Vicky Angel Read online

  “Vicky was going to join your Friday club, the Fun Run,” I mumble.

  “I saw both your names on the list, though they were crossed out. Well, you could always come on your own, Jade.”

  “Me? I can't run for toffee.”

  “It's not serious running. And—and sometimes when you're feeling really sad it's good to go for a run, work it out of your system. Sorry, that's a daft thing to say. There's no way you're going to get through this in a hurry, you poor kid.”

  It's so weird. They're all being so kind, as if they're my friends. And in class and at break everyone treats me like I'm really really special, even the toughest girls like Rita and Yvonne, even the boys. Vicky's old boyfriend Ryan Harper, the only halfway decent boy in Year Nine, comes up to me at break, warning me to stay away from the fences because the photographers are still there, gawping and flashing. “If they start hassling you, Jade, just give me and my mates the word and we'll soon sort them out,” he says. Old Fatboy Sam doesn't get a look in now.

  He tries to save me a seat next to him at lunchtime but Jenny and Madeleine and Vicky Two whisk me off to their table. I've always liked them but Jenny annoyed my Vicky because she went out with Ryan Harper too. Jenny's a bit boy-mad. Vicky Two is like a boy herself, cheeky and bouncy, but she's in floods of tears now. Vicky Two has always known she comes second to my Vicky. Jenny gives her a big hug, and Madeleine gives me a big hug, even though we've hardly said two words to each other before today. She's a big soft plump pink-and-white girl. It feels like I'm being hugged by a giant marshmallow.

  I'm smothered by sweetness. It feels like people are wrapping me in duvets, more and more and more. I can't move. I can't breathe. I can't be. Not without Vicky.

  I try going to school again on Tuesday but when I get near and see all the flowers on the Vicky spot, more and more of them, acarpet of roses and lilies and freesias, flickering candles, and a children's zoo of cuddly toys, it's all too much. I have to make a break for it. I run.

  “I thought you hated running!”

  Vicky jogs along beside me, little blue butterflies in her hair to match her tiny blue T-shirt. She's wearing snowy white jeans and sneakers and when she streaks ahead of me I see small white painted wings on the back of her T-shirt.

  “Cute, eh? And dead appropriate. Just call me Vicky Angel.”

  We saw someone else wearing one of those T-shirts last week and Vicky liked it then.

  “And now I can wear anything I want,” she says, jogging on the spot. “While you're stuck in that stupid school uniform! Why don't you go home and get changed if we're bunking off school?”

  “Dad might hear me. He doesn't always get to sleep till later.”

  “Well, what if he does? He's not going to get mad at you now.”

  Vicky's never understood what it's like with my dad. He can always get mad. I don't know if it's because he works nights. He usually leaves me alone but sometimes he can get really niggly, picking on me for the slightest thing. He can go crazy, yelling all sorts of stuff, waving his arms around, his fists clenched. He's never hit Mum or me but sometimes he hits the cushions or the sofa. One time he hit the kitchen wall and made the plaster flake. His knuckles bled but he didn't seem to notice.

  Sometimes Mum says it's a shame and he never used to be like that in the old days before his other factory closed down. Other times she just says he's a pig and she can't stick him and she'd clear off tomorrow if she could.

  I'd always much sooner be round at Vicky's than my home. Her dad never gets cross. He thinks the world of Vicky. She's always been his baby, his special girl. He's always fussing round her, laughing at all her jokes, ruffling her hair, whistling when she wears a new outfit, putting his arm round her and calling her his little Vicky Sunshine—

  Only that's all stopped now.

  “My dad,” Vicky mumbles, her face screwed up.

  “I know,” I whisper.

  “And my mum.”

  “Yes. But we can still be together, Vicky.”

  “OK, I'll haunt you permanently,” says Vicky. “Come on, let's go and have fun. I can't stand all this saddo stuff all the time. Let's—let's go up to London, eh?”

  Vicky and I go to school together and down the park and we go round the local shops on Saturdays or go to the pictures or hang out down at McDonald's—but we're not allowed to go on a proper day out together. Especially not up to London.

  “We can't!”

  “Yes, we can,” says Vicky. “Go on. Please. If anyone finds out you can say it's all my idea.”

  “Oh yes, like they'd believe me! They'd think I'd gone crazy.”

  I think I have. I walk purposefully through the town to the station. I've got ten pounds in my school purse for some stupid school trip. I'd much sooner have a day trip with Vicky.

  I buy a child's return fare, cheap rate.

  “Even cheaper for me,” says Vicky. She jumps right over the ticket barrier and swoops down the stairs, just grazing the tips of her trainers on the steps. I rush after her and collide with a large lady on the platform reading a local paper.

  “Careful, careful! Look where you're going. You kids!” she grumbles.

  “Sorry. We were just—”

  “Not ‘we’, loony,” Vicky whispers. She blows out her cheeks and struts about in a rude imitation of the large lady. I can't help giggling. The woman frowns at me. Then she looks at me again, shocked.

  “Here! You're the girl in the paper!” she says, tapping a black-and-white photo.

  For a moment I think she must be talking to Vicky. Then I see a blurry picture of me, my eyes squinting from the camera flash, and the caption underneath: JANE MARSHALL, VICKY'S BEST FRIEND, TOO DISTRAUGHT TO TALK.

  “Jane!” Vicky snorts. “Trust them to get it wrong. It's a wonder they got my name right.”

  “It's you, isn't it?” says the woman, flapping her paper. She sniffs. “You don't look distraught.”

  “It's not me,” I say quickly.

  “Yes it is! Look, you're wearing the same uniform.”

  “I go to the same school but I'm in a different grade. I didn't know Vicky, honestly.”

  She doesn't look like she believes me.

  “Never mind that nosy old bag,” says Vicky, linking her transparent arm through mine. “Come on, walk up the platform. Forget her. We're going to have fun.”

  So we walk away from the woman and the train comes soon. I take off my school tie and roll my sleeves up in the train to try to make my uniform less obvious. I'm scared, now we're speeding off to London. I don't really know my way round anywhere. Mum's always going on about these creepy guys who hang out round London railway stations and lure runaway teenage schoolgirls into a life of prostitution.

  “Well, at least we'd make some money,” says Vicky. “It's obvious what we're going to do. Go shopping, right? Though you won't be able to buy much. I'll be fine, though. I can have my pick of anything. Hey, I can go seriously upmarket now. Where shall we go? Covent Garden? They've got designer clothes shops there, haven't they?”

  “Don't ask me. Vic, do you know the way?”

  “Easy peasy for me. Straight up in the sky, then swoop,” she giggles. “I can go anywhere, any speed. Hey, watch!”

  She dives right through the train window, kicking out as if she's swimming; then she flies along beside the train, her hair streaming.

  “See!” she yells, speeding along. She whirls around and around, even turning a cartwheel in midair.

  “Get back in! You'll hurt yourself!”

  Vicky laughs so much she bobs up and down.

  “I can't hurt myself, you nutcase,” she shouts. “I'll show you.” She hurtles sideways at a rooftop, aiming at the chimneys and sharp television aerials. She doesn't impale herself, she simply glides through and out the other side.

  I stare after her in awe. She waves and then shoots upward like a rocket, up and up until she's out of sight. I open the train window and crane my head out, desperate for a glimpse of