Girls in Love Read Online Free PDF Page A

him until we met up in a romantic ruined castle one wild and windy day. “We literally fell into each other’s arms!” I say.
    Well, it’s sort of true.
    I tell them he’s called Dan. They immediately ask how old he is.
    “He’s not as old as your Liam, Nad,” I say.
    That’s true too.
    “So how old
is
he?” Magda insists.
    “He’s . . . fifteen,” I say.
    He
will
be, in three years’ time.
    “What does he look like? Is he dishy? What sort of clothes does he wear?” Magda persists.
    I abandon all attempt at truth. “He’s very good-looking. Blond. His hair’s lovely, it sort of comes forward in a wavy fringe, just a little bit tousled. He’s got dark eyes, a really intense brown. He’s got this way of looking at you . . . He’s just a real dream. His clothes are very casual, nothing too posey. Jeans, sweatshirt—still, that’s just what he was wearing on holiday. It’s so unfair, we didn’t meet up properly until right at the end, and yet somehow when we started talking it was like we’d known each other forever, you know?”
    “Did he kiss you?” Nadine asks.
    “We didn’t get a chance to kiss, worst luck. We were with my stupid family nearly all the time. We did manage to steal off together at a picnic, but just as Dan was getting really romantic, Eggs came chasing over to us and started pestering us and that was it!
Honestly!
”
    “What are you getting all passionate about, Eleanor?”
    Oh, God, it’s Mrs. Henderson in her tracksuit, jogging off to the gym.
    I look down at my lap, going all pink, trying desperately hard not to giggle.
    “Her boyfriend!” says Magda.
    “Surprise, surprise!” says Mrs. Henderson. She sighs. “You girls seem to discuss little else. You’ve all got one-track minds. Many thousands of determined intelligent women fought battles throughout the last century to broaden your horizons, and yet you’d sooner sit there babbling about boys than concentrate on your all-round education.”
    “You said it, Mrs. Henderson,” says Magda. Unwisely.
    “Well, you three are going to have to curtail your cozy little chat and do a detention tomorrow, because you’ve been so carried away by your enthralling conversation that you’ve failed to notice the bell for afternoon school went five minutes ago. Now get to your lessons at
once
!”
    We jump to it. We get told off all over again when we get to English. It isn’t fair. I quite like English. It’s about the only thing I’m any good at, apart from art, but now Mrs. Madley glares at us and goes on and on and we get divided up and I have to sit right at the front.
    We’re doing
Romeo and Juliet
this year. Everyone thinks it’s dead boring. Privately I quite like Shakespeare. I like the way the words go, though I don’t understand half of it. Certainly the beginning bit’s dull—but when I flip through the book and find the first Juliet part it gets much more interesting. Juliet is only thirteen, nearly fourteen, so
she’d
be in Year Nine too. As far as I can work out her mother and her nurse are keen for her to get
married
.
    I sit wondering what it would be like to be married at thirteen in Juliet’s day. It would be fun as long as you were rich enough to have someone pay the mortgage on your Italian mansion and loads of servants to spruce up your medieval Versace frocks and deliver your pizzas to your marital four-poster. . . .
    Mrs. Madley suddenly shouts my name, making me jump. “You not only come to my lesson ten minutes late, Eleanor Allard, but you obviously aren’t paying the slightest attention now you’re here! What on earth is the matter with you?”
    “She’s in love, Mrs. Madley,” says Magda. She can’t
ever
keep her mouth shut.
    Mrs. Madley groans in exasperation while the whole class collapses.
    It looks like I’m in serious trouble
again
. I stare wildly at the page in front of me. I spot a line at the top that looks dead appropriate “ ‘Under love’s heavy burden do I sink’,”