Nick suddenly coughed and wrinkled his nose. “Can you smell something?” he said. “I think the cleaner’s gone a bit mad with the air freshener this week!”
I could hardly keep a straight face as he went off to serve someone. As soon as he was out of earshot, Frankie elbowed me and we collapsed in giggles.
“Air freshener!” I snorted. “I knew that perfume smelled horrible!”
“Maybe Fliss should just ask for a can of that for Christmas instead!” Frankie giggled. “Save her mum a bit of dosh, anyway!”
Once we’d pulled ourselves together, I noticed the others had left the shop and were waiting outside for us. “We’d better go, I suppose…” I said reluctantly.
“Found the footy top you want, then?” Frankie asked.
“I think I’ve found something better,” I told her, pointing up at one of the videos where someone was going a 90-degree turn in mid-air, like it was the easiest thing in the world. “Snowboarding,” I said. “That’s what I want!”
You know what I’m like. Once I get one of my brilliant ideas in my head, it’s impossible for me to think about other stuff. Suddenly I really really really wanted to go snowboarding, more than anything else in the world!
I could just imagine myself whizzing down those slopes, a spray of snow flying up behind me, hat and sun-goggles on, arms out to keep my balance… WOW!! What a thought!
Lyndz had something else on her mind, though.
“Lunch time!” she said loudly as soon as we got out of the shop. “I’m STARVING!”
“Lyndz, you’re always starving,” Fliss said disapprovingly. Fliss’s mum thinks we should all live off carrot sticks and sunflower seeds – and sometimes I think Fliss agrees with her. Fliss even went on a diet once – I mean, D-U-M-B or what?!
“Maybe you’ve got worms, Lyndz,” I said to wind her up. “Dad says they make you feel hungry all the time.”
“Eeeeugh!” Rosie said, pretending to be sick. “Gross, Kenny!”
“I have not got worms!” Lyndz said hotly. “I just feel like a cheeseburger, that’s all.”
“Yeah, you look a bit like one, too,” I said, dodging out of her way as she tried to whack me with her bag.
“You’re in a good mood for someone who hates shopping,” Fliss said suspiciously. “What’s got into you?”
“I wish a cheeseburger would get into me,” Lyndz was moaning. “Like, now.”
“I’m on a mission, that’s what,” I said mysteriously.
“What, with that bloke in the shop?” Frankie said, winking at me. “They looked very cosy when I walked over there!”
“Get knotted!” I said crossly, but they’d all creased up giggling and Lyndz started making smoochy kissing noises in my ear.
“He was quite a babe actually, wasn’t he?” Fliss said thoughtfully. “Not as nice as Ryan Scott, though.”
“Well, now we know what Kenny’s type is like,” Lyndz said between giggles. “Action Man! What a perfect couple you two would make! Mwaaah!!”
“Shut up!” I said.
“Ooh, getting a bit hot and bothered, are we?” Rosie teased, elbowing me. “You must like him!”
“I don’t like him – well, he was OK, I suppose,” I said. For some reason I was blushing like anything. “It’s snowboarding I’m into now! That’s my mission!”
“Oh, here we go,” Fliss sighed. “I thought it was trampolining you wanted us all to get into?”
“That was last week,” I said. “But this sounds much more fun! Even better – it sounds much more dangerous! You have to have nerves of steel to try it, Nick said!”
Fliss did this big dramatic groan like she’d rather eat worms. As I told you, she’s a bit of a wuss sometimes, especially when it comes to my brilliant ideas. Nerves of steel? Nerves of cotton wool, more like!
In fact, me and Fliss are pretty different in a lot of ways. When we have a sleepover at hers, she always tries to get us to play hairdressers and girly stuff like that – and sometimes she won’t join in my ideas for games because she thinks they’re “too rough” or she doesn’t want to mess her hair up. Honestly! The only time I ever even think about my hair is when Mum is brushing out the tangles and I’m yelling with pain. Some people are weird, aren’t they?
“This way,” Lyndz said, shepherding us into the burger joint. “Unless you want me passing out from hunger, that is?”
I started telling them all about the things I’d seen on the snowboarding videos in the shop while we were queuing up to get some lunch.
“And then I saw this one bloke doing a jump like this, right,” I said, whizzing round quickly in the queue just like the guy on the video.
Uh-oh. Bad idea…
“Whoops!”
“Oh, look where you’re going, young lady!”
I’d just sent someone’s vanilla milkshake flying! It shot through the air and splattered all over the floor, spraying our feet with sticky white goo.
I bit my lip. Things like that are always happening to me – I don’t know why.
“Sorry,” I said to this lady who was looking furiously at me, and I scrabbled in my purse. “I’ll get you another one.”
“I should think so too!” she snorted. Stuck-up prune. Didn’t she know a snowboarder in the making when she saw one?
We finally got to sit down with our lunches and the others all started teasing me again about Nick. Rosie started doing her terrible Aussie accent, every time she said anything.
“I bet he likes hanging out in Summer Bay,”
she drawled. “Awww, surf’s up – chuck another shrimp on the barbie, willya?”
“You sound like Rolf Harris – go back to Animal Hospital, will you?” I growled. “And get yourself a brain operation while you’re there!”
“Ahh, fair dinkum, Sheila!” Frankie giggled.
“Tie me kangaroo down, sport!” Lyndz added, laughing so hard that milkshake shot straight out of her nose – both sides!!
“Eeeeurggghhh!” squealed Fliss, turning away hurriedly.
“Gross!” Frankie said, sticking her tongue out and laughing at the same time.
“Yeee-uck!” Rosie wailed.
“Can you tell what it is yet?” I yelled, doing my own Rolf impression.
By now we were all laughing hysterically, and were creased up over the tables. For a minute I even forgot all about the idea of going snowboarding. Not for very long, though…
Well, the next thing that happened was that I went home and found out that my parents had been abducted by aliens – and even better, the aliens had taken my gross sisters too!
Nah, not really. Just checking to see if you’re paying attention, or if you’re skimming through to get to the best bits. Sneaky, eh? Mind you, I’m the biggest skimmer in our class. Sometimes you just want to skip ahead to see what’s going to happen at the end, don’t you?