Pony Passion (6 page)

It took Ryan a few minutes to notice the paper. But when he did, he read it and snorted with laughter. Then he turned round and looked at someone. It was odd. I could’ve sworn he looked straight at the M&Ms.

“I just have to go to the staff room for a moment,” said Mrs Weaver. “Carry on working, everyone. Quietly.”

By this time Danny McCloud, who sits next to Ryan, was desperate to know what the note said. He grabbed it off Ryan and read it quickly, and then started making terrible strangulated sicky noises and pulling really disgusting faces.

This, of course, drew the attention of half the rest of the class. Soon the note was travelling round at lightning speed, causing muffled squeaks and snorts.

“Kenny, what on earth does it say?”

“It says, ‘Emma H. fancies Fog-brain’,” said Kenny. ‘Fog-brain’ is the class nickname for Danny McCloud (cloud – fog, get it?). “But the best thing is, it says it in the Goblin’s writing.”

“How come?” How could Kenny have made Emily write what she wanted? Then it struck me. “Duh! All that writing practising you were doing!”

“I nicked that page of notes so I could copy how she writes, see?” said Kenny, grinning from ear to ear at her achievement. “Am I or am I not a total genius?”

“Total!” laughed Rosie.

“Way to go, girl!” said Frankie.

I flapped my hands. “Shh! Don’t look too pleased or they’ll work out who did it.”

Immediately, Kenny wiped the smile off her face and got back to her book, sneaking glances every so often from under her hair.

For now the M&Ms didn’t have a clue what was going on. But they would find out soon. I watched the progress of the note round the room. Soon it reached us.

“Look like you don’t know what it says!” instructed Frankie, and we all huddled round it, nudging each other and giggling.

At long last I saw Regina Hill push the note on to Emily Berryman’s desk.

“Nooo!” breathed Kenny, watching. “Don’t give it to Emily! She’ll hide it. Oh, botheration.”

The Goblin unfolded it. All of a sudden she went deathly pale and then, the next moment, bright red. She turned the note over and back again, looking confused. Then Emma Hughes leant across, and asked what it was. Emily tried to hide the note, and there was a short hissed argument. Then Emma grabbed the note and read it.

“What?” we heard her splutter. “How could you?”

“I didn’t write it,” Emily protested.

“Don’t even try to pretend,” snapped Emma. “It’s your writing! Look – it’s got those pathetic little hearts you draw on your ‘i’s!” Emma waved the note under Emily’s nose. Then she hissed, “I told you it was a secret.”

“Omigosh!” gasped Kenny, her eyes widening. “Don’t tell me she really does fancy Danny!”

Well, it turned into the biggest row between the M&Ms any of us had ever seen. Emma told Emily she was a “traitor” and “the sneakiest blabbermouth ever”, while Emily shouted back that Emma was fat and spotty and she’d never liked her anyway. Meanwhile, half the class clapped and cheered, while the other half chanted, “Emma fancies Daa-nny! Emma fancies Daa-nny!”

None of us noticed when Mrs Weaver walked back into the room.

“RIGHT!” she thundered, slamming a pile of books on to her desk. “I’ve had just about ENOUGH of this class!”

“Oh no,” groaned Kenny. “Now we’re really for it.”

I guess, after all the stuff at the library, Mrs Weaver was never going to let us off lightly.

“But that was harsh,” said Frankie later that afternoon, when we were in the cloakroom getting ready to go home. “I mean, detention! For the entire lunchbreak! Bummer or what?”

“And why did she have to make us write out spellings?” said Rosie. “Torture!”

“But hey,” whispered Kenny, flapping her coat to get the sleeve the right way out. “You
have to admit – it was worth it, right?”

“Totally,” nodded Frankie. Fliss, who hates getting into trouble with the teachers more than she hates heavy metal music (and that’s a lot), didn’t look so sure.

For my part, I was well pleased that the Sleepover Club – thanks to Captain Kenny – had got its super-cool revenge on the M&Ms. On the way home, though, it occurred to me: in all the excitement, we’d hardly made any progress on our projects. I was prepared to bet my best riding boots that the M&Ms hadn’t got very far either, considering how they still weren’t talking to each other. But I didn’t want to take any chances.

That night I made a decision. I, Lyndsey Collins, had dumped the worst, most boring project topic on my friends. So I was going to be the one to get us out of the mess. Yes – I was going to have a mega-fantastic idea.

It turned out that that was the easy bit. Deciding to have a great idea is one thing. Actually having one… well, I spent most of the
next week discovering that that’s something else entirely.

At least, now that I wasn’t heading off to the stables most days after school, I had plenty of time to think about it. I scoured our house for books that might help. Dad, being an Art teacher, had a couple about Victorian paintings, but that was it.

“Tom?” I poked my head round my brother’s door. “Got any books on the Victorians?”

“You’re joking, aren’t you?” His eyes were glued to his computer screen. He didn’t even turn his head. Brothers! Useless, huh?

I tried sitting and thinking, but my baby brother Spike was having a screaming fit and Ben was grizzling, just to join in, so it was no use at all.

“Lyndsey, if you’ve got nothing to do…” began Mum.

I know that hassled look of hers. She was about to give me a heap of washing or ironing or cleaning or something equally awful, so I said, “I’m thinking, actually. It’s my homework,” and dashed out into the garden.

I stumped across to my dad’s workshop (really more like a shed), and found him inside, up to his elbows in clay, making another of his weird lumpy pots.

He didn’t seem to mind me being there, so I fiddled around for a while, looking at his paints and brushes. There were some enormous cardboard boxes left over from when he’d bought a new lawnmower and a DIY workbench. I even climbed into one of them and sat in it for a while. And that’s when I had it: my brilliant idea.

