So Feral! (15 page)

‘Geoffrey!’ cried Mrs Polo. A shocked hand went to her face, leaving a white palm print on her chin.

‘Rubbish! Don’t forget it’s my room, too.’ Geoff’s voice rose ten octaves as he pretended to be his sister. ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall …’

‘Stop it!’

‘Who’s the
foulest
of them all? Why, Princess Pruneface I do recall!’

‘Geoffrey!’ scolded Mrs Polo, again. ‘Enough! Apologise to Caterina.’

‘She started it. And she’s the one telling lies.’

Princess Pruneface smiled a secret smile, then leant towards her mother. In a stage whisper she said, ‘He sneaks into the room and doesn’t knock. Last time I was naked!’

Mrs Polo’s complexion turned even whiter under the paint. ‘Geoffrey! How could you! What about the rules?’

Geoff tried to keep calm, but it wasn’t easy when right now he hated his sister. Hated her with a passion. ‘I follow the rules, Mum. I do knock. Only sometimes I forget … It’s my room, too!’

Mrs Polo chose not to argue. With a final glare at Geoff she left the room.

‘Your room, too. We’ll soon see about that!’ Princess Pruneface stormed out of the bedroom, giving Geoff the royal one-finger salute.

What’s she up to? Geoff wondered.

It was not long before he found out.

Geoff flung himself in the beanbag, thinking of ways to get back at Princess Pruneface, when ‘Ouch!’ something jabbed him in the back. It was a book. ‘Must be Pruneface’s,’ he said, rubbing his back as he picked it up and read,
Book of Spells
. Geoff inspected the jagged graze on his back then threw the book onto Caterina’s bed, thinking, Maybe I should put a curse on her.

A knock on the door interrupted his thoughts.

‘Come in.’ Geoff was surprised to see both his parents standing there. ‘I don’t spy,’ he began, but his father cut him off.

‘Geoffrey, a woman needs her privacy.’

‘Woman! Caterina’s only twelve.’

‘Nevertheless, young man.’

Mrs Polo joined in. ‘Caterina is … er … how

shall I put it?’

‘Maturing!’ said Mr Polo, helpfully.

‘And needs her own space,’ Mrs Polo went on.

‘Don’t we all,’ said Geoff, scowling at the book he’d just sat on.

‘Exactly,’ said Mrs Polo. ‘Which is what we’ve come to talk to you about, son.’

Son? Alarm bells went off in Geoff’s head.

‘Geoffrey, dear …’ began his father.

The alarm bells went into overdrive.

‘We knew it would come to this one day and now that day is here. We’ve decided that Caterina will have this room for her own room …’

‘And you can sleep on the verandah,’ finished Mr Polo.

Geoff jumped to his feet, as quickly as you can leap up from a beanbag. ‘But this is
our
room! You can’t kick me out. That’s not fair!’

Mrs Polo filled the doorframe, her arms rigid by her sides. ‘I wish we had the space so you could each have your own room, but we don’t. Your father and I have talked about this, Geoffrey. Caterina needs her own room. You will sleep on the verandah.’

‘But that’s not a room. It’s outside! People can see in.’

‘We’ll put blinds up,’ said Mrs Polo. ‘Or curtains,’ said Mr Polo.

‘When it rains I’ll get wet!’ Geoff spotted Princess Pruneface hovering outside his — their — er, her bedroom door. Smiling and blowing kisses, she came inside, reminding Geoff of Cruella de Vil.

‘Outta my room, buster,’ spat Caterina as she pranced over to the mirror. Picking up the world’s smallest brush she began combing her eyebrows. ‘Like golden angel wings!’ she said, her words as soft as a sigh.

Geoff rolled his eyes and looked at his father.

‘But, Dad!’

Mrs Polo butted in. ‘Nothing you say can change things, young man. Caterina needs her privacy. This weekend you will pack and move to the verandah.’

Mr Polo looked sympathetically at his son. He said, ‘When we’ve got the money we’ll get it glassed in.’

Geoff looked at the row of determined faces.

‘But …’

‘Any more arguments and you’ll be on washing-up duty for the rest of the year,’ growled Mrs Polo.

‘Put him on it now, Mum!’ said a gloating Caterina.

Geoff gritted his teeth. Caterina was getting her privacy, but what about him? Anyone passing could see into the verandah. He may as well live in a zoo.

‘It’s not fair,’ Geoff said later that afternoon when Rob, his friend, called in. He looked at the kite strung above his bed and the mounted tarantula on his side of the wall. Geoff thumped hard on his pillow.

‘Life sucks!’ agreed Rob, also thumping the pillow to show his sympathy.

