A Royal Mess

by Tyne O'Connell

  I don’t know how he does it, but he manages to make my dislike of murdering animals sound like treason.

  Is it my fault no one ever tells me anything? Buggery boyfriends and their stupid expectations and disappointed looks. It wasn’t easy sniffing on that chili-soaked handkerchief all weekend. But did he give me any thanks, or any respect, or encouragement? No.

  Now his parents thought I was sickly and sniffly and they would probably banish me from all their castles forever, and Freds and I would be confined to cafés and pizza shops like ordinary girls and boys. Merde, merde and double algebra merde.

  Basically, the weekend was not the triumph I had hoped it would be, and I returned to London in a major sulk. The icing on the cake was that my green bejewelled slippers got all soggy when Freds took me walking in some bogs. ‘You should have worn Wellingtons,’ he told me.

  And then just when I thought life couldn’t get any worse, I ended up with a really nasty cold.

  FOUR

  Witness to Madness

  I left the castle feeling less than magical.

  When I arrived back at the house my parents were renting in Clapham, London – The Clap House, as my evil anti-girlfriend Honey O’Hare had named it – my life took another nosedive.

  Sarah and Bob pitched up to my bedroom, swung open the door (without so much as a courteous knock) and declared in one voice, ‘We have decided to get married, Calypso.’

  All I said was, ‘Fine,’ because, well, the ’rents are always lobbing up and saying the most random things.

  I was listening to my favourite song on the really cool green iPod they’d given me for my combined birthday/Christmas present. Oh, and txting Freds at the same time because some ancient Greek chap in a toga (or was it a bath?) once said, ‘Life is too short to limit oneself to one activity at a time.’ Then again, I might have read that it in a fortune cookie.

  However, my parents’ announcement slowly began to seep into my consciousness, and I pressed Send before I’d even added any x’s. I turned around to face them, ripped my earphones out of my ears and stated the blindingly obvious. ‘But you are married!’

  They giggled like loons.

  And then a horrible idea occurred to me. ‘You’ve not been buying things off hooded men on the Landor Road?’ I asked sternly, because the last thing I needed was my mad parents to start smoking weed and end up like Star’s father, Tiger. Yes, he was probably in a semi-vegetative state on his kitchen floor even at that moment. Star claimed the reason he called everyone ‘man’ was because he had no memory cells left. It must be très, très mortifying having a father like Tiger.

  Bob and Sarah have never shown an interest in exploring drug culture, but they are extremely gullible, especially Bob. Honestly, since coming to London in December he’s been mugged like nine times. That’s more than once a week. No matter how many times I tell him not to pull his entire wallet out when he wants to give a pound to a beggar at a crowded tube station, he persists in doing it. Proving that parents need round-the-clock supervision. I really don’t know how they’ll cope once I grow up.

  Bob and Sarah looked into one another’s eyes and laughed. They had been doing that a lot since they got back together, which is why I’d been forced into this unwanted role as a sensible parent-type person rather than the irresponsible adolescent I should have been.

  ‘No, Calypso, we’re not smoking weeeeed,’ they reassured me. ‘It’s just that we’ve never been married in England,’ Sarah explained.

  ‘You haven’t been married in Mississippi either, Sarah; that’s not the point,’ I told the mad madre calmly. ‘You can’t just go round the world marrying one another. It’s probably not even legal.’

  ‘Why not?’ Bob asked, giving my mother’s bottom a playful pinch, which made her squeal.

  ‘It’s called bigamy, Bob,’ I told him, even though I don’t know if marrying the same person over and over is called bigamy. But I do know it is madness. They didn’t listen, though. I watched my giggling ‘rents for a bit longer as they tickled and kissed in my doorway.

  In the face of such parental madness, I put my earphones back in and said, ‘Fine,’ with the dismissive tone that any teenager whose parents have just fallen back in love will be only too familiar with.

  There was no talking them out of it, either. During the last week of the Christmas holidays, Bob and Sarah had had a marriage blessing in Windsor Chapel. And that’s another thing. Of all the picturesque places to wed, they chose the one a few steps from one of Freddie’s family castles. When I begged them to choose another lovely church, they rolled their eyes and said I was being ‘paranoid.’ They’ve been saying that a lot lately. Luckily Freds and his ‘rents were still up in their Kiltland castle.

  Bob’s parents, affectionately known as The Gams, came out for the blessing and gave me twenty dollars worth of book vouchers from their local bookstore in Kentucky.

  I’ve never even been to Kentucky, so I don’t know what they could have been thinking.

  After the ‘wedding,’ which was really only a blessing, Bob and Sarah threw a big party back at the Clap House. It’s actually a really lovely house, and Sarah and Bob invited all my friends to the reception and said they could sleep over, which made me feel more supportive of their madness. But then Sarah and Bob spoilt everything by a very public, very passionate kiss as they cut the cake. It lasted – this is true, by the way – forty-nine painfully embarrassing seconds. I timed it on my mobile while all my friends took photos of them with their camera phones.

  I was witnessing insanity in its truest form.

  ‘They’re soooo cute,’ Star squealed as she took photo after photo of the cute couple snog-aging.

