Boys for Beginners (5 page)

Out of the corner of my eye I see Paul calling to Jenny. ‘Oi! Jenny! Oiiiii!' Jenny pretends not to hear him. She is staring at me talking to Charlie Notts.

‘Are you guys going to play again after school?' Charlie asks me.

‘Oi, Jenny! Come over here and watch my skills!' Paul's still shouting, and he's putting me
off. He starts doing keepy-uppies to impress her.

‘Gwynnie?' Charlie tries to get my attention.

‘Yes. Hello.'

He raises an eyebrow at me.

‘How can I help you?' I sound like I work in McDonalds. I hope he can't tell I'm blushing under my hot, sweaty, puffed-out face.

‘Can. I. Play. Foot. Ball. With. You. Later?' He's speaking at me like I'm a dimwit and, to be honest, I can't blame him.

All I can do is stare at him like I'm an Olympic musical-statues champion.

‘Oh well, if you don't want me to . . .'

‘Oh God, no!' Charlie Notts is walking away and I grab him by the arm. I can't believe I've just touched Charlie Notts. ‘Sorry,' I say, ‘I'm just being a mentalist. It's school, it does that to me. Makes me crazy.' I pull a face like they've just let me out of an asylum.

He laughs. But not in a mean way like I'm an idiot, in a nice way like he thinks I'm funny. Maybe he's not that clever. Maybe that means I'm in with a chance.

‘We definitely play every day after school. Definitely. We'll definitely be playing later.'

Paul comes over. ‘What is up with Jenny?' he asks me like I'm supposed to know. ‘She's totally ignoring me.'

I shrug. ‘No idea. Maybe the earrings block sounds made by people with an IQ over 35.'

Paul shrugs back. ‘That should make me fine then. She's always telling me I'm thicker than a frozen milkshake.'

‘Who's that?' Charlie asks about Jenny. ‘Your older sister?'

‘No. My girlfriend. Jennifer Gregson.' Paul is being a bit funny with Charlie Notts.

Charlie picks up on it and sticks out his hand. ‘Sorry, mate. My name's Charlie and I'm new here.'

Charlie and Paul shake hands. ‘No worries.' And Paul is over it. That's what's wicked about Paul, he never holds a grudge.

‘Heya, Paul. Heya, Gwynnie. How's it going?'

Jenny Gregson has reappeared from nowhere. Everyone's walking inside, and the way they're penning the four of us in makes us into some sort of group: Paul and Jenny, and me and Charlie Notts. Wow, I'm in
a group
.

Then these kids from the year below block my path so I get forced out of the group. Some people
are so rude! Already I've been ostracized, after only three seconds of being in a new group. I have to shove the kids out of the way to stick with the others.

Paul goes to put his arm around Jenny, just like he's been instructed to, but she sort of subtly moves away so that he's left hooking the air like a muppet. ‘Did you miss me?' he asks her.

‘Like a runner in my pantyhose.' Paul and I are not really sure what that means, but Charlie laughs so I laugh. Paul laughs too.

‘Gwynnie,' she says, ‘I really need to speak to you.'

Why does Jenny need to speak to
me
?

‘I'm listening.'

‘Me and my gals were thinking of talking to little ol' Mr Roberts. We want to arrange a school prom at the end of the year. Would you like to come if we did?'

‘Me?' I ask.

‘Well, yeah, you. And I guess, all of you.' She looks from me to Paul and then to Charlie.

‘I'll come,' says Paul. ‘Might be a laugh.'

‘Yeah, why not. I'll go to the prom,' I say. If everyone's going . . .'

‘It's not
the prom
, it's just
prom
,' she says.

Fair enough.

We step inside the school and Charlie is about to go to his Year 10 classroom when Jenny steps in front of him. ‘What about you? I'm so sorry to appear rude – I don't know your name.'

Doesn't know his name, my bottom.

‘My name's Charlie,' he says, and looks at Jenny like all the guys do. Except nicer than the other guys because he doesn't look at her massive chest. He asks, ‘Are you American?'

I'm glad I'm not drinking something or I would have spat it out right now.

Jenny giggles in this girlie sort of way. ‘Aw, ain't you a honey? No, I am not fully American, but I have family across the pond and I have just spent all vacation over there. There's a chance that I might have picked up a teensy bit of an accent.'

For goodness sake!

‘I like American accents,' says Charlie.

Jenny smiles and looks at the floor.

‘I do too,' Paul gets in quickly. ‘I think your accent is nice. I've said that before.'

‘When have you said that before?' she asks. Paul's in trouble again.

‘Well, I've either said it or I've thought it.'
Paul's a rubbish liar. He changes the subject by turning to Charlie. ‘So, you want to play football later?'

Charlie nods.

‘What team do you support?'

Please don't say Arsenal. Please don't say Arsenal
.

‘Well, I know they can be a bit rubbish sometimes, but I'm Spurs till I die.'

I think I might die right here right now.

‘Oh, then you and Gwynnie will get on like a house on fire,' says Paul.

Charlie smiles at me, ‘You're Spurs too? Nice one, Gwynnie. It's tough, but we're born to it, aren't we? We'll have to stick together.'

Someone must have lent me their hoverboots because I'm like 200 feet in the air.

There are six billion people on the planet. So what are the odds of running into Kevin on the thirty-second journey from my house to Paul's?

‘Gwynnie! Wait!' I don't really know what to do because I can't decide if I'm talking to him or not. I suppose he
is
my brother and I have to talk to him sometime.

‘Hi, Gwynnie.'

‘Hi.'

‘How are you?'

‘Fine.'

‘So it was the semifinal yesterday? Who'd've thought that Spurs would make it this far?'

‘Yeah. It's brilliant.' Which it totally is. But this is all very polite and therefore weird. I'm not looking him in the eye so that he knows that I am still angry with him a little bit.

‘Look,' he says, ‘I'm really sorry that I shouted at you on your birthday.'

I sort of grunt in reply. The grunt means that I am annoyed but I accept his apology. Sometimes grunts speak louder than words.

‘It was your birthday and I shouldn't have had a go at you.'

Grunt
.

‘I suppose it's just that I thought really hard about what to get you and I was disappointed when you didn't like it.'

Grunt
.

‘It was probably stupid of me to buy—'

‘That's all right, Kev. Don't worry about it.'

‘The thing is Gwyn—'

‘It's no big deal.'

‘But the thing is, is that you are brilliant the way you are.'

This is getting weirder by the second. ‘Honestly, Kev, I'm not bothered.'

‘You
are
brilliant the way you are: you don't try and be like other girls, which is great.' He takes a deep breath. ‘I'm just saying that if you ever want, like, a boyfriend or anything – not that I think you should get one right now – but if you did want a boyfriend ever, you might
have to start being a bit more like a girl than a boy.'

I contemplate jumping in front of a car but there aren't any cars coming. Just my luck.

‘Most boys like girls. Not boys. Unless, that is –' he draws in a long breath – ‘you don't like boys—'

‘Oh my God, Kevin, just because I play football doesn't make me a lesbian!'

At that moment an old granny walking past almost falls off her Zimmer frame.

‘I know. I know! I'm just saying that if you were, that would be OK. We would still love you.' I can tell he's regretting this conversation because he can't quite look at me.

I give Kevin another grunt and I excuse myself. ‘Look, Kev, Paul and Jennifer Gregson are waiting for me.'

‘OK,' he says. Then he stops. ‘Who's Jennifer Gregson?'

‘Paul's girlfriend.'

‘Is she Stephanie Gregson's sister?'

‘Yeah.'

‘No way.' Kevin looks impressed. ‘Tell him congratulations from me,' he says, and walks back towards the house.

Why congratulations? You wouldn't congratulate someone for downloading 80 hours of white noise on to their iPod. You would tell them they were an idiot.

Right now I would prefer to be in school, sitting next to Rachel Govens in quadruple maths. And Rachel Govens does Sudoku for fun.

But instead I'm sitting in Paul's living room playing
Gears of War
but Paul's not here. He's officially present, but he is in his own little world, snogging the face of Jenny Gregson. All I can do is turn up the volume loud enough so I can't hear the slurpy noises they're making, but not so loud that I go deaf. They sound like our washing machine when it's on the blink.

I get killed by a locust and start to wonder if things could get any worse.

‘Your go,' I say.

Paul and Jenny don't look up.

‘Oi, Paul! It's your go on
Gears
!'

He says, ‘You can have another go,' and I swear to God that he doesn't even take his tongue out of Jenny's mouth to say it.

‘I don't want another go.'

Finally he looks up. There is a thread of saliva
running from his lip to Jenny's and I think I might vomit all over Angela's brand-new Ikea rug. Jenny wipes her face and says, ‘I've told Paul that I'm not going to come over any more if I just have to watch you two play the stupid computer.'

‘Yeah, Gwynnie,' says Paul. ‘You're always saying that I hog the game. Now you can have as many goes as you like.'

He turns back and starts snogging Jenny's face off again. I'm surprised she even has a face left. As I start playing I realize it's no fun killing locusts if no one is watching to see how brilliant you are at it.

Suddenly I have an idea. I kind of prepare myself to sound really calm, but inside, just thinking the words is making me feel nervous. ‘Maybe I'll give Charlie Notts a call and see what he's doing. If you two are going to eat each other all afternoon then I might as well have someone to look at – er, I mean – talk to.'

This gets Jenny's attention and she's crawled out from underneath Paul. ‘Yeah, Paul, we are being very rude to Gwynnie.' It's amazing how that accent of hers drops when it's just me and Paul. ‘Why don't we see what Charlie is doing? Because, you know, three's a crowd!'

‘I don't have his number.' Paul doesn't look quite as keen as me or Jenny.

‘Oh, no problem, I've got it.' Jenny gets out her mobile. Paul frowns at the fact that his girlfriend has another bloke's number in her phone. And not just any other bloke, a Year 10 bloke.

I reach out my hand for her to pass me the phone but she says, ‘I'd better call him. It's a breach of trust to give someone someone else's number. You don't want him to think you're stalking him.'

She presses call and she doesn't seem nervous one bit. Sometimes I wish I was like Jenny Gregson. Oh my God, did I just think that out loud?!

‘Heya, Charlie,' and the American-speak is back. ‘How's it going?' Then she starts giggling.

‘What's so funny?' asks Paul, and Jenny frowns at him like,
Can you please be quiet?
So then Paul looks grumpy at me, and I look at him like,
What have I done?
I am only the one that suggested we get him over; she's the one who called him.

All she does is giggle and say things like,
Oh my God
, and,
I fully know what you are saying
, and,
Shut up!
(she so doesn't want him to shut up). Finally, when she manages to stop laughing, she
says to him, ‘We're all round at Paul's – me and Paul and stuff – if you wanna come on over. They're just playing some game or something and it's real boring, but if you wanna come it could be cool.'

Me and Paul are waiting like Charlie is the referee and he's deciding whether to allow a goal or not. I want him to come over. Paul doesn't want him to come over, but if he does come over then everyone will know that Paul had a Year 10 round his house, and that's pretty cool.

‘Oh, I really can't say.' Then she screeches at us in a hushed voice behind the phone, ‘What's this game called?'

‘
Gears of War
,' we both say together.

‘It's some little ol' game called
Beards of War
.'

He corrects her and she giggles. ‘Oh, how silly of me! Of course I mean
Gears of War
.'

‘The latest version!' I add, as extra incentive.