Sleepover Girls Go Gymtastic! (2 page)

“Yeah, but she takes it a bit far sometimes,” I said, “bothering about her eyeshadow when we’re supposed to be planning serious Sleepover business.”

“Well, maybe it’s to build up her confidence?” Dad suggested. “She might be feeling a bit pushed out now her mum’s got the twins to worry about.”

I guess he had a point. It must be kind of weird having babies in the house again when you get to our age. Although Frankie’s got a new baby sister too and she hasn’t gone all freaky over make-up and stuff. But then Fliss’s mum is a bit, erm, neurotic at the best of times. I guess Fliss’s life isn’t as easy as we think it is.

“Now why does it not surprise me that you’ve drawn a picture of a horse next to Lyndz’s name?” Dad laughed, looking more closely at my piece of paper.

Everyone knows how mad Lyndz is about horses. I guess that’s her escape from all four of her brothers – they’re enough to make anyone crazy. But strangely enough, Lyndz is one of the calmest people you’ll ever meet. She hates it when we fall out and is always playing the peacemaker. And she has the most fearsome hiccups in the world!

I drew one of those mask-type things next to Rosie’s name – you know, the kind where one face is laughing and the other is crying.

“That’s a bit of a strange thing to draw, Kenny.” Dad looked puzzled. “What’s that about?”

“Well, you never know what you’re going to get with Rosie, do you?” I pointed out. “She’s great fun most of the time, but sometimes she can be really prickly.”

Finally I drew a football next to my name on the list. If there’s one thing I’m passionate about it’s Leicester City Football Club. As well as my friends, of course. Which is why I was determined that we should win this gymnastics competition. It would be a
major
thrill for all of us.

When Dad had gone out of the room, I started to seriously think about gymnastics and what we could do. And I was reminded of one thing – Circus Jamboree. Do you remember Ailsa trying to teach us how to perform flick-flacks? And the workshop we went to? Well I kind of wished I
hadn’t
remembered it, because we weren’t really much cop at all the acrobatic stuff. And this time, just dressing up as clowns wouldn’t win us any prizes!

Still, hadn’t the TV presenter said that for this competition they didn’t want gymnastic geniuses, they wanted “raw talent”? Well, she wouldn’t get talent much rawer than the Sleepover Club’s, that was for sure. And I was pretty certain that when the others realised that the prize was to star in our very own television programme, they would be able to backflip and flick-flack with the best of them.

I went back up to my bedroom and started to practise a few moves. I did a couple of cartwheels but there wasn’t as much room as I thought, and I crashed straight into Molly’s bedside cabinet. A few of her precious ornaments fell over, so I picked them up quickly, because she goes ballistic if anyone even
looks
at her stuff.

Then I tried to do a handstand and make shapes with my legs in the air. But it’s much harder than it looks and I ended up sprawled on the floor. Hmm, I could see that we would have to get in some serious practice if we were going to win this competition.

But that wasn’t my biggest problem. No. I could hear Molly thudding upstairs like an elephant, so I had to get back to my homework. If there’s one thing that Molly loves doing, it’s winding me up about the SATs.

And sure enough, as soon as she came in she started.

“I hope you’re working hard there baby sis, because those SATs papers are just the hardest thing ever!”

Molly sat hers last year so she reckons she knows everything about them now.

“And let’s be honest,” she carried on, “you’re not as clever as me, are you? I mean, you’ll never get the levels I got.”

She smiled a false sickly smile. “But you’ve got to do your best, you know. And I promised Mum and Dad that I’d keep an eye on you and make sure that you’re working hard. So no slacking now, Laura dearest. We can’t have you letting the McKenzie family down, can we?”

Sometimes I could quite happily stuff my sister down a dirty toilet and flush her round the U-bend. But instead I flashed her a sarcastic smile and gritted my teeth. I had to keep the peace and make sure that she didn’t find out about the competition, because if she did she’d make my life hell for sure.

The next morning I was bursting to tell the others about our chance to be famous. But I was kind of late for school, so they were already in the classroom when I managed to catch up with them.

“I’ve got some excellent news for you,” I garbled as I plonked myself down at our table.

“Have the SATs been cancelled?” whispered Fliss hopefully.

But before I could reply, Mrs Weaver turned her beady eyes on me.

“I am trying to get on with registration, if that’s all right with you, Laura?”

I absolutely HATE anybody using my real name, so I did my best impression of a very angry tomato.

After that there was no way that I could tell the others about the competition, especially as we had a maths test which we had to do in absolute silence. To be fair, I did try to give them as many clues as I could. Like drawing a picture of us on television on my paper. But they just thought I was doodling because I was bored. So ‘accidentally on purpose’ I dropped my rubber on the floor. And when I went to pick it up I did a weenie little handstand. Lyndz stared at me like I’d lost it completely, but Mrs Weaver was
not
impressed.

“Laura McKenzie, is there any particular reason for your foolish antics, or are you just too shy to ask me for the extra maths homework I am now going to give you?”

A ripple of giggles spread round the room.

At least the extra homework would be worth it when I told the others my news. They wouldn’t just be giggling then. Oh no, they’d be whooping and cheering, carrying me on their shoulders and telling me how they’d be grateful to me forever for making them stars. Well, I expected something like that anyway. Boy was I in for a surprise!

“Gymnastics?” Frankie shrieked when I’d told them all my news. “I don’t think so, Kenny. I mean, look at me. I don’t exactly look like a gymnast, do I? Gymnasts are
small.
I’d be laughed out of the place for looking like a freak.”