  FIVE

  H to the O to the N to the E to the Y

  The kissing didn’t stop after the wedding/blessing affair, either. They were still doing it when they took me back for my first day of term. I had been really looking forward to being dropped off at school by my parents too. This was the first time in years that I didn’t have to make my own way to Saint Augustine’s from the airport after the LAX-to-Heathrow hell flight.

  It was a festival of luxury being driven back to school by the ’rents, even if it was in a car of shame which neither of them could drive properly. The biggest advantage to having Sarah and Bob drive me to school was they could help carry my madly heavy trunk and fencing kit up the stairs to the dorms just like all the other girls’ parents and valets. Hoorah! Well … that was the plan I’d hatched in Calypso’s Very Own Fantasyland at least.

  My school is an odd little world within an odd little world. For an American, it’s sort of like a culture shock within a culture shock. Sarah sent me to this school because she was born in England and she went here –and loved it. I never thought I would love it, but after four years of being the school misfit, I had actually started to get into the swing of it. But maybe that’s because I’m more or less into the swing of being a misfit too.

  As we drove down the fern-lined track to the entrance of Saint Augustine’s, we passed small groups of tiny little nuns wandering along holding hands. They all waved at us, and Bob tooted the horn. The nuns are soooo sweet. They never punish us or roll their eyes at us like other grown-ups. Also, they sneak us into their convent sometimes for little tea parties and ply us with sweets and Battenberg cake.

  As we parked the car of shame alongside the Bentleys, Range Rovers and Rolls Royces, Bob and Sarah declared they’d better not carry more than the trunk.

  ‘We wouldn’t want to put our backs out,’ Bob said.

  ‘Never mind that my vertebrae have been cracking under the strain for years!’ I muttered.

  It was agreed that I would lug the shoulder-cutting fencing kit, my hand luggage and my rabbit, Dorothy Parker. Not that I’m totally complaining. I love carrying Dorothy (especially in her new lime green leather carrier). I don’t trust anyone with my fencing kit, and I definitely didn’t want Sarah and Bob near my hand luggage, as it contained
my Body Shop Specials – aka vodka. Also, the trunk weighed like five thousand pounds!

  The problems only arose when, halfway up, they attempted another kiss. Obviously they’d never studied basic physics, because by taking their hands off the trunk it went belting down the narrow winding stairs, knocking a gaggle of parents, valets and other girls flying in the process.

  I was struggling with my own load some way behind them when one of the girls they’d knocked fell back into me, and I was sent sprawling in a heap on the stone floor at the foot of the stairs. Neither Bob nor Sarah bothered to see if I was okay. I don’t think they’d even registered the disaster their snog-aging had caused.

  I was just checking Dorothy when the Not So Honourable Honey O’Hare and her horrible manservant, Oopa, followed by some random guy in orange Buddhist robes, stepped over me as if I were roadkill.

  Honey addressed me in that special psycho-toff sneering way she has perfected over a zillion put-downs. ‘Oh, the American refugee has returned. I thought the new immigration regulations would have seen you off.’ Then she pursed her collagen-enhanced lips and laughed hyenalike at her own wit. Between her Botox and her collagen implants, her face was pulled in all directions. It was not a pretty sight.

  Oopa just stood wheezing evilly by her side. His spine was probably breaking under the weight of Honey’s LVT steamer trunk and custom-made LVT luggage, but I was soooo over feeling sorry for Oopa after the way he had reacted the last time I offered to help him. The Buddhist monk guy was looking peacefully into the middle distance.

  I didn’t respond to Honey’s attack. It’s a survival skill I picked up over my four years at Saint Augustine’s. I had faced my fear-of-fears last term when I shared a room with her, but I wasn’t sharing a bedroom with her this term, so our froidure was back on. My modus operandi was to have as little to do with her as possible.

  Honey wasn’t finished with me though. She opened her mouth as if about to launch into one of her ‘H to the O to the N to the E to the Y’ rants. Then she looked up and stopped.

  I followed her gaze and saw what had captured her attention. Bob and Sarah were standing under the stained glass window of Mary and the infant Jesus, wearing the same look of rapt adoration for one another they’d been sporting all holiday – and giggling.

  ‘That,’ Honey sneered, pointing at Bob and Sarah with one of her evil talons, ‘is the most revolting sight I have ever endured.’ Then she did her signature shiver of disgust before taking a deep breath and setting off up the stairs followed by her manservant and the Buddhist monk-type chap.

  If she hadn’t been Honey, I would have agreed with her. Instead I silently gathered my rabbit and kit together and followed her as imperiously as I could. Like most of the girls and parents, she was tanned from her New Year ski trip to Val d’Isere. But unlike them, she was wearing the most revealing yellow sundress and gold Jimmy Choo strappy sandals. Of course, she was also wearing those other two never-be-seen-without Sloane accessories: the implausibly small bejewelled phone (permanently glued to ear) and a five-hundred-dollar pash wrapped around her neck like an African tribal choker.

  Halfway up, Honey turned and ran her eyes up and down me like an evil prison guard’s searchlight. Under her scrutiny, I looked down at my unremarkable outfit to see what the problem was. I even checked the soles of my dilapidated green bejewelled slippers as I waited for her attack.

