this really full social calendar. Her life is a whirl!
Sometimes I used to wish that my life could be like Lily’s. I used to wish it so much. Dad always said that I was his little stay-at-home while Lily was Miss Gad About. I always pretended that I thought it was funny and that I didn’t mind. I even pretended it to myself.
It is silly, pretending things to yourself.
One day near the start of the spring term Lily came home all excited because Sarah’s mum, who is something important to do with TV, had said that Sarah could invite some of her friends to visit the set of Riverside.
“She said we could go next Saturday, so is that all right, Mum? It is all right, isn’t it? Sarah’s mum will take us there and bring us back, so can I say I’ll go?”
“I don’t see why not,” said Mum. “Who else is going?”
“Just me and Sarah, and Francie and Hara. Debbie was going to, but she can’t.”
“So what about Violet?” said Mum.
There was a pause. I felt my cheeks go tingly. I did wish Mum wouldn’t!
“She didn’t invite Violet,” said Lily. “Just me. ‘Cos I’m Sarah’s friend.”
“I wouldn’t want to, anyway,” I said.
Well, I wouldn’t! Not with Lily and her crowd. They’re all loud and shrieking, just like Lily. And they don’t really like me, they think I’m freaky.
“Wouldn’t want to?” said Mum. “But you’re such a fan! Even more than Lily is!”
“But she hasn’t been invited” said Lily. “Not just anyone can go. You have to be asked.”
“Well, I’m sure Sarah would ask her if she knew what a fan she was. After all, she is your twin!”
Lily set her jaw in that way that she does, like it’s made out of cement, or something. I felt myself shrivel. Mum does this to me, sometimes. She tries to push me in where I’m not wanted. It gets Lily so mad! And it gets me all hot and embarrassed.
“Mum, it’s all right,” I said. “I’ve got to help you in the shop.”
“You haven’t got to help me in the shop,” said Mum. “I’m very grateful when you do, but it seems a shame to miss out on other things. A visit to Riverside! And if Debbie can’t go —”
“That isn’t any reason for her to come.”
Mum said, “Lily!”
“Well, it isn’t,” muttered Lilly. “People don’t have to invite her just ‘cos they’ve invited me. Just ‘cos we came out the same egg doesn’t mean we have to do everything together all the time!”
“You don’t do anything together any of the time,” said Mum. “I just thought, this once —”
“But I don’t want to go!” I snatched up Horatio and buried my face in his fur. “Mm… yum yum,” I mumbled, nibbling at him with my lips.
“Stinking swizzlesticks, you’re disgusting!” said Lily.
She could talk! I’ve seen her doing things that are far more disgusting than chumbling in Horatio’s fur. I’ve seen her chewing her toenails. That is gross!
Later that day I heard Mum and Dad discussing me. They were in the kitchen and didn’t know I was there. Well, I wasn’t actually there, exactly. I mean, I wasn’t sitting in a cupboard or anything. What it was, I was outside the door, about to go in, when I heard Mum say “too much in Lily’s shadow” and I immediately froze.
I heard Mum say about Lily going off with her friends, and me not going anywhere. Then Dad said, “She’s my little shrinking violet,” and Mum said, “But she ought to have friends!” And then a tap started running, and the sound got blotted out, and next thing I heard was Dad saying something about chat rooms.
“That way, she could meet someone with her own interests… that’s what she needs! Someone to share her interests with.”
“Not in a chat room,” said Mum.
Dad said, “Oh, come on! We’d monitor her.”
‘No,” said Mum. “No way!”
She’d read this horror story just a few days ago about a young girl being picked up (in a chat room) by this middle-aged man pretending to be a fifteen-year-old boy. Lily had said boastfully that that could never happen to her. She’d soon suss him out! But Mum was now convinced that all chat rooms were full of middle-aged men in mackintoshes (I don’t know why she thought they were in mackintoshes), all looking for young girls and pretending to be fifteen years old. She had forbidden Lily to go anywhere near one.
She said to Dad, “If I’m not letting Lily visit one, I’m certainly not letting Violet!”
I wondered if this meant that Mum cared more about me than she did about Lily, or whether it simply meant she thought that I was more stupid than Lily and more likely to be deceived by the men in mackintoshes.
Probably she thought that I was more stupid, although in fact it is Lily who talks to strangers, not me. Lily talks to people everywhere she goes. In the supermarket, in buses, on trains. She just strikes up these conversations. I would be too shy! I was really relieved when Mum stood up to Dad and said no way. I didn’t want to visit any chat rooms! It would be too much like actually meeting people; I would get tongue-tied and not know what to say.
But then Mum had an even worse idea. Worse even than Dad’s!
“Maybe we could find some sort of club.”
I thought, No! Please! We’d already tried a club. An after-school club. I’d hated it! Lily had immediately made about twenty new friends and I’d just sat in the corner like a droopy pot plant waiting for Mum and Dad to come and pick us up.
“Maybe on her own,” said Mum, “without Lily …”
It is true that I tend to get a bit crushed by Lily. She is so loud, and so bouncy! She bursts through doors like she’s jet-propelled.
And then it is all shrieking and screeching and stinking swizzlesticks. (Her favourite expression for this term.) It is very difficult, when you are a shrinking kind of person, to have a twin that is so noisy. Everyone expects you to be the same.
Actually, it’s funny, but no one ever expects Lily to be like me. They all expect me to be like Lily. And I can’t be! I’ve tried. It just doesn’t work. Maybe if I was on my own, people wouldn’t think it so peculiar if I was a bit quiet. But I still didn’t want to join any clubs!
I never got to hear what Dad thought of Mum’s suggestion ‘cos just as he started to say something there was this loud CRASH, followed by a series of thuds and bangs, like the house was collapsing. All it was, was Lily, coming out of her bedroom and hurtling down the stairs. She always hurtles down the stairs. Dad asked her the other day if wild elephants were after her.
“Mum!” She went shrieking past me, into the kitchen. “I’ve been trying to find something to wear on Saturday and I can’t! I haven’t got anything! Mum, I need something new! I’ve got to have something new! ‘Cos it’s Riverside, Mum. There might be actors! I’ve got to, Mum!”
She goes on like this all the time. Like, if she’s already been seen wearing something, she can’t possibly be seen in it again. To be seen in it again would be death. It’s what happens when you lead