“But that’s exactly the point of the competition,” I assured her. “Gymnastics isn’t just for delicate little people…”

“Like me!” piped up Fliss.

“Yep, like you Fliss. It’s for everyone. They’re trying to get more people to join in and benefit from it. Oh come on, it’ll be fun. What do you think, Lyndz?”

Lyndz was looking pretty sick actually.

“I agree with Frankie,” she said. “You know that I’m hopeless at gym, Kenny. I even get stuck on forward rolls sometimes. And do you remember that time Mrs Weaver asked us to try a handstand and I lost my balance and crashed down on top of Alana Banana? She was so dazed everyone thought she had concussion. She was off school for ages.”

“But the presenter said each person only has to do a
short
solo performance, Lyndz,” I reassured her. “There must be lots of gymnastic-type balances and stuff you
can
do. And the rest of us can cover for you when we do the routine all together.”

“I suppose.” Lyndz shuffled her feet and didn’t sound too convinced.

“So Rosie-Posie, are you up for it?” I demanded.

Rosie smiled warily. “Yeah, I guess so. As long as it doesn’t interfere with SATs too much. I’ve promised Mum I’m going to work really hard for these tests.”

“When is the competition exactly?” Frankie wanted to know.

“Dunno,” I shrugged. “Ages away, I think. Anyway, wouldn’t it be great to have something to look forward to
after
the SATs? And in the meantime, practising for it will help us clear our minds a bit. What do you say?”

The others all looked at each other. Only Fliss was jumping about like she’d got ants in her pants.

“It’ll be so cool!” Fliss twittered. “This competition was made for me… I mean,
us
!”

I sighed. I just knew that
that
was because she thought she was little and perfect and would capture the judges’ hearts the moment they saw her. PUKE!

To be honest I was well cheesed off with the others. You’d think they could have mustered
some
enthusiasm when I was offering them the chance of stardom.

“Look guys, don’t you realise that if we win this thing, we actually get to star in our own TV programme?” I told them in exasperation. “And that’s not just going to be about gymnastics, is it? It’s going to be about
us.
Everybody will get to see us and we’ll be famous. Lyndz, they’ll probably film you at Mrs McAllister’s stables. You’ll be able to show everyone how much you love horses and you’ll be offered some top job where you can ride the best horses in the world all day. Isn’t that what you want?”

Lyndz’s eyes had begun to sparkle. She beamed and nodded.

“And Frankie, you’ll bowl everyone over with how witty and clever you are and no one will even notice that you’re as tall as a giraffe!”

Frankie batted me playfully on the arm. But I could see that she was beginning to realise what a mega-opportunity we were looking at here.

“And I’ll be spotted by a model agency, won’t I? It’s going to be
totally
cool!” Fliss gushed again. “It’s a brilliant idea, Kenny. Have you sent off for the factsheet yet? We’ve got to start planning everything. I mean, I’m brilliant at gymnastics, but you knew that, right? I’m sure I can teach you all a few moves, even you Lyndz.”

And with that she cartwheeled across the grass in front of us.

“Charming!” Lyndz tutted, but she was laughing really.

“So are we about to be famous TV stars then?” I shouted.

“YES!” the others chorused.

“We should start rehearsing right away!” Fliss reappeared, a little breathless from her exertion. “What about after school?”

“Revision!” the others reminded her.

“Who cares about stuffy old SATs when we’re going to be on TV?” she retaliated.

“I think you’re being just a tad hasty there, Fliss,” Rosie reminded her. “We’ve got to actually
win
the competition first, you know.”

But you could tell that there was no stopping Fliss now. She had that look on her face which spelt trouble with a capital T.

“Oh-oh, she’s in Cloud Cuckoo Land again,” Frankie whispered. And we just knew that Fliss’s fluffy little brain was filling up with images of herself being mobbed by adoring fans whenever she went out. Revision for SATs was going to have a really tough time competing with that.

To be honest with you, it was hard enough finding time to see each other at all, what with after-school revision clubs and the masses of homework that Mrs Weaver kept piling on top of us. But as soon as I’d received the factsheet about the competition, we made a firm arrangement to meet round at my place.

“So how was the science revision club?” I asked as Lyndz, Rosie and Fliss staggered through the door.

“I just don’t get it,” Lyndz moaned. “I mean, reversible changes? What’s that all about then?”

“Oh come on Lyndz, Mrs Weaver’s been going on about it for the last hour. You’ve got to understand it by now!” Rosie sounded really exasperated. “Water turns into ice when it freezes, doesn’t it? But you can melt ice when the conditions are warm enough, right? So that’s a reversible change.”

“And salt dissolves in water,” added Frankie. “But you can recover it again through evaporation, so
that’s
a reversible change too.”

“But what about bread turning into toast?” Lyndz looked puzzled. “If you burn it, you can scrape the black bits off so it looks like bread again, can’t you?”

“WHAT?” we all shrieked. “Changes involving burning are
never
reversible!”

Lyndz started spluttering.

“You’re having a laugh, aren’t you?” I yelled, wrestling Lyndz to the floor. “The question is, if I tickle you until you explode, what kind of change would that be, Lyndz?”

“An icky, gooey, horrible change!” giggled Rosie.

All the time we were fooling around, Fliss was stretching elaborately in the hallway, totally oblivious to us.

“What’s with her?” Frankie asked, when Lyndz and I had finally picked ourselves up.