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There was the poem that Cain had pinned to the tree with a knife.
Written in thick untidy writing.
Like he’d got a twig and dipped it in ink.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
And underneath:
I know tha likes this sort of thing
See thee later.
Did it mean he knew I’d liked kissing him?
Did he even know we’d got to Number 6 on my Lulu-Luuuve List?
No, he couldn’t know that because I’ve just made it up.
I could do with some proper girl company. Thank goodness I’ll see the Tree Sisters tomorrow.
Hurray!! The Tree Sisters together again. Vaisey, Flossie, Jo and me. We used to be five, but Honey, dear lovely Honey, has gone to Hollywood. She’s been, what do you call it? Talent-spotted by an American entrepreneur.
Hey, I’ve just thought of what you’d call it if the owlets had been spotted by an American entrepreneur looking for talent in the bird world.
Talon-spotted!!!!
They’d be talon-spotted!
I’m going to write that down in my diary.
I may turn out to be a comedy genius.
CHAPTER 4 (#ulink_ea9e26f5-d35e-5d9a-8500-9d9ff4398e23)
Snogs ahoy! (#ulink_ea9e26f5-d35e-5d9a-8500-9d9ff4398e23)
On Monday morning, I struggled against the wind walking over the bridge to Dother Hall. I’m early so I’ll go and stash my stuff in my locker then find the Tree Sisters. If Bob hasn’t burned the lockers as fuel. I hope the money thing is better than it was last term. Or at least we’ve still got a roof. I dread to think what would have happened if Honey’s manager hadn’t come up trumps with cash to keep Dother Hall going.
I miss Honey. She is sooo Honeyish.
And knows such a lot about boys.
Maybe she’ll come back and visit. Or we could visit her!
Yarooo, I feel like a real performing artist. I am one of an elite gang of ‘entertainers’ our sole purpose in life is to give give give of ourselves.
My only worry is that I’m not sure I’ve anything to give.
The rest of the Tree Sisters have special talents. Vaisey can sing and dance and act and Jo can sing and act and Flossie can sing and act and she’s really great at art. And Honey is so good at everything that she’s been taken to Hollywood to be in films, and then there’s me.
Ms Fox (“Just call me Fox. Blaise Fox”) our dance tutor believes in me. She thinks I have my own very special quality. Well, what she actually said was “Watching you perform is like watching someone set fire to their own pants. Strangely riveting.”
So that’s good, isn’t it?
Isn’t it?
Dr Lightowler has hated me ever since I accidentally flew off my bicycle and destroyed the backstage area during my Sugar Plum Bikey ballet. Oh and because I did spontaneous Irish dancing in her class. When we were doing a tragic improvisation of the Brontë sisters dying of consumption.
And maybe because I pretend she actually IS an owl.
But this term I’m going to show her and everyone else that I am Tallulah Casey, superstar in the making. Bleeding feet at the ready.
Walking along the woodland path I passed the sign ‘Woolfe Academy for Boys’.
That’s where Charlie goes.
Oh, Charlie. I hope I can be friends with him. The last thing he said to me was, “See you next term, gorgeous.” And he said I was a really good kisser.
It’s just that he’s got a girlfriend.
I can be grown up though. You know, so what if he’s got a girlfriend?
Girls and boys can be mates.
We can be mates.
I might even be mates with his girlfriend. That’s how matey I can be.
I don’t mind tiny people. I like them.
I turned the next corner and saw Dother Hall. With its towering ramparts and cock-eyed spiralling chimneys. High up on the roof, if it wasn’t sleeting, you could see all the way to Grimbottom. And past the woods to the grey brick walls and mullioned windows of Woolfe Academy.
The place where naughty boys were sent. Bad boys like our friends Charlie, Phil, Jack and Ben.
Naughty boys who are watched over by a stern and strict one-legged headmaster.
A man that Charlie says demands and gets their full respect.
A man that he and Phil call ‘Hoppy’.
Which reminds me, Phil, Jo’s boyfriend, is officially back. After serving his time at Woolfe, he was sent off to ordinary school. But it was a short stay because he dug a secret tunnel under the rugby pitch. He was going to unexpectedly pop his head up during a match for a laugh. But sadly the tunnel collapsed and the rugby squad fell into the hole.
Phil had done it for Jo. He said freedom was nothing to him if she wasn’t there, punching him on the arm and shouting at him.
I wish someone felt like that about me.
I wonder if they ever will.
They won’t get a chance if the Bottomleys get to me first.
As soon as I walked through the gates, Jo came running out of the front door. All little and shiny and dark, jumping up and down like a mad terrier, shouting, “Loopy Lullah!!!!”
She gave me the usual dead arm. Violence is her way of showing affection.
She was followed by Flossie, who has such a long fringe that her face really only begins at her glasses. For some reason she often finds herself (in her mind) in Texas.
