Cathy Hopkins - [Mates, Dates 01] (9 page)

Mum pulled a black ostrich
feather out of the bag. ‘Why don’t you use this to trim Izzies top?’

‘Good idea,’ I said.
‘I could hem it along the bottom.’

By the time I’d
finished, both tops looked so good I was tempted to keep them for myself. But
no, I wanted to give them something to show I can be a good friend.

‘Lucy, phone!’ called
Steve from downstairs.

I was so absorbed in
my sewing I hadn’t even heard it ringing.

‘Lucy,’ said Izzie’s
voice as I picked up the receiver. ‘I’m so sorry, I just called home and Mum
said that you’d left a message.’

‘Oh right. And I sent
you an e-mail too. I wanted to know if you and Nesta wanted to come over
tonight for a girlie session.’

‘What, now?’ said
Izzie. ‘Isn’t it a bit late?’

I looked at my watch.
I couldn’t believe it. It was nine thirty. I’d been sewing all day.

‘Where have you been?’
I asked. ‘In fact, where are you?’

I could hear music and
voices in the background. It didn’t sound like she was at home.

‘Hold on,’ she said.
‘I’m going into the bathroom. I’m on the mobile.’

‘Where are you?’

‘Lucy, please don’t be
mad when I tell you.’

I immediately felt
apprehensive.

‘See Nesta went into
Hampstead this morning and…’

Nesta again. I might
have known she was with her.

‘Yes, and?’

‘Well she bumped into
Michael Brenman and one of his mates and he asked her if she wanted to do
something.’

‘Right…’

‘Well she didn’t want
to be hanging around with two of them. She really likes Michael and wanted a
bit of time on her own with him so she called me on her mobile and
begged
,
begged me to go and meet them. Please understand, Lucy, we didn’t mean to
exclude you but we couldn’t ask you as well. I mean, we’d have looked like a
right load of twerps if we’d all turned up.’

‘I know,’ I said
grimly. ‘Two’s company, three’s a crowd.’

‘No. It’s not like
that, not exactly,’ said Izzie. ‘In fact, I wish you had come as well. I’ve got
lumbered with Michael’s mate. We’re back at his house and he’s a right Kevin.
I’m going home in a minute if I can drag Nesta away from snogging Michael. I’d
rather have spent the day with you honest,
honest
, Lucy. You’re not
mad, are you? I had to meet Nesta. As a friend. And I did spend all last week
with you trying to meet the Mystery Contestant. I didn’t want to let Nesta
down…’

‘Yeah, if you want a
friend, you have to be a friend,’ I said, looking at the presents I had waiting
for them and the face-packs and make-up all laid out ready for the girls’
evening.

‘Yeah,’ said Izzie.
‘Oh, hold on a minute, Nesta’s just come in. She says, come over to her house
tomorrow after school. And oh, she says Michael is the worst snogger she’s ever
met. I suppose that means we can go home now.’

First
Kiss

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Monday morning I
overslept. I’d been up so late chopping up fab fabrics for future use, I was
late for school and didn’t get a chance to see Izzie or Nesta before lessons. I
was feeling a bit wary of them both after Sunday.

Izzie gave me a little
wave as I scrambled into my place in class then in came Miss Watkins with a
large shopping bag.

‘I have a little
homework for you all,’ she smiled mysteriously as she took what looked like
three dozen eggs out of her bag. I could tell by her face it was going to be
one of her mad ideas.

‘Now then, Candice,’
she said. ‘I want you to hand out the eggs. One to each girl.’

Candice did as she was
told as we all looked at each other, mystified.

‘I’ve been thinking
about your career prospects,’ Miss Watkins said as she perched in her usual
position on the desk corner. ‘There’s one choice that none of you mentioned.
It’s full-time. It’s demanding as well as rewarding. It means total, and I mean
total, commitment. It’s days, nights and weekends. And sometimes no time off. Can
any of you guess what I’m talking about?’