  Eventually she said, ‘Well?’

  So I said, ‘Well what?’

  ‘Your chavscum parents are blocking the stairwell, you American Freak.’

  I craned my neck and saw she was right. Oh my giddy aunt, it was unbelievable. They were still canoodling, completely oblivious to all the people who were struggling to squeeze past them. I called out sharply, ‘Sarah and Bob! Stop that at once!’

  You can see how badly this role reversal was affecting me.

  SIX

  Bohemian Rhapsody in the Dorm

  This term I was rooming with two of my first choices: boy-crazed, adorably sentimental Clementine and a princess from Nigeria, Indiamacca – known as Clems and Indie, respectively. Both girls were already in the room chatting on their tiny phones – Indie’s phone is soooo feverishly cool. It is purple enamel and has her name picked out in real diamonds.

  Clems’ parents and my parents were chatting together as they unpacked our clothes. Clems’ little brother Sebastian was opening and shutting the wardrobe door, pretending to be a savage animal and biting the clothes as they were being placed inside by the grown-ups. He was three now and looking less and less like a Jelly Baby and more and more like a bad elf.

  Indie’s valet was unpacking for his mistress, while her security guards were decorating the room in her trademark purple.

  I was so used to the madness of my school life in England now that I barely gave a second glance to the two burly suits in buzz cuts balanced on dainty floral stools as they hung the purple curtains.

  I hadn’t seen Indie or Clemmie since last term, so I was far more desperate to hear their goss. But before the hugs and air-kisses were over, I overheard Sarah say to Clemmie’s parents (and anyone else with hearing in the building), ‘Yes, we got married at Christmas. It was soooo romantic.’

  Seriously, this was atrocious. I was sure Indie’s valet and security men couldn’t care less about Bob and Sarah’s marital unions. But Clemmie’s parents were another matter. Clems’ ’rents were not bohemian rhapsodies like Star’s or mine. No, they were your normal, madly conservative, Tory-voting ’rentals.

  This was an emergency. Acting on instinct, I dove over Indie’s valet, who was carefully placing designer casuals in the drawer under her bed, clamped my hand over Sarah’s mouth, and cried out, ‘Stop saying that!’ Turning to Clems’ ’rents, I explained, ‘Honestly, they were married years before I was born! It was just a repeat performance. I don’t want any trouble.’

  Mr and Mrs Fraser Marks looked at me as if I were a mad adolescent on hormonal meltdown. Then Clems’ madre spoke directly to Sarah. ‘Yes, Clementine told us about the blessing. Congratulations to you both.’

  I removed my hand from Sarah’s mouth and pretended that I had merely been brushing her face for crumbs. Sarah shook her head and frowned, so I planted a dutiful-daughter kiss on her nose.

  Bob gave me one of his “you’re so paranoid, Calypso” glares. I slunk back over to Indie and Clemmie. Stupid, stupid, stupid Calypso – I wish I’d fainted instead.

  Sebastian pointed at me and said, ‘Bad fox.’

  ‘He’s a cute little fellow,’ Bob said, and laughed when Sebastian sunk his teeth in my hand and said, ‘Bad fox, bad fox, bad fox.’

  No one so much as scolded him. Star is right. It’s unbelievable what boys get away with.

  Clems’ father said, ‘Clemmie was most upset she was unable to attend, but we were skiing.’

  ‘Star sent me photos, though,’ Clemmie piped up as she ran her Mason Pearson through her long straight blonde hair, which now hung below her waist.

  ‘Yes, we, erm, thought the cake looked very lovely,’ her parents agreed uncomfortably. Obviously they’d seen the tongue swallowing shot as txted by Star.

  ‘Swell,’ said Bob. Yes, he actually said ‘swell.’

  ‘You two make such a cute couple,’ Indie told my parents.

  Why does everyone keep saying my ’rents are cute? If I said ‘swell,’ the whole of England would take the piss for the next ten zillion years. Yet for some reason everything Bob and Sarah say or do is met with cries of, ‘They’re soooo cute.’

  Hello Kitty toasters that toast Hello Kitty faces onto your bread are cute. Bob and Sarah are vaudevillian paragons if anything. Why can’t they keep a pleasing balloon’s distance between them at all times, like normal parents?

  ‘Let’s take Dorothy down to the pet shed,’ I suggested to Clemmie, who had already taken my rabbit out of her carrier for a hop.

  ‘Good idea,’ she agreed as Dorothy gave her a punishing nip. Dorothy became quite th
e prima donna when left in her carrier for too long.

  ‘I’ll join you,’ Indie added, checking her modelesque figure in the mirror as she rearranged her purple pash around her neck. ‘Edwards, can you supervise the rest of the decorations?’ she asked her valet. He gave her a little bow.

  ‘We’re going to take Dorothy down to the pet shed,’ I told the loony madre and padre. They were still busy extolling the revolutionary effects of their remarriage to Clems’ parents. Would you believe my father was talking about writing a script based on their rapprochement? That’s what he was going to call his screenplay, The Rapprochement!