Lizard's Leap: Chapter Nine: The Letter

Chapter Four: Big Red Spots and Consequences.

Emma was in a grump.

Mark was fishing with his Dad and Granddad and Kerry had gone to London to see a production of Swan Lake with her Mum; so they wouldn’t be at Granddad’s until after lunch the next day. Vicki was going out for the afternoon with her friend Rachel. That left Emma on her own and wishing that she’d gone with them to the ballet.

She was in a foul mood because she was bored. They’d made a pact that none of them would ever do a leap without the others knowing. If they did, and anything went wrong, nobody would know where the person was; and that could be dangerous. She would be a little bit scared going on a whole adventure by herself anyway, anything could happen. She didn’t want to read and she didn’t want to play with the Playstation. In fact, she was that way out with herself and didn’t know what she wanted …or maybe she did.

Vicki and Rachel were in the hall getting ready. They were going into town to look around the shops; then they were going bowling and to hang out with friends. They felt very grown up.

‘Can I come?’ Emma asked.

‘You won’t be allowed.’

‘Yes, I will. Nana said I can go if it’s all right with you two.’

‘Well, it isn’t,’ said Vicki unkindly.

‘I’ll tell Nana you’ve got make up in your bag and that you’re going to put some on in town.’

‘You little snitch,’ Vicki hissed. ‘I’ll tell Nana that you stole a chocolate bar’

‘That was four years ago, I was six. I’ve never stolen anything since.’ Emma’s lower lip wobbled. She was ashamed of what she’d done, even though she was too young to know better. She didn’t want her Nana to be disappointed in her. It was stalemate and both girls knew it.

Vicki and Rachel passed a look between them.

‘Okay,’ Vicki said. ‘You can come. But you’d better get changed. You’re not coming with us looking like that.’

Emma beamed. Sometimes her cousin wasn’t so bad after all. She ran upstairs two at a time and pulled out her new black trousers and a pink top. She changed her clothes fast. It wouldn’t be wise to keep them waiting when they’d reluctantly agreed to let her go with them.

‘Vicki? Rachel?’ she called out after hurtling back downstairs.

They’d tricked her and had run off down the street without waiting.

She thought about going after them but they’d probably reached the main road and Emma wasn’t allowed there by herself, which was really dumb when she’d been all the way to America and back on her own. She ran to tell her Nana what had happened.

‘Oh, aren’t they horrible?’ Nana said. ‘Never mind, love, you can help me bake a chocolate cake for tea later. And you can lick the bowl out without having to share it with the others.’

Emma stomped up to her bedroom. She was furious with Vicki. Sitting on her bed, she brushed away big, fat, angry tears.

‘Don’t get mad, get even,’ she said to herself.

Emma wasn’t a nasty child, but she did have a temper and anybody who crossed her got to know about it one way or another. She got out her writing pad and pen and composed a furious letter to her cousin:

Dear Vicki,
Running off like that was nasty. It was cruel and it hurt my
feelings. How would you like it if someone did that to you? You’re a girl dog, and not a cute one, either, a big, ugly, nasty one with bad breath and rotten teeth and fleas.
You’re stupid and I hate you. I hope you get run over by a big, red, double-decker bus.
From Emma, (with no love or kisses.)

She looked at her handiwork and felt better. But, as she looked at the note, she did begin to feel a bit guilty. Maybe it was too strong. The more she looked at it, the less she liked it. So she took her pen and ran a thick blue line through the words ‘big, red, double-decker bus’ and, instead, wrote:

Ok, maybe not a double-decker bus, just a single one will do.

She reread the note, satisfied until she had another pang of guilt. After all, she thought, would Vicki get any less squished by a single-decker bus than a double?

She got rid of the busses altogether, ran another line through the last sentence and wrote:

I hope you wake up tomorrow morning covered in big red spots, so that none of the
boys in school fancy you.

There, that’s much better, she thought. She read it through again and then, as an afterthought, added:

And I hope you have a snotty nose for three weeks.

Finally happy with her work she put the letter on her bookcase, but as she opened her bedroom door it flew into the air and fluttered down onto the carpet beside her. She put it on the bookcase. It fell down. She picked it up and sighed. She watched the note and it stayed exactly where she had put it until she turned to leave and then it fluttered down onto the carpet beside her.

She had an idea. To really get Vicki’s attention she would put it in the lizard frame. It would keep it secure and would make sure it was the first thing that Vicki saw when she walked into the room. It was no big deal fitting something in the frame; all you had to do was twist two grips and lift off the back.

Once she had fit the letter, Emma felt pleased with herself. She wanted Vicki to know how much she had upset her. As she thought about what Vicki had done to her, the anger built inside her again. She said out loud, ‘Vicki, I’m so mad with you and I’m not going to forget what you did to me today.’
She fumed until she ran out of words, her mouth opened but she couldn’t think of anything else to say that wouldn’t get her grounded if Nana heard her, so she stamped her foot in temper and said the first thing that came into her head:

‘Sand Lizard. Sand Lizard, cautiously creep.
Shim. Sham. Shally wham. Lizards leap.’

The room didn’t spin. She hadn’t said the whole verse, and, anyway, there was no picture in the frame. She couldn’t go inside a letter, could she? But the room did give a little jolt. Emma shuddered, feeling nervous. She was glad she hadn’t said the whole verse; maybe she would have found herself next to life-sized commas and angry words. Even so, a little twinge of worry stayed with her for the rest of the day. Something didn’t feel good and it wasn’t stomach-ache. Emma couldn’t get the jolt out of her mind.

****

While she was out, Vicki had a fit of the guilts about Emma and was ashamed of the mean trick she’d played.

‘We were rotten to her, weren’t we?’ she said to Rachel. ‘I was so bothered about having a ten year-old hanging around with us that I didn’t stop to think about her feelings.’

‘I wouldn’t like anyone to do that to me,’ Rachel said.

Vicki spent the last of her money buying Emma a pretty blue necklace to make up for being nasty.
When she got home Vicki was in trouble for what she’d done to Emma and she was grounded for the rest of the weekend. For once, she didn’t make a fuss. Even though she was grounded, Vicki still gave Emma the present and said that she was sorry for being horrible. Emma felt guilty, too, because Vicki obviously meant what she said. She didn’t even have a go at Emma for telling on her and getting her grounded.

Emma ran upstairs and took the letter out of the frame before Vicki saw it. She stuffed it into her trouser pocket and returned the frame, with the horse picture back inside, to Kerry and Mark’s room before anybody noticed. She felt better but still had a feeling that things weren’t right. She remembered the way the room had jolted.