‘Wish I never had a sister,’ growled Geoff, flinging his pillow in frustration. It skimmed along Caterina’s bed and skidded to a halt beside a book. ‘Stupid
Book of Spells,’
said Geoff, rubbing the graze it had left on his back and taking a swipe at it, too.

The book fell off the bed and landed with a clack on the floor, open at page 57. At the top of the page an eye stared out.

‘What’s that?’ asked Rob, peering closer.

‘It’s Princess Pruneface’s
Book of Spells,’
explained Geoff, thinking that the eye looked a lot like his sister’s — demented. ‘She’s been trying to find a spell to make herself beautiful. Someone should tell her she’s the Queen of the Uglies.’

Rob laughed, picked up the book and peered at the heading on the top of the page.
‘The Art of Ev-an-esc-ence,’
he read.

‘The art of what?’ asked Geoff.

‘Ev-an-esc-ence,’ repeated Rob.

‘Wonder what that means,’ said Geoff, grabbing a dictionary off the bookshelf.

Rob shrugged. ‘You tell me.’

Geoff began flicking through pages, then looked at Rob, who was still holding the
Book of Spells
. ‘Evanescence. How do you spell it?’

‘Evanescence. The art of making things disappear,’ said Geoff a few moments later. He looked up, his frown flipping into a smile. ‘Maybe I can make Pruneface disappear!’

‘Spells!’ exclaimed Rob. ‘Mumbo jumbo.’

Before Geoff could answer, they were interrupted by a, ‘When this room is mine I’m going to paint it, and you won’t have a say in the colour. I’m going to paint it fuchsia!’

‘See what I have to put up with?’ said Geoff, rolling his eyes. He took the
Book of Spells
from Rob and hid it under his shirt. ‘C’mon.’ He gestured at the door. ‘Let’s go.’

Caterina flounced into the room, slamming the door as they departed.

‘This might be my only hope of dumping my sister and getting my room back,’ muttered Geoff, bending over the book in the back yard.

Rob shrugged. ‘It’s crap. Spells don’t work. Face it. You’re doomed to a life with Pruneface, even if it’s not in the same room.’

Ignoring him, Geoff started to read out loud. ‘How to make your homework disappear.’ He looked up. ‘Tempting.’

‘Very,’ agreed Rob.

Geoff grinned. ‘How to make your whole school disappear. That would be better.’

‘Yeah!’ Despite himself, Rob laughed.

Using his finger as a guide Geoff read down the list. Pimples, cellulite, warts. There was a spell to get rid of everything. Geoff frowned as he was nearing the bottom of the index. Suddenly, he jabbed at a line of print. ‘There!’ he said. ‘How to make annoying people disappear.’ He beamed at Rob, turning to page 72 as fast as his fingers could take him. ‘This is it. I wonder what you need?’

Rob leant over and began to read out loud. ‘Eye of beaut —’

Geoff laughed and interrupted. ‘Newt, you mean. I’ve rehearsed that scene for a school play.
Macbeth.’

‘Newt?’ asked Rob, peering at the book to check the word.

Geoff put on a high-pitched crackly witch’s voice. ‘Eye of newt —’ he began.

‘Beaut!’ exclaimed Rob, pointing at the word. ‘It says beaut. Besides, newt sounds like a suss word.’ He grinned. ‘A bit like girt.’

Geoff laughed. They’d been arguing about the words in the National Anthem only last week. ‘A newt is a lizard, der-brain.’

‘Lizard, shmizard!’ said Rob, jamming his finger on the page. ‘It says, “Eye of beaut”!’

Geoff peered at the spell. ‘You’re right,’ he said simply and sat back.

Rob continued. ‘Eye of beaut, and toe of mog.’

‘Frog,’ corrected Geoff.

‘No,
mog!’
yelled Rob, giving Geoff a stern look. He went back to the book. ‘Eye of beaut and toe of mog. Wool of rat —’

‘Can’t be,’ said Geoff, shaking his head. ‘Rats don’t have wool. You sure it’s not bat? Wool of bat?’

By now Rob was losing his patience. He pushed the book at Geoff. ‘Here. You read it.’

But Geoff didn’t take the book. He was lost in thought, mumbling things like, ‘Wool of … numbat? Meerkat? Maybe wombat?’

‘What about ding-bat!’ said Rob. ‘Suits you.’

Geoff smiled. ‘Sorry. But this spell doesn’t sound right.’ He shook his head as if to clear his doubts. ‘Let’s read it together, shall we?’

‘Eye of beaut and toe of mog
,

Wool of rat and tongue of hog
.’

‘Tongue of hog? Toe of mog?’ said Rob, pushing the book away and standing up. ‘Where are you going to get a pig and a cat from?’

