Stars! Page 3

  ‘Are we going to be famous, miss?’ asked Leon.

  ‘Just do as I say,’ replied Hayley. She smiled, but it was one of those smiles like my mum does sometimes. Underneath she’s getting wound up but she tries not to show it. Usually when I’ve done something wrong, which is, like, most of the time!

  ‘OK . . . what do you all honestly think of playing in a mixed team?’ Hayley asked.

  Everyone put up their hands and Hayley picked Dal to answer first.

  ‘I didn’t like it to begin with,’ he told her. ‘I thought the Reds were a boys’ team . . .’

  Lily was pushing her hand into the air excitedly. She was trying really hard to get Hayley’s attention.

  Dal carried on. ‘We thought that they would be . . . er . . . not . . . er . . . very good and that,’ he added.

  ‘And are they good?’ asked Hayley, with a proper smile this time.

  Dal nodded.

  ‘And girls – what do you think of—?’ began Hayley, only for Lily to cut in.

  ‘Well I think we’ve been a great success,’ she said as she straightened her hair and looked directly into the camera. ‘I mean – it’s been difficult having to put up with the name-calling and the rudeness, but we’ve done very well. And tactically we are better than them, except for Dal, who is really clever and the best footballer by miles in the team and . . . and . . . and Wendy is a woman and she’s a coach, which is really, really, really great, don’t you think?’

  ‘Oh—’ began Hayley.

  Lily didn’t let her get another word in. ‘We train the same as the boys,’ she added hurriedly. ‘And we’re better at lots of stuff and I think that without us the Reds wouldn’t behalf as good and . . . and . . . and . . .’

  ‘Take a breath,’ Hayley told her.

  Lily straightened more of her hair and smiled. ‘I’m OK,’ she told Hayley. ‘Now where was I? Oh, yes – the boys. Well, most of them have been really nice after complaining at the beginning. They really love us now and it’s all because we—’

  ‘She’s a right chatterbox!’ laughed Byron, interrupting.

  ‘I’m just trying to get my point across,’ complained Lily.

  Hayley put on my mum’s smile again and turned to me.

  ‘Let’s see what someone else has to say,’ she told us. ‘So, are you totally happy with the girls, Chris?’ she asked me.

  I shrugged. ‘They’re OK,’ I told her. ‘Lily has won us a couple of games with her goals and they can tackle and everything. I didn’t think they’d be able to play against really good boy players but they can. It’s like it doesn’t matter if we’re stronger than them . . .’

  ‘You are not stronger!’ shouted Parvy.

  I looked at the cameraman.

  ‘Over here please, Chris,’ said Hayley.

  I nodded. ‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ I told Parvy. ‘I don’t mean that we’re . . . Well, I do mean it, but not in the way that you think and–’

  Parvy snorted. ‘I could kick your butt any day of the week,’ she told me. ‘Shooting, running, training – anything you want.’

  ‘But I only meant that some of the lads we play against are quite big,’ I added.

  ‘Big like empty barrels,’ Lily told me. ‘And empty barrels make the most noise when you break them . . . my dad told me that.’

  Hayley held up her hands. ‘OK, OK . . .’ she told us. ‘Try not to get too carried away. Now who thinks that Rushton Reds can actually win the league or the Cup?’

  Every single one of us shouted out: ‘Me!’ ‘Me!’ ‘Me!’

  ‘Even against teams which have all-male squads?’ she added.

  ‘YES!’ shouted Parvy.

  ‘But you started the season very slowly . . .’

  ‘And now we’re getting better,’ replied Byron and Dal together.

  Jason nodded and joined in. ‘We’re going really well,’ he told Hayley. ‘We really play as a team and the coaches are brilliant.’

  ‘So, glory for the Reds then?’ asked Hayley.

  ‘WE ARE THE REDS! WE ARE THE REDS! WE ARE THE REDS!’ Byron sang out.

  The rest of us looked at each other and started to laugh.

  ‘What you laughing at?’ asked Byron.

  ‘We’re laughing at you, you silly sausage!’ Lily replied.

  Hayley asked us a few more questions and then we went back to shooting practice as the other half of the squad had their turn in front of the camera.

  Abs had gone home by the time we finished practice, which meant that I didn’t have a lift. I told Wendy that I was stuck. Abs should have told me he was going but he didn’t. It was as though he had fallen out with all of us and didn’t care any more. I didn’t like it.

