The It Girl: Team Awkward. Katy Birchall

throw her way?

      J x

       From: [email protected]

       To: [email protected]

       Cc: [email protected]

       Subject: Re: Desperate times

      I’ve been looking at the video and it’s actually a Dracaena Lisa plant that you fell into, Anna, not a palm tree, although they are often mistakenly identified as palms due to their similar shape. The name Dracaena Lisa comes from the Greek word drakaina, which means ‘dragon’. This is because, if you cut the stem of the Dracaena, the juice that seeps out resembles dragon’s blood.

      Danny.

       From: [email protected]

       To: [email protected]

       Cc: [email protected]

       Subject: Well, that settles it

      I hate my life.

      See you guys at school.

      Love, me xxx

      From: [email protected]

      To: [email protected]; [email protected]

       Subject: Re: Well, that settles it

      Three million views and counting!

      J x

      

      ‘You know, I think you will find that this whole situation will really boost your popularity,’ Jess said, leaning back against the cubicle door.

      ‘How, exactly?’

      ‘For one thing.’ She hauled her bag up from the floor sharply, causing her Chemistry book to tumble out on to the bathroom floor. Jess grimaced. ‘It makes you . . . approachable.’

      ‘Approachable?!’ I pulled my knees closer to my chest, struggling to maintain my balance on top of the closed toilet seat.

      ‘Yes.’ Jess shuffled into the corner of the cubicle and awkwardly leaned sideways to pick up her book, her forehead narrowly avoiding my knees. ‘Approachable. You’re one of the people, just like Princess Diana was.’

      ‘I don’t remember Diana, Princess of Wales, ever getting stuck in a plant pot,’ I huffed.

      ‘Probably because there were no smartphones back then,’ Jess said comfortingly.

      ‘This is so embarrassing.’

      Jess looked at me. I could tell that she was less sympathetic than she had been before I’d forced her to cram herself into a toilet cubicle with me before school began on the first day of the summer term. ‘Are you speaking to your dad yet?’ she asked.

      I sighed. The truth was, what had happened at Dad and Helena’s engagement party probably hadn’t all been his fault. But everything else that had happened up until then definitely was.

      You’d think that after your dad decided that he was going to marry the most famous actress in the world, meaning that you suddenly have not only a future stepmum who has two Oscars sitting on her drinks cabinet but also a future stepsister who happens to be Britain’s most well-known It Girl, your life would get a bit better.

      But noooooo. Since Dad’s sudden revelation last term I have:

      1. Become the enemy of the most popular students in my year.

      2. Accidentally tried to steal the Queen Bee’s boyfriend.

      3. Accidentally set her best friend on fire.

      4. Been left hanging upside down in a waterfall in front of my entire year, my Wolverine vest on full display.

      5. Unintentionally become an It Girl in the press and almost lost my two best friends, Jess and Danny, when I attempted to use this to become more popular.

      6. Sung Fame! in front of my WHOLE school, out of tune and with no backing music.

      7. Fallen backwards into a plant pot, the video of which has now gone viral.

      So yeah, you could say that Dad’s surprise, very public engagement hadn’t really helped my personal and emotional growth as a teenager.

      And yes, it was pretty annoying of him to choose to have the party in Helena’s house rather than a super-cool exclusive club somewhere in London. I mean, come on, he’s marrying the most famous actress in the world and where do they choose to have their engagement party? At her home.

      If you ask me, it’s disappointing.

      But still. I guess it wasn’t not technically his fault that I fell into the plant pot. I don’t even blame Helena for having Dracaena Lisa plants in her house. Some people might think them an unnecessary decoration for a hallway. And yes, some people might perhaps have thought to move them away from a space that guests might be gathering in.

      But I have decided to overlook this lack of judgement. For my humiliation there really is only one person to blame: the person who invented sausage rolls.

      I told Jess this.

      ‘You’re blaming sausage rolls?’

      ‘No. Just the person who invented them,’ I stated. ‘I tried looking it up online. There’s no one listed specifically, but I bet it was someone who owned a cat.’

      Jess, for some reason, looked confused. ‘What do cats have to do with anything? And why are we talking about sausage rolls?’

      ‘Because,’ I explained to her wearily, ‘that’s the whole reason we’re in this mess in the first place!’

      At the party, I had been happily listening to Marianne Montaine, my It Girl soon-to-be stepsister, wax lyrical about her hugely famous rock star boyfriend Tom Kyzer. But Dad forced me to come with him so he could introduce me to some of his old-person author friends. They weren’t talking about interesting things like rock stars, either, just history and politics, which no one cares about really.

      Luckily I spotted a waiter milling around with a platter of sausage rolls and an escape plan formed in my mind. ‘Sorry,’ I excused myself to no one in particular. ‘I’m going to go get a sausage roll.’

      The waiter had sped back towards the kitchen, though, so I followed him. But as I looked back over my shoulder to see if anyone was watching, he came back out with another big tray of sausage rolls. I swerved to avoid him, he yelped, I got scared by the yelp, lost my balance and fell back into the plant pot.

      Jess blinked at me. ‘And now you have a thing against sausage rolls?’

      ‘The inventor of sausage rolls. The sausage rolls themselves were not at fault.’

      ‘Well, it’s a great story that makes no sense,’ Jess nodded. ‘Now can we get out of this cubicle? There really is not enough space in here for both of us.’

      ‘But there are people out there.’

      ‘Yeah, and I’m sure they’re all desperate to hear the sausage-roll-plant-pot story.’

      ‘Jess, be serious. It’s all over the Internet. Everyone will be laughing at me. Again.’

      ‘I’m sure they won’t laugh. And if they do I’ll tell them off.’

      ‘Promise?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘OK,