Oh my gosh, today at Mr. Yolk was proper DULL. OK. I tell a lie, there was one exciting bit at about 3 o’clock when we totally ran out of one-quid coins and Mario (Mr. Yolk himself—Goodmayes’s biggest celebrity) let me get the bus to the bank in Ilford Mall and get some.
So I take one of my detours round by Greggs the bakers and I spot Kezia Marshall and we both buy a gingerbread man in the shape of Bart Simpson. Then we sit on the wall outside Claire’s Accessories chatting about Kezia’s bump. Last year everyone thought Kezia was pregnant by Luther—then it turned out to be a false alarm. Then it didn’t. Kezia really was pregnant by Luther. Even my mum was shocked at that.
Kezia’s bump is well big now. She looks like one of them Teletubbies with her red hair and orange hoodie and big belly. Like LaLa or Tinky Winky, me and Carrie couldn’t decide. Kezia kept pulling down the front of her trackie pants and making me feel the bump kicking. Kezia didn’t mind which passersby saw the bump and pretty much all the rest of her downstairs bits too. (Safe to say, red is Kezia’s natural hair color.) I didn’t feel like my gingerbread man much after that. I worry about Kezia a bit. Kezia says Luther ain’t calling her much no more like he used to. Kezia says all their mums and dads are trying to sort something out. Poor Kez.
I asked about baby names and Kezia says she likes Usher for a boy or Latanoyatiqua for a girl. Then she’s going to double-barrel the surnames. Latanoyatiqua Marshall-Dinsdale! Oh my days—by the time the poor kid’s got that spelled in finger paints at school the day will be over.
I went back to Mr. Yolk and Mario was all up in my face giving it. “Where you been? I give you ten minutes!” So I said I had menstrual pain in my womb and had been in Boots looking at the ladies intimate problem counter, then Mario pushed away his beans on toast and made a face like “Too much information” and got back on the phone to his bookie.
See, even the exciting bits at work ain’t that exciting. Only fifty more years and I can retire.
8PM—My mother—Mrs. Diane Wood—says work ain’t meant to be exciting. Mum reckons the important thing is that I’m bringing home some cash and earning my keep. This ALONE should be exciting enough for me, Mum reckons. Yeah, she is barking mad. I love my mother ’cos like you have to don’t you, but she is a proper mental sometimes when she says stuff like this.
I said to her, “Mother, have you ever cleaned out a deep fat fryer and had your bum cheek pinched by an eighty-six-year-old customer with missing bottom teeth for £3.50 an hour?!! It AIN’T EXCITING, right?”
“Oh, Shiraz. Give it a rest. Real life ain’t never exciting.” My mother sighed. She was half-staring at Emmerdale, where some vet had his arm up a cow’s bumhole. “REAL LIFE AIN’T NEVER EXCITING!” my mum said again. “That’s why I pay for this bleeding Sky+ satellite TV subscription!”
I gave her £50 out of my wages toward my keep and she rolled it up and stuck it in her pocket. Then she rubbed Penny, our obese Staffy, and said, “Woohoo Pennywenny! More Russell Stover Chocolates for you and me. Ooh, we like those coffee truffle ones, don’t we?!”
She’d better be joking.
I went to my room and put cotton balls in my ears to drown out the noise and carried on with this book I’m reading called Pride and Prejudice by a bird called Jane Austen. Ms. Bracket said I would like it and I do. It’s proper old. It’s about this woman called Elizabeth who fancies this well-minted proper buff bloke called Darcy who is sexy but up himself. I can’t stand lads like that.
10PM—Carrie just texted. Carrie’s going to schlep over tomorrow and do me some false nails. Carrie says she’s going to use some stronger glue this time. Carrie says she’s still a bit freaked out about the last time she did them. One of them fell off at work when I was making the tuna mayo and Mario had to give some old geezer the Heimlich maneuver when it got jammed in his windpipe. That was definitely exciting. Just, like, not in a good way.