Flossie was in Texas now.
I knew because she was walking really slowly and fanning her face like it was a thousand degrees, and drawling in a Deep South accent, “Why, Miss Lullabelle, I do declare, it’s too goddam hot. I was axing and axing, ‘Where in the name of hominy grits is Miss Lullabelle?’ And here y’all are!”
Vaisey was at the back, dear Vaisey, with her curls bouncing and her little bottom … er … bouncing as well. She came running to me and threw her arms round me. “Oh, Lulles, Lulles, I’ve missed you.”
And we had our first official Tree Sisters hug. It was so good to be with my pals again. Nothing can go wrong when you have your little girl gang around you. Nothing!!!!
Back in the Theatre of Dreams with my gang!!!!
I started singing “There’s no business like show business, we smile when we are down …”
And doing high skipping. I don’t know why, but my legs got excited.
A voice behind me said, “I might have known. Tallulah Casey. WALK properly, you are not a silly baby.”
Oh, how I remembered that voice. I didn’t have to turn round to see who it was. I could feel beaky eyes staring into the back of me.
Dr Lightowler.
Half woman, half owl, half really, really horrible to me.
Well this term she was going to see a big change in me. She wasn’t dealing with a little kid any more. I had grown and not only in the corker department.
Vaisey whispered, “Don’t say anything to annoy her.”
I stopped and turned round. Blimey, I must say, and this didn’t seem possible, Dr Lightowler looked even more owly. Had she got a new winter cloak?
She glared down her thin nose unblinkingly. I smiled cordially, my legs together.
“Ah, Dr Lightowler how marvellous to see you again. You look rested. The rest has done you good. In fact, you look in beak condition.” (Oh sweet Jesus!) “Er. Hahaha, woopity doodah … peak, PEAK condition.”
The girls were snuffling and putting their heads down to hide their laughter.
Dr Lightowler wasn’t laughing. She was looking and not blinking. She hissed, “It’s a shame that the rest of us aren’t as impressed with you as you are, Tallulah Casey. Remember, I am watching you. And I don’t like what I see.”
And she swished off.
Flossie said, “I think deep down, really deep down, so deep down that she’d have to get a rope and the emergency services to get there, she’s very, very fond of you.”
Vaisey put her arm round me. “It’s so unfair, just because you fell off a bike once she never gives you a chance.”
How right she is.
Jo was jumping up and down. “Oh, shhhh, shhhhh. Don’t let’s start talking about Lullah. I want to snog Phil. He phoned me and said he’d be at our Special Tree!!! So snogs ahoy!!!!”
As we walked into the main hall, Vaisey said shyly, “I got a postcard from Jack. I think he might like me.”
I gave her a hug. “Who doesn’t like you, missy?”
Flossie said, “Fiddle-de-dee, I just want to see some menfolk. LOTS of menfolk. ANY menfolk. It’s this goddam relentless heat.”
I didn’t point out that there was ice on the inside of the windows.
The main hall was full of babbling girls. Milly and Tilly, Honsy, Bibby. It was nice to see everyone again. Groovy to see the ‘showbiz’ crowd.
I was leaning against the stage, queuing up when a posh voice said, “Oh, Tallulah, begorrah, bejesus. Did you have a noice time in your holidays?”
It was Lavinia and her mates, Davinia and Anoushka.
Lav, Dav and Noos.
For some reason, Lavinia pretends she’s Irish like me and treats me like I’m a half-witted five-year-old. I can’t really not like her because she’s so ‘nice’ to me. But it’s only because I know Alex and she rates him.
In fact, as I was thinking that, she said, “We must see that friend of yours again. What was his name … Alex? When he next comes home, to be sure, to be sure.”
She swished her copper hair as she went off.
Flossie said, “SHE loves you as well. There’s a lot of love in the room for you, Tallulah.”
Gudrun, Sidone’s assistant, came onstage with the register. She was covered in knitwear from top to toe, including a knitted beret. Flossie said, “Is she a knitted person?”
Gudrun shouted at us, “Achtung, Fräuleins!!! Bitte!! Achtung! Ve mussen sign the register!!!” (She always gets a bit German when she’s left in charge, it goes to her head.)
We carried on chatting. Gudrun shouted again, “Wilkommen, girls. Danke for your attention. Erm, those girls at the back, will you just come down from the stag’s head? It’s an heirloom and not for sitting on. I don’t know how you got up there in the first place, and we don’t want any accidents …”
At that moment the stag’s head and the girls on it crashed to the floor. We all cheered.
After registration, we went to the loos. It was freezing in there. And when I went to use one of the taps it fell off in my hand. There were no towels, just a notice written by Bob:
No paper towels this term – we are saving the rainforest, dudes.
Remember,
Be a shaker
Not an endangered resource taker.
I had to dry my hands on my leggings.
