My Brilliant Life and Other Disasters

by Catherine Wilkins

  Ryan starts setting up the Lego on my carpet. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if my parents really wanted to save money, they should just go back in time and buy Ryan fewer toys. Admittedly, the outlay for inventing and developing a working time machine might well eat into any savings made by the endeavour, but still.

  Ryan is quieter than usual and puts less gusto into explaining his new pirate storyline than he normally does. (The stripy-topped first mate is now called Clyde and he is missing in action after a storm. Turns out – sorry, spoiler alert – he’s been kidnapped and is being held to ransom by another gang of pirates.) Even using the cannon doesn’t make Ryan that happy. I decide to try and cheer him up.

  “Don’t worry, Ryan, they’re all nuts,” I say. Ryan giggles shyly, unsure. “This will soon blow over,” I add. “I think Mum and Joan are genetically programmed to shout at each other or something. It isn’t really even anything to do with you. It’s just how they communicate.”

  Ryan nods, looking relieved, and lets fire another Lego cannon.

  Honestly, I think as I ride the bus to school on Monday morning, my family is nuts. Still, at least my mum apologised to Ryan for confusing and upsetting him. Even though her apology was slightly marred by Auntie Joan storming out of our house and refusing to be spoken to “like that” by my mum ever again. I’m pretty sure she’ll be back though.

  Anyway, at least everything is going really well with Natalie.

  “What do you mean, you didn’t read it?” explodes Natalie at registration when I reveal that I may not have actually completely finished reading the rest of the wildlife project literature. Eek. Well, things were going really well with Natalie.

  “I’ve read most of it,” I say, trying to backtrack. “Focus on the positives.”

  “Oh, Jess,” sighs Natalie crossly. “Why didn’t you finish it?”

  I want to say: “Because there was a big fight at my house involving busking with a xylophone in the front garden, and I had to play Lego pirates with my little brother to cheer him up.” But it sounds a bit … strange when you say it like that, so I don’t.

  “I’m really sorry, Nat. I didn’t realise you were so keen to start everything right away,” I say.

  “Even though I specifically said I was?”

  “Yeah, exactly. It was hard to know what you meant by that.” I attempt humour.

  A flicker of amusement crosses Natalie’s face, but she manages to suppress it. “Jess, I’m serious about this.”

  “I know,” I say contritely.

  I really want to lighten the mood and make her laugh. I don’t want her to be annoyed with me. I decide to go for broke. Go big or go home. I take a pretend swipe at Natalie’s nose and put my thumb between my fingers. “I’ve got your nose!” I say in a silly voice.

  Natalie looks like she is not going to crack but then she gives a massive grin and starts chuckling. “You are such a doofus!” she exclaims.

  “That’s why you love me,” I reply.

  “You promised you would work hard at this though.”

  “I know, and I will. I’ve said I’m sorry. Come on, I thought we were going to make it fun too.”

  “Yeah, we are.” She smiles again and shakes her head at me.

  Phew, the old got-your-nose trick might not work on Ryan but Natalie loved it. I probably can’t keep doing it every time she’s mad at me though. The novelty will wear off at some point.

  I feel slightly frustrated as we file out to assembly. I don’t want to have to keep appeasing Natalie like this. My life is exhausting enough. This was meant to be fun. I wish she’d chill out and enjoy it more.

  There’s nothing like a lovely Monday morning to make you glad you’re alive. And this is nothing like a lovely Monday morning to make you glad you’re alive. Ha ha, I am still funny though.

  Luckily my morning lessons of double science and double PE pass by fairly uneventfully. It’s fun to catch up with Cherry, Shantair, Megan, Emily and Fatimah. And even Tanya and

  Amelia seem in reasonably good spirits.

  The only really bad thing that happens is a comment that Joshua makes at break time about Scarlett seeming “all right”, which for some reason depresses me. I mean, the girl is clearly weird and mean – any idiot can see that.

  “And she said OMG,” I tell Cherry and Shantair at break, once Joshua is gone. “Like, oh em gee. Out loud, not in a text or anything. I mean, how ludicrous is that? You don’t even save any time or anything!”

