by Konnie Huq
Suzie and Alison are in matching combat outfits complete with camouflage scrunchies tying their hair back.
Even Keziah and Jake look ready for an adventure, dressed in khakis and army greens.
I feel a bit scruffy in comparison, looking down at my battered old stripy anorak and bobbly jogging bottoms.
‘You!’ orders Edmonds. ‘Pick a partner. For our first exercise, Foresters, everyone will be in pairs.’
Oh boy! Who should I choose? This is an unusual situation for me. I’m used to being picked way past the halfway point in PE team picking (I’m not very sporty), but getting to do the actual choosing – this is new to me. Suddenly Jake, Keziah, Suzie, Alison and Axel are all staring at me like they’re puppies in a pet shop, each of them desperate to be chosen. Suzie is looking particularly eager. Who should it be? With great power comes great responsibility … help!!!!
Usually I’d pick Keziah as she’s my best friend but Jake is a close second and I feel bad that I lied to him about my gig tickets. It’s like I owe him now. But if I don’t pick Suzie, the gig will be unbearable. In fact, my life will be unbearable. Am I turning into Alison? Just doing everything to please Suzie?
It’s because of her I starved at lunchtime the other day. Being friends with Suzie … what kind of a life is this?!
‘Come on, Haque!’ booms Edmonds. ‘We don’t have all year.’
I need to decide quickly! Arghhhh … hang on though! If it wasn’t for Suzie I couldn’t even have done Forest Club. She gave me the twenty-five pounds! Jake and Keziah didn’t even give me a birthday present!! They just went to Suzie’s party WITHOUT ME!!! Mind you, I did give Suzie the Aliana ticket that should really have gone to Jake. Then again, she’s still being really nice to me even after she got the ticket. She must be genuine. She does actually like me …
‘Hurry up, Haque!!’ barks Edmonds so loudly that I pretty much jump in the air, and impulsively blurt out, ‘Suzie!’ before I’ve actually managed to finish thinking it through. Ugh! I’ve been forced into a knee-jerk reaction. I can’t make eye contact with Jake or Keziah now. Keziah will be OK – she’s pretty cool about most things – but wait till Jake finds out that me and Suzie are going to see Aliana at Wembley together. It doesn’t bear thinking about. I push the thought to the back of my head.
‘That took you long enough,’ says Suzie, beaming that I’ve chosen her. Meanwhile, Alison looks as though she’s been slapped in the face.
‘Errr, yeah. I was miles away,’ I lie. ‘I was thinking about what I want for dinner.’ More lying. It’s becoming a way of life.
‘No eating till sundown though, Cookie!’ says Suzie. ‘You’re still fasting, right?’
‘Yeah, right,’ I reply. I’ve been avoiding eating in front of Suzie for over a week now and the whole thing is starting to turn into a total joke. Waiting till she leaves the canteen, sitting down low, hiding out of sight, snacking secretly. It’s like something out of a comedy show and no one knows apart from Selina, who is helping me out with my deception!
Suzie doesn’t even seemed to have noticed that I’m the only person in the whole school observing Ramadan this year.
Edmonds takes us to the wooded area round the back of the school. Our first challenge is to make minibeast hotels using natural materials. They’re a place for bugs and little beasties to thrive, breed and shelter.
This might actually be fun …
‘Ewwww! Gross!’ screeches Suzie. ‘We’ll get our nails dirty! We may as well just empty the contents of the school bins like the foxes did – ready-made minibeast hotel complete with bacteria, germs and disgusting little creatures! Yuck!’
Suzie does not share my enthusiasm for this activity. I look over at Keziah who’s partnered with Jake. They’re having a great old time. Even Alison and Axel seem to be having fun together.
‘Surely you’re not into the idea?!’ asks Suzie.
‘Err … nah, not really …’ I lie for a quiet life, although I’m secretly annoyed. Yet more lies. I can’t be bothered to convince her this would be fun. Too much effort.
At the end of the session, Jake and Keziah have made ‘K and J’s Bedbugs and Breakfast’ complete with the cutest mini wooden sign EVER.
Axel and Alison have made nothing short of a minibeast skyscraper with about ten separate levels – a feat of insect engineering and a very impressive design, given they only used bits of old wood, pine cones and the like.
Meanwhile, me and Suzie have very little to show for ourselves. I can see Edmonds is disappointed and to be honest so am I.
Why didn’t I stand up to Suzie? Why didn’t I pick someone else in the first place? Why am I pushing my two best friends away? What’s more, I’m beginning to quite like Edmonds and I’m sad I’ve let her down. That evening I feel miserable. I go to bed without eating anything, and it’s not even Ramadan …
CHAPTER 11
Scavenger Hunt!
How can I get out of being partnered with Suzie at Forest Club? I mean, why even bother with it if you’re worried about getting dirt under your nails?! Everyone else seems really into the whole thing now. Plus, we’re all starting to like Mrs Edmonds – she always has our back at break times these days. We’re her gang.
We can be a little more unruly than the other kids and get away with it. If we drop a tissue we can just pick it up without having to do a gazillion press-ups like poor Martha Masters. We have an understanding.
