Friends Forever! Read Online Free PDF Page A

Claude. “Let them laugh!”
    â€œShe’ll just be jealous, because we’ll look so hot,” Fleur said.
    Quickly it was agreed. Friday was going to be Triplet Day. Immediately, Claude started arguing for a “sexy ninja fighting squad” look, while Fleur began planning a “Parisian babe” feel. After a lot of squabbling and shopping we agreed on three black-and-white stripey long-sleeved T-shirts, three black pleated mini-kilts, black high heels, black opaque tights and the perfect finishing touch—powder-pink berets worn at a jaunty angle.
    Naturally, Triplet Day was a massive triumph.
    Jimi, my Year 13 skater boyfriend, said he’d never seen me look so totally babelicious. He wrapped me in his arms and said he’d never been so proud to be seen with me in the whole two years we’d been together.
    And when the LBD appeared at Blackwell that Friday arm-in-arm, sashaying down the main corridor, kids were hanging out of windows whooping and hollering. It was so great! I didn’t even flinch when Panama cornered me in the dining hall to inform me that “saggy-chested dumpy girls” such as myself should avoid horizontal stripes and skirts above the shin. And okay, sadly, we didn’t win the Fancy Friday prize. But that was because Year 9’s Darius Carver painted himself turquoise, festooned himself in plastic wrap and tampons and came as an interplanetary life-form.
    But who cares, because the LBD still appeared in the Local Daily Mercury under the headline “Triple Trouble at Blackwell’s Golden Celebrations!” This made Magda, Paddy and Gloria, Claude’s mum, extra happy because they could call all their friends and bore their pants off.
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    â€œThat was a grand photo of you!” Nan says, laughing as she sifts flour into a white mixing bowl.
    â€œHmmm . . . ,” I say. “Well, Fleur looked better in it than me.”
    â€œNonsense!” Nan tuts. “She’s not a classic beauty like you are.”
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    Triplet Day turned into Triplet Weekend.
    I hadn’t laughed so much in ages. That Friday night we wore our berets and T-shirts to the noodle bar Shanghai Shanghai, then afterward we had a sleepover at Fleur’s. (Fleur’s parents had just bought her a “facts of life” book called Your Body, Yourself. Oh my Lord! We had no idea so many unpleasant yeast- and fungus-related things could occur on your bodily parts! Yeucccch!) On Sunday we hit Westland Mall to suss out the fresh fall collections arriving at Top Shop, Morgan and River Island. Of course, that went out of the window when Fleur spotted Baz Kauffman, a Year 12 from Chasterton School, and persuaded the LBD to stalk him around Marks and Spencer snapping telephone pictures of him buying underpants!
    At that point in my life, one Sunday last September, I don’t think I’d ever been so happy. With life. With Jimi. With the way I looked. With my friends. Being part of the LBD absolutely rocked.

the new girl
    But then, the following Monday, just after registration, we were in form room drooling over a surf hunk centerfold in Bliss magazine, when the door swung open and the doom-meister general Mr. McGraw swept in. Standing meekly in his shadow was a tiny, elfin, decidedly beautiful young girl, with long golden hair hanging loose over her shoulders and a blunt fringe chopped just at her eye line. The girl’s powdery-pale complexion, doll-pink cheeks and cherubic pout were slightly beguiling. Her long floaty gray skirt, nipped at her tiny waist, a blue cashmere jersey, expensive crocheted tights and black pumps with crisscrossed ribbons were a spurious nod toward the Blackwell uniform.
    She had a touch of Cinderella about her. The entire room was silenced by her prettiness.
    â€œWell, helloooo, missy!” leered Liam Gelding as the rest of the boys stared in wonderment.
    â€œNow then, listen here, Class Eleven-B,”