I looked over Carrie’s shoulder and there was a girl standing there with straight blonde hair in a low-cut white dress. Her knockers were already sunburned.
“Shiraz,” said Carrie, “this is Dee-Dee! You’ve never met each other before?”
“Hi,” said Dee-Dee, glaring at me.
“Dee-Dee,” said Wesley, “this is the girl who I found outside the factory.”
It didn’t sound as nice when he put it like that.
“Yeah, I know who Shiraz is,” said Dee-Dee, staring right at me.
We all stood about for a bit awkwardly, then Bezzie pitched up wearing a full Burberry tracksuit, holding some electrical leads, saying, “Right peoples, now we can get dis bashment jumpin big time!” He says stuff like that a lot. You get used to it after a while.
We all walked through the crowds together to the sun patio where Bezzie’s sound system was. Dee-Dee was whispering in Carrie’s ear and linking Wesley’s arms and they were all saying something about a car cruise they’d all gone to recently. I started to feel really angry then. Especially as it then dawned on me that when Bezzie said he was going to play “some tunes,” he actually meant “his own tunes,” meaning for the next hour he was dropping stuff like “Girl U Iz My Baby-Boo” and “Clinton — Don’t Diss My Wifey” which he then MC’D OVER HIMSELF. And he sounded rubbish. It sounded like a drunk person arguing with a dustbin but Carrie and Dee-Dee thought it was AMAZING. All the grown-ups seemed to think it was funny and they started dancing around and at one point I looked over and to my bloody horror my mum and dad, who looked well hammered, were doing fake hip-hop dancing. God, I could have died. Carrie, Bezzie and Dee-Dee were laughing and cheering them on. Wesley gave me a look like he could see I was embarrassed.
“Woo-hoo!” laughed Dee-Dee. “Shake that ass!” Then Dee-Dee started doing an impersonation of my mother and everyone was laughing more.
Something inside me just snapped. I stormed off upstairs to the loo with Carrie following after me. She pushed her arm through mine and pulled me back.
“Shiz, what’s up?” she said. I just tutted and said I was OK.
“Come on Shiz, tell me what’s up!” she said, sounding like she actually cared. What a faker. I just decided to totally tell her the truth.
“Oh you wanna know what’s wrong, do you?!” I said. “Bloody Dee-Dee. That’s what’s up.”
“What about Dee-Dee?” she said.
“What’s she doing here? Snotty cow,” I said.
Carrie looked stunned. “I had to invite her, Shiz. She’s Wesley’s bird. And she’s my mate now too.”
My face flushed red then. “Yeah, too right, I know that! That’s why I never see you anymore! That’s why we never hang out no more! ’Cos when you’re not with bloody Bezzie, you’re with Dee-Dee! You treat me like crap these days.”
“No I don’t!” said Carrie, but she looked a bit guilty.
“You only see me when there’s no one else! I only found out about this barbecue ’cos my mum was invited! You’ve changed! The moment you met Bezzie Kelleher you changed!”
Carrie’s lip wobbled. Good, I thought, I hope she cries.
“That’s not true!” she said.
“Yes it is! You’re totally not the same person now you’re with Bezzie,” I shouted. “You even kicked me out of the car on the street! You’re an airhead and a user! And by the way, your Bezzie can’t rap! And he’s not even buff or nothing — he’s MINGING!”
Carrie’s mouth fell open then.
“And I hope you’re all happy together,” I shouted. “You and munter and Wesley and sunburned knockers. Have a nice life. Laterz!”
I turned around and stormed off down the stairs, but then Carrie shouted after me, “Oh well, suit yourself Shiraz, you mardy cow! Don’t take it out on me ’cos you fancy Wesley Barrington Bains II and he don’t fancy you back. Which he don’t by the way! He loves Dee-Dee! You blew that one being your usual awkward-cow self!” Carrie’s voice started to crack a bit then. “And don’t diss my Bezzie ’cos I love him and we’re going to be together forever! And, er, that’s how it is! Build a bridge and get over it, you silly mare!”
I turned around to shout something back but Carrie was really crying then. And by the time I got to the garden gate I was too.
FRIDAY 1ST AUGUST
I am so totally not speaking to Carrie Draper. And I so DON’T CARE. If she wants to spend the school holiday with stupid Dee-Dee, munter Bezzie and Mr. Smooth Wesley in their stupid cars going to stupid car cruises then that suits me fine. How anyone manages to fit in a car with Dee-Dee and those monstrous melons is a bleeding miracle anyhow. Good riddance to all of them. I am really happy. I’m keeping it real.