  Cherry and Shantair exchange a slight look with each other, but then Shantair says, “That’s true, it’s the same number of syllables.”

  “Exactly!” I say. I knew my chess club friends would think Scarlett was an idiot. Why can’t Joshua as well? Stupid Monday.

  Instead of IT after lunch we’re having another wildlife project lesson in the DT classroom. It turns out there’s going to be a field trip soon, which does perk me up a bit.

  The main upshot of this lesson is that we need to write to people who work with wildlife-type stuff to tell them we’re doing a school project on their specialised subject and to ask them to send us information to help with our research. We get to practise our letter writing and pester semi-important people. What’s not to like?

  Well, I say semi-important people; one of the discussions this revelation immediately sparks is who to ask.

  Mrs Cole has some strong ideas. In fact, she hands out a whole list of suggestions. Mostly various members of organisations for wildlife trusts, local councillors, charities and that sort of thing. They have been tipped off that we might be writing to them, and so are primed to respond quickly, leaving us with enough time to do the project.

  But that is not how some people have chosen to interpret this information. Natalie and I overhear lots of people blithely ignoring Mrs Cole’s advice and saying they want to write to as many young celebrities and pop stars as they can crowbar into the project.

  Everyone’s favourite targets are the TV presenters who do a kids’ wildlife show called Cool For Cats. (There’s three of them, two girls, Melanie and Saz, and a boy, Martin, who some of the girls in our year fancy.) The Cool For Cats team also sometimes go on Blue Peter and show the presenters there how to hold a rabbit and stuff.

  Mrs Cole can’t help but hear this chatter as well and issues warnings several times. “Look, everyone, I know it’s very tempting to write to more glamorous wildlife people, but think about how likely they are to reply. The Cool For Cats team probably gets loads of letters all the time, and just won’t be able to reply to everyone, however much they may want to. I’d really prefer it if you stuck to the list.”

  No one appears to be listening. We can hear people talking about asking them to come into school, and even helping them to do the final presentations to the rest of the class. Everyone’s already got totally carried away from reality. To be completely honest, I can sort of see the appeal.

  Nat takes the lid off her pen and marks something off the list. “Look,” she says. “Everyone is going to pick really obvious TV people who won’t ever write back. The official people will write back the quickest, so we’ll get the work done quickly. So let’s write to them.”

  “Yes,” I say obediently. Though, actually, part of me had started thinking it might be fun to at least try and write to a celebrity. We don’t have to always do everything exactly by the book. “Unless,” I begin uncertainly, “are you sure that’s not a little bit … boring?”

  “Jess!” Natalie’s face is like thunder. “Not you as well? Come on. We have to give ourselves the best possible chance of getting this done. No popstars are going to give a monkey’s about a Year Six Wildlife Project, and you know that.”

  “Well, not the really famous ones, but you know, what if––”

  “No.” She interrupts me firmly. “The sooner we write to the boring official people, the sooner they will write back. And the sooner we can do the work.”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

 
“And then there’ll be more time left to draw lots of pictures,” she adds with a shrewd smile.

  Nat does know me pretty well. I feel a bit bad for thinking mean thoughts about her just now. I smile back apologetically.

  “I do like to draw lots of pictures,” I say. Nat giggles and calls me an idiot.

  We pick two official wildlife experts and work well on our letters, finishing them by the end of the lesson. Now all I have to do is get a stamp from my parents when I get home, and post my letter. Then when we’ve got all the main work out of the way, nice and early, I’ll be able to draw animals to my heart’s content. Hurray.

  I arrive home to find my dad watching TV on the sofa, looking slightly tired and a bit dejected.

  “Hello, Jessica,” he says, looking up as I come in. “Would you like to come and sit here with me? I’m watching Horace King’s new bird programme. It’s very interesting.”

  “Uh, sure.” I drop my bag and slouch down next to him, though I doubt my dad and I have the same definition of the word interesting.

