Super Awkward Read online

  8.32 p.m. Argh. How has only two minutes gone by since I last checked?! Will this torture never end? At least I know what missing out on the most important social event of the year feels like. Kind of like being too ill to get out of bed at Christmas, but multiplied by one million.

  Hurry up, tomorrow, when I can be back home. It’s cringe that I’m excited about going back to Appleton. It’s my dive of a nothing-to-do and nothing-to-see village, whose only highlight is that we have a weird rock, which if you look at it from an exact angle resembles William Shakespeare. Sadly, that is only interesting for 0.5 seconds, and I’ve had to live there for 15.5 years, which is quite a lot of seconds more. Thank goodness the others live there or I’d probably have already become Britain’s Youngest Hermit, which sounds like the name of a TV show I’d probably watch while being one.

  I picked off a rogue cornflake which had glued itself to my knee and tried to focus on tearing up the cereal boxes for my DIY costume. It should really be called BPDDIY – Bella Please Don’t Do It Yourself (as it’s potentially the worst idea I’ve had yet). As I glued down flaps of cardboard, blobbed on spots of nail varnish, I reassured myself that this bad idea was a good one.

  BEEP.

  FINALLY! Information from the outside world. But the name on my screen hit me like a tennis ball in the boob. Luke. Why oh why did God invent mobiles?! And why does He enable intermittent reception in caravan parks when He can’t manage decent hot water or food that isn’t beige? Priorities, please, beardy one. Maybe he’d bum-messaged me by accident (Luke, not God). I opened it up. Two words.

  Guess who?

  There was something else. A picture. A picture that made my insides knot before my mind had even figured out what was happening. Proof I really do think with my stomach.

  If only there was an emoji for throwing up on a caravan floor. There on my phone, invading my space, my eyes, was Luke. Doing what he does best. Thumbs up. Winking at the camera. Not paying any attention to the poor girl he was kissing, cos as always, it was all about him. Was it Lou? All I could see was the back of a wide brimmed purple hat, which was more fabric than Lou would normally wear on her whole body. But why send it to me? We hadn’t managed eye contact, let alone phone contact, since we split up, so why start messaging me all of a sudden? Did he think I’d be bothered? I totally am, but how dare he think that! None of it made sense.

  I rang Rach. Answer machine. No replies to my messages either, same for Tegan. I even called Mikey, even though he can’t form sentences if it’s over a verbal communication device. Crapballscrapballscrapballs.

  I shouldn’t care what Luke does. It wasn’t like I liked him any more. So why did I feel so gross about it? Out of everyone in the world, it should be easy to understand myself, but I swear there’s a secret bit of my body that hides away information from my own brain, eurgh.

  Whatever happens, I MUSTN’T reply. He’d think I cared. And it doesn’t matter what I really think, but it really does matters what he thinks I think. WWBD? What would Beyoncé do? Yes, I was a strong, independent woman, who could rise above being stuck in solitary caravan confinement while my ex prods at my pride.

  Guess who cares, more like.

  Oops. As soon as I sent it I regretted it. Well, I regretted it before I sent it, but it takes more than concrete logic to stop me making bad decisions. So, I was a strong independent woman with the willpower of someone who once threw up after eating an entire tin of Quality Street. I don’t even like strawberry creams.

  My phone beeped.

  Hope ur ok. Don’t panic but Luke telling peeps

  he snogged T . Not true. Repeat NOT

  TRUE. Long story – explain when ur back. DO

  NOT WORRY. Battery dying. Miss u. R xxx

  WHAT THE WHAT?! When World War II erupted, did Winston Churchill, or whoever, just text the UK saying, ‘Ooh, look out, there might be a spot of trouble brewing?’

  How could Rachel drop a text-bomb like this on me? She knows I’m a sensitive (by that, I mean unbalanced) individual. What ‘long story’? And why couldn’t she plug her phone in?!

  I studied Luke’s picture. Last time I looked, the hat was just a piece of headgear; now it was an evidence-obscurer. Who was he kissing? And why pretend it was the one person in the world who we both knew would never snog him? I ignored the niggling doubt that made me zoom right in just to see if I could spot a glimpse of Tegan’s black hair. But there was nothing to be seen except Luke’s smug face. I forwarded it to Rachel.