Do you ever forget what day it is? The next morning, when I hadn’t properly woken up yet and my brain was still fuzzy with sleep, I was sure it was a school day.

And then I remembered it was Saturday – which was cool.

But then I remembered it was the day of the gymkhana – which was not cool.

And then I remembered it was also the day of Frankie’s sleepover. Which was majorly, fantastically awesome. And that I’d got my fab idea to tell everyone about. Which was even better.

Honestly, before I even got out of bed, my mood had gone up and down like a yo-yo!

Mum drove me to Frankie’s after lunch. We passed a load of horseboxes coming the other way, heading for McAllister’s stables. That was a nightmare – just thinking about Bramble and how I could have been tacking her up for the gymkhana right now made my chin go all trembly.

But as soon as Frankie flung open her front door, saw the monster bag of marshmallows I was clutching, and squealed, “Here she is! The marshmallow queen! Are we glad to see you!”, I felt a load better. Sleepovers rule, as Kenny would say!

In the sitting room, I found Kenny, Rosie and Fliss sprawled on the carpet. Fliss had her bag open and was unpacking enough Hannah Montana dvds for about nine sleepovers.

“We don’t have to watch them all,” she said, stacking them up in a pile. “But I thought we should have a choice.”

“Well, I reckon we’ve got enough sweets to get us through a TV marathon,” said Rosie. It was true. There was a major heap of Minstrels, Liquorice All-Sorts, Jelly Babies and Toffee Popcorn, even without my marshmallows.

“And we’ve got to make the bracelets!” said Frankie, holding up a big clear plastic bag that sparkled and twinkled in the light. The beads were loads of different colours – deep reds and purples and blues, gold and silver (Frankie’s fave colour – no wonder she was so pleased), plus delicate pinks and apple greens and lilacs.

“Wow! They are beautiful!” breathed Fliss. Even Kenny looked impressed.

“Before we start the fun stuff,” I said, “can I tell you something?”

Instantly my friends looked at me eagerly. “Is it juicy gossip?” asked Frankie.

“’Fraid not,” I said. “It’s just that I’ve had an idea for our presentation.”

“Glad somebody has!” said Kenny. “cos I was getting nowhere.”

“Me neither,” said Rosie. “Tell us then, Lyndz.”

“Well…” Suddenly, with them all looking at me, I wondered whether it was such a good idea after all. But I ploughed on. “…My dad’s got these giant bits of cardboard, you see, so I thought we could make big cardboard cut-outs of things. Like a train, and a horse, and one of those old-fashioned bicycles – you, know, the really tall ones…”

“Penny farthings,” said Frankie.

“That’s it.” I nodded. “And one of us could stand on a chair and hold the picture below them to make it look like they’re riding the bike. Someone at the back could hold up the train, and make it go along. And then instead of just giving speeches or whatever we were going to do, we could make it into a little scene. Say, a posh lady comes along in a carriage and meets the man on the bicycle, and they have a
chat about these new things called trains…”

“Bagsy I’m the posh lady!” said Fliss. “I’ve got a long dress and everything!”

Frankie gasped. “You know what the best thing would be?” she said. “Two of us should be the horse that’s pulling the carriage – the front end and the back end, like in a Christmas panto! It’d be hilarious!”

“You and me!” yelled Kenny, grabbing Frankie and scrambling to her feet. Frankie bent over, and held Kenny round the waist. Kenny put her hands up as ears and pawed the ground with her foot, and they set off galloping round the room.

Suddenly Frankie broke away, holding her nose. “Hey, Kenny, did you parp?”

“Baked beans for lunch – sorry,” said Kenny sheepishly while the rest of us roared with laughter.

“You’re definitely the back end next time,” said Frankie, flopping down on the carpet.

“That is a seriously cool idea, Lyndz,” said Rosie.

“It’s top,” agreed Kenny. “But where are we going to get a horse costume?”

“Make it?” I suggested. “Brown tights, brown T-shirts – we could get some wool for the tail.”

“And we could make a mask for the face,” added Rosie.

“Wicked,” said Kenny. “Chuck us the popcorn, someone – I’ve worked up an appetite here.”

I grabbed the bag and tossed it to Kenny. I was so chuffed that my friends liked my idea, I felt like boogying round the room!

As it turned out, a chance for that came soon enough. Frankie brought in some juice and we all slurped and munched our way through two episodes of Hannah Montana. We made a rule that every time the theme music came on, we had to dance around and pretend we’re famous popstars.

After that we were pretty exhausted (not to mention a bit queasy from the sweets-and-juice-and-bopping combination), so Frankie fetched needles and thread and we got down to making
the bracelets. I was doing one for Kenny. “Can you make it in Leicester City colours?” she asked.

“You’ll be lucky to have any colours at this rate,” I said. It was pretty tricky with my arm in plaster. In the end, Rosie had to do half of it for me.

After that we had the ceremonial trying-on of the bracelets. Kenny had made Frankie’s too small, but Rosie – who has smaller hands – offered to swap, so it was fine. Then we plunged into the marshmallows and gorged ourselves on pink and white squish until it was time to get into our pyjamas.

“Look!” giggled Kenny, who’d shut her eyes and was somehow managing to grip a marshmallow in each eye socket. “I am the marshmallow monster! Aaarrrgh!”

If it hadn’t been so hilarious it would’ve been dead scary. We laughed so much that I got a major attack of the hiccups and Rosie’s Coke came out of her nose.

“Ach! That hurts!” she said, shaking her head.

At that moment Frankie’s dad put his head
round the door. “Er…I’m not even going to ask,” he said, looking round at the mess and our flushed faces. “Teeth cleaning then lights out, you rowdy rabble!”