that stuff about her being jolly and Dad being sweet and me being perfectly happy… all yuck!”
We stared at her, perplexed.
“Has someone upset you, or something?” said Skye.
“Mum, if you must know!”
“Your mum?” What could she have done? Me and Skye adore Jem’s mum. She is large and jolly, and she does laugh a lot. She’s fun!
“What’s she done?” said Skye.
“Just gone and ruined my entire life is all!”
Uh-oh! Me and Skye looked at each other. I pulled a face: Skye rolled her eyes. It is hard, sometimes, to take Jem seriously, especially when she goes into drama queen mode. But we are her friends and she was obviously desperate to offload. Now that the cork was out of the bottle, there was no stopping her. Her mum was impossible! She didn’t understand her, she didn’t even try to understand her. And her dad just sat on the fence. He never stood up for her! He never even stood up for himself.
“He just agrees with everything Mum says! It doesn’t matter what it is, she’s the boss and he just goes along with it. Like ask your mum and what does your mum say? and—”
“And what does she say?” said Skye.
“She says no! So Dad says no!”
“Says no to what? I’m afraid,” said Skye, “you are not making any sense. Try starting at the beginning,” she said kindly, “then perhaps we’ll know what you’re talking about.”
“Right.” Jem heaved a great quivering sigh and clutched at her hair with both hands. I wondered if the top of her skull was coming off again. “There’s this girl in my road? Liliana? She’s, like, thirteen?”
We nodded, solemnly.
“Well, she’s joined this model agency, OK? And she’s already got her first job, modelling clothes for a catalogue, and they’re paying her, like, a fortune? So she says why don’t I enrol, cos they’re really looking for kids like me, sort of… ” Jem waved a hand.
“Pretty,” I said. I don’t mind admitting that Jem is pretty.
“Yes. Well, sort of. But, like, good in front of a camera. You know?”
Jem is good in front of a camera. It’s why she loves being photographed. Me and Skye just freeze, but Jem really plays to it.
“So anyway,” she said, “I asked Mum if I could sign up, I begged her to let me. I pleaded with her! I told her I would so like to be a model, cos I feel it’s something I could really do. You know?”
“I thought you wanted to be a make-up artist,” said Skye.
“There’s nothing to stop me being both! I could be a model and a make-up artist. This girl, Liliana? She says it’s so cool! She’s even got her own portfolio.”
I said, “What’s a portfolio?”
“It’s like this collection of photos? Like head-and-shoulders and full-length… all different. But big ones! Not just titchy little things. You get them when you join the agency.”
“What, for free?”
“Well… sort of. You don’t have to pay them till you start earning money. But Liliana’s already earning money! Her mum’s putting it in the building society for her, for when she’s older. If I did that, it would help me go to college to study make-up and stuff. I told Mum, I said it would mean she and Dad wouldn’t have to pay anything, but she wouldn’t listen. She’s just so… stodgy. And fat! She’s fat. That’s why she won’t let me do it! She doesn’t approve of people being models. She thinks they’re too thin. She hates people that are thin! She says what I do when I leave school is up to me, but she’s not having me starving myself to a size zero while I’m in her care. Like I would! She’s just being totally stupid. And all Dad says is, it’s up to your mum. It’s all he ever says!”
On she went; on and on. We did our best to console her. I made soothing noises and Skye made what I think were supposed to be helpful suggestions such as, “Maybe if she sees you’re really serious your mum will change her mind,” and, “Maybe you should speak to your dad and tell him how much it means to you.” So Skye! But Jem had gone into tragic mode. We obviously didn’t understand: her life had been blighted! Totally blighted! This other girl, Liliana, was going to get rich and famous while Jem would be left behind to moulder. All because of her mum!
I did sort of feel sympathetic, cos I know what’s it’s like to desperately want to do something and not be allowed to. Like one time when I really really really wanted to try hang gliding and Mum said, “At your age? You must be joking!” and Dad said, not on your life. I sulked for a while, like about a day or two, but then something else turned up and I forgot about it. I could see that not being allowed to join a modelling agency was probably more frustrating for Jem than me not being allowed to go hang gliding, since hang gliding wasn’t exactly going to turn into a full-time career. Jem really could be a model. Well, a mini model. As Skye somewhat tactlessly pointed out, she wasn’t ever likely to grow tall enough to be a proper one.
I groaned. That was absolutely the wrong thing to say. That just got her going even more. She kept at it all the rest of the day. All through the lunch hour, all through the afternoon break, all the way home. It’s funny how some people can’t ever let a subject drop.
I wondered, as we all peeled off in our different directions, what Mum would say if I told her I wanted to do modelling. Not that I did, I am just like totally the wrong shape, being sort of… square, I suppose is the word. But I thought I would put it to her, just out of interest. See if she reacted the same way as Jem’s mum. If she did, then maybe it would make Jem feel a bit better and not so down on poor Mrs McClusky. It was really mean of her to call her mum fat!
I started to yell “Mu-u-um” as soon as I let myself in, but then I saw that the door of the front room was closed which meant Mum had someone in there so I went through to the kitchen to find that Dad was home. He was sitting at the kitchen table with Angel, eating pizza. Well, Dad was eating pizza; Angel was nibbling on a lettuce leaf. I was glad he was there as there was something I’d been meaning to ask him. It was a pity about Angel, but as she lives in the same house it is not always easy to avoid her.
“Dad,” I said.
Dad said, “Mm?”
“Can you tell me something?”
“Don’t know till you ask.”
“If you were using an iron,” I said, “and all of a sudden there was a power s—”
“Not again!” shouted Angel. “Don’t you ever give up?”
She looked like she might be going to turn violent.
“Well, all right, then,” I said. “What about the garden shed? You don’t th—”
Angel screamed. A short, sharp, mad sort of scream.
“Do you mind?” I said. “I’m trying