  WTW is this? I’m FREAKIN out. Ring me!

  RING ME.

  I waited about fifteen seconds. I sent the same to Tegan. Nothing.

  Are you getting my messages? Ring me! It’s

  urgent x 1000000000.

  Didn’t they understand the urgency?

  NOW.

  Was that too demanding? I messaged an extra ‘please’ just in case. But no matter how much I wafted my phone, no delivery notifications would come through. Had they even sent?

  In frustration I slammed the nearest thing to me down on the table. Unfortunately, it was an opened box of Cheerios, which flew over me like breakfast-based confetti.

  But as I flicked off the main offenders, I was oblivious that I’d still be picking them out of my pants when I met the boy of my dreams.

  CHAPTER

  THREE

  “Er, please tell me that isn’t the most disgusting rash I’ve ever seen?”

  Jo has a habit of choosing the worst moments to show her face. And her grey eyes were wide open, staring straight at a clump of Cheerios stuck to my armpit.

  “And why are you standing on a chair with your arms in the air?” She eyed me suspiciously. I flicked the armpit Cheerios on to the table. Totally still eatable.

  “Sending a message.” I continued to wave my phone above my head, ignoring the alarming watercolour of a naked man she’d casually thrown down on to the sofa. She really had paid attention to detail. Too much detail.

  “Right. . .” She gave me the slightly disapproving-yet-patronizing look that makes up eighty per cent of her entire look repertoire. “What’s up this time?”

  “Just party stuff. . . It’s complicated.” Still no signal.

  “What kind of complicated? I’m currently averaging 92 per cent in my degree; I think I might be able to get whatever it is.” Then it dawned on her. “Ohhhh. Is it boy-complicated?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe yes, or maybe no?”

  “Maybe yes, all right! I just got a weird message from Luke and it’s making me lose my mind a bit.”

  She looked me up and down, which is easy to do when someone’s standing on a chair. “Did you lose it so much you didn’t realize you seem to be rocking a combo of cardboard, comedy pants and my vest top. Which I can’t seem to remember us ever talking about?”

  “They’re pug pants.”

  “It’s my vest top.”

  “It’s the start of my costume.”

  “And it’s my vest top.”

  She was so annoying.

  “Cowbag.”

  “Thief.”

  “Sssshhh. Can’t you see I’m having a breakdown? Stop nagging me, and start telling me everything’s going to be fine.”

  “Everything’s going to be fine.”

  “No! With conviction.”

  “I don’t lie. Nothing is ever fine with you . . . and it’s my vest top.”

  I pulled out a chair and sat cross-legged so she couldn’t spot my de-furred legs and figure out I’d finally found where she’d hidden her razor. The distraction worked, and I avoided discovery. She sat down beside me, and I took a deep breath.

  “So, apaz Luke’s saying he snogged Tegan.”

  “No way!” Her genuine shock reassured me.

  “Way.”

  So it was weird. Jo knows as well as I do that Tegan’s one of the good people. The kind that have nice eyes and play wing defence in netball. She’s also the person who can always be relied on to sort party d
rama, not cause it. Jo doesn’t know, but I do, that Tegan also calls Luke ‘Puke’, and surely you can’t willingly put a tongue in someone who is human vomit?

  “I can kinda see why you’re freaking out.”

  “I’M NOT FREAKING OUT!”

  Jo raised her eyebrow at my frantic phone wafting.

  “Of course you’re not.”

  “Look, there’s probably a logical explanation. You know what it’s like when parties get out of hand.”

  “Not really. . .” Unless she meant Mum’s overnight Pilates parties, but they’re just full of foot smells and people offering us green tea.

  “Stupid stuff always happens. That’s what parties are for. For things that would never happen in real life.”

  I walked the one metre across our caravan and lay on the sofa, closing my eyes like I was in an American therapy session.

  “Pleeeease tell me I’m the subject of a hidden camera show, just that there aren’t any cameras and this isn’t funny?”

  “I . . . can’t do that. Have you tried ringing them?”

  “Obvs. No answer.”

  “Ahh, so is that who you’re messaging?”