  ‘I’ll take you,’ Wendy said. ‘Just use my phone and call your parents to ask them if that’s OK.’

  She handed me a pink phone. It was tiny but I still felt silly holding it. It was pink! And it had flowers printed on it. YUK! After I’d called my mum, Wendy asked me why I hadn’t gone with Dal or Jason.

  ‘Dal’s dad is taking him into town and Jason went to go see his nan,’ I explained.

  ‘OK. And what did you think of the TV crew?’ she added.

  ‘’S OK,’ I replied. ‘What did Abs say to you?’

  Wendy shrugged as she led me out to her car. ‘Oh, nothing much,’ she said, but I could tell that she was hiding something.

  ‘Did he quit?’ I asked.

  ‘Quit? Oh, no – I just told him to go and cool off. He’ll be back for the next training session.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Although he will have to start being nicer to the girls . . .’

  I nodded again. ‘I think he’ll be OK,’ I told her.

  ‘Let’s hope so – he’s a very fine attacker,’ she said. ‘Even if he is a little bit greedy on the ball!’

  I grinned. ‘He’s like that all the time,’ I said. ‘Will Ian and Steve be back for the next session?’

  ‘Er . . . Ian will,’ she said. ‘Steve is a bit . . . er . . . busy with his family.’

  I didn’t ask any more questions after that. Instead, as Wendy drove me home, I wondered whether Abs would be OK with me at school the following day. I hoped so. Abs could be a bit stupid sometimes, but he was cool too.

  And he was one of my best friends.

  Chapter 6

  Wednesday

  ‘AIN’T TALKING TO you!’ Abs told me as I sat on the wall outside our classroom the next morning.

  ‘Hey! Why aren’t you talking to me?’ I asked.

  ‘Because I’m not!’ he replied.

  ‘What about me?’ asked Dal, who was standing beside me.

  ‘None of you. We aren’t friends any more . . .’ Abs told us.

  He walked off into the classroom as Jason came up.

  ‘What’s wrong with Abs?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I told him. ‘He said he isn’t our friend any more.’

  ‘Why?’ Jason looked really upset.

  I shrugged.

  ‘I bet it’s got to do with what happened yesterday at football,’ said Dal.

  ‘He was really strange then too,’ I added. ‘He only spoke to Gurinder and Ant.’

  Dal asked me what we were going to do.

  ‘We haven’t done anything wrong,’ I told him. ‘Abs is the one who’s being a baby.’

  ‘Yeah, Chris, but he’s our friend,’ said Jason.

  I shook my head. ‘You didn’t hear him,’ I replied. ‘He said he doesn’t want to be our friend.’

  For the rest of the morning Abs didn’t even look at me, Dal or Jason, even though we’re all in the same class. We were doing a project on recycling and I was trying to draw a picture of a paper-recycling machine. Abs was supposed to help me with it. But he stayed on the other side of the classroom, talking to a lad called Dylan. When the teacher, Miss Chohan, asked him why he wasn’t working with me, he just shrugged and said that he’d changed partners to be with Dylan.

  ‘I
told him I was going to change,’ Abs told Miss Chohan.

  But he was lying. He hadn’t told me. I wanted to say something, but before I could Lily and Parvy walked into our classroom.

  ‘Hello!’ Parvy said, smiling at me like those crazy old people on the bus do sometimes.

  ‘Why are you here?’ I asked.

  ‘We’re doing the project too!’ she replied as Lily went over to Dal and gave him a hug. She’s always doing that – pretending that they’re going out with each other. Dal gets really embarrassed by it.

  ‘Don’t do that!’ he complained as two lads from our class, Nilesh and Mark, started to giggle like little five-year-old girls.

  ‘What you laughing at?’ Dal asked them. He was getting upset.

  ‘Your big ugly face!’ Nilesh told him.

  Lily spun round to face Nilesh and put her hands on her hips.

  ‘Don’t you dare call my husband ugly!’ she told him. ‘I’d tell you to look in a mirror but you broke them all so you can’t,’ she added.

  ‘EHH!!!! Nilesh got beat by a girl!’ shouted another lad, Paulo, just as Lily turned back and Nilesh leaned forward and pinched her – hard – then tugged at her hair.

