Read Online Faking Sweet by J.C. Burke - Free Book Online Page B

and walked out of the mall, the mobile vibrating in my pocket. I was almost sure I could hear it sniggering, ‘Loser, loser.’
    Â 
    â€˜You’re home!’
    â€˜What’s up with you?’ I managed, once I’d wriggled out of my mother’s cheek-flattening bear hug.
    â€˜Your father suggested we all go out for pizza this evening. Doesn’t that sound like fun?’
    Poor Mum; she was so desperate for us to be a normal family.
    â€˜Like all of us being me, you and Dad?’ I just couldn’t share her enthusiasm. ‘Wow, what a party. Is that why you’re dressed up?’
    â€˜No. I’ve been in the city. And guess what?’
    â€˜What?’
    â€˜Guess!’ Her eyes were bulging so much they resembled a giant gobstopper. ‘Come on, Holly, guess.’
    â€˜Um, you cracked the giant showcase this arvo?’
    Mum was shaking her head with each word.
    â€˜I know … you got it all right first go?’
    â€˜No!’ she shouted. ‘Much better!’
    â€˜Better?’ I frowned. ‘But there isn’t any better. For you, that is. Is there?’
    â€˜I saw Sally!’
    â€˜Sally? Sally who?’
    â€˜Sally! Sally, the main model. You know the one who sits in the car and waves at the end of the show.’
    â€˜Oh.’ My mother needed a life, or a lobotomy.
    â€˜Even more stunning in real life, she was. Beautiful, really beautiful. I wished you’d been there, Holly.’
    â€˜Mmmm.’ I was backing my way down the hall.
    â€˜I wanted to go up to her. I really did. I wanted to get her autograph but I was –’
    â€˜I’ve, um, got to check my emails, Mum.’
    â€˜Oh?’ For a moment she frowned at me, almost like she’d forgotten where she was. ‘Well, don’t forget we’re having an early pizza so don’t get too caught up gossiping with Miss Calypso. Make sure you tell her I saw Sally. Sally’s her favourite too.’
    â€˜I’m not coming to dinner, Mum.’
    â€˜But your father wanted to celebrate our first week in Sydney.’
    What was the catch? My father had never suggested celebrating our first week anywhere. He was always too busy ‘settling in’. Probably just as well, or we’d be fat blobs rolling from one pizza parlour to the next.
    â€˜I’m tired Mum, and I’ve got stacks of Shakespeare to get through.’
    â€˜You’re not hiding in English work again, are you?’
    She had a point. Usually that was my device for surviving a new school without feeling like the usual no-friends, nowhere-to-go loser.
    But this time she couldn’t have been more off the mark.
    â€˜Bring me home some pizza,’ I called from my bedroom door. ‘No anchovies.’
    I shut the door, and for a while leaned against it, the masses of thoughts tumbling through my head.
    I scrolled through to Calypso’s last text. I couldn’t face the others. It said:
    Hello! Hello!
    â€˜Hello yourself,’ I grumbled.
    I kicked off my shoes, laid on my bed and tried to figure out a plan that’d get me out of this disaster without looking like I’d stuffed up again.
    Number one, Calypso didn’t have to know Scott turned up. That wasn’t really breaking the honesty pact. In fact it was only omitting a tiny detail and it was in her interest. Just because Calypso said she was over Scott doesn’t mean she actually was.
    If Scott had been my boyfriend I would’ve found a more flattering photo for my bedroom wall. Then, come to think of it, if I looked as good as Calypso did in that photo I would’ve had it up on my wall too. Calypso thought she looked a bit like Rachel Bilson from The OC and she did. But Scott was so much better looking in real life. Anyway what was I doing even thinking about Scott? He was only good looking on the outside. Inside he was a rat.
    I sat at the computer, my decision made. Honesty and loyalty.