficiently to give rise to Bell End’s hopes that she’d also make it to the Nationals.
Our excitement levels hadn’t dropped when we finally got the chance to tell our friends about the day. After we returned from supper slops, Star insisted that we have a tuck fest to celebrate, and Portia and I were happy to repeat our tales of victory once more. Even Portia was animated beyond her usual regal demeanour and acted out some of Sister Regina and my mother’s maddest antics. We were high on the whole adventure, and with a pile of sweets on the floor nothing was likely to bring us down anytime soon. Even Honey – who sat by the window smoking cigarette after cigarette – couldn’t dent my excitement.
We’re definitely coming to the next tournament,’ Star insisted firmly.
‘Definitely,’ agreed the others – even Honey.
Indie laughed. ‘Sorry, I keep thinking of your mother and Sister Regina and that banner. We’ll have to make our own banner!’
Portia and I looked across at one another in solidarity. The fact of the matter was, Bell End, Sarah and Sister Regina had actually done us proud.
‘Yes, let’s all go,’ Honey added in syrupy tones, stubbing out her cigarette on the window sill and spraying the room with Febreze. ‘It sounds like fun. I want to be there next time to see you rinse the competition. And Bell End sounds hilarious. We could all join him in insulting your competition.’
‘I think he’s got that side of things under control,’ Portia said as she suppressed a smile.
Honey continued. ‘It must have felt fantastic, Calypso, winning the tournament like that. I’m seriously impressed. You and Portia deserved to win.’
Thanks, Honey,’ I replied, surprised by the genuine warmth in her congratulations.
‘Although with all this time you’re putting into your sabre, it’s natural that your other subjects will suffer.’ She flopped onto her bed, grabbed her Tatler and pretended to be absorbed by an article.
Once again I’d been too hasty in thanking her for her warm wishes.
‘Not that failing GCSEs matters, darling, well, not to the rest of us,’ she added, without looking up from her magazine. ‘Between Daddy’s plastic and Mummy’s contacts, we’ll all be fine,’ she assured me. Then she looked up at me through the curtain of her implausibly long lashes and added, ‘But you don’t have a trust fund of your own do you, Calypso?’ Her collagen-inflated lower lip wobbled as if she were truly moved by the pathos of my plight. As if she really were about to burst into tears at my lack of plastic and contacts.
Once again, Star came to my rescue. This time with a bag of sugared almonds. ‘Almond?’ she offered Honey sweetly, holding out a pink coated nut, knowing full well that Honey was allergic to nuts. Once the ‘idiot chavs in the kitchen’ had added nuts to a pudding, and she’d had to be rushed to hospital and been kept in for a week on a drip. The school was forced to sack all the ‘idiot chavs in the kitchen’ for fear of a legal suit. That was back in the days when Honey was still sticking Post-it notes on my back declaring me an American Freak.
Honey shoved away the proffered nut. ‘But perhaps money doesn’t matter to an American wild child like you, Calypso?’ she continued, looking innocently into my eyes. ‘You can always make Freddie pay your way, can’t you?’
‘Pack it in, Honey,’ Portia warned.
‘Yes, once Calypso wins the essay-writing competition, she’ll get a book deal. Unlike you, she doesn’t need to rely on Daddy’s plastic and Mummy’s contacts. She’s got something you don’t even understand. Talent,’ Star said.
As if set off by satanic forces, my txt alert sounded.
Congrats on your victory. F
Merde! I hadn’t rung Freddie! Billy must have told him about my victory. All I could think of as I read and reread the message – apart from what a horrible girlfriend I was – was the distinct lack of kisses. I should have been the one to tell him. Billy would have told him about Sarah too, and about the madness of the ‘Go Boojie! Go!’ banner. Fantastic. Just fantastic.
Star and Indie, who were sitting on either side of me, looked at the message. Arabella and Clemmie clambered over to have a look too.
‘No kisses,’ Arabella noted.
I showed Portia, who grimaced. ‘You should have txt-ed him immediately. Billy would have told him as soon as he got back.’
I was already punching in a reply.
Cheers, we just got back. I tried to txt earlier but no signal, soz. xxx C
Before pressing ‘Send,’ I held the message up for a group opinion.
Star shook her head. Too lame,’ she announced as she snatched the phone from me and changed the message.
Only half the victory without you there to witness. C U in W tomoz? xxxxxx C
‘Better,’ Indie agreed, holding up the message for everyone else.
‘But aren’t you going to Windsor with Sarah?’ Portia remarked, only she asked too late. Star, being Star, had already pressed ‘Send.’
