Jacqueline Wilson's Happy Holidays Read online

  ‘Oh, we’ll definitely go and have a cup of tea in Peggy’s Parlour,’ said Mum, giggling. ‘It all looks so old-fashioned. I do hope Peggy herself is a little old lady in a black dress with a frilly white apron, tottering around writing everybody’s orders in a little notebook tied to her waist.’

  ‘You are daft, Mum. Don’t let’s go there yet though. I want to see the sea.’

  ‘OK, OK, stop bouncing around in your seat!’

  We drove on past a proper restaurant, a pub, and a white hotel with a big green lawn and several swings.

  ‘See, there is a hotel! Oh Mum, can we stay there?’

  ‘Maybe. It might be a bit expensive.’

  ‘But Auntie Avril’s given us heaps of money.’

  ‘It might have to last us a long time until I manage to get a job,’ said Mum. She nibbled at her lip. ‘Beauty, what can I do? Jobwise, I mean. I’ve only ever been a receptionist, and I was hopeless.’

  ‘You could do heaps of things, Mum,’ I said. ‘You could . . . be a cookie baker.’

  It was a little joke to make Mum laugh. She smiled at me. ‘OK, that’s what I’ll do,’ she said.

  She turned down a steep little lane towards the seafront. There were more houses now with sloping gardens. Some of the houses had signs.

  ‘We could stay in one of these,’ I said.

  ‘OK, we’ll pick one later,’ said Mum.

  We drove downwards, round another bend, Mum’s foot hard on the brakes – and then we were at the seafront.

  ‘Oh, Mum!’ I said.

  ‘Oh, Beauty!’ said Mum.

  Rabbit Cove was perfect. There was a high cliff on either side (the rabbit’s ears) sheltering a beautiful cove of soft golden sand. There was hardly anyone on the beach, just a few families with little kids running about trailing seaweed and sticking flags in sandcastles.

  An old-fashioned artist with a beard and a baggy blue shirt was sitting up on the little white wall, painting. At the other end of the wall there was a small car park, a little wooden hut for toilets, and a beach shop-cum-café festooned with buckets and spades and an old tin ice-cream sign spinning outside.

  ‘It’s just like a picture in an old story book!’ I said. ‘It’s so lovely!’

  I couldn’t be sure I wasn’t making it all up. I closed my eyes, counted to three, and opened them again. Rabbit Cove was still there, serenely beautiful.

  ‘I’m so pleased it’s lovely,’ said Mum. ‘I was hoping and hoping it would be and yet sure it would be this ropy old pebbly place, all grey and ugly.’

  ‘Maybe I’m still dreaming?’ I said. ‘And you’re dreaming it too, Mum.’

  ‘Well, let’s park the car and then we’ll have a little run on the beach. If you can feel the sand between your toes you’re definitely wide awake,’ said Mum.

  We put the car in the little car park. I delved into my suitcase for my drawing book and new felt tips and then we went on the beach. I kicked my shoes off and wiggled my toes in the soft powdery sand.

  ‘I’m definitely not dreaming!’ I said.

  Mum kicked her own sandals off and did the same. ‘Doesn’t it feel great!’ she said. ‘Here, roll your jeans right up, Beauty. We’ll go and have a paddle.’

  We ran across the sand, slowing as it became hard and damp, and then both of us shrieking as the first wave washed round our ankles.

  ‘It’s absolutely freezing!’ Mum said. ‘I think you can be the chief paddling girl, babes. I’ll sit and watch.’

  Mum sat back on the soft sand looking after my felt tips for me while I waded around up to my knees, jumping waves, stooping to search for shells, walking up and down the little ridges in the wet sand. When I went back to Mum I was soaked right up to my bottom but she just laughed at me.

  ‘They’ll dry soon enough. That’s what the sun’s for! Are you hungry, sweetheart? Shall we have a picnic? Wait here!’

  Mum sprang up and went skipping over the sands, not bothering to put her sandals on. She went into the beach shop. When she came out she was carrying two huge whippy ice creams with a big carrier bag over her arm.

  ‘The ice creams are for pudding but we’ll have to eat them first or they’ll melt.’

  Mum sat down cross-legged and we licked our ice creams appreciatively. Each ice had two chocolate flakes and a little blob of raspberry sauce.

  ‘They’re a Rabbit Cove special,’ said Mum. ‘The chocolate flakes are meant to be ears and the jam blob is a little bunny nose.’

  ‘Yum!’ I said, eating all the distinguishing features of my rabbit face.

  When we’d finished our ice creams Mum produced two cheese salad rolls, two packets of salt-and-vinegar crisps, two mini chocolate rolls, two apples, two bananas and two cartons of orange juice.

  ‘This isn’t a picnic, it’s a veritable feast!’ I said, clapping my hands. ‘There’s only one thing missing – cookies!’

  ‘We should have kept a few of Avril’s cookies. I’m sure she’s not going to munch her way through the whole batch,’ said Mum. ‘Oh well, I’ll have to try and make some more some time.’

  We ate all our wonderful lunch and then Mum lay back on the sand, using her handbag as a pillow.

  I trickled sand on her feet and she giggled sleepily, shutting her eyes. She was asleep in seconds. I wondered about burying her legs in the sand, but it was too soft and slithery to cling.

  I tried to make a sandcastle, using my hands as scoops, but I needed the damp sand nearer the sea and I didn’t want to leave Mum alone. I got out my drawing pad and felt tips and drew a sandcastle instead. I made it a huge sand palace with pinnacles and domes and towers. I had a sand princess with long golden hair peering out of her tower window, waving at the mermaids swimming in the moat around the castle. All the mermaids had very long hair right down to their scaly tails.

  I had a blonde, a brunette and a redhead and then experimented with emerald-green, purple and electric-blue long wavy hair. I gave them matching jewellery and fingernails and thought they looked gorgeous, if a little unusual.

  I studded the mermaid moat with starfish and coral flowers and decorated the palace with seashells in elaborate patterns. The princess looked a little lonely even though she had the mermaids for company, so I drew more people looking out of the windows. I drew a queen mother with even longer golden hair, a best-friend princess with short black hair, and a handsome prince with a crown on his floppy brown hair. He was holding a very special royal rabbit who had a tiny padded crown wedged above her floppy ears.

  Mum turned on her side, opened her eyes and yawned.

  ‘Have you been drawing? Let’s have a look. Oh, darling, that’s lovely! It’s so detailed. I must have been asleep ages.’ Mum sat up and stretched. ‘Shall we go and have a little walk round and explore Rabbit Cove?’

  We stood up and brushed ourselves down. We didn’t have a towel with us to get all the sand off our feet but when we got to the little wall Mum sat us down and rubbed our feet with the hem of her dress.

  ‘Here,’ said the artist, holding out one of his painting rags. ‘Use this. I’ve got heaps.’

  ‘That’s very sweet of you,’ said Mum. ‘This is a lovely spot, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. I must have painted it hundreds of times but I never get sick of it,’ said the artist.

  He was quite old and quite fat, with a smiley face and a little soft beard. He wore a big blue shirt and old jeans dappled with paint and surprising scarlet baseball boots.

  ‘Are you admiring my funky boots?’ he said, seeing me staring.

  ‘I’d like a pair like that,’ I said shyly. I stuck my feet in my own boring sandals and sidled towards him, keen to see his painting. It was very bright, the sky and sea a dazzling cobalt blue, the sand bright ochre yellow. I wondered if that was the way he really saw the soft grey-blue and pale primrose cove. He’d painted the children paddling, the families chatting – and right in the middle of his canvas there was a lovely blonde woman lying asleep, a plump little girl by