The Worst Thing About My Sister Read online

  ‘Can I have some too?’ I asked Melissa.

  She looked astonished, but said yes.

  I took a nice dollop and then started rubbing it on Patches and Gee-Up and Sugarlump and Merrylegs and Dandelion and Starlight to see if it made their coats shine.

  ‘Marty!’ said Melissa. ‘Don’t waste my hand cream on your stupid horses!’

  ‘Oh, Marty, you’re so funny!’ Jaydene giggled, rubbing her rose-scented hands together. ‘Mmm, this smells heavenly! I feel so grown up.’ She looked at all Melissa’s make-up. ‘Of course, I’d feel even more grown up if I could wear some make-up,’ she said hopefully.

  Melissa smiled at her. ‘Would you like me to make you up, Jaydene?’ she asked, in this sweetie-pie, silly-girlie voice, like Glinda the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz.

  ‘Oh, Melissa, yes!’ said Jaydene.

  It took ages, and Jaydene didn’t even want to talk to me while Melissa dabbed all her make-up junk onto her face. Jaydene just listened to Melissa the Beauty Queen. She told her all this utter rubbish about your eye shadow reflecting the colour of your eyes, and kissing a tissue after you’ve applied your first coat of lipstick. Melissa was making it up as she went along, but Jaydene drank it all in. I couldn’t distract her at all. When Mum called out that it was supper time at long, long last, Jaydene started fussing.

  ‘Oh dear, will all my lipstick come off if I eat my supper?’ she said.

  I started to think she was such an idiot that I didn’t really want to be friends with her after all. She wasn’t acting like my friend, not in the slightest.

  It was spaghetti bolognese for supper. I tried to get Jaydene to play my slurp-slurp-slurp game, when you suck each strand up into your mouth without cutting it up. Mum always tells me off when I do this, but I knew she wouldn’t moan at Jaydene, as she was our guest. But Jaydene giggled at me fondly and said it looked as if I had lipstick on too – I had orange spaghetti sauce all round my mouth. She tried to copy the way Melissa ate, winding her spaghetti round and round her fork in an affected manner.

  Mum and Dad kept chatting to Jaydene while I fidgeted and sucked and slurped. I wanted them to like her, but it was irritating the way they kept nodding triumphantly at me when Jaydene said I was so lucky to have such a lovely bedroom, and even luckier to have a big sister like Melissa.

  We still had about an hour left to play after supper. I was planning to show Jaydene all my Mighty Mart comics and maybe suggest we act one out together. I was even going to invent a brand-new character with superpowers: Giant Jay, who would have her very own adventure. But Jaydene asked if Melissa would come and play with us too.

  ‘No, we don’t want her,’ I said quickly.

  ‘Yes we do,’ said Jaydene.

  Melissa didn’t have to come. But she seemed intent on stealing my best friend away from me. ‘Of course I’ll come,’ she said. ‘Let’s all go up to my bedroom.’

  ‘It’s my bedroom too,’ I said, but they weren’t even listening to me.

  They started playing a new, incredibly boring game together – hairdressers!

  Melissa twiddled Jaydene’s funny little plaits enviously. ‘How do you get your hair in those little plaits all over your head, Jaydene? They’re so neat.’

  ‘My mum does them for me, or sometimes my gran. It takes ages, but I watch telly while they do it. Do you want me to plait your hair, Melissa?’

  ‘Oh, yes please!’

  I groaned, unable to believe it.

  Jaydene looked at me anxiously. ‘I’ll plait your hair too, Marty,’ she said sweetly.

  ‘No thanks. I can’t imagine anything more boring,’ I said rudely. ‘Don’t play hairdressers, Jaydene. Play a proper game with me!’

  At school I can nearly always make Jaydene do what I want – but here at home it was as if Melissa had cast a spell on her.

  ‘I’ll play in a minute, Marty. I’ll just show Melissa how to do my kind of plaits. It’s only fair, seeing as she did all my make-up,’ she said.