Geoff shrugged. ‘I don’t know … yet.’

‘What about the rat?’ Rob persisted.

‘I’ll find one. Catch one. Buy one, if I have to.’

Rob waved his hand dismissively at the book. ‘Why would you need all those things anyway?’

‘It’s a spell, stupid!’

‘Stupid spell, if you ask me.’

Geoff sat quietly, mulling over the items he’d need for the spell.

‘The easiest one is the moggie,’ Rob blurted. ‘There’s one next door to us you can borrow.’ His brow creased. ‘But how you’re going to cut off its toe is beyond me …’

Taking Rob by surprise, Geoff leapt to his feet. ‘I’ve got it! I know how to do this spell!’

That night Geoff lay in his room, biding his time, waiting for the moment he could start collecting the things he needed for his spell.

Caterina was taking hours to get ready for bed. First she brushed her eyebrows, shaping them into graceful arches. Then she brushed her hair — ten thousand times.
Then
she had to choose her clothes for the following day. It was a mufti day and she wanted to look
stunning
.

‘The peach or the watermelon?’ she asked, holding up two tops to Geoff.

‘I prefer banana,’ said Geoff, keeping his face straight.

Frowning, Caterina said, ‘Yellow? I don’t think I’ve got any yellow. The closest I might have is lemon.’

A muscle jerked in and out in Geoff’s cheeks. He would have liked to tell his sister what she could do with her lemon but knew better than to inflame the situation. The quicker he could help Caterina decide, the quicker she would get to bed. Taking a long, deep breath Geoff said, ‘Wear the lemon, then.’

Ten outfits later the lemon top and a matching pair of pants were draped over Caterina’s schoolbag and Geoff breathed a small sigh of relief. The room looked like a clearance sale clothing bin.

Next, Caterina tackled her face. This wasn’t easy as she wore contact lenses. To get off the mascara on one eye she had to remove the lens, then put it back in to see properly while she did the other side. This way, litres of make-up were painstakingly stripped away.

‘Your eyes are all squiggled with red,’ said Geoff when she had finished. ‘They look like those floating eyeballs in key rings.’

Caterina ignored him, murmuring, ‘Moisturiser,’ and humming to herself. When she had finished, she carefully removed her contact lenses and placed them in some special solution on her bedside table.

‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’ asked Geoff, pointing to her forehead when she’d finished.

‘What?’ Caterina peered at her image in the mirror. ‘My eyebrows are perfect.’

‘Spack filler!’

Caterina closed her eyes. She started taking deep breaths — very deep breaths. ‘Three days and counting,’ was her reply.

Three days till Geoff couldn’t scratch himself without the neighbours knowing! Under the covers his fingers curled into fists.

Caterina started to read. Geoff lay still, the light boring through his closed eyelids. He glanced at the alarm clock. Ten thirty-nine!

‘It’s late!’ he snarled. ‘What about your beauty sleep? Don’t want our angel-wing eyebrows to droop, do we?’

Caterina kept reading.

He must have drifted off, because when Geoff next woke the clock said twelve-o-five.

A distinctive,
‘Hhhaaaagh, whoooh! Hhhhhaggh, whooogh!’
filled the air.

Caterina lay on her back, her mouth agape. With each
whooogh
, flecks of spit pooled at the corners, glistening in the moonlight. Every now and then, one would fill with air, expanding like a bubble. Geoff lay for a while, watching one bubble expand and contract. With each breath, it was getting bigger.

‘One, two, three …’ Geoff started to count, guessing that at eight the bubble would pop, ‘… six, seven …’

Ping!

A crown of droplets cascaded down, leaving a ring of spit on Caterina’s face.

Geoff held his breath, praying she would not wake.

‘Hha — hha — hhhaaaagh, whoooh.’

Amazing I ever get any sleep, thought Geoff. He toyed with the idea of stuffing a sock in her mouth but thought better of it. For what he was about to do, Caterina needed to be asleep.

For what he was about to do! What he was about to do could get him into serious trouble. Geoff thought of the spell. He thought of losing his room to Pruneface. Trouble or not, his mind was made up.

Satisfied that Caterina was asleep, Geoff got out of bed and waded through the pile of clothes on the
floor till he stood over her bedside table. He looked at Caterina, still blowing bubbles. It was time to get the first thing for the spell — the eye of beaut.

‘I spy with my little eye,’ whispered Geoff. Leaning over her bed, he steadied his hand, took aim and used his finger as a scoop.

The wetness came as a shock but it was the fact that he met so little resistance to his tugging that took Geoff most by surprise.

Caterina lay there, dead to the world, liquid pooling on her face.