Strawberry Crush. Jean Ure

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      “What’s she up to?” she said.

      “Oh!” I waved a hand. “I dunno. She thought he might give us a lift again.”

      Linzi regarded Maya in silence for a few seconds. Maya was standing with her nose pressed against the glass. She looked like a child wistfully gazing into a toyshop. Linzi shook her head.

      “Pathetic,” she said.

      I bristled at that. It’s hardly Maya’s fault if she has a mum who is permanently anxious and a dad who is always rushing off in all directions, leaving them to cope without him. It would be enough, I should think, to make anyone pathetic.

      “I don’t know how you put up with her,” said Linzi.

      “She’s my cousin,” I said.

      Lots of my friends wonder how I manage – on the whole! – to be patient with Maya; but they are my friends. Friends have the right to ask that sort of question. Plus they understand when I tell them about Mum and Auntie Megs being twins and me feeling the need to look out for Maya. Linzi Baxter was not my friend and I had no intention of explaining myself to her.

      “Why did he give you a lift, anyway?” she said.

      The cheek of it! What business was it of hers? I was still trying to think of a suitably crushing response when Maya suddenly decided to join in the conversation. She sank down into the seat in front of us and draped herself over the back, her eyes shining.

      “He rescued me,” she said. “I came off my bike, and he rescued me! He was soooo sweet. He picked me up and drove us home and then he carried me into the house cos I couldn’t walk. If Jake hadn’t been there I don’t know what we’d have done. We might have had to call an ambulance! Mightn’t we?”

      I shrugged. I did wish Maya hadn’t felt the need to tell everything to Linzi. She obviously wasn’t impressed. She is not the sort of girl to be impressed. She gave Maya this long unblinking stare then said, “Yeah. Right.”

      Even then Maya didn’t get the message. Eagerly she said, “Lots of boys wouldn’t have bothered. I don’t know why Jake did! Just cos he’s a really nice young man, my mum says.”

      “You don’t think p’raps he fancies you?” said Linzi.

      She was being sarcastic. That anyone as cool as Jake Harper could possibly fancy a Year Eight nobody, especially one as small and skinny as Maya, obviously struck her as absurd. I guess it did me, too. To be honest, I hadn’t even considered it. It was only Auntie Megs being his mum’s cleaning lady that had made him stop. Cos he knew who Maya was, that was all. Nothing to do with him fancying her.

      “Omigod,” said Linzi, as Maya’s face turned a bright happy scarlet, “she actually thinks he does!”

      Maya at once protested that of course she didn’t. “He just happened to be there!”

      That was what she said; but I could tell she was seriously taken with the idea. Trust Linzi! This was going to make matters a whole lot worse. All we needed was Maya having fantasies that Jake had as much of a crush on her as she had on him.

      People like Linzi are such a menace. And I was stuck with her all the way to school! It’s not really that long a walk from where we get off the bus; it just seemed that it was, with Linzi droning on non-stop in my ear. All about boys. Boys that fancied her, boys that wanted to go out with her. Boys that she might possibly go out with, boys she wouldn’t touch with a barge pole. Nothing but boys, boys, boys the whole length of Sheepcote Road! They are her main topic of conversation. Practically her only topic of conversation. If conversation it could be called, which strictly speaking it couldn’t since I was hardly able to get a word in edgeways. Not that I tried very hard. Mostly I just tuned out, cos who’s interested in hearing about Linzi Baxter and her boring stupid love life? Not me!

      Once through the school gates, thank goodness, we parted company. In spite of being in the same class, Linzi and I don’t really have much to do with each other. Nor, for that matter, do me and Maya. I have my friends, Maya has hers. She’d gone waltzing off to join a couple of them as soon as we’d got off the bus, leaving me on my own to suffer permanent brain damage from Linzi and her loudmouth wittering.

      Fortunately on the way home that afternoon I was spared the earbashing on account of Linzi having to stay behind for something or other. All the same, I told Maya that in future, until Auntie Megs calmed down and we could use our bikes again, we were going to leave home fifteen minutes earlier. Maya immediately protested.

      “I can’t! I’ll never be ready in time.”

      I said, “Well, you’d better be or I’ll go without you.”

      There wasn’t any reason I shouldn’t go without her. It was only habit that kept us together.

      “We’ll need to be here by at least a quarter to eight.”

      “But why?” wailed Maya. “We got to school in plenty of time! What d’you want us to leave earlier for?”

      “You can do what you like,” I said. “I just don’t want to get stuck with Linzi again.”

      “Oh,” said Maya. Her face cleared. “Is that all?”

      I said, “Yes. Why?” She didn’t say anything to that, but her cheeks had gone a bright give-away pink. I knew what she’d been thinking. I can read her like a book! She’d thought I was trying to stop her cadging a lift from Jake. Like it was some jealous ploy on my part to come between them.

      “Well, anyway,” I said, “it’s up to you. Either we go early or I’ll use my bike.”

      Maya heaved a sigh. “Oh, all right! If I have to. But if I’m doing something for you I think you ought to do something for me.”

      I was immediately suspicious. I said, “Like what?”

      “I want us to join the Music Club!”

      “The Music Club?”

      Why on earth would she want to join the Music Club? She isn’t in the least bit musical! Nor am I, to be honest. I once tried out for the junior choir, but Mrs Morgan said I wasn’t quite ready for it. According to Mum she was just being kind. “What she really meant was, you have a voice like a screech owl!”

      Well, and Maya’s not much better. Worse if anything. She sings flat.

      I reminded her of this, but she said just because she couldn’t sing didn’t mean she couldn’t learn how to appreciate good music.

      “You mean like classical?”

      “Anything,” said Maya.

      “Classical’s all they listen to,” I said. “Beethoven and stuff. It’s really boring! Emily Armstrong goes.”

      Emily is this girl in our class that is really sweet but has these totally weird tastes in practically everything. She loves poetry. She adores paintings. She worships Shakespeare. She goes to the opera. If it was Linzi you’d know she was just showing off; with СКАЧАТЬ