The next morning, I woke to the sound of hammering. By the time I was dressed, Dad had fixed the crooked table and the wobbly chairs, and was pacing the living room with a screwdriver in his hand.
‘That’s enough for the moment, Andrew,’ said Mum, laughing. ‘Come and join us for breakfast.’
‘So,’ said Dad as he sat down. ‘What’s the plan for today?’
‘I had thought we could have a picnic on the beach,’ said Mum. ‘But I think maybe it’s a bit grey and cold for that.’
‘Well,’ I said. ‘Since we can’t go to the beach, let’s think of something else to do. We could look out the front window, or we could look out the back window or we could walk to the stupid village, or we could … oh yeah that’s it, isn’t it? That’s everything we can do in this stupid place.’
Mum put on her dangerous face.
‘Now, Eva,…’ she began, before she was interrupted by a knock on the front door.
We all looked at each other.
‘Are we expecting someone?’ asked Dad.
‘Not that I know of,’ said Mum.
‘Maybe it’s my fairy godmother, come to rescue me,’ I said. ‘I wonder where I left my pumpkin?’
No one laughed.
‘Do you know any of the neighbours here, Joey?’ asked Mum.
Joey shook his head.
‘I’ve only been here once before,’ he said.
There was another knock.
‘I’ll go,’ he said in a bored voice, like he’d done nothing except answer the door all morning.
He opened the door and stood there for a second. Then he closed the door and ran back over to us.
‘There’s someone out there, but I don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl,’ he whispered.
‘What did they want?’ asked Dad.
Joey shrugged, ‘Dunno. Didn’t ask did I? I was too busy trying to decide what it was.’
Mum nudged me.
‘Go and see who it is, there’s a love.’
I sighed and got up and went to the door. Our visitor was still standing on the step. She was a girl, but I could see why Joey had been confused. She had short, untidy hair that looked like it had been cut by a blind hairdresser. She was dressed in what looked like a boy’s tracksuit, and runners. She looked about my age. She stared at me, and I stared back at her.
‘Hello,’ I said, as ‘hi’ seemed a bit too friendly for this strange, silent person.
‘Hello,’ she said back, and then we looked at each other some more.
I was starting to feel a bit embarrassed.
Would it be rude to say, what do you want?
In the end I couldn’t take any more. ‘Can I help you?’ I asked, sounding like somebody’s ancient old granny.
The girl looked like she was about to laugh.
Was she going to laugh at me?
I was wearing Victoria’s blue hoodie, and one of Ella’s totally cool tops, so how dare someone wearing a boy’s tracksuit laugh at me?
‘I don’t need help, thanks,’ she said.
And there was another long silence.
This was totally stupid.
‘I’ll go inside, so,’ I said.
Now the girl went red.
‘No! Don’t go. I live over there,’ she said, pointing vaguely in the direction of our hedge. ‘I saw you arriving yesterday.’
Oh no!
Had she heard me shouting at Mum and Dad and acting like a total baby?
I could feel my face going red now, giving me something in common with this strange girl.
Then I tossed my head. Why did I care what she thought of me anyway?
‘And?’ I said coolly.
‘… and I was wondering if you’d like to … I don’t know … go for a walk or something?’
Great.
There was a crazy girl living at the other side of our hedge, and she wanted to be my friend and do totally fun stuff like going for walks.
Summer was looking up.
Not.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘We’ve just got here, and I probably have to help my mum and dad around the house for a while. I––’
Suddenly Dad was at my shoulder.
‘Who’s this, Eva?’ he said, like I was supposed to know.
‘I’m Kate,’ said the girl.
I turned and made a face at Dad. ‘Kate asked me to go for a walk with her, but I was just telling her how you and Mum need me to stay here and do a few jobs for you.’
Dad beamed at me. ‘Oh, that’s very kind of you, Eva, but I think we’ll manage without you for a while. You go off and have fun with your new friend.’
‘But I haven’t even had my breakfast yet!’ I wailed.
Dad shoved the piece of toast he had in his hand towards me.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘Have mine.’
I took the toast and made another face at Dad, but he ignored it. He practically pushed me outside.
‘See you later,’ he said, as he closed the door behind me. ‘And don’t rush back, we’ll be absolutely fine.’
I stood outside the closed door. Part of me wanted to run around to the back of the cottage, and climb in through a window. If I did that though, I knew Mum and Dad would just make me go back out again, so I’d still have to go on the stupid walk, and I’d be in heaps of trouble as well.
I looked at Kate.
‘OK’ I said in my most bored voice. ‘It’s too cold for the beach, so where are we going to go?’
She shrugged. ‘Where do you want to go?’
‘Home,’ I said.
I thought that was quite funny, but Kate didn’t even smile.
‘Let’s just walk in to town, so,’ she said.
There’s a town?
I really wanted to know more about this town, but that would have involved having a conversation with Kate, so I bottled up my curiosity and looked bored again Kate started walking and I walked beside her. What else could I do?