The Taming Of The Tights. Louise Rennison
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thing is funny.
I dragged my case along the platform towards the sign. I hope it’s been cleaned up because it doesn’t give a very good impression of the … Hang on a minute, the hooligan has been at it again! Now the sign reads Skipley Home of the Brest Riding Otter.
That is just wrong.
That shouldn’t be allowed.
What if American people were on the train? They have a seizure if you say prat.
I left the station and trundled across the bridge to catch the bus to Heckmondwhite. Brrr, I am absolutely soaking now. The rain has got in through the front of my anorak and jumper and into my new bra. Or new ‘corker holder’ as me and my friends say. I hope my corkers don’t shrink.
Hahahaha. What larks! I’m going to put ‘corker shrinking’ in my Performance Art Diary, or as I call it, my ‘Darkly Demanding Damson Diary’. Under ‘Ideas for Modern Dance’.
A bus flew round the bend and screeched to a halt. The warm, welcoming bus opening its welcoming doors to welcome me back to my …
A cloud of smoke billowed out. The driver was smoking a pipe. Uh-oh, I recognised that balaclava. It belonged to Mrs Bottomley. She did part-time bus driving as well as cage fighting in Leeds. I said, “Single to Heckmondwhite, please.”
Mrs Bottomley repeated ‘single to Heckmondwhite, please’ in a horrible posh simpering way as she slammed the ticket down. Then she said, looking down at my legs, “Keep those bloody legs off my seats AND mind how you go!”
She accelerated violently before I had time to sit down and I fell onto the lap of a bloke with a guide dog.
I said, “I’m really sorry but the bus …”
He said, “Is it full then, the bus? Is there nowhere else to sit? You’re a bloody big lad. My legs’ll be numb by the time we get to Heckmondwhite.”
At a red traffic light I staggered to a spare seat.
Everyone on the bus was looking at me and grumbling. “From that bloody Dither Hall”, “simpleton, I think”, “they’re allus messing about in beards and tights. Sitting on blind people’s knees … bloody daft.”
It was raining so hard you couldn’t see the road ahead. It didn’t make Mrs Bottomley slow down though. There was a bump and I thought I saw a sheep fly past the window, but I can’t be sure. Then as we passed Grimbottom Peak it stopped raining and a watery sun came out and a little rainbow appeared.
Ooooooh, maybe the rainbow was a sign.
A sign that everything was going to be all right. All of my hopes and dreams would come true. I’d become a star but, more importantly, get a proper boyfriend. Oh, and also I’d have a corker growth spurt. Not just one corker. Both, I mean.
When we stopped at my bus stop, Mrs Bottomley was cleaning her nails with a penknife. She didn’t look up as I got off but she said, “Our Beverley dun’t like thee, so that meks me not like thee. Watch your sen, lady. Walls have ears and radishes repeat.”
I got my case down from the bus and there before me was Heckmondwhite in all its glory! The autumnal light shining on the bus stop! The village green! The shop! The church! And the pub – The Blind Pig.
My substitute parents the Dobbins, who I lodge with in term time, are away on a Young Christians’ Foraging weekend in Blubberhouses.
Harold and Dibdobs and the lunatic twins are nice but possibly the maddest people I have ever met. They’re away till tomorrow so I’m staying the night with my little mate Ruby at The Blind Pig. I’m really looking forward to seeing my fun-sized pal and her bulldog Matilda. Ruby told me that out of eighty breeds given an intelligence test, bulldogs come seventy-eighth. But that’s the intelligence-o-meter test not the love-o-meter test which Matilda would definitely win paws down.
What I am not looking forward to is seeing Mr Barraclough, Ruby’s dad. He’s the landlord of the pub but mostly chief tormentor of me and my legs – which I must admit sometimes have a life of their own. When I am nervous or excited they, my legs, well, they initiate Irish dancing. All by themselves. My brain has nothing to do with it. Also, because of my skinniness, Mr Barraclough keeps pretending I am a long lanky lad. In a dress.
In a nutshell, Mr Barraclough and most of the village people think that Dother Hall is for fools. That’s why they call it Dither Hall.
I went quietly in through the front door of the pub. There’s a real racket coming from the bar so I’ll just creepy creep up the stairs to Ruby’s room.
“Well, well, well, thank the Lord the thespians are back!!! I haven’t known WHAT to do with myself since tha left. By ’eck, is there a giant gene in your family, young man? You’ve sprung up again, haven’t you, lad! What are you practising being today? Dun’t tell me! Let me guess.” Oh dear. There he was. Ruby’s dad. In his leather trousers and Viking helmet.
He was looking at me, stroking his chin.
“Hmmm. Green trousers, rain hat, anorak. Big boots. Are you a Hobbit, is that it?”
I said, “Hello, Mr Barraclough.”
He put his hand to his ear. “Is that elfin you’re speaking?”
Just then Bob, the technician from Dother Hall, emerged from the ‘Stags’ door. He was also wearing a Viking helmet. Over his ponytail. He saw me and said, “Nice one, Tallulah. Great to see you back. Monday I’ll be there at Dother Hall, the dude with the know-how, the equipment king, the ‘facilitator’ … but tonight I’m the real me. The muso. The rhythm master. Be prepared for total madness. The vibe is going to be like awesome.”
Like awesome?
He went off into the front bar.
I said, “Why is Bob here?”
Mr Barraclough chucked me under the chin.
“Why is Bob here? Why is Bob here? I’ll tell you why he’s here, young man. He’s our new drummer for The Iron Pies. We are going to be a sound sensation. Good to see you back, young Bilbo.”
He went off into the bar shouting, “Hit it, lads!”
And an awful din of drums and guitars started up. It really did sound like Bob was just hitting things.
Ruby and Matilda came tumbling down from upstairs. Matilda was leaping up at my legs and Ruby was dancing around me, yelling, “It’s Tallulah-lebulla, Matilda, let’s mek her dance, do the dance, Tallulah-lebulla, do the dance!!!”
I said with dignity, “I don’t want to, you know I’ve sort of grown out of the Irish dancing thing.”
The Iron Pies crashed into their version of a James Bond theme. Mr Barraclough started singing, “From Russia with PIES I came to yooooooo.”
And Ruby had to yell over the top of it. “Oh, come on, just a little bit. For me! I’ll sing the Irish song. Hiddly diddly diddly diddle.”
So I let myself go. I did my Irish dancing. Ruby joined in and we were leaping and hopping around in the hallway. It was fun actually. There was no one to see me and I needed to relax so I let my knees go wherever they pleased.
When I was mid-hiddly, I noticed Matilda had got caught in the umbrella stand. Umbrellas were crashing around her. She looked up blinking at us. Ruby said, “What? What? Why are you blinking at me?’”
Then Matilda looked at the door and back at Ruby.
Ruby said, “No, I’m not taking you out now, it’s quiet time.”
Matilda started making a snuffling noise which sounded a bit like crying. Ruby gave in and picked her up.
“Oh, bloody hell, all right, Matilda, you daft ninny. Come on, I’ll tek