Freddie’s reply came back at once.
C U tomoz. F xxx
‘See!’ Star trilled. You have to be more assertive with boys, darling. Look at Kevin, he’s the perfect boyfriend. Well, just about perfect. I still have some work to do on him musically.’
Kevin was Billy’s younger brother and quite possibly the sweetest boy we knew. He was putty in Star’s hand and openly worshipped the ground she walked on. Even with Star’s willful charm, I could never have that sort of relationship with Freddie. These heir-to-the-throne types like to keep a certain amount of power in their relationships. Kevin might enjoy Star’s tantrums (well, we all did – she was hilariously outrageous in her treatment of boys) but Freds was not, and never would be, Kev. He was heir to the throne and would never settle for being number two in a relationship.
I took my mobile and stared at Fred’s message. Even with three kisses, my fate was sealed – only not in a good way. Sarah w
as about to collide with the love of my life. A vision of her chasing Freddie through the streets of Windsor with a question-and-answer form and a camera flashed through my mind.
As tired as I was, I knew I was not going to sleep well that night. In addition to the collision course with disaster, Honey’s words continued to haunt me. I suppose during all my years of dreaming of making it to the Nationals, I hadn’t really considered what that might mean to my grades. To girls like Honey and, well, all the other girls I knew, grades were not an issue. They could pursue their dreams with trust funds.
Honey might be a toxic toff but she still had a solid point. While I focused all my energy on fencing, it was inevitable that my grades would suffer. The GCSE exams were in six months, and my attention was spread very thin indeed, stretched as it was between Sarah and Bob’s marital problems, my dream of being a sabreur par excellence, and snog-aging my way back into Fred’s affections. I hadn’t even factored in my GCSEs.
But Honey had. Bob was right when he said even idiots talk sense sometimes. The essay competition and its prize money was starting to seem like an increasingly attractive idea. After all, I had always wanted to be a writer. Maybe the essay competition wasn’t such a bad idea. It might even be my big chance at having a proper career someday.
TEN
Royal Collision in Windsor
Sarah wore a Chanel suit to Mass the next morning. Not that there weren’t other mothers in Chanel suits that morning. In fact it’s a virtual mother’s uniform at Saint Augustine’s School for Young Ladies. What scared me was that Sarah does not wear Chanel suits, ever. I didn’t even know she owned one. The only suits Sarah wears are track suits. I don’t know how she used to dress when she grew up in England, but since living in LA she had definitely clung to the casual dress code – like latex shorts to an athlete.
Her hair, blonde like mine, was normally tied back in a ponytail, just in case she suddenly had an urge to jog somewhere. But now here she was in the chapel as we filed in, pink Chanel suit, matching pink Chanel shoes and bag and hair arranged artfully in a chignon. At six foot tall she looked like a pink stork.
As soon as my year began to file in, she began to jump about and wave frantically. Presumably she was worried I might miss her loud cries of ‘Calypso! Calypso! Darling! Boojems! Over here!’
Throughout Mass, she kept putting her arm around me as if I might escape (the thought did occur to me). She sang her hymns louder than anyone else, cuddled me like I was two and called out ‘Ah-men,’ twice during the sermon. Honey, who was sitting in the row in front, kept turning around and giving her little smiles and winks of encouragement.
I pinched Sarah on the arm over a dozen times to pull her into line. It was as if she had totally forgotten what a toxic witch Honey was. It was only about six months ago that Sarah and Bob flew over from LA to rescue me from one of Honey’s poisonous pranks.
As if reading my mind, Honey cast me a look of smug, evil intent, which Sarah totally missed because she was singing reverently with her eyes tightly closed.
After Mass, Sarah swooped down on Sister Constance. ‘Oh, Sister!’ she cried ecstatically, grasping both Sister’s hands and clasping them to her bosom. ‘I just want to say how super it is to be back here. It is as if time has stood still. Frozen in that moment of pure joy that defined my years here at Saint Augustine’s. It really is just like old times.’ She spoke so loudly that Sister Constance could have heard her from a mile away. Everyone stared. Even the Year Sevens. I wanted to shrink up and die of embarrassment.
‘Is your mother on medication, darling?’ Honey asked in faux concern.
‘Shouldn’t you be running along, Honey?’ Star said, giving her pinch and a shove. ‘You wouldn’t want to be late for your black mass now, would you!’
‘Oh, Star,’ Honey replied, still managing to ooze sarcasm while rubbing her pinched arm. ‘Has your hilarity no end, darling?’
