Pandora’s Box

ShelleyPixie says: Only if you win the million. LOL.

He’s joking, by the way. He knows I’m on this time-limit thing. He knows I’m not going to last all that long. I told him about all that at the beginning. He’s gone quiet now. He’s probably talking to three girls at once. He’s asking them all to marry him. Guys who look like him don’t lack for girlfriends. Oh well. Where’s SugarShuli?

ShelleyPixie says: Still there?

SugarShuli says: Still here. Where’d you go?

ShelleyPixie says: Krok just came on. You wont believe it. He’s been chosen as a finalist on Beat the Bank.

Surinda watches this every Saturday evening. It’s what brought us together in the first place. She’s hooked on it, like me.

SugarShuli says: He never is!

ShelleyPixie says: It’s true.

SugarShuli says: When will he know? OMG. Could he get us tickets to be in the audience do you think?

That’s a thought that hadn’t occurred to me.

ShelleyPixie says: Might do. If he gets in. Would you even be allowed to come? Don’t know if Mum would take us. Actually I don’t even want my mum to take us. Mum always has to be in on everything. I want to do this without her. Maybe Surinda could help me?

SugarShuli says: I’ll tell my parents it’s a school project. I’ll come if your mum can take us.

ShelleyPixie says: No, Mum can’t do it. Can yours? What about we two go alone?

Krok’s back.

Krok says: Sorry, Pixie. Phone call interrupted there. I’m supposed to be working at the moment too.

ShelleyPixie says: Who wants to hire DVDs at this time in the morning?

Krok says: You’d be surprised. Never mind the shop, though, Pix. I’ve got a stint at the recording studio this afternoon.

ShelleyPixie says: Cool. Hope they give you a job.

Krok says: It’s all good experience. They like me helping out. Maybe they’ll hire me eventually!

ShelleyPixie says: They should.

SugarShuli says: Hey, Krok, I’m Surinda.

Hell, where did SHE come from?

ShelleyPixie says: Private conversation, SugarShuli.

I’m going to kill her.

SugarShuli says: Sorry. Good luck with the Beat the Bank thing, man.

Krok says: Thanks.

Krok says: Who’s that?

ShelleyPixie says: Just a friend who wants to come with me when you send me tickets to see the Beat the Bank being recorded.

Krok says: Will do. Got to go now, Pixie.

ShelleyPixie says: Speak soon?

Krok says: Very soon. Bye bye, sweetie.

He’s gone.

SugarShuli says: He’s cute, Shell.

ShelleyPixie says: You’ve been looking in my photos file?

SugarShuli says: Why not? You can look in mine.

ShelleyPixie says: You’ve got nothing in there. Not even Jallal.

SugarShuli says: Are you sure your mum can’t take us? Ask her again.

ShelleyPixie says: Yep, okay, speak later.

Silly cow. She could help me get there. We could take the train.

I shouldn’t complain I suppose. At least Surinda from my form class still keeps in contact with me, which is more than Michelle and the others have done since I stopped going to school. They say they’re really busy. I know some of them are seeing boys and the ones who aren’t are just hanging out hoping to see some boys or else they’re studying. I don’t know why I don’t want to hang out with them any more. I just don’t see the point. Sometimes I just wish I didn’t think so much. Life would be a lot easier.

If Krok sends us the tickets I think I’ll have to make an excuse. I don’t even want him to have a picture of me, much less actually see me in real life. I couldn’t cope with that. It’s not going to happen. I’m not even going to ask Mum so Surinda can forget all about that. I know what she’s like, though, she won’t let it go now.

I wish I’d never told her.

5 Rachel (#ulink_ad1e03e0-07a8-51b5-b5a9-e7c043a3b7c1)

‘Coo-eee?’ Annie-Jo’s special-edition turquoise Mazda Berkeley MXS just pulled up in the drive. I can hear her Josh and my Daniel clambering out, chasing after one another, laughing. They’ll be round the back in a minute, dark curls crashing against short blond spikes, racing up the new treehouse my old friend Sol has installed in the oak tree for Daniel.

My hands are deep in the earth. I’ve been digging a trench so I can insert a palisade of sticks like a little fort; somewhere we can put Daniel’s tortoise Hattie so she won’t be able to escape. It’s seven thirty and the last rays of the sun are beginning to slope over the rooftops, bright yellow and a bit chilly now, the sky just getting shaded in with patches of grey.

‘You’re back early?’ I scramble to my feet, wiping earthy hands behind my back before hugging my old friend. She is looking far too nice for me to get soil all over her. I take her in a little wistfully: ‘You’ve been out celebrating something today?’ She’s dressed in an elegant skirt and a soft white blouse and she looks…radiant somehow. The thought that she might be pregnant again crosses my mind. She is five years younger than me; it is still possible, after all. Her new husband Bryan has adopted her two but they don’t have any children between them. Not yet.

‘Oh no!’ she laughs dismissively ‘Just been running around town doing errands, you know the sort of thing. Nothing special. We’re going to be “lunching” next week, though. Would you like to come? Say you will. My treat.’ For a moment she smiles at me and I catch a glimpse of the old Annie-Jo; the one who would have come to visit me wearing torn jeans and a faded T-shirt with baby-food stains still on it. That Annie-Jo would have flopped down beside me on the grass and we’d have finished off Hattie’s palisade of sticks together in no time. This Annie-Jo looks like she’s just had her nails done. She isn’t going to be up for any digging.

‘See what day you’re going. I might come. I’d like to.’ I do want to have lunch with Annie-Jo, but probably not with all her new friends. We’d see. ‘I suppose we’d better get you inside then. I can’t have you out here drinking tea in your finery.’

‘Where’s that old garden bench we used to sit on?’ She looks around, frowning.

‘I threw that away two years ago, Annie-Jo!’ I laugh at her, but it surely can’t have been two years since she last came and sat out in the garden with me? When our children were little we practically used to live in this garden. Her daughter Michelle is just a month older than Shelley, and she had Josh pretty much around the same time I had Daniel. In those days Annie-Jo was a single mum, struggling on her own in a bedsit. Now she’s married to Bryan and they live in what I can only describe as a mansion in the better half of town. How times change!