Fiona Cummings - Sleepover Girls Go Gymtastic!

Molly made a lunge for my hair, but Mum came in and caught her just in time.

“Out you come, young lady. You can help me tidy up in the kitchen!”

I turned back to the television just in time to catch the presenter saying:

“The winners of our competition will become the stars of their very own TV series, which will follow their progress and see what kind of impact gymnastics has on their lives. Think Popstars in leotards! For more information send for our factsheet at the address which follows. And remember that the competition will be held on…”

But I didn’t hear what she said next because I was flying out of the room looking for a pencil and paper so that I could copy down the address. This was just the kind of break the Sleepover Club was looking for. We’re always looking for ways to get famous. (You’ve got to remember the time that Lyndz almost appeared in the advert for Spot Away spot cream.) I knew that the others would be totally razzed when I told them about it.

You know about the Sleepover Club, right? How we all stay over at each other’s houses and have a laugh? Well, I started doodling all the names of the Sleepover Club on the piece of paper I was holding. I wrote Frankie’s name first because we’ve known each other forever, and although we’re not really supposed to have best friends in the club, she’s mine. She’s a real laugh and can go a bit crazy at times, but she’s usually the one who makes sure we don’t get too silly or carried away with our ideas. Next to her name I drew a star, because she’s a star mate of course, but also because she’s well into astrology and stuff.

“Is that in case you forget your friends’ names?” Dad asked, glancing over my shoulder at the paper. Fortunately I’d folded it over so he couldn’t see the address I’d written for the competition. “Why’ve you drawn a picture of a princess next to Fliss’s name?”

“’Cos she thinks she is one, of course!” I giggled.

“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to look nice,” Dad said, eyeing my scruffy Leicester City football shirt.

“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.