  A minute! Jaydene spent nearly the entire hour combing and plaiting Melissa’s horrible hair. While Jaydene parted and gathered and twisted and plaited, she asked Melissa’s advice again and again. She wanted to know silly stuff about make-up and clothes and pop stars. I yawned so much I nearly ended up with lockjaw.

  But then she got on to school stuff.

  ‘Do you have any really mean girls like Katie and Ingrid in your class, Melissa?’ Jaydene asked.

  ‘Yes. I’ve got Chantelle and Laura. They’re worse,’ said Melissa.

  ‘So how do you manage when they’re mean to you?’ Jaydene asked anxiously. ‘Marty is soooo brave. She just says mean things back, but I can’t ever think of stuff to say. Or she fights them, but I’m hopeless at fighting. I just cry if anyone hits me. Or she throws eggs – imagine!’

  I perked up at this. I remembered that Jaydene was really a very good friend.

  ‘Yeah, well, that’s not the most sensible way to react,’ said Melissa. ‘Marty got into serious trouble. Don’t you ever throw eggs, Jaydene.’

  ‘Oh I won’t, don’t worry. I wouldn’t dare,’ she said, her eyes round.

  I felt almost as big as Mighty Mart. I dared.

  ‘I don’t think you need to fight back, Jaydene,’ said Melissa. ‘If I were you I’d just laugh when Katie and Ingrid say mean things. Act like you don’t care. I laugh at Chantelle and Laura, or I say, ever so gently, “What’s your problem?” and it just totally fazes them.’

  ‘Really?’ said Jaydene.

  ‘Until the next time,’ I said.

  Then there was a knock on the door. It was Jaydene’s mum, ready to collect her. Her visit was over.

  Well, nearly. Mum made Jaydene’s mum a cup of tea, and then she took her upstairs to see her new sewing room and our new bedroom. Jaydene’s mum loved all Mum’s dresses twirling on hangers all round the room.

  ‘You’re so clever, Mrs Michaels,’ she said. ‘These dresses are absolutely beautiful.’

  I raised my eyebrows at Jaydene. It looked like she might be in serious danger of ending up in a cringe-making crinoline herself.

  ‘Come and see Marty and Melissa’s bedroom, Mum,’ she said quickly.

  Jaydene’s mum went totally ecstatic! She oohed and aahed over the duvet covers and the cushions and the chandelier, but she especially adored the shelf unit.

  ‘Did you get a special carpenter, Mrs Michaels?’ she asked.

  ‘No, my husband did it,’ said Mum.

  ‘Really! Oh, Mr Michaels, you’re so clever,’ said Jaydene’s mum.

  When Jaydene left with her mum, all three members of my family spent the next twenty minutes going on and on about her, saying how much they liked her.

  ‘I’m so happy you’ve got a special best friend at last, Martina,’ said Mum, putting her arm round me and giving me a squeeze.

  I supposed I was happy too – but Jaydene didn’t really seem like my best friend any more. She seemed to be Melissa’s best friend forever. Maybe that’s the worst thing about my sister. Everyone likes her best.

  The next Friday Melissa had her best friends to tea, to show off our new bedroom. She said she couldn’t choose who she liked best so she invited three girls – Ali, Nina and Amaleena.

  ‘That’s not fair,’ I protested. ‘I only had one friend to tea.’

  ‘You’ve only got one friend,’ said Melissa scornfully.

  ‘I’ve got heaps of friends,’ I said. ‘Micky West and me play together every single lunch time now.’

  ‘You can’t ask a boy to play in your bedroom,’ said Melissa. ‘Anyway, he wouldn’t be interested in stuff like colour schemes and shelf units.’

  ‘Well, I’m not interested either.’

  ‘That’s perfectly obvious. Now listen, I want you to tidy up before Ali and Nina and Amaleena come. I’m sick of you leaving your socks and knickers in a nasty heap on the carpet. Why can’t you put them in the clothes basket?’

  ‘Do you know, you sound just like