Pick ‘n’ Mix. Jean Ure

going to be easy. She’s not like an ordinary thirteen-year-old.”

      “No problem,” I said. “I’ll look after her. It’ll be good training!” I plan to be a social worker when I leave school. Either that or an aromatherapist. At any rate, something to do with helping people. Mum knows this. “I reckon the sooner I get started,” I said, “the better.”

      “Well… so long as you’re sure.”

      I told Mum that I was absolutely positive and went galloping back upstairs to admire my corner cabinet standing in its corner. It was a pity I wasn’t going to get the benefit of it for the next few weeks, but Angel needn’t think she was putting her stuff in there. I wasn’t turning out my fossil collection just for her.

      I got a bit of a shock when I went into my room: a long bald strip of carpet had appeared between the cabinet and the bed. It was Rags! He’d discovered the loose fronds and was joyously tugging at them, making happy little growly noises, his bum stuck up in the air.

      “What are you doing?” I shrieked. Rags started, guiltily. “Bad!” I said. “Bad!”

      Rags rolled an eye, and grinned, then collapsed on to his back and frantically waved his paws at me. Poor little man! How could I be cross with him? It wasn’t his fault. All the same, it was a nasty moment. Mum could hardly be expected to miss a long bald strip in the middle of my carpet. I didn’t even have a rug I could use for covering it up. In the end, in desperation, I grabbed a pile of clothes and chucked them on the floor. I knew Mum wouldn’t clear them away cos she’d told me only last week she wasn’t going to tidy up after me any more.

      “You must learn to be a bit more responsible. I’m not here to act as your servant.”

      I was safe for the moment, but I knew it couldn’t last. Sooner or later I was going to be moved into Angel’s room and Angel was going to be moved into mine, and then the baldness would be revealed in all its horror. And the hole in the carpet. It was fraying fast, all round the edge, and was ballooning out where Rags had tugged.

      There was only one thing to do. I raced back downstairs and into the kitchen.

      “Mum?”

      Where was she? I had to get to her before she rang Mrs Duffy.

      “Mum!” I ran, panting, up the hall.

      “What is it?” said Mum, coming out of the front room. “Is the house on fire?”

      I said, “No, but I’ve been thinking… maybe it’s not fair on Angel, me moving into her room. You know how she hates people touching her things.”

      “Well, that’s all right,” said Mum. “Don’t touch them.”

      “But she hates me even just looking at them. Just breathing on them. It might give her a nervous breakdown!”

      “She’ll get over it,” said Mum.

      “But it could be fatal!”

      “I doubt it.”

      I was really surprised at Mum. Who would have thought she could be so heartless?

      I said, “Mu-u-um!”

      “It’s no big deal,” said Mum. “So she’s sacrificing her bedroom for four weeks. It won’t do her any harm. I’m more concerned about you; Emilia can be quite clingy. I just hope you’re not biting off more than you can chew.”

      “I’m not,” I said. “It’s Angel I’m worried about.”

      “That’s very sweet of you,” said Mum, “but really quite unnecessary. In any case, it’s too late now, I’ve already rung Mrs Duffy. Emilia’s coming on Tuesday.”

      I said, “Oh.”

      “We’ll do the move tomorrow evening.”

      “OK.” I trailed to the door, then suddenly turned back. “Maybe Emilia could sleep in my room, with me?”

      “Don’t be silly,” said Mum. “We couldn’t get a second bed in your room.”

      “I could always sleep downstairs,” I said. Emilia by herself probably wouldn’t even notice a hole in the carpet. “I could sleep on the sofa!”

      “Now you’re just being ridiculous,” said Mum.

      “But, M—”

      “You’re both sleeping in Angel’s room! That’s it, it’s all sorted.”

      “B—”

      “Frankie!”

      I was doomed.

       Chapter Two

      “So then Mum said how would we feel if she came to live with us for a bit, and I said I wouldn’t mind, except if it meant sharing a bedroom with Angel, cos you know what she’s like.”

      Jemma said, “Yuck, yes!”

      Skye nodded, wisely. “Wouldn’t work.”

      “Well, this is it,” I said. “I mean, imagine.”

      It was Monday afternoon and we were walking back from school. Skye and Jem are my best mates. I’d been bursting all day to tell them about what had happened to my carpet and the terrible trouble I was going to be in, but what with one thing and another this was the first chance I’d had.

      “Anyway,” I said, “I got this bright idea? I said if Angel moved into my room, me and her could share Angel’s room—”

      “You and this girl?”

      “Emilia. Yes! But—”

      “What’s she like?”

      “Oh –” I waved a hand. “She’s all right.” Emilia wasn’t what I wanted to talk about. What I wanted to talk about was this fearsome thing that was hanging over me. The hole in my carpet… “I don’t actually know her very well. The thing is—”

      “Suppose you don’t get on?” said Jem.

      “We’ll get on! It’s only for a few weeks.” I’m not like Angel, I don’t get all fussed and bothered about stuff. Angel is always on about her ‘stuff’ and how no one’s got to touch it. “The thing is—”

      “Could seem like for ever,” said Skye.

      “Well, it won’t, cos it’s not! The awfulthing is she’s coming tomorrow and tonight we’re going to swap bedrooms and Mum’s going to discover there’s a hole in my carpet!”

      The words wailed out of me. There was a silence. Then Skye, very solemnly, said, “A hole.”

      “In my carpet!”

      They looked at each other. “You mean it’s, like, threadbare?” said Jem. “No! I cut it.”

      “You what?” said Skye.

      “I cut it!”

      “Cut your carpet?”

      Honestly! It is so annoying when people keep repeating everything you say.

      “Yes,” I snapped. “I cut my carpet!”

      “But why?”

      “Cos I wanted Gran’s cabinet to fit in the corner and the ceiling wasn’t high enough!”

      “So you cut the carpet.”

      Really, for someone who is supposed to have this immense great brain, always getting A pluses and coming top of everything, Skye can be incredibly slow on the uptake. How many more times did I have to tell her? Yes, I cut the carpet!

      “It would have been all right,” I said, “if it hadn’t gone