Planet Janet (7 page)

Sara Dancer’s father twisted his ankle on Saturday night so Sara stayed home to look after him instead of going to the party. I think this may be an excuse. It’s only an ankle, for God’s sake.

Back in the land of the sexless, there was so much trauma at home last night because of Nan (Sigmund and the Mad Cow are both sleeping on the couch now, which is not exactly an optimum situation) that I forgot all about doing my spell again until I was getting ready for bed. It was raining, so I reckoned it didn’t matter if the moon was full or not. I mean, who’s going to see it anyway? I lit some candles and sat cross-legged on my bed in my underwear so I’d be more in touch with my primitive self. I closed my eyes and REALLY concentrated. At first I had to keep checking to make sure I was saying it right, but after a while I started to get into it. I swear I could feel the
Spirit of the Female Goddess
filling my room. I started rocking gently back and forth and chanting, “Queen of the Moon … Queen of the Sun … Queen of the Heavens … Queen of the Stars…” (I didn’t plan to do this. It just happened! It was well wicked!!!) I forgot about who I was, and where I was. I was an Aztec maiden or an ancient Druid. I was drifting in the cosmos like a particle of light, unfettered by the chains of the material world. At least I was until Nan screamed, “Praise be to Jesus! It’s the devil’s spawn!” I came back to Earth pretty sharply at that. My first real spell and I had a manifestation! The devil’s spawn! How brilliant can you get? I opened my eyes, shouting, “Where? Where’s the devil’s spawn?” Turns out there wasn’t any manifestation – Nan was actually talking about me! Can you believe it? Her own flesh and blood! I was well disappointed. It took EONS to calm her down (it’s a good thing I wasn’t naked). The Mad Cow put a sign on the bathroom door that says
BATHROOM
in case Nan gets confused again. I demanded that the lock on my door is fixed, but Sigmund isn’t having it. He gave me twenty excruciatingly boring minutes on why he doesn’t believe in locks (he doesn’t know how to fix them himself and he’s too cheap to pay someone else to do it is why).

Late again for school. Mr Kipling slept on my jacket and it was COVERED with hairs (he must have a disease; it can’t be normal for a cat to shed that much!), but the MC refused to remove them for me while I had my breakfast. She said if I hung up my jacket instead of tossing it on the floor, Mr Kipling wouldn’t be able to sleep on it. Anyway, it took EONS to get the hairs off with sticky tape, so that’s why I was late. Not that Stalin cared about my traumas, of course. He gave me another detention. (According to the papers, teachers are leaving the profession IN DROVES, but not Mr Wilkins, of course. Probably he knows he’d never get another job.) One more example of the unfair nature of life, since obviously it wasn’t even my fault.

Disha discreetly pumped Calum for more information on Elvin. (There’s not a doubt in my mind that Disha is my cosmic sister. I know in my
Soul
it’s no coincidence that we were born in the same year, in the same borough of the same city and go to the same school.) Anyway, besides being a veggie, Elvin (according to Calum) is very concerned about the state of the planet. He feels film-makers have a responsibility to show the world as it really is and to help protect it (so at least there’s no danger that if I do
Fall Madly in Love
with him he’ll go running off to Hollywood). Elvin’s anti-hunt, anti-vivisection, and anti-international globalism (he’s anti so much that even Sappho would approve). I asked Disha what international globalism was, since it’s one of those terms that everybody uses but no one ever explains. I thought it might have something to do with the age of communication and being able to e-mail anywhere in the world in a second, but Disha said it had something to do with those riots they have every spring. So she isn’t sure either. But whatever it is, Elvin was nearly arrested outside McDonald’s at the riots last year. No wonder Catriona Hendley’s after him. She’s always protesting about something. She’s practically London’s answer to Joan of Arc. Besides all that, Elvin’s taking some sort of eastern martial arts course (for the philosophy, not the ability to break a brick wall with one hand, of course), but Disha couldn’t remember which one. And also his star sign’s Leo. I don’t know anything about Leo. I’ll have to ask Willow.

The police were round at ours when I finally got home this afternoon! At first I thought they must be looking for Justin, but they were there to talk to Nan. Apparently she didn’t fall off the bus; she jumped after some guy who’d grabbed her bag. She downed him, but he got away (
sans
said bag). The police were v impressed with her quickness of mind and body. Nan said it was the way she was trained in the war. She’s obviously still suffering from the drugs.