SUNDAY 3RD AUGUST
Still not speaking to Carrie. I don’t miss her at all. Got better stuff to do this summer, like watching telly, sunbathing, and being personal trainer to the dog. Penny needs to lose weight. The vet says that unless she does more exercise and stops eating Hostess pasties she will die. I don’t want Penny to die, she has been very supportive during my fall-out with Carrie. I took Penny to Goodmayes Park this afternoon for a run. She frolicked like a normal dog for a bit then she smelled a burger van and lay down sulking until I bought her a hot-dog. Not everyone can be as positive and motivated as me.
WEDNESDAY 6TH AUGUST
Poor Penny. I just measured her out one cup of Purina Lo-fat Science Diet from the vet. She stared at it, looking proper depressed. It’s for her own good. Just like when I told Carrie that Bezzie was a minger who couldn’t rap. It was for her own good!
I feel well bad about that now. Not that I think about Carrie Draper much. Well, OK, I did just then, but that was the first time today, right?
FRIDAY 8TH AUGUST
Mum came home from work today in a right mood. Me, Murphy, and Cava-Sue were all lying about bored on the couch eating Pringles watching CITV when Murphy shouts at Mum, “Oi! What’ya making for dinner?” For some reason this sent Mum loopy.
“What am I making for dinner?” Mum shouted. “What are YOU lot making ME for dinner? You’re as fit as I am!” We all stared at her ’cos she was obviously having some sort of mentalist episode. “Look at you all!” she yelled. “You lazy bloody lumps! Do you think I’m a slave? Is this what you think you’re doing for the summer holidays? Dossing about on your fat behinds eating crisps?” I informed Mum that I wasn’t dossing, I was supervising the dog’s weight-loss regime. “Well you’re doing a blindin’ job there Shiraz,” shouted Mum, “’cos the front door was left open and I just found her down at Aunty Glo’s house eating jam tarts!”
SATURDAY 9TH AUGUST
Mum has made a home-duties chart. She saw it on this show called
The Terrible Teen Tamer
on ITV. She’s put a chart in the kitchen and some stickers and some felt-tip pens and when we do our housework chore we’ve got to mark it off on the chart and get a gold star. If we get three gold stars we get an extra £2 a week allowance. According to
The Terrible Teen Tamer
this will make everyone stop wanting to kill each other.
Cava-Sue started whining right away ’cos she has to clean the bathroom. Cava-Sue says Murphy’s bumhole is a law unto itself and he can clean up his own skidmarks. Then Mum got narky and said HARD LUCK ’cos she’s been in charge of EVERYBODY’S bloody skidmarks for the last twenty years and she wants a day off. Then Cava-Sue got upset and shouted that “this entire family has a conspiracy to break her spirit.” Then Murphy chipped in that there was NO WAY he was hanging out the washing as it was a girl’s job and he wasn’t touching anyone’s thongs. So I said I’d swap with Murphy and he could do the dusting and polishing instead. Then Cava-Sue said that was TOTALLY UNFAIR ’cos that meant Murphy had the easiest job as usual. So Mum told Cava-Sue to shut up ’cos Murphy is a boy and he’s no good at housework. Then Cava-Sue got really angry at Mum and said that maybe if Mum hadn’t been such a bloody dinosaur in her attitudes and made Dad and Murphy do some housework then they’d be less helpless and Mum wouldn’t be such a slave in the first place. Mum told her to shut up and go and wash her hair ’cos it was greasy. “It’s like living in the Dark Ages before feminism happened!” squealed Cava-Sue, storming off.
“Well if you don’t like it here then you know where the door is!” shouted Mum.
I went to my room sharpish before I ended up on skidmark patrol.
SUNDAY 10TH AUGUST
No one has got a gold star yet. I put the dog on the bathroom scales. She has put on two pounds. I am trying to stay positive but it is quite hard. I looked at Carrie’s MySpace site for ages today. She has gone to the Dominican Republic for three weeks with her mum and dad. Carrie’s family always have dead good holidays. They actually enjoy spending time together. They never chuck felt-tips at each other’s heads or draw rude pictures of each other with willies poking out their heads on home-duties charts. I miss going to Draperville.
TUESDAY 12TH AUGUST
Cava-Sue says she will NOT co-operate with the regime anymore as the gold star scheme is completely UNJUST. Why should Murphy get a star for playing
Zombie Armageddon
in his underpants with a can of Mr. Sheen polish sitting next to him? Mum said, “Fair enough, but I’m NOT lending you another penny and you can stop farting about with that drama course and get a job right now!”
Cava-Sue went mental then and shouted, “You never wanted me to get an education anyway so that’ll suit you just fine. That’s why you came up to the college and made a big show of me during my play!”
So Mum shouted, “I think you were making a big enough display of yourself, Cava-Sue! And I don’t care what you do as long as you bring some money into the house and stop scrounging.”
