The Secrets Club Read Online Free PDF Page A

Georgia. If you consider that the population has doubled since
–’
    Georgia: ‘So are you telling us we
should use birth control, Sir?’
    Mr Little (realizing too late it’s
a trap, and flushing fiery red): ‘Um, I’m not sure we should be
discussing this …’
    ‘You’re not being funny,
Georgia, you’re just being rude!’ says Lissa loudly and sternly. Georgia
turns round with a wounded look on her face.
    ‘No, I’m not, I’m just
asking questions,’ she says pretending to be hurt. ‘If I was being rude
I would be saying things like,
Sir, your lessons are boring
or
Sir, your coat sleeves are too
short
. Or
Sir
 …’
    ‘Georgia, shut up!’ says
Lissa, her voice full of command, and Georgia does as she’s told.
    You don’t want to mess with Lissa.
I’m glad she’s my friend, not my enemy. I carry on reading aloud to the
now silent class. The door opens and the headmistress pokes her head round.
    ‘Everything all right, Mr
Little?’ she asks and he nods nervously.
    ‘Everything’s fine, thank
you, Mrs Shepherd.’
    But I can’t help noticing how he
darts a grateful glance towards Lissa as the head closes the
door.

Chapter 9
    This Saturday it turns out that Tash is
doing something with her family and only Lissa and Ali have plans to meet up. Maybe
because of this there seems to be less pressure on me to join them.
    ‘You going to see your gran again
this weekend, Dani?’ asks Lissa and I nod.
    ‘Yep, we’re all going. Mum
too.’
    ‘I think it’s lovely the way
you visit your grandmother every week,’ says Ali. ‘I watched a programme
on the telly last night and it was all about how lonely old people are nowadays.
It’s because they’re stuck inside all day with nothing to do and nobody
ever goes to see them.’
    I think of my jet-propelled gran
whizzing
around between home and gym and
school, and theatre and tennis club and golf course, and lunching and swimming and
shopping, and wonder if she actually minds us turning up each week to disturb her
busy life. I’m such a fake. People think I’m being kind and unselfish
when actually I’m not. I’m even fooling my own mother. Last night she
asked Jade and me what our plans were for Saturday.
    Jade looked at me and I said,
‘Gran’s?’ and she nodded happily. Easy-peasy.
    ‘You don’t have to,’
said Mum. ‘I’m not working this weekend. We could do something else if
you want.’
    ‘Can we go swimming?’ Jade
asked eagerly.
    ‘If you want to,’ Mum said.
‘Do you want to come, Dani? Or maybe you’d like to meet up with your
friends instead?’
    I stared at them both in alarm. No way!
This Saturday would be our last but one chance to train together. In two
weeks’ time we were going to play our first match as Blackett Juniors.
    ‘Jade! Gran will be expecting us.
We don’t want to disappoint her.’
    Jade looked a bit shamefaced but Mum
smiled at me. ‘That’s
really sweet of you, Dani,’ she said. ‘Maybe I should come
too.’
    It was my turn to feel ashamed. Then
immediately I started worrying that if Mum came with us to see Gran she might find
out what I’m really up to.
    Now Ali’s making me feel bad as
well. I’m a fraud. Everyone thinks I’m being really kind to my poor old
granny, going all that way to visit her each week. Whereas I know my motives are not
quite so pure. I love my gran but the simple reason I make that trip to Blackett
each Saturday without fail is so that I can play with Ryan and the others.
It’s the best opportunity I’ve ever had to play class football and
I’m not going to blow it.
    Gran, though she doesn’t know it,
is my alibi.
    Lissa’s eyes flick towards my leg.
The bruise has all but disappeared now, just a faint blue and yellow shadow left to
remind me where Marvyn’s size eights collided with my shin last week. It
strikes me that Lissa is the only person who’s not completely taken in by my
Little Red Riding Hood act. Maybe it’s because, like me, she doesn’t
believe