GET THIS!!! Geek Boy overheard me telling Disha about the police and everything, and he said Nan REALLY WAS in the war. I said right, in an air raid shelter (which D thought was v funny), but Justin said no, not in an air raid shelter, in France! He said she was some sort of spy. Disha and I nearly choked, we were laughing so much, but later I asked Sigmund and he backed Justin’s story. He said not only did they give her a medal for bravery, but I’d seen it at least a million times because it’s up on her mantelpiece, next to Grandad’s ashes. So then I asked the MC, because although she has a lot of faults, winding me up isn’t one of them. Plus she doesn’t have a sense of humour. The MC said if I visited Earth more often I might have some idea of what was going on around me. Which I took to be confirmation of Justin’s story. My grandmother the spy. I REALLY can’t believe it. The MC said that’s because I think Nan was born OLD, which she wasn’t. I said did she mean unlike
her
, and she said she took it back; I should stay on my own planet or she might have to kill me. Didn’t I say she has no sense of humour?

The Mad Cow was in a prize bitch mood this morning. If she got paid by the moan, she’d be a millionaire. All I did was ask where my black trouser-skirt was and she went mad. “I’m not your skivvy, young lady! If you want it washed, get off your fat arse and wash it yourself!” (I nearly burst into tears. She knows I’m sensitive about my weight!) Justin shuffled in right then, asking about breakfast (one of the few verbal communications he can be relied on to make), and she rounded on him for a change. She told him he could do his own laundry from now on too. (How unfair is that? He only changes once every couple of weeks, whereas I change at least twice a day!) After that crack about my fat arse (like she can talk!), I didn’t feel much like eating, so I made my escape. I was HOURS early, of course. It would’ve served the MC right if I’d been raped by some drug-crazed psychopath on his way home from a night of carnage. That’s what I was thinking as I turned into the road the school’s on. I was imagining my mother weeping on television, begging the nation to tell the police if they knew anything that could lead to the arrest of the heartless killer of her only daughter. I was practically crying myself. And what happened next? All of a sudden I heard a mobe go off behind me. It was playing the
Star Wars
theme song. The
Star Wars
theme song is definitely not something you’d expect a normal person to have on their mobe. It really took me by surprise, but I managed to calm myself down. (Psychopaths are like dogs – they can smell fear.) Besides, I was fairly certain a drug-crazed psychopath wouldn’t remember to take his mobe with him. I mean, who would he call? Psychopaths don’t have friends. And even if he did, what would he say? “Hi, I’m on the street and I’m just about to attack this attractive young woman with a bum like Jennifer Lopez’s who’s walking on her own.” I looked round. It wasn’t a mobe. It was a hi-tech bicycle bell. And on the bicycle (which was also hi-tech) was ELVIN!!! Electricity shot through me as if I were a metal pole (the metal pole of
Love
!). I couldn’t believe it! What was he doing here? What if I hadn’t left early? What if I’d been LATE? I half expected Catriona Hendley to drop out of a tree and ruin it all. Elvin said, “Hi. It’s Jan, isn’t it?” I admitted to being Jan. He got off and walked the rest of the way with me. He was meeting Calum to give him something before school. I mentioned that Disha and I saw him in the café on Saturday, and he said we should have come in and said hello, so I explained that we were just going to our yoga class and didn’t have time. He said he’d always been interested in yoga. I said it had changed my life. I told him we went into the café a lot (which is a slight exaggeration, but we do pass it quite often on our way to the video shop). I said we went there after our yoga class for herbal tea and stuff like that because there aren’t that many places that cater for veggies. He said he didn’t know I was a vegetarian too. I laughed as we turned in at the gate. I am now.

Bought a lock for my bedroom on the way home. If I’m going to really get into my yoga, I can’t live in fear that Justin’s going to burst in to take more photos. It destroys my concentration.

I asked Willow about Leo. She said if I got her the exact birth date and time she could do a real chart for me, since a lot depends on what’s rising and stuff like that. I said that’d have to wait until after I’d found out Elvin’s last name (Disha isn’t sure what it is). In general, though, Willow says that Leo’s a fire sign, which is
Creative and Charismatic
(how true is that?!!). She says Leos are into expressing themselves and like an audience. You’d think she knew him, she was so dead on. She offered to do my cards, to see if my Leo showed up in them, but the human Jupiter was rising pretty steadily while I was there (he was climbing round the house without touching the floor, so things kept falling) so I told her I had enough to be going on with.