  “Can see why you’re doing so well in your exams.”

  “Oi, I’m trying to help. Show me your phone.”

  I showed her the crucial messages, carefully obscuring the slightly manic ones I’d sent since.

  “Look, it’s probably not that bad. I was once in a similar situation.”

  “You were?”

  “Well, not quite, cos I’ve only really been out with boys that have liked me more than I’ve liked them.”

  THANKS FOR THE REMINDER, PERSON WHO EVEN LOOKS GOOD SLEEP-DRIBBLING. She carried on oblivious to my mental gagging.

  “Anyway, a boy I once liked – you know, Owen, the actor one? – well, after we’d been out a few times, he ended up pulling Rosanna.”

  Rosanna was Jo’s best mate, and one half of their award-winning cross-country running duo, RoJo. This could actually be a useful insight for a change.

  “We ended up talking it through, and seeing the funny side – that we’d both been taken in by a man whose day job was dressing up as a hamburger.” She laughed at the hilarious memory. “So always remember the rule. BFs before boyfs.”

  Am I seriously the only person alive whose sister is basically a walking talking personification of inspirational internet quotes, which people like, but no one actually does? I rolled my eyes under my shut eyelids.

  “No offence. But you two are not normal. And anyway, Tegan didn’t even snog him, ’member?”

  “Either way, there’s nothing you can do about it from here, so there’s no point obsessing over it.”

  “I’m not obsessing. I’m just thinking about it. Deeply. A lot of the time.”

  “Well, why don’t you deeply think about something you can control, like taking off my top, or at least putting on some more of your costume so I don’t have to look at your bum any more. Or . . . you could stay in on your own and wave your phone for the next three hours, but I doubt you’ve got the upper arm strength for that.”

  What a choice. Rock. Hard place. But if Jo wasn’t going to let me wallow privately, I’d just have to do it publicly. I looked at the rest of my cardboard creation, which was taking up almost all of our floor space. A giant arrow shape, taller than me, constructed out of all the red cereal boxes I’d dug out of our bin (and maybe some other people’s bins too), with a special circle cut out for me to poke my face through. Despite my best efforts, it not only looked a bit rubbish, but smelt a bit of it too. Oh well.

  When I’d strapped the prototype to my body earlier, Mum didn’t instantly guess that I was obviously dressed as ‘a tribute to the beautiful memory of One Direction’. Although, maybe she just wouldn’t know a giant comedy pop reference if it hit her. Which it then accidentally did. Oh well, if I did have a full-on breakdown, at least I was basically an easy-to-find walking version of Google Maps.

  With my phone in constant line of sight, I opened up three fresh roles of sellotape and began securing the creation to my body. One hundred and twenty-four phone checks, five Beyoncé power anthems, four Cheerios in surprisingly difficult to reach places, three emotional breakdowns and an unhealthy amount of talcing and vertically backcombing my hair later, I was ready to go.

  If messaging Luke was my first big mistake of the evening, throwing myself into this look was my second. I tugged at my outfit, feeling like a cross between a lamp post and a red Monopoly house. I’d had to do up Jo’s belt so tight to help secure it, I was risking oxygen deprivation.

  “Jo. Be honest. Are you sure people will get it?”

  Jo looked at me like honesty wasn’t the best policy.

  “Look. The worst they can do is stand and point. And you’re already kinda doing that anyway.”

  I nodded as if this was reassuring but almost knocked the ceiling light off with my giant pointy head. This must be how aliens feel.

  “Guess the only way is up? Isn’t it time you got changed?”

  “Into what? You’ve nicked the red top I was going to wear. I’ll just go as one of last year’s X Factor rejects.”

  “But no one here will remember who they are?”

  “Exactly.” She’d picked up her arguing technique from Mum – confuse and conquer. “Trust me, you’ll feel loads better when we’re there, and everyone’s all dressed up. You know that weirdo family who always wear matching trousers will have gone way more OTT than you.”

  Feeling entirely self-conscious, but also desperate to distract myself, we headed out. We were both in Jo’s shoes – easy for her, harder for me, who is two sizes smaller. We walked/tottered (Jo/me) our way out to the events hall, unaware that witnessing tone deaf OAPs gyrating to Brie-anna (a cheese-based tribute duo) would soon be the very least of my worries.