  Miss Chohan looked up. ‘Who’s beating who?’ she asked.

  ‘No one, miss,’ Lily told her. ‘It was just Nilesh. He pulled my hair, but I’m OK . . .’

  ‘NILESH PATEL!’ shouted Miss Chohan.

  ‘But I never, miss – I never!’ protested Nilesh.

  Only Miss Chohan didn’t believe him. She marched over and told Nilesh to go and see Mr Williams, the school deputy head.

  ‘You don’t pull hair,’ she told him.

  ‘But he didn’t do it, miss,’ came a shout from behind us. It was Abs. ‘Lily is lying. It was Chris who done it!’

  Me, Dal, Jason, Lily and Parvy all spun round to look at him. He shrugged at us and then grinned. But none of us grinned back. It was one thing not talking to us – but to get us in trouble with the teacher? That was just wrong.

  ‘Lily?’ asked Miss Chohan, looking concerned.

  Lily let her face drop and then her lower lip began to quiver, as though she was going to cry. I knew she was faking, but the teacher didn’t. She fell for it.

  ‘Now now, Lily – no need to cry – there’s a good girl,’ said Miss Chohan.

  ‘He did do it, miss,’ said Lily. ‘He pulled my hair and he pinched me and he told me that I was a silly poo–’

  ‘No I didn’t!’ shouted Nilesh.

  ‘ENOUGH!’ shouted someone from the doorway. It was Mr Kilminster, our form teacher. He was red-faced and his eyes looked like they were going to pop out of his head. But then again he always looked like that. I felt a joke coming on.

  ‘Do you think that’s how he asks for his breakfast in the morning – by shouting at his wife?’ I whispered to the others.

  ‘Probably,’ replied Parvy with a grin.

  ‘GET ME MY TEA!’ said Dal in a loud whisper.

  ‘Imagine being his kids,’ I added. ‘That would be horrible.’

  ‘He hasn’t got kids,’ whispered Lily. ‘He’s far too ugly to be allowed to have them . . .’

  We all started to giggle and Mr Kilminster went mad again.

  ‘THIS IS A CLASSROOM – NOT A ZOO!’ he yelled.

  ‘Then why are you here?’ whispered Parvy, really faintly.

  This time we had to hold our laughter in. By the time we had settled down again, I’d totally forgotten Abs’s betrayal. But Dal and Lily hadn’t.

  ‘Don’t know what his problem is,’ Lily said after about ten minutes.

  ‘Who?’ asked Jason. ‘Mr Kilminster?’

  ‘No – not him,’ Dal replied. ‘Abs . . .’

  I grinned. Dal and Lily were thinking the same way now.

  ‘They must be married,’ I said to Parvy and Jason, talking about Dal and Lily. ‘That’s what my mum and dad do. Like, my mum will start saying something and halfway through my dad will walk into the room and finish what she’s saying. It’s spooky.’

  ‘Like your sister’s haircut?’ asked Jason.

  ‘No – that’s SCARY,’ I joked.

  We laughed a bit more but soon shut up when Mr Kilminster walked towards us.

  ‘Abs is soooo out of order,’ continued Lily, in a whisper.

  ‘It’s all about football,’ I replied.

  ‘ARE YOU WORKING OR TALKING, CHRISTOPHER?’

  ‘Working, sir,’ I said.

  ‘GOOD!’ Mr Kilminster bellowed.

  We waited five minutes and then Lily started whispering again.

  ‘I think he hates me,’ she said, talking about Abs.

  ‘No, he doesn’t,’ Dal told her, taking the words right out of my mouth.

  ‘Then why is he so mean?’ she asked.

  ‘I dunno,’ I replied. ‘I think he’s just being funny about you girls playing for the team.’

  Parvy groaned. ‘Is he still on about that?’ she asked. ‘It’s been ages since then. He’s just a big baby.’

  Lily nodded in agreement. ‘We aren’t going anywhere,’ she told us. ‘Rushton Reds is as much our team as it is yours.’

  ‘We know that,’ said Dal.

  ‘Why, thank you for the support, darling,’ teased Lily.

  ‘Stop it!’ Dal demanded.

  ‘Oh, don’t be like that. I was only—’ she began just as a familiar shout went up.

  ‘WORK, NOT PLAY!’ yelled Mr Kilminster.

