Confessions Of A Karaoke Queen Read Online Free PDF Page A

happened, in so far as anyone can explain anything with a horrendous volume of gin pickling them from inside out.
    Bollocks.
    I shower and get dressed. Right, I think as I sit on my bed, concentrating on not being sick. Plan, Maddie. Come up with a plan.
    OK. Not happening. My brain can barely process what’s happened over the last twenty-four hours, let alone work out how to deal with it.
    Make a list. Make a list! Right. Yes. Good idea. I’ll make a list.
    I grab a pen and paper and start writing:
     
1. Make a list
    2.
     
    Um … This is tougher than I thought. I chew the end of my Biro before continuing.
     
2. Eat toast covered in so much Nutella it makes me feel ill
    3. Call Lou
    4. Despair over horrible ex-boyfriend and disastrous career prospects
    5. Weep
    6. Bang fists on floor
    7. Howl like a caged animal
    8. Lunch time? Eat lunch
    9. Sort out whole entire life please god amen
    10. Deal or No Deal
     
    Finally I add ‘Wake up’ and ‘Shower’ at the top, so I can cross the first few off and feel like I’ve got started. Hmm. It’s looking kind of OK up until the weeping part …
    Quite astonishingly I managed to drag home the Sing It Back paperwork last night, so I lift one of the files from my bedside table and start flicking through. It’s pretty haphazard, but that’s to be expected: all the charts and tables are algebra to me, and there are some worrying-looking letters from the bank manager. Even so it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that the place is in deep shit. Everywhere I look there are numbers in deficit, red crosses, botched projections, unmet targets.
    Lovely. Mum and Dad have left me to clean up a cesspool with nothing but a cotton bud. With a massive sigh I flip it closed, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. There’s only one thing for it:
Takeshi’s Castle
and chocolate spread.

     
    ‘They’ve done
what
?’
    It’s four o’clock on Saturday afternoon, a couple of hours before Sing It Back is due to open for another sleepy weekend. In the end I got stuck on number nine on my list, so decided to call a meeting with the bar staff. We’re gathered round the table in my parents’ flat, the scene of last night’s horrendous revelation.
    I hand Jaz a cup of coffee. ‘Three months. So …’ I smile weakly. ‘It looks like I’m the boss!’
    ‘I don’t get it,’ says Simon, running a hand through his dark-blond hair. ‘Why didn’t they tell any of us?’ He pours milk into his drink and stirs thoughtfully. I can understand what Lou sees in him – if you like the quiet bookish type with the possibility of a battered Sartre in his coat pocket. He’s got ambitions to one day complete a novel of his own, and working at Sing It Back means he’s able to temp part-time, thus freeing up his hours to write.
    ‘It ain’t any wonder – look at the state of yer!’ Archie Howard, Sing It Back’s longest-serving employee – and, so the rumour goes, my parents’ former hairdresser, though he’s wise enough never to admit it – shuffles upright in his chair. ‘Bless ’em, they knew there’d be this right old fuss with the lot of yer. So they’re gone for a bit, it ain’t the end of the world! You’ll take care of us, won’t you, pet?’ He looks at me with crinkly eyes.
    I try to appear confident. Privately I think my parents’ failure to mention their trip is more likely down to an acute lack of organisation, but highlighting that doesn’t help our plight.
    ‘But Maddie doesn’t know the first thing about Sing It Back – she hates it!’ Jaz points out, fiddling with a gigantic scissor-shaped earring. I don’t have the energy to feel offended.
    ‘Then we’ll all make sure we show her, won’t we?’ Archie pats my knee and I’m grateful for his reassurance. I just wish I had the same faith in myself.
    ‘Hell
ooo
!’ cries the final member of our party, a six-footleggy blonde called Ruby du Jour, half stuck out the window with a fag in her mouth.