I’d just said, because two minutes later Molly came thundering up the stairs and stuck her head round the door. “Emma’s got to come home tonight,” she said with a great big silly grin on her face. “Jade’s house has been burgled, and Emma can’t stay after all!”
Molly looked round Emma’s room at all the piled up furniture. “Ha! Looks like you’ll be in big trouble now!” And she flounced out.
Emma coming home? We stared at each other.
Fliss put on her drama queen face. “I knew it!” she said, and she waved her arms. “It’s because it’s Friday 13th! Everything’s bound to go wrong!”
“I’m going to ask Mum if it’s true,” I said, once I’d got over the shock. “The monster might have made it up – it’s just the low-down kind of trick she likes to play.”
As it turned out it was true – but it wasn’t quite as bad as Molly had made it sound. Emma couldn’t stay the night, but she and Jade had gone out to have a pizza, and Dad was going to collect her on the way back from his meeting.
“It’s going to be quite late, so Emma may as well sleep in your room with Molly tonight,” Mum said.
I heaved a huge sigh of relief – inside. Outside I just nodded. “OK,” I said.
Mum gave me a suspicious sort of look. “I hope you haven’t been making a mess up there,” she said. “Molly says you’ve been moving furniture.”
“We only moved things a little,” I said. “And we do that in my room.”
“Fine.” Mum went on stirring something in a saucepan. “Molly and I are eating with Dad, so you lot can do your feasting on green cake afterwards in peace.”
“Thanks, Mum, you’re the best,” I said, and gave her a hug.
I was going back up the stairs when I heard Dad coming in. I gave a quick wave over the banisters, and then shot back into Emma’s room to tell the others not to panic – yet!
“We can sort the room out in the morning,” I said.
Fliss was peering out of the window. “I’m sure I heard a strange noise,” she said. “Do you think there’s someone down there?” She was looking twitchy again.
“I expect it’s Dad,” I said. “He’s just come home.”
“Oh,” Fliss said, but she didn’t sound very convinced.
“Let’s go and see!” Frankie said, and she made a face at me behind Fliss’s back, and mouthed, “Blood trail!”
“Oh no!” Fliss squeaked. “We ought to stay inside!”
“It’ll be OK with all of us,” Lyndz said, and she grinned. “What burglar would take on the Sleepover Club?”
Even Fliss smiled a little. “I still don’t think we shou—” she began, but she didn’t sound so certain.
“Come on!” Lyndz grabbed her hand. “We can make sure it’s all clear down there while it’s still light! We’ll check out the bushes!”
“Only a mini burglar could hide in your garden,” Rosie said.
“That’s it!” I said. “The burglar’s only sixty centimetres tall – and that’s why no one’s found him yet!”
We were halfway down the stairs when Frankie suddenly stopped. “Sssh!” she said. “We sound like a herd of elephants! From now on we’ve got to go on tiptoe!”
“Tippytoe! Tippytoe! Hunting burglars! Here we go!” giggled Lyndz, and we got in a line and tiptoed down the rest of the stairs and out of the front door. (We made sure we left it on the latch this time. Frankie and I weren’t taking any more chances!)
It was beginning to get dark as we crept round the side of the house. Frankie was in front, then me, then Lyndz, then Rosie, and then Fliss.
“Tippytoe! Tippytoe! Tippytoe!” sang Lyndz, and we all tiptoed in time down the path, until—
“Look!” Frankie did her mega-thrill, over-the-top acting voice and stopped dead on the path.
We all crashed into each other, and somehow Fliss ended up at the front – so she saw the trail of blood before Lyndz or Rosie. And she screamed…
I think the rest of us were as frightened by Fliss’s scream as she was frightened by the blood. I know my heart gave a huge walloping leap inside my chest, and I heard Lyndz gasp beside me. When someone really truly screams for real, it’s not a nice noise at all – it’s really scary! And then Fliss turned and she ran back into the house, and of course we all tore after her.
If it had been me I think I’d have headed straight for the grown-ups, but Fliss didn’t – luckily for us. She zoomed up to Emma’s room, and when we got there she was shaking all over and trying to stuff her pyjamas into her bag.
“Fliss, what are you doing?” I asked.
She looked up, and her face was a horrible colour – completely grey-green. “I want to go home,” she said. “I saw blood all over your path! I want my mum! I’m scared!”
I looked at Frankie, and Frankie looked at me. “I’m really sorry, Fliss,” I said. “It wasn’t blood – it was just raspberry juice from Frankie’s pudding.”
“It melted when we were shut outside,” Frankie said. “And it seemed a pity to waste it all – so we trailed it round the path.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t blood?” Fliss still looked like a frightened rabbit, but at least she’d stopped shaking. She’d stopped trying to pack her pyjamas, too.
I suddenly remembered what Dad had told me about people who’d had a terrible fright. You should keep them warm, and if there’s no chance of them having any kind of internal injury, you should give them a warm drink.
“Hang on!” I said. “Frankie, put my duvet round Fliss!” and I rushed off downstairs.
Molly and Mum were just finishing eating, and Dad had made a pot of tea. Just the thing!
“Can I take a cup of tea up to Fliss?” I said. “She’s – she’s a bit cold.”
“I thought I heard you go outside,” Mum said. “Don’t go out again, though – it’s getting dark now.”
I wondered why they hadn’t heard Fliss scream. The noise was still ringing inside my head. Probably Molly had been bleating on about some boring thing she was doing at school – or maybe they thought it was on the TV. I could hear it mumbling away in the sitting room.
I poured out the tea, shoved in a big spoonful of sugar, and got out of the door as fast as I could before anyone asked me any awkward questions.
Upstairs, Fliss was much better. She was wrapped up in my duvet, and Lyndz was fussing round her in just the way Fliss likes best. She drank the tea, and her face went back to its normal colour.
“It’s a good thing we didn’t have time to make a body!” Frankie said cheerfully. “Fliss would have had a hundred fits then!”
“Mum says I’m very sensitive,” Fliss said, sounding really pleased about it. Then she shivered again. “The blood did look real, though!”
“I never got a chance to see it properly,” Rosie said in a disappointed voice, and that made us all laugh.
There was a knock on the door. “Kitchen’s clear!” Dad said, and we heard him stomping off into my parent’s room. I guessed he was going