She looked around
hopefully.

‘Doctor,’ said Tracy
Ford. ‘They’re on call day and night sometimes.’

‘OK, good,’ said Miss
Watkins. ‘But they get holidays. No holidays with this.’

‘God,’ said Candice.

Miss Watkins laughed.
‘Not a job available to most of us,’ she said. ‘Any other suggestions?’

No one had a better
idea.

‘I’m talking about
being a mother,’ she said. ‘And it’s something you should all think about
carefully.’

Blimey, I thought. I’m
only fourteen. Give me a break. I haven’t even got a boyfriend yet.

‘Everyone always says
it won’t happen to me but it only takes one time,’ Miss Watkins continued as
half the class went scarlet and the other half went giggly, ‘and it can change
your life for ever. I know you’ve all had classes about contraception but this
little exercise I want you to do will help you realise the responsibility
you’re undertaking if you don’t use it.’

My mind was boggling.
Contraception? One night that can change your life for ever? Responsibility?
What is she going to make us do with the eggs? I thought we were trying to
decide our GCSE subjects.

‘I want each of you to
take the egg home,’ she continued as Candice placed one in front of each of us.
‘That’s your baby for the week. I want you to bring it back next week in one
piece, not broken.’

Easy, I thought. I’ll
put it in the fridge.

‘I want you to take it
everywhere with you,’ said Wacko. ‘To the shops. To your friends’ houses. To
the bathroom.’

What
? Mad, she’s completely mad.

She hadn’t finished.

‘And while we’re at
it, there’s some leaflets on all the types of birth control available. I want
you to pick one up from my desk at the end of the class so you can read through
it at home. Any questions, ask your parents, or please come to me whenever you
like.’

Does she think we’re
sex mad in this class?

Clearly the answer is
yes.

Nesta, Izzie and I met
up after school. With our egg babies. And our leaflets.

We read them on the
bus to Nesta’s house.

‘It’s weird, isn’t
it?’ said Izzie. ‘One minute everyone’s telling you not to grow up,’ she put on
her snotty cow accent, ‘
to enjoy our youth
. Next minute, it’s all grow
up, decide what you want to be and think about babies.’

‘I know,’ said Nesta.
‘But she must think we’re a right load of plonkers if we don’t know all about
contraception by now.’

‘So what’s oral
contraception, then?’ I asked.

‘Talking your way out
of it,’ said Nesta.

‘You only have to say
one word,’ said Izzie. ‘No.’

I got the feeling
neither of them had a clue. Best to ask Mum. She’s always too happy to fill me
in on all the gory details.

‘This coil thing
sounds painful,’ I said, scanning the leaflet. ‘It goes in your womb.
Urgggh
?

‘More painful for him
more like,’ giggled Izzie. ‘Imagine, what if his thingy touches it,
bdOING…
argghhhhh
!’

Once we started
laughing we couldn’t stop.

‘My brothers found
Mum’s sanitary towels once. Of course they didn’t know what they were,’ I said.
‘Lai put one on over his head then pretended that he was a brain surgeon.’

‘When I was little I found
my mum’s. I used them as hammocks for my dolls,’ said Izzie. ‘She hid them
after that.’

‘My mum uses a cap,’
said Nesta, reading her leaflet. ‘I found it in her bedside drawer when I was
about eight and thought it was a toy frisbee. So we had
the conversation
,
you know, when they get all embarrassed and tell you the facts of life.‘

‘The whole business
sounds very messy to me,’ I said.

‘Not as messy as
having a baby,’ said Izzie, getting up suddenly and screeching. ‘I’ve just sat
on mine.’

Egg yolk dribbled off
the bus seat on to the floor and that set us off laughing again.

‘Egg on your face,’
sang Nesta, ‘egg on your face…’

‘Not my face,’
grimaced Izzie, wiping yolk from her skirt. ‘Oh, my poor baby.’

