Louise Rennison - ‘…startled by his furry shorts!’

Her mutti and vati were going to their allotment. Jas’s mum was wearing welligogs and a proper mum-sized pair of trousers and a cardi. Her vati probably doesn’t even know what leather trousers are. My vati has a clown car and my mum came in last night with her T-shirt on inside out. How am I supposed to know how to behave? Why would any Luuurve God want to have anything to do with me? Oh nooo, please don’t let me blub.

Tom looked at me and then he put his arm around me. “Listen, Georgia, if he doesn’t get you then its his loss. You’re fab; we all know that.”

Jas even had a go at being nice. “Yes, you are, er… fab, and you are so, you know… you. I mean, you wouldn’t be you if you weren’t you, would you?”

What was she rambling on about?

Tom was fishing about in his rucky. “I’ve got something to show you, Gee.”

Oh blimey, now he was going to get his newts out or something, at a time like this. He handed me a pile of photos. Oh good, they were of his trip to Kiwi-a-gogo land. How interesting. Not.

I flicked through them. Trees, trees, sheep, trees, Kiwi-a-gogo people in big boots and shorts and funny beards. And the men were just as bad!!! Hahahahahaha. Oh, shutup, brain. More sheep, wombat droppings, rogue bores, more beards, sheep, trees, sheep and… then I saw the photo of you know who. The Original Sex God Heartbreaker. Smiling into the camera. With dreamy dark blue eyes. Suntanned. Standing in a river wearing shorts. Thank goodness I had eschewed him with a firm hand and felt nothing.

Corrrrrr. And also phwoar.

I felt like a goosegog extraordinaire round at Jazzy Spazzy’s. All that hand holding and giggling, it’s pathetic. I may as well have been the wife of the Invisible Man. Mrs Invisible Man. It was all kissy kiss kiss, “Oooooohhh, Tom, do you like my new shoes? Oooohhh, Tom, I’ve got a new owl.” Pathetic. I would never do that in front of anyone. I needn’t worry, though, because if Masimo chooses Wet Lindsay, I am going to be living in a lesbian monastery for the rest of my life.

Life really has gone merde when I can’t even speak to my besty pally because she is so BUSY with her boyfriend.

Well, so be it: if she chooses Tom above me, that is her lookout.

I will be eschewing her with a firm hand.

A LOT.

Like I am eschewing Robbie.

I will not have him in my brain. There is no room for anyone else in the cake shop of agony; it’s crowded enough in there already. And, anyway, Masimo is my one and only one.

Maybe.

I hate Jas. My so-called friend and bestie.

But I tell you this for free: she will never know how much she has hurt me. I might be in pain, but at least I have my dignitosity.

That I will never give up for anyone.

Phoned Jas.

“Jas, what do you think Masimo will say? Do you think he wants to go out with me? Would you go out with me if you were him?”

“Oy, don’t start that lezzie business again.”

“Jas, I am just asking you to imagine being him and what you would think about me if you were him. I mean, you wouldn’t pick Wet Lindsay over me, would you?”

“She’s got quite nice arms.”

“Jas, that is the wrong answer. The correct answer is, ‘Of course I would choose you every time, Georgia, you gorgey creature.’”

“Well, if you already know the answer, what is the point of asking me the question?”

“And, by the way, what do you mean she has got nice arms? She’s a stick insect, therefore she’s got sticky thin stupid arms. And unusually enough for a stick insect, it doesn’t stop there – she’s got a stupid forehead and stupid feet and—”

“I’ve not seen her feet unclothed. Have you? When did you see her feet?”

“Jas, I don’t know that I have seen her feet, but I know that they are sad. Anyway, stop going on and on about her feet. I’m not interested in her bloody feet.”

“Well, I didn’t start the feet business. I was only being polite.”

I slammed down the phone. I may be having a nervy spaz.

I’d better eat something sweet.

Nothing to eat, of course.

I must and shall have sugar.

Never have sugar on bread. It is disgusting.

I had better plan what I’m going to wear the day he comes round to see me. It may be the deciding factor between happinosity and sadnosity.

I must make sure he doesn’t see me in my school uniform. It will only remind him that I go to school.

I think I’ll practise smiling in the mirror.

Oh, what larks, I’m developing a lurker on my chin. Perfect. It should just be nicely ripening into a massive red pus-filled second chin by Friday.

Typico, I have run out of spot cream. I could squirt some perfume on it; that sometimes works. What does it say in CosmoGIRL! vis-à-vis lurker alerts?

Apparently you are supposed to lure out the lurker by encouraging it to come to a head. You should steam the area. With a steaming thing.

I’ve had my face over a boiling saucepan for the last year and a half, and although my face is bright red and dripping with water, the lurker is still lurking there happily.

In Cosmo ’s beauty hints it says you can use a poultice to draw it out. What can I use as a poulticey-type thing? It says a muslin bag with herbs and stuff in it.

I have just looked in the “medical chest” and it has got some mouldy old oranges, a leg from Libby’s Pantalitzer doll, and some dried cat poo in it. How disgusting.

I’ve found some corn plasters in a drawer. Maybe they would do as a poultice. I’ll stick one over the lurker.

Well, that is attractive. Not.

But who said that love was painless?

And who said it involved corn plasters?

God, the lurker is throbbing. I hope the corn plaster poulticey thing isn’t drawing anything else out. I don’t want to wake up with no chin.

I may as well be an orphan, for all the notice my family takes of me. They went out gaily laughing and singing years ago, leaving me with a measly fiver for a whole day. Just out scaring people for hours and hours.

I hate them.

It’s a bit spooky in the house by myself. Even the kittykats are nowhere around. What if an escaped prisoner came in out of the night and broke into the house to get food and so on?

He wouldn’t stay long, I can tell you that.

I never thought the day would come when I would be glad to hear the whine of Vati’s half-horsepower clown car, but it has.

I scampered up to my bedroom.

Bang bang, crash. Why can no one in my family open a door normally? Crashing around when starving people with two chins are trying to sleep.

Mum came upstairs into my room. I don’t know why she bothers having her own room.

She sat on the bed and looked at me. What am I? A looking at person?