  “I used to love Horace’s kids’ TV show when I was your age,” says my dad. “I once made a bird feeder for the garden, just the way Horace showed us.”

  I briefly picture my dad’s idyllic prehistoric childhood before being snapped back to the present when my mum bursts into the living room and says, “You’d better keep your son in here while I’m cooking. He’s driving me mad!” Then she shoves a space-helmet-wearing Ryan through the door and disappears, slamming it behind her.

  “I’m a SPACEMAN!” shouts Ryan, utterly unrepentant.

  “Shh, Ryan, Dad’s trying to watch a programme about birds,” I say.

  “I’M A SPACEMAN! I’M A SPACEMAN!” shouts Ryan. I hate it when he’s like this. I feel annoyed I was so nice to him yesterday now.

  “Shut up, Ryan!” I raise my voice. “We’re watching TV here.”

  “Tape it, tape it, tape it,” chants Ryan, spinning round loads, then falling over and making loud “death” noises.

  “I can’t tape it,” says my dad sadly. “The thing’s broken and we can’t get a new one while we’re tightening our belts.”

  “DADDY!” Ryan leaps up and into my dad’s lap. “Let’s play outside.”

  “Why doesn’t Jessica take you outside and play?” says my dad hopefully.

  “Sure,” I say, starting to feel sorry for my dad.

  “NO!” shouts Ryan, looking outraged. “DADDY!”

  “KEEP IT DOWN IN THERE!” yells my mum from the kitchen.

  “Come on then, Ryan.” My dad sighs and stands up. “Let’s go to the garden.”

  I think this is the first time I’ve felt sorry for one of my parents. I mean, I’ve sympathised with them loads in the past, sure. But ultimately I’ve generally thought it’s their fault for having Ryan in the first place. Now I appreciate that they don’t always get their own way either.

  My poor dad. He’s really quite a gentle and kind man, always making tea and trying to keep the peace. All he wants to do is watch one programme that his hero is in, and he can’t even do that.

  Then I have a brilliant idea.

  I’m still really excited about my brilliant idea on Saturday, when Joshua and his dad come to pick me up to go to the comic convention. (That’s how brilliant an idea it is.) It’s also a secret brilliant idea, and I never realised how exciting it can be, keeping secrets from people.

  Nat and I have made pretty good inroads into the project this week too. We’ve been round each other’s houses a couple of times, and I now know loads about insects, leaves and beekeeping. Go ahead, ask me anything. I feel a bit bad I haven’t even told Natalie my secret brilliant idea, but I think it’s better this way. It will be more of a surprise.

  Joshua’s parents are divorced, and his dad is pretty much happy to take him wherever he wants on the weekends he stays with him. And he never says he’s too busy as the whole point of the weekend is that he’s not.

  In some ways, that almost seems like a better arrangement than having two parents who are together but who collectively ignore you. I don’t want my parents to get divorced or anything, but in some ways I envy Joshua’s arrangement as a system. I can’t remember the last time I spent a whole afternoon with one of my parents. My parents love it when we go out without them. My aunt is the one who takes us places.

  Although in fact it turns out that Joshua’s dad just sits in the café reading the paper while we go round the convention without him, which isn’t as involved as I’d expected. But you know, whatever. The system still probably mainly works.

  Joshua shows me some of his favourite comics and we have a smoothie each and talk about the different ways of drawing and what the best stories are. Then we join a queue to get an autograph of one of Joshua’s favourite comic writers. I’m really enjoying myself. This is fun.

  “Oh em gee! Josh, right?” Suddenly, from nowhere, Scarlett taps Joshua on the shoulder. Nooooooooo!

  You know what’s great about bumping into Scarlett? Absolutely nothing.

  “Oh hi,” says Joshua.

  “Fancy meeting you here, Josh,” she continues. Joshua, I manage not to shout. There’s a slight pause.

  “You remember Jess too?” prompts Joshua. Scarlett seems keen to ignore me. But really, the feeling is mutual.

  “Oh! Um, yes…” Scarlett pretends to rack her brains. “Jen, wasn’t it?”