Having to pretend I’m not eating at lunchtimes means that I’m not hanging out with Keziah and Jake as much as I want to. Any time I’ve tried to declare that fasting is finally over, I’ve chickened out. What am I scared of? Suzie?!
Meanwhile, I’m really missing Jake. At one point I was practically living round his house. I haven’t been over there in ages now. I usually walk home from school with him but these days he ALWAYS has an excuse not to, like he urgently needs to pick something up for his mum from the shops or return an overdue library book. It’s like he’s trying to avoid me.
When I need my fix of Keziah, we can just speak on the phone. Jake, on the other hand, is never home to chat. In school, he seems distant all of the time … miles away, deep in thought.
Is it because I haven’t offered him an Aliana ticket yet? The subject will come up again sooner or later. Keziah keeps telling me I should get over my FOMO and let him go to the gig with Suzie. It would make him so happy. He wouldn’t even mind if he had to go with Edmonds! Now that I would like to see … Mrs Edmonds at an Aliana gig!
I’m so desperate to get out of Forest Club before next week’s session that I even consider inventing violin lessons that I can pretend to go to instead. But I’d never get away with it …
Besides, I don’t want to do any more lying right now.
The fact that I spent twenty-five pounds (or rather, an Aliana ticket) to be able to go to Forest Club means that I have to see it through. Plus, if I did quit, Jake and Keziah would still keep going without me. It would be like Suzie’s party all over again. Who knows? They might even end up moving in next door to each other and sharing a cat! Ugh! My FOMO’s really getting the better of me. How has this even happened?! An Altick worth three hundred pounds on the black market in exchange for Forest Club with Suzie as my partner?!!
Maybe there’s a way I can switch partners to be with Keziah or Jake at the next session? I’d happily partner with Axel too. I wonder whether on some level Alison prefers being with Axel. Despite the fact that she wouldn’t ordinarily want to be paired with someone who she thinks is unpopular, they seemed to have so much fun making their minibeast skyscraper together. She must know deep down that she could never have had that much fun with Suzie.
I needn’t have been dreading our second session though, because the next Forest Club meeting is AMAZING! I haven’t had so much fun in ages!
The first thing Edmonds says is, ‘OK, Foresters! We’re going to split into two teams of three today. Who wants to be a team leader?’ Everyone shoots their hands into th
e air and Keziah and Alison get chosen. They take it in turns to pick team members.
I needn’t worry about being picked last, as Keziah will definitely pick me first – which she does (making me feel awful for picking Suzie as my partner last week). Alison then chooses Suzie (also predictable), Keziah chooses Jake and lastly Axel ends up on Suzie’s team. Axel is used to being picked last and doesn’t seem that fussed about it.
Just as I thought, Alison does seem pleased about getting Axel on her team. She was probably just too scared to choose him first because of Suzie!!
‘Today’s activity is an A to Z scavenger hunt,’ booms Mrs Edmonds. ‘Armed with these printouts and checklists, you must try to find an item from the woods for each letter of the alphabet. Don’t expect to get all twenty-six – you’re not miracle-workers. However, I will tell you that some items have been specially hidden for you to make your quest a little easier. OK, teams! Take up your arms and good luck!’
Take up your arms? We aren’t going into battle!
I just know this is going to be fun. Maybe it will be like a battle … I can imagine Axel getting quite competitive over this. Although with Suzie ‘I don’t want to get my hands dirty’ Ashby on his team, perhaps not.
Mrs Edmonds has printed out loads of pointers and clues for us. There are specimen jars, as well as the checklists to help us collect and identify stuff. Axel’s right – Forest Club is an adventure!
Jake is being much quieter than usual. I’m trying to work out whether it’s just with me or if he’s being weird with Keziah too. It’s hard to tell as we’re all over the shop trying to ‘scavenge’ things against the clock! He keeps giving me one-word answers to everything …
He’s also refusing to make eye contact with me when he speaks. Even Axel manages to look at the ground less often than this! What on earth is going on with him? Is he annoyed that I picked Suzie as my partner last week? Or maybe that Keziah picked me over him, despite the fact that I picked Suzie over both of them the other day? Keziah never holds grudges. She thinks it’s funny that I chose Suzie by accident and then hated Forest Club as a result! I have no idea what is up with Jake …
Still, the clock is ticking and we have some serious scavenging to do. We venture deeper into the wooded area, which is very shaded as the trees are densely packed together.
‘Has anyone got their torch handy?’ asks Keziah. ‘It’s pretty dark in here.’
‘I have,’ says Jake, ‘but come on! You can tough it out, Keziah. You don’t need a torch!’
Hmmm, well, she definitely is getting more than one-word answers from him. Maybe he’s just being off with me?
‘Ah, come on, Jake. Pretty please!’ pleads Keziah.
‘Yeah, how would you like it if you were scared of something?’ I say, joining in to support her. ‘Which obviously you’re not because nothing scares you, right?!’
‘Not this again!’ he says, loosening up a bit. ‘I told you! I honestly can’t think of anything that scares me!’
