Grandad came round. Even he was wearing shorts. As I said to Mum, “There is really no need for that.”
He is so bow-legged that Angus can walk in between his legs with a stick and Grandad doesn’t even notice. Mind you he doesn’t notice much as he lives in the twilight world of the elderly mad. After fiddling in his prehistoric shorts he gave me twenty pence and said, “There you are, don’t spend it all at once.” Then he laughed so much his false teeth shot out. He was wheezing away for so long I thought he’d choke to death and then I’d have to do the Heimlich manoeuvre. Miss Stamp (Sports Kommandant) made us learn it in First Aid. If someone swallows a boiled sweet or something and chokes, you grab them from behind and put your arms round below their breastbone. Then you squeeze them really hard until the sweet shoots out. Apparently some German bloke called Mr Heimlich made it up. Why Germans have to go round grabbing people innocently choking on sweets I don’t know. But they do. That is the mystery of the German people.
8:00 p.m.
Well, that is it. No call from the SG. He must be back. I can’t call him because I have pride. Well actually, I did phone him but there was no reply. I didn’t leave a message. I don’t understand boys. How could you do number six type snogging and then not call someone?
8:10 p.m.
Buddhism is the only way. I must meditate and be calm.
My room
8:20 p.m.
I found one of Mum’s kaftans that she got when she went to India on the hippie trail. She has some very sad photos of her and Dad with hilarious haircuts in Katmandu. Dad looks like he has got a big nappy on. She gets the photos out when she is drunk, especially if you beg her not to.
I put on the kaftan and was listening to some dolphins on a meditation tape. It was called “Peaceful Universe”. Squeak, squeak, squeak. On and on– it would go quiet for a bit and then squeak, squeak, squeak. If dolphins are so intelligent why don’t they learn to speak properly? Instead of squeaking? It is fantastically irritating. I would turn it off but I am too depressed to get off the bed.
8:40 p.m.
Phone rings. Of course, everyone else is far too busy to answer it. So I’ll tramp all the way downstairs and get it.
I yelled out, “Don’t worry, Mum, I’ll come all the way down and answer the phone which is probably for you. You try and get some rest!”
Mum shouted from the living room, “OK, thanks.”
I picked up the receiver. “Yes?”
It was Robbie!!! Yes and treble fabuloso!! He’s got such a lovely voice; quite deep– not quite as deep as Grandad’s, but then he doesn’t smoke forty cigarettes a minute. He said he’d been away.
I was thinking, I know you have, you great huge sexy hunk!!! My lips are stiff with puckering!!! But I didn’t say that, I said, “Oh, have you?” which I thought was quite cool and alluring. Anyway, the short and short of it is that he’s really, really glad that I didn’t go to Kiwi-a-gogo and I’m going round to his place tomorrow!!! His parents have gone away.
Ooooooohhhhhh. I’m all shakey and nervous now. I’m like a cat on a hot tin roof. We did Cat On a Hot Tin Roof in English. There was no cat in it…or a tin roof…or…stop it, brain, stop it!!!!
8:45 p.m.
Phoned Jas.
“He called me!!”
“Who?”
It’s like talking to a sock. “Jas. HE called me. HE– the one and only HE in the universe.”
9:00 p.m.
Jas came round to discuss what I should wear. We went up to my room. Unfortunately I forgot to warn Jas about the hammock that Libby had made for her dolls. She’d made it out of one of Mum’s commodious bras and tied it across the landing. Jas grazed her shins quite badly when she fell over. She was going, “Ow, ow!”, but I can’t be bothered with minor injuries just now.
She hobbled into my room and we looked through my wardrobe. I held things up and Jas went, “No. No. Maybe. No, too tarty. No, no…er…maybe.”
I was trying on a suede mini and she said, “Erlackl! The front of your legs are quite hairy but the backs of your legs are all baldy.”
I had a look. She was right!!! Time for operation smoothy legs. I grumbled to her as we went down to the bathroom. “What is the point of evolution? Why bother giving us hairy front legs and baldy back legs? When can that ever have been useful in our fight for survival?”
Jas said, “Perhaps it was to frighten things off.”
I said, “Oh yeah, that will be it. Stone Age girl would have said, ‘Here comes a big dinosaur chasing me from behind. It thinks I am a push-over because of my baldy legs, but wait till I turn round! I’ll scare off the big lug with my terrifying hairy front legs.’ That will be the explanation.”
Jas wasn’t interested in my scientosity because she was looking through the bathroom cabinet. “Your mum has got loads of anti-ageing creams, hasn’t she?”
“I know. It’s sad. Why doesn’t she save all that money and put it towards some new spectacles or a hat? Or a decent bra that can contain her gigantic basoomas.”
9:30 p.m.
Mum’s hair remover worked a treat; my legs were smoothy smooth. I was tempted to use a bit on my eyebrows but I remembered the last time I had shaved them and they had taken two weeks to grow back.
Clothes-wise we decided on a turtle-necked crop top (implies that I am mature for my years, on the brink of woman hood, etc…but doesn’t go as far as saying “I am desperate for a snog”). In the leg department it was the tight Capri trousers.
Jas said, “Tom is going away on work experience this term. I will be on my own for weeks. I’ll really miss him. Do you know, he said the other day that he…”
In a caring way I said, “Go home now, Jas, I have to get my beauty sleep.”
11:00 p.m.
In bed nice and early. I’ve barricaded my door so that Angus and Libby can’t get in.
Midnight
I am SO nervous…What if I have forgotten how to snog? What if all my snogging lessons go out of my mind at the last minute and we bump teeth?
1:00 a.m.
Or I lose my grip altogether and go to the same side with my head as he is going, and knock him out? Heeeeelp!!!!
What if I have one of those laughing fits that you can’t stop? You know, when you remember something…like for instance when Herr Kamyer took us on a school trip and when we arrived at the railway station he said, “Ach yes, here ve are!” and then opened the door on the wrong side of the train and fell out of the carriage.
Hahahahahahahaha…hahahahaa. You see, I’m doing it now. I’m laughing by myself in the middle of the night in my room.
OhmyGodohmyGodohmyGod. Hahahahahahahahaha.
Tuesday July 27th SG Day
Setting off to his house.
7:00 p.m.
It’s taken most of the day to achieve my natural make-up look. Just a subtle touch to enhance my natural beauty(!). I wanted the just-tumbled-out-of-bed look, so I