‘Can’t make an
omelette without breaking eggs,’ I said.

‘Oh, oh,’ moaned
Izzie. ‘I’m a terrible mother. Look at you two. You’ve still got yours.’

‘I know,’ I said,
looking at Nesta. ‘And I know exactly what we should do with them.’

‘What?’ said Nesta.

‘Let’s go home and
boil them.’

‘Great idea,’ said
Nesta.

Somehow I don’t think
any of us are ready to be mothers just yet.

When we got to
Nesta’s, she made us big cups of frothy coffee on her dad’s cappuccino maker
and we went into their gorgeous living-room. No sign of Tony.

‘So why was Michael
such a rotten snogger?’ I asked Nesta. I was intrigued to know what a rotten
snog was, not having being snogged at all so to speak.

‘Onions,’ she said.
‘He’d had a hot dog. And it was all sloppy. Wet.’

Sounded awful. ‘Have
you snogged many boys?’ I asked.

‘Not really,’ she
said. ‘About seven.’

Seven‘
? She’s so experienced!

‘The best was
Alessandro,’ continued Nesta dreamily. ‘I met him last year when we were in
Tuscany. He did it fabulously. Soft. Tender. Why? How many have you snogged?’

True to form, I went
red. ‘None,’ I said. ‘I’ve never seen anyone I liked.’

‘Except Mystery Boy,’
said Izzie. ‘Don’t forget him.’

‘How many have you
snogged?’ asked Nesta, turning to Izzie.

‘Two,’ she answered.
‘Peter Richards when I was seven, so I don’t suppose that counts. And I can’t
really remember how it was. And Stuart Cameron last year. He was OK but he kept
trying to grope me as well and I didn’t really fancy him. No, I’m waiting for
someone special. Not one of the local nerds, thank you very much.’

Just at that moment,
Tony appeared with a huge grin on his face. Oh, God. He’d been in the house all
the time. How much had he heard?

He came in and flopped
on the sofa next to me. ‘The art of kissing,’ he said. ‘My speciality.’

‘You wish,’ said
Nesta. ‘What do you know? Nothing.’

‘More than you think,
actually.’ He turned to me. ‘Never been kissed, eh?’

Red turned to scarlet
turned to purple.

‘Leave her alone,’
said Izzie.

‘I was just going to
offer to show her how it’s done,’ said Tony. ‘Then she’ll have something to
measure it against in the future.’

Aaarghhhh
. I didn’t know what to do. What to
say. He was sitting so close. His long gorgeous legs in jeans stretched out in
front of me. And he smelled nice, clean, not like Michael Brenman’s
overpowering pong. My breathing went all funny like someone had just pulled a
belt across my chest.

‘Yeah, she’ll know
what it means to be kissed by a huge show-off big-head…’ started Nesta.

‘You want to try?’ he
said, turning to Izzie.

She tossed her hair.
‘In your dreams.’

So he turned back to
me.

‘Lucy. Do you want to
learn from the Master?’

‘The Master…’ guffawed
Nesta.

This only seemed to
egg him on. He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, tilted my face up to his
and looked into my eyes. My insides melted into warm honey.

‘Tony…’ warned Nesta.

‘Close your eyes…’ he
whispered.

‘TONY…’ Nesta again.

Too late. He was
kissing me. I didn’t care that Nesta and Izzie were there. My first kiss.
Little firecrackers were exploding inside me. Nice. Very nice.

Suddenly a hand
grabbed him by the back of his shirt. ‘In the kitchen,’ said Nesta harshly.
‘NOW.’

He laughed and got up
to follow her.

Izzie looked at me as
they disappeared. ‘You OK?’

I nodded. I giggled
stupidly. OK? I was in heaven.

‘The cheek of him,’
said Izzie. ‘Who does he think he is?’

‘Just going to the
loo,’ I said and crept out into the hall.

I could hear Nesta’s
voice in the kitchen. ‘You stay away from her, do you hear?’