  “Jessica,” I say.

  “Right, right, nice to meet you – sorry – see you again!” She laughs at her apparent confusion. “We met at the sleepover, didn’t we?” I nod. Then (dropping all pretence at being nice) Scarlett adds icily, but quietly so Joshua doesn’t hear, “I guess you’re just quite forgettable.”

  Honestly. We spent over sixteen hours together at that stupid sleepover and traipsing round that stupid mall. It was horrific. She spent five minutes chatting to Joshua. It’s such a pathetically obvious attempt to diss me, I feel sure Joshua will laugh at how transparent she’s being, but he doesn’t seem to have noticed how fake she is.

  “Sorry, what did you say? I didn’t catch it,” I pretend. Yeah, repeat it louder so Joshua can hear you insult me, you big faker, I think.

  “What?” says Scarlett. “Oh, by the way, I love what you’ve done with your hair,” she says sweetly to me. “Really cool how you’ve made it look so messy, like you only just got up.”

  How dare – so rude! Honestly.

  “I’m lucky, it just goes like this,” I reply drily. Not going to give you the satisfaction of a reaction.

  Unbelievably, this insult goes undetected by Joshua as well, just because it had the rhythm of a compliment.

  “Can I cut in with you guys? The queue is, like, really long now.”

  “No,” I hear myself say, before Joshua can answer. Scarlett and Joshua look at me. Well, Joshua looks; Scarlett kind of glares. “What?” I say, trying to sound reasonable. “I get really annoyed when people cut in in front of me. It’s not fair.”

  “Oh, OK.” Scarlett sounds dejected. “That’s cool. It’s just … I really love this guy and I’m worried I’ll have to go home before I get to the front of the queue otherwise.” She starts turning to leave.

  “Hey, wait,” says Joshua. She stops moving. (Is it me, or did she only move really slowly anyway? Like she knew this would work?) He turns to me. “She can cut in this once, can’t she? If it means she doesn’t miss out?”

  “Oh, yeah. Sure!” I try to sound enthusiastic and upbeat rather than really annoyed. Checkmate. I can’t really argue now. Well, I can, but not if I want to maintain the dignified moral high ground. I’m trapped by my stupid manners again.

  Scarlett wastes no time and jubilantly starts jabbering away to Joshua like they’re old friends. She keeps talking about things I’ve never heard of so I am really left out. Evil, horrible Scarlett. Joshua asked me to come here. If he wanted to see her all day he would have asked her.

  We eventually make it to the front of the queue and Joshua and
Scarlett get the comic writer’s autograph. Joshua seems really dazed and starstruck afterwards. “That was cool,” he keeps murmuring.

  “Are you guys hungry?” asks Scarlett. “I might just grab some food before I have to go home.” Oh, you suddenly have time for food? I think cynically. Thought you had to rush off? It’s almost like you’re a big liar.

  “I don’t have any money,” I reply flatly.

  “Oh well, come with me anyway,” she says, forcefully enough that the dazed Joshua starts following her, so I drag myself along too. Honestly, this is the living end.

  To my slight surprise, Scarlett buys a hotdog. “I thought you were vegetarian?” I remark.

  “What?” asks Scarlett, having swallowed her first bite. Joshua buys onion rings and offers me one.

  “At the sleepover? You couldn’t eat the meat pizzas because you’re vegetarian?”

  “Oh right!” says Scarlett, as if she had completely forgotten about this. “Oh yeah, well, I was vegetarian then but, like, I kept fainting, so my doctor said I had to eat meat again.”

  “Right, right,” I say, pretending to mull this over.

  Something has clicked into place and Scarlett is now officially in the category of LIAR in my head. It’s the only explanation. An attention-seeking liar. Possibly with pants on fire. She might even be a sociopath. (Plus she steals and says OMG out loud.)

  “How’s your comic going?” she asks. This nearly jolts Joshua out of his post-autograph buzz, but he still doesn’t really seem to be listening. “Have you come up with any good ideas yet?” (She addresses this question to me.)