  Words cannot express how embarrassing it was walking through the heavy wooden double doors into the way-too-brightly-lit party room. If there was an Olympic medal for Simultaneous Conversation Stopping, I would currently be on a podium collecting it. The door even creaked extra loudly just to help focus everyone’s attention on me. Not that you need any help getting attention when you’re dressed as a giant arrow. Of the hundred people gathered there, not one other person had gone in fancy dress.

  A woman in office-wear scurried over, an enthusiastic smile plastered on her face, the exact opposite of the horrified one on mine.

  “Ooh, loves, look at you.” She said ‘you’ plural, but clearly meant ‘you, the girl in the cardboard monstrosity’. “Don’t you just look . . . something. So sweet of you to make the effort, even though we posted that memo about fancy dress just being for the staff.”

  Standing in the middle of a multitude of ageing couples who were very much not wearing giant arrow costumes was not the ideal time to discover this. MEMO TO THE ROOM – I DID NOT GET THE MEMO. Office-wear woman continued.

  “We decided to call off fancy dress for the guests when our most enthusiastic family had to head home after one of their children got concussion running repeatedly into a brick wall.”

  Oh. My. Cod. Matching-trouser-child had managed to hospitalize himself in what was surely an ingenious escape plan. Why had I not thought of this?

  Over-friendly office-wear lady did a slow 360 spin. “I’m Mariah Carey, see?”

  I did not see, unless Mariah had a second job as a doctor’s receptionist. I shot daggers at Jo. How could she not have checked?! “And full marks to you for your fab arrow outfit. Are you a . . . Pointer Sister?”

  I was shaking so much with rage and humiliation that I looked like a wobbly compass needle.

  “I. AM. OBVS. A TRIBUTE TO THE BEAUTIFUL MEMORY OF ONE DIRECTION.”

  Oh excellent. My volume control had taken a mini-break along with my dignity.

  Jo mouthed ‘sorry’, but unless she had Doctor Who skills, ‘sorry’ was not going to wipe the memories of everybody in the room. Even the mini sausage rolls looked lik
e they were laughing at me. My eyes prickled the pre-cry warning.

  Two options. Stand and cry, or storm off.

  I kept it classy, and did both, scoring extra loser points for my staccato hiccup crying voice as I yelled at Jo for not reading the memo.

  Back home my real life was being ruined by my ex-boyf, and now my holiday life was an utter shambles too. Sympathetic looks coming in from all angles, I bent myself sideways out of the wooden door (taking out one entire line of bunting in the process) and stormed back to the caravan. All I wanted to do was crawl into my table/bed and hide from the world.

  Now, I don’t know how I forgot that I didn’t have any keys, but I did. Probably something to do with having the worst night of my life. So I had to do an extra half a mile detour stomp to the restaurant where Mum was meant to be enjoying ‘Losing Your Veg-inity’ (their annual vegan dating night). It’s actually quite exhausting doing a long distance storm-out, but I had to keep it up in case Jo saw me walking normally and figured I was over it.

  I would NEVER be over this.

  Luckily, there was hardly anyone in the restaurant block. Unluckily that included my mum, who was nowhere to be seen. Sweeping the floor was a disinterested waiter, who chose to ignore what I was wearing, and that I had more mascara down my face than on my eyes, and reeled off a message from my mum. Apparently ‘she was out all night, with her phone off, finding inner peace practising “Yoga through the Menopause”, and there was some tuna in the fridge if I was hungry’. Why did I have to have the maniac-fifty-something-hippy mum, not the totally-normal-taking-us-to-Spain-for-a-week-in-the-summer mum?

  I stomped back out into the freezing night. Now what?! Was going back to the warmth of Pop-Swop better or worse than slowly dying of hypothermia? I hobbled to the hall to assess the options. A man was on stage announcing that they were moments away from the delights of Pearls Allowed (the OAP girlband), Oldplay (clue’s in the title) and BigMacFly (a Weight Watchers cover band). Hypothermia won. Resigned to waiting for Mum to finish posing like a post-menstrual panda, I trudged back to the caravan.