  That evening Dal came over for tea and we spoke more about Abs. I wanted to go round to Abs’s house or call him on the phone but Dal told me to forget it.

  ‘It won’t last long,’ he told me.

  ‘What if he really does stop being our friend – like permanently?’ I asked.

  ‘He won’t,’ said Dal. ‘Come on – let’s go on your computer. I want to check out that new Audi supercar!’

  We ran upstairs and I turned on my PC so that we could surf the net. Within thirty seconds Dal had found the car he was on about. He sat and talked about how fast it went and how many valves it had, but I wasn’t listening. I don’t mind cars – they look great, some of them. But I don’t like talking about them.

  After about ten minutes, I navigated to the Liverpool FC website and we looked at that. There was loads of news on it and we downloaded LFC screensavers too. Just as the last screensaver was loading, I noticed a small box pop up at the bottom right of the screen. It was Abs and he was signing into Messenger. I clicked on the box and the screen changed.

  ‘He’s online,’ I told Dal.

  ‘So?’ asked Dal. ‘If he didn’t talk to us at school, he isn’t going to do it online, is he?’

  I shrugged. ‘He might,’ I replied.

  I typed a quick message to him and pressed the ‘send’ button. The message said: ‘Hello.’ I waited for about five minutes and when Abs didn’t reply, I sent another message which read: ‘What’s up, bro?’ He didn’t reply to that either.

  ‘Told you,’ said Dal.

  I thought hard about how I could get Abs to reply. What would wind him up so much that he wouldn’t be able to resist replying? I asked Dal.

  ‘Manchester United,’ he said straight away.

  ‘Good one!’ I shouted, wishing that I’d thought of it myself.

  I waited a moment and then typed ‘Man U are rubbish!’ I pressed ‘Send’.

  For a minute Abs did nothing, but then ‘Abs is writing a reply’ flashed up.

  I smiled at Dal. ‘See?’ I told him. ‘Now we can chat to him and find out what’s wrong.’

  But the reply said only one thing: ‘GET LOST!’

  Chapter 7

  Thursday

  WENDY TOLD US about Steve at Thursday’s training session. He had gone home early during our last game and hadn’t turned up for Tuesday’s session either. I remembered Wendy telling me that he had some family problems, but she hadn’t been telling me the truth. Not that she was lying or being sly or anything. She just hadn’t wanted to upse
t me. But now she was telling us all.

  ‘I’m afraid that Steve had a heart attack on Monday morning after feeling very ill during Saturday’s game. He’s in hospital, recovering, and although he’s OK, he is very, very poorly.’

  Ian, who looked really tired and upset, turned to us. ‘I’ve been visiting him every day and I have to say he’s fighting to get better.’

  Everyone in the squad just looked at each other. I put my hand up.

  ‘Yes, Chris?’ asked Wendy.

  ‘Will he get better?’ I asked. Dal and Byron nodded as though I’d asked what they were thinking too.

  ‘We hope so,’ she replied.

  ‘The doctors say that he’s on the mend,’ added Ian. ‘And Steve also told me to pass on a message. He said that although you’re not quite there, he feels that this team will very soon be the best junior team he has ever worked with . . .’

  Hayley and the TV crew were filming us as we stood in silence. She looked very serious, and when the rest of the squad went to get changed, she asked me and Parvy to stay behind.

  ‘Would you like to tell me how you are feeling?’ she asked us. ‘For the programme?’

  I nodded. John had the little camera and he pointed it at us and then said ‘Go’. Hayley asked us how we felt about Steve.

  ‘It’s a big shock,’ Parvy told her. ‘He’s really lovely and he is a great coach.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I added. ‘He just wants what’s best for all of us and I hope he’s back soon.’

  Hayley coughed a little. ‘Do you think that Steve’s illness will make you closer as a team?’ she asked.

  Parvy nodded. ‘We’re already quite close but yes, this should help too,’ she replied.

  ‘It’s like, if we go and play on Saturday,’ I said, ‘we’ll be thinking about him and what he always tells us to do. I know I will . . .’

  Hayley smiled at us. ‘So Rushton Reds to win the next game for their poorly coach?’ she asked.

  ‘Every game!’ said Parvy.

  ‘We want to win our league,’ I added. ‘And the Cup too . . .’

  ‘OK,’ replied Hayley. ‘Thanks, kids.’