Star gave her a wrist burn, and Star is famous for the brutality of her burns. ‘Guess not, darling,’ she replied mildly, as Honey wrestled back her injured wrist.
‘Ouch! Sister! Star just burned me –’ Honey wailed, but Sister Constance didn’t hear her cry for help because Sarah was moving into her conversational third gear.
‘Sarah does seem on madly good form for a woman who’s brokenhearted after running off on her husband,’ Star whispered in my ear. ‘Is it possible that she is on medication, darling? My mother is, so I’m soooo not judging or anything.’
‘I honestly don’t know,’ I whispered back. ‘But she’s been reverting since she got here and that’s why I don’t want to bump into Freddie while I’m with her,’ I explained. ‘If you see Kevin can you make up a lie about how I couldn’t make it into Windsor because I had to, erm –’
‘Darling, you shock me. Of course you can meet Freddie, and anyway, you can’t ask someone to lie in the house of God!’ Star teased as she put her arm around me supportively. ‘Besides, Freddie’s a big boy, he’s going to be king one day, so I’m sure he’ll be able to manage Sarah even if she is a bit more bonkers than usual.’
That’s Star’s philosophy with boys. She considers them charming fools, like circus tumblers placed on this earth for the amusement of girls. I wish I was more like Star, strong and unimpressed by the opposite sex. But I wasn’t. Freds made my knees knock, my face redden and my hands shake. I didn’t want to risk his feelings for me by exposing him to Sarah in the state she was in.
‘Besides, Sarah’s a laugh,’ Star assured me, giving me another supportive hug. ‘I bet he’d love to meet her.’
Sarah had hired a car, a horrible chav car, a true vehicle of shame. Not just because it was a chav-mobile but because after all her years in LA, Sarah had lost the art of using gears. As we crunched and bunny-hopped into Windsor, she cursed all the cars behind us leaning on their horns. She was just like a true American.
‘Aw, shut up you Limey arseholes!’ she bellowed out the window.
It was the first time I’d seen her criticise the English since she’d arrived. Suddenly things weren’t so ‘super.’ I took a strange comfort in this and relaxed into my seat. Maybe she wasn’t on medication, after all.
We decided to have lunch in the pizza place I’d first gone to with Freddie. I knew it was too early for Freddie to eat. In fact it was probably the safest place to hide from him in Windsor. I flashed back to the last time I’d been there with him, and remembered how he had kissed me under an awning as we took shelter from the rain. Today it was crisp and bright.
‘What a super day. I love the sunlight of England, don’t you?’ Sarah asked passionately, looking up as a feeble ray of light broke through the sullen grey sky.
‘Erm, well, it’s a pretty rare occurrence, but yaah, I guess.’
She clutched my hand and looked into my eyes like a child that’s had too many E-numbers. ‘Let’s both have a large-size, thick-crust pizza with lashings of cheese and pepperoni.’
‘What about the carbs!’ I cried out in shock. My parents view carbohydrates with the same suspicion other parents view drugs.
‘Oh, don’t be such a stick-in-the-mud, Boojie. How often do I get to have my baby all to myself, hey?’ she asked as she reached out and pinched my cheek.
‘Ow!’ I rubbed my cheek. ‘Look, Sarah could you not call me Boojie?’ I insisted a little more brusquely than I meant to.
Sarah looked like she might cry.
I softened my tone. ‘At least not in public. It’s kind of babyish and, well, you haven’t called me Boojie since I was a baby.’ I have never felt soooo horrible. I could see she was about to tear up and, after all, this was a difficult time for her.
‘I haven’t done a lot of things since you were a little girl, Calypso,’ she almost sobbed. That’s why I’m here. Your father has oppressed me for so long, and now I feel like I have a second chance. Bunny thinks this could be an opportunity to find the real me.’
‘The real you?’
‘Yes, the real
Sarah!’
‘I don’t understand. If you’re not the real Sarah …’ I stopped myself before I said, ‘you’re barking.’ ‘And who on earth is Bunny and why would you listen to anything someone with a name like Bunny has told you?’ I demanded crossly.
Sarah looked at me then like / was the mad one. ‘Oh darling, try and understand please. I know it’s hard on you, losing your father, but it’s hard on me too.’
‘Hang on, we haven’t lost Bob. You’ve run off on him! Because of his Big One.’ (I lowered my voice as I said the words). ‘And what’s this about him oppressing you? The only person in our family who’s been oppressed is me, and you are just as much an oppressor as Bob. Remember the navel-piercing incident?’
A Royal Mess Page 8