Disha asked Calum if he met up with Elvin this morning and Calum didn’t know what she was on about. So Detectives Bandry and Paski now know that meeting Calum was just a feeble excuse. Elvin was there to see ME! I actually TINGLE when I think of it.

I made my announcement about turning veggie at supper tonight (last night we had sausages, which is one of the few things the MC can actually cook properly, so I reckoned I might as well have one last meal as a meat-eater). As per usual, I had to wait for Sigmund and his wife to finish their argument, but as soon as they took a break I pushed my plate away and went for it. “I can’t eat this,” I said. The Mad Cow turned her venomous gaze on me and wanted to know why not. Justin said he’d have it. Sigmund didn’t say anything, because he’d already stormed off to go to one of his groups (Sigmund’s got more groups than Columbia Records). I explained that I had become a vegetarian and would only be eating fish, chicken and soya burgers from now on. “And you’ll be cooking them yourself too,” mooed the Mad Cow. “I’m not making special meals for
you
.” I pointed out that her sister, Sappho, was a VEGAN and she didn’t have to cook her own meals when she came round. The Mad Cow said I could go and live with her. And they talk about teenagers having attitude!

I was going to mention to Mrs Kennedy that the twins have been a little overactive lately. But I never got the chance. As per usual, she was flapping all over the place getting ready and banging on about what a great person Sigmund is and how lucky I am to have him as my father. I always agree. I see no reason to burst her bubble.

Cinderella Bandry (that’s ME) was fixing herself a veggie burger for supper tonight when the oven mitt caught on fire. I reacted immediately. (I was v impressed!) Without a second’s hesitation, I swung round and hurled the mitt into the sink. This was obviously the most intelligent thing to do, but of course the Mad Cow was in my way and the mitt hit her instead. You’d think I’d shot her (and except for a little singed hair she wasn’t even hurt). Now she’s changed her mind about me cooking my own food. Didn’t I say she’s menopausal? What more proof do you need, I ask you? She’s up one minute and down the next like an oil pump.

I think I’m starving in the clinical sense. The incident with the MC and the oven mitt distracted me so much that the burger got burned and all I had for supper was vegetables. It’s like living on water. But I’m not giving up. The Hendley has enough advantages with Elvin. I can’t let her have that one too. And all I had last night was a cheese sandwich. I had to stop at McDonald’s on the way to school this morning, I was feeling so faint. I ate two boxes of those chicken things (I couldn’t eat duck – you know, because ducks are so cute – but chickens aren’t very attractive so I reckon they’re all right). But coming home on the bus tonight was this depressed-looking giant chicken (wearing Reeboks) and I wondered if it was some sort of sign and started feeling guilty.

Disha says she was once given a bag of baby carrots by a giant rabbit on Parkway. She says he was really grubby and there was even a stain on one of his ears. She threw the carrots away.

Last night was the last straw as far as Mr Kipling is concerned. They always say that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but as far as I can see you can’t teach a cat ANYTHING. If I’m not really careful about keeping my door shut, I find him sleeping on my bed, spreading fleas and cat fur. But I was so exhausted by the time I got back from Mrs Kennedy’s last night that I forgot to shut the door properly and I woke up with him actually ON MY FACE! He licks himself ALL OVER, for God’s sake! So tonight, while the MC and Nan were busy stupefying their minds with some shallow piece of popular entertainment on the telly, I shoved him out into the garden. I reckon he’ll be all right there till morning. There’s no way he can get over the wall (it’s v high) with his big belly. If I could get rid of Justin that easily I’d be REALLY happy.

Sigmund thinks my decision to show respect for other animals and turn veggie is the sign he’s been waiting for that I’m not just getting older; I’m growing up as well. He’s delighted to see me thinking for myself and accepting responsibility for my own life. (I don’t understand why he sounded so surprised.) Then he said that at least I was doing better than the “bloody government”. I bet the bloody government isn’t as hungry as I am though. I finished off the shepherd’s pie Mrs Kennedy left for the twins’ supper on Thursday before I remembered about being a vegetarian. I reckon it’s all right though, because she used mince and that doesn’t really count as meat either.