in the glove compartment. They’ll help.”
“She doesn’t usually get sick in front,” carolled Annie. “The worst things are those things at fairgrounds that go round and round.”
Harriet looked puzzled. “Roundabouts?”
“No, those things where you stick to the side.”
“Oh! You mean, like a centrifuge.”
“Yes. She gets really sick in those!”
“Poor Megan!” Harriet smiled at me as she started the car. “You’re obviously like me, you have a delicate stomach.”
“You could write a story about someone like that.” Annie draped herself, eagerly, over the back of Harriet’s seat. “Someone who throws up everywhere she goes … you could call it Sickly Susan!”
“Well, it’s an idea,” said Harriet. “I’ll certainly bear it in mind.”
She was only being polite; she never used other people’s ideas. I knew that, from my reading. She’d said she had “a resistance” to them. I felt like telling Annie to just be quiet. She’d done nothing but burble ever since Harriet had met us! But something had happened to my tongue; it was like a great wodge of foam rubber in my mouth. I couldn’t talk! It was really annoying. Although I am not as bubbly and up-front as Annie, I am not usually shy; but when you are in the presence of greatness it is all too easy to just shrivel. Yet I had so many things I wanted to say! So many questions I wanted to ask! Anyone would have thought it was Annie who was the number-one fan rather than me.
“So how long have you been reading my books?” said Harriet.
I whispered, “Since I was about … s-seven.”
“She’s read them all!” crowed Annie.
“I haven’t read them all,” I said.
“Most of them!”
“Have you read this one?” said Harriet. She pointed at her old battered copy of Victoria Plum.
“Yes!” I found it a bit easier, now that we were talking about books. “It’s one of my favourites, ’cos Victoria’s always having bad hair days. I like the bit where she tries to make it curly and she goes to bed in rollers and says it’s like sleeping on a hedgehog!”
“And then she goes to school,” – Annie just couldn’t resist joining in – “and is forced to play hockey, ugh, yuck! And it rains, and all the curls come out!”
“And she says how for a little while she’d looked like a bubble bath but now she’s gone back to being a limp dish mop, and she’s just so ashamed she runs away and hides in the loo!”
“We used to think that maybe you had hair like a limp dish mop,” said Annie. “But you haven’t! You’ve got nice hair.”
Harriet’s hair was beautifully thick and curly – but it was going grey. Harriet was going grey! I felt sad about that, though I knew, of course, she couldn’t still look the same as she had fifteen years ago. She was wearing glasses, too. Just for a moment I wished that I could have met her when she was young; but then I thought that that was a very ageist thing to think, and very ungrateful. After all, she was still Harriet. She was still writing wonderful, marvellous books! And she did look warm and friendly; just a bit … mumsy. But that was quite comforting, in a way. If she had been young and glamorous I would probably have been struck dumb for all eternity.
Rather timidly, I said, “How did you manage to know what it’s like, having limp hair?”
“Megan’s got limp hair,” said Annie. “She’s always going on about it.”
“Like Victoria,” I said. “I really love the way you understand how people feel. Like having bad hair, or spots, or being plump, or not having any boobs. Like Sugar Mouse. I don’t know how you do it!”
“Well … there is such a thing as imagination,” said Harriet. “Very important, if you want to be a writer!”
“Megan wants to be a writer,” said Annie.
“In that case,” said Harriet, “I very much hope that you will be. Do you have a copy of this one, by the way?”
“She’s got all of them,” said Annie.
“I haven’t got all of them.” Annie did exaggerate so!
“You’ve got a whole shelf full.”
“I’ve got thirty-four,” I said.
“Good heavens!” Harriet laughed. “You are a fan, aren’t you?”
I nodded, bashfully. “Victoria Plum was one of the first ones I had.”
“And I bet it’s in better condition than this! I’m afraid this one’s been read to bits.”
I have read my copy over and over, but I do try to look after my books and keep them nice. I was only young when I ruined Candyfloss. Now that I’m older I wouldn’t ever turn down the corners of pages or stand mugs of hot chocolate on them or leave them out in the rain. Poor Victoria Plum looked as if all those things had happened to her. I picked her up, and opened her at the title page. Across the top someone had written, “For Jan, with all my love, Mummy”. I wondered who Jan was, and why she didn’t take better care of her books. Maybe she was Harriet’s niece and knew that she could always ask for new ones. It made me feel quite jealous. Imagine having a famous writer as your aunt!
“Hey, look, Megs.” Annie lunged forward and poked a finger at me. “Isn’t that where we went when we visited your gran?”
Annie had come with me a couple of times, to visit Gran. Mum had thought she would be company for me, but then she had said we couldn’t behave ourselves properly, and made too much noise, and upset the old people, so now I had to go on my own.
“Megan’s gran is in a home,” said Annie. “She has Oldheimer’s.”
“Alzheimer’s,” I said.
“Oh, dear! That must be very upsetting,” said Harriet.
I said, “Yes, it is, ’cos me and Gran used to be best friends. Now she doesn’t even know me … like Clover’s gran, in Daisy & Clover. I cried when I read the bit where Clover wants to burst into tears. That’s just how I feel, when I see Gran … you always seem to be writing about how I feel! Like when Clover says about remembering all the things that she and her gran used to do together—”
“That was me,” said Harriet, “remembering my gran! She had Alzheimer’s, too. That’s what made me want to write about it.”
“Except that … Clover’s gran doesn’t actually have
