Tthe Sleepover Club on the Beach Read Online Free PDF Page A

traffic around here, but its better to be safe.”
    “Tell you what,” said Mum. “You girls go for a ride and work up an appetite, and when you come back we’ll get some fish and chips.”
    Fliss looked anxious. “That’s a really nice idea Mrs Collins, but we had burgers and fries at McDonalds. And we’ve just had cake and scones. That’s an awful
lot
of calories.”
    “Oh, a good bike ride will soon burn those off!” my aunt said cheerfully. “You’ll be famished by the time you get back.”
    So we strapped on our helmets and wheeled the bikes over the bridge, ducking slightly to avoid traily weeping willow branches.
    We hung over the bridge to look at the stream. It was flowing really fast. As we watched, a little black water bird came swimming along with her tiny babies.
    By this time I’d stopped being homesick. I was in heaven. I mean, Cuddington, wherewe live, is supposed to be a village, but it’s practically next door to Leicester. At night, you get that weird orange glow from thousands of street lights all like, bombarding the sky with their rays.
    But this place was totally and utterly rural! You could just tell the Thingybobby kids would feel totally at home here.
    We set off along the lane on our clunky old bikes. I’ll admit we were a bit wobbly to start with, but for me, it was a genuine Thingybobby moment. Though I
did
make a mental note to wear jeans, next time I rode a bike. Cycling in a skirt is
très
drafty.
    The rain had stopped by this time, and the sun wasn’t out exactly, but you could see it was thinking about it. Now and then little gleams of light shone up from the puddles.
    “It’s so
quiet
here,” said Rosie.
    “We’ll soon fix that,” grinned Kenny, and she rang the little bell on her handlebars. DINGALINGALING!
    “Hey, there’s a windmill!” Frankie yelled. “The sails are even going round, look!”
    She braked violently, took a little Polaroidcamera out of her pocket and snapped a photo. Then we all cycled on again.
    “This is so ace,” said Kenny.
    “Yeah,” said Fliss. “But I hope we can go to the pleasure beach tomorrow. I really want to work on my suntan.”
    “There’s no need to whinge. My mum promised, didn’t she?” I said.
    “Oh sorree,” said Fliss huffily.
    I know I shouldn’t have snapped like that, but Fliss’s remark made me feel really crabby. I mean, we only had a weekend. We’d be lucky to fit in an adventure at ALL at this rate!
    Kenny was tinkling her bike bell, with that Young Scientist expression she gets sometimes. “Do you think they all sound the same?” she said.
    We experimented. The bells were all slightly different.
    “Coo-ell,” Kenny grinned. “We can have a
wicked
bike-bell orchestra!”
    And she started singing that really dumb song about a mouse in a windmill, which we had to sing in Cuddington Infants.
    We all joined in, jingling our bells loudly for the chorus. It was totally mad!
    Unfortunately, the scowling man in the Ford picked that exact moment to drive past, and we had to drag our bikes into the hedge.
    “Did you see his face?” giggled Frankie, as he roared past.
    “Did you see his sideburns, more like!” said Kenny. “Talk about stuck in a time-warp. Bet he was a big bad teddy boy back in the nineteen-fifties and he never got over it!”
    “Teddy boy?” said Rosie in amazement. “What’s a teddy boy?”
    “They went around in gangs, picking fights and slashing cinema seats,” I said. “I have NO idea why.”
    “Stylish though,” said Fliss wistfully. “Drainpipe trousers, jackets with gorgeous velvet collars.”
    I shuddered. “You think greasy hair is
stylish
?”
    I still couldn’t help thinking that our surly ex-ted would make the perfect Thingybobby villain. A poacher say, or a heartless kidnapper. But I didn’t say so, in case Frankie did one of her superior sniggers.
    We came to a steep slope and wentfreewheeling down, truly one of the world’s
great
feelings!
    “Yayy!” Kenny