Then Cava-Sue shouted that she wasn’t a scrounger and the only reason she’d asked to borrow £20 yesterday was ’cos her student loan hadn’t cleared and she was going to The Secret Underground festival that weekend with Lewis.
Then Mum laughed and said that there was NO WAY Cava-Sue was going to the Magic Underpant festival or whatever it was called with all her soap-dodger mates ’cos Mum’s changed her mind about the loan now ’cos of all Cava-Sue’s lip.
Cava-Sue looked totally furious then. She slammed down her copy of
Rolling Stone
magazine and stormed upstairs. There was a lot of banging, then she came down carrying a big suitcase and three plastic bags and a sleeping bag and some files. She looked at Mum and shouted, “I hope you’re happy now, you bloody witch! I never want to see you again!” and walked out slamming the door.
Mum put down her cup of tea and went to the window and watched her storming off up Thundersley Road. Mum’s hands were shaking and she looked like she was about to cry, but she didn’t stop Cava-Sue going.
THURSDAY 14TH AUGUST
Cava-Sue has not come home for two days. She’s ignoring my texts. I know she’s probably just at Lewis’s house sulking or something. She’ll come home. It’s quite good having the bedroom to myself. I can listen to whatever music I like and have the light on as late as I want. I brought the portable TV from the kitchen upstairs last night and watched
Hollyoaks
in bed. It was weird not having Cava-Sue slagging it off all the time for being “poorly structured.”
SUNDAY 17TH AUGUST
Still no word from Cava-Sue. I texted her a few times today but she never texted back. Then I rang her phone and it went to voicemail. I don’t know how Cava-Sue will pay for any top-up credits on her cell as she has no money. I wish she would call me. I have moved into her top bunk. Penny has the bottom one. It is much comfier up here but it doesn’t quite feel right as I never sleep this high. I wonder how Cava-Sue is coping with sleeping so low?
TUESDAY 19TH AUGUST
THIS HOUSE IS DOING MY HEAD IN. Today I asked where everyone reckons Cava-Sue is. Dad just made one of his “don’t start trouble” faces and Murphy just pretended to be deaf. My mum just lit up a ciggie and picked up the
Sun.
“Are you not bothered where she is?! It’s been a week!” I said to Mum.
“She’s the one who left,” muttered my mum from behind her paper. “I’ve devoted my whole life to doing my best for that girl and all she does is throw it back in my face. When she wants to apologize to me she can. I certainly won’t be.”
Cava-Sue will NEVER apologize. Once, when we were little, Cava-Sue pushed a yellow crayon right up my nose and it got stuck. She never said sorry. Even when we got to the hospital all she did was ask the nurse for the crayon back ’cos she’d not finished coloring in her rainbow.
FRIDAY 22ND AUGUST
I hate these summer holidays. It’s crap without Carrie and Cava-Sue. Got the bus to Nan’s house. She made me a pork chop and some mashed potatoes and a glass of purple soda. Then I sat on Granda’s old chair and we ate Fox’s Glacier Mints and played Beggar My Neighbor, which is a card game only me and her seem to know. I told Nan I was quite depressed ’cos I’ve fell out with Carrie and Cava-Sue has going missing. Nan sat quiet for a bit. She said she could help with one bit. Nan said she knew where Cava-Sue was. Nan says she’s been trying not to get involved ’cos my mum already says she’s an interfering old bag. Nan says that Cava-Sue is in London. I felt sick when she said that, imagining Cava-Sue sitting at an ATM with a scabby face and a begging cup, being homeless. Nan says it’s not as bad as it sounds. Nan says Cava-Sue and Lewis are staying at a friend’s in Kentish Town in northwest London. A FRIEND CALLED PIXIE?!!! Nan says Cava-Sue came to her house last week and was upset and says she hates Mum and she’s never coming back to Goodmayes ever, but Nan reckons it might all blow over. Nan lent Cava-Sue £100 so she’s not broke.
I stared out of the window all the way home on the bus and thought about Cava-Sue. I miss her loads. I wish there was something I could do. What do I do?
Carrie would know what to do. “She who dares wins, Shiraz,” that’s what she’d say. Carrie was the one with all the good ideas.
TUESDAY 26TH AUGUST
Cava-Sue has been gone two weeks. I lay in bed most of today with the dog, reading
OK!
magazine and the last chapters of
Jane Eyre
again. I like the bit at the end when Jane Eyre gets together with that Mr. Rochester geezer who she fancies and they live happily ever after. Jane Eyre had a right old crap life up until then ’cos she’s small and unlucky and plug-ugly too, just like me. It’s nice to think that there is love out there for people like me and not just Carrie and Collette Brown.