‘How about this spider?!’ I say, picking up a spider and dangling it in front of his nose.
‘Nope!’ he says proudly, finally making eye contact with me … progress!
‘I know what your fear is,’ says Keziah. ‘That Cookie will never stop asking you what your fear is!’
‘That’s it!’ He grins. ‘You got me!’
We all laugh. ‘By the way that’s a daddy-long-legs, not a spider – they have much longer legs and smaller bodies.’
‘OK, thanks for that, wise guy!’ I reply. ‘Fear of daddy-long-legses doesn’t quite have the same ring as arachnophobia!’ We laugh some more. Jake puts the daddy-long-legs in a little jar and we write it down on our list for the letter D. Jake seems to have come out of his shell at last. Phew! We’re doing pretty well and are whizzing through the alphabet.
We’re on a roll rushing about looking for things, collecting things and identifying things, all the while teasing the other team that we’re doing better than them. The others also seem to be having fun, although Suzie appears to be doing less of the fieldwork and more of the bossing around while waving her clipboard about!
This is the opposite of last week’s Forest Club. Running around the woods with my friends is such fun. I feel so happy and free. All six of us are having the time of our lives. Jake is back to being my buddy again. This is GREAT. SO GREAT. Unfortunately, it doesn’t last …
CHAPTER 12
A – ZZZZZZZZZZ
We zip through the first half of the alphabet in no time at all.
A Ant – we find about a million of these under a bit of bark that we pull off a fallen, withered tree. There are so many of the little critters that we decide to use them for I and Q as well – see later!*
B Bark – the one and the same bit we found all the ants under!
C Conker – I happen to have some in my pocket already because someone once told me that they’re good for getting rid of spiders. I found two in my bedroom the other day (spiders, not conkers, that is). Strictly speaking this is cheating as I actually put them in my pocket last week when I found them on the way home from school (conkers, not spiders, that is). But, hey – we’re up against the clock so it’s all in the name of time-saving!!!
D Daddy-long-legs – the one I dangled in front of Jake thinking it was a spider!
E Earwig – we find one on the same bit of bark as the ants – good bit of bark, this. In fact, there seems to be a whole insect town centre under it. I always thought earwigs looked like caterpillars or grubs but Keziah identifies it right away with the help of Mrs Edmonds’ lists.
F Fern – ferns like moisture, which means they love sheltered, shaded areas, so this bit of woodland is the ideal location for them. We find quite a few about the place.
G Grass – G is the first letter we do. We race off to get cracking and Keziah pulls a clump out of the ground and says, ‘Well, that’s G sorted!’
H Hawthorn leaves – as much as I’d like to, I can’t claim that we’re able to identify a hawthorn leaf by ourselves. This is the first of Edmonds’ planted clues. She’s left a few different leaf bundles hidden about the place labelled with letter tags (the letter ‘H’ in this case).
She’s also left tagged pictures of some other stuff lying around, like mushrooms, flowers and butterfly specimens, all neatly labelled with their corresponding letters. We reckon it’ll take longer to look stuff up on the printed sheets and because time is of the essence we decide to find as much as possible on our own.
I Insect* – one of the ants from the vast collection we’ve uncovered!!!
J Juniper berries – these are also in a pre-tagged clump, which Edmonds has left hidden for us.
K is a tricky one …
K Kindling – a bunch of small twigs and sticks used to start a fire. Lighting campfires is a topic on one of the factsheets we received at our initial meeting and Jake remembers all about kindling from it. Nice one, Jake!
L Leaf – we are pretty much surrounded by them!
M Mud – we’re stood on loads of the stuff!
N Nest – Keziah finds a small abandoned nest lying on the ground complete with empty eggshell. We decide we can use eggshell for E if we’ve identified the earwig incorrectly! We’ve got multiple options! How good are we?
O Oak leaf – one of the few leaves we manage to recognise without a checklist because of its wiggly edges and the fact that as a kid I went through a phase where I was obsessed with acorns!! I actually collected them at one point and tried to make hats for my Playmobil characters from them!!
P Pine cones – there are loads of these knocking about on the ground. I even find a closed one. I think that means it fell off in the rain.
Q Queen ant* – we don’t actually know for sure if this ant is the queen or not, but it looks a bit bigger than the others so we figure we’ll give it a go as Q is not an easy one. I’m sure Edmonds has planted something beginning with ‘Q’ for us somewhere, but we don’t want to waste our time loo
king for it!
R Red admiral butterfly – well, a picture of one left by Edmonds with an ‘R’ tag attached to it. Luckily Keziah knows what it is anyway so we don’t even need to cross-check it on our handouts!
S Stick – from our kindling
T Twig – also from our kindling!
U Ulmus minor leaf (from an English elm) – this one is the hardest letter to get! Jake spends a good while trying to identify it even though it’s tagged with a ‘U’! Doesn’t help that the checklist isn’t in alphabetical order – tricky when so many leaves look exactly the same!
V Vine – I always thought vines had to grow grapes, but in fact they are any climbing or trailing plant and we’ve found a good few of them.