The Ruby Redfort Collection: 4-6: Feed the Fear; Pick Your Poison; Blink and You Die. Lauren Child
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I’m planning on meeting Elliot at the diner if you feel like it.’
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ said Ruby. ‘Meantime, stay outta jail.’ She hung up and went down to the kitchen looking for food but as she was passing the hall table, the telephone began to ring. She picked up the receiver. ‘Twinford Space Programme, slip into an astronaut suit and make gravity a thing of the past.’
‘Uh. . .’ said a hesitant voice down the end of the line.
‘Oh, hi Quent.’
‘It’s Quent,’ said Quent.
‘I know,’ said Ruby.
‘You did? How come?’ He sounded really pleased.
‘You have a kinda recognisable voice.’
‘I do?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Wow, no one’s ever told me that before.’
‘Happy I could make your day, now what can I do you for?’
‘I was hoping you could make it to my birthday party.’
Silence.
‘I sent the invitation several weeks ago but I know you were in hospital getting your arm fixed so you might have missed it.’
Silence.
‘That’s why I’m following up with a call.’
Silence.
‘It’s going to be a superhero theme.’
Silence.
‘I haven’t decided on my costume yet, but it might be that one who breathes underwater.’
‘Aqua-man?’
‘Yeah, Aqua-man, but it’s a hard superhero to do out of the pool and our pool’s being drained due to the algae.’
‘So remind me of the date Quent?’
‘It’s on Saturday 16th.’
‘Saturday 16th, that’s a tough break, any other day but Saturday 16th and I’d be there like a shot.’
‘You mean you can’t make it?’ Quent sounded devastated. Not a tiny bit upset – devastated.
If Ruby could be hard-nosed when confronted by bullies and psychopaths, she entirely crumbled when faced with disappointed, lisping eleven-year-old boys, or disappointed anyone for that matter – all that Ruby Redfort tough-talking, cocksure cool just evaporated.
‘Look Quent, before you let that lip start wobbling let me see if I can’t rejig a few things here.’
A superhero party, that’s all I need.
While Ruby was contemplating her dilemma, her friend Clancy was figuring a way to wriggle out of his little problem. He was so absorbed by these thoughts that he didn’t at first hear the small voice calling out to him.
‘I said, can you walk me to the party now?’ It was Olive, Clancy’s five-year-old sister.
‘No,’ said Clancy, ‘I said I’d hang out with you, but I’m not walking you to any party.’
‘But Mom said you have to.’
Olive was standing in the doorway to his room in her hat, coat, gloves and backpack.
‘What are you wearing Olive?’ said Clancy. ‘You do realise it’s still about 24 degrees outside?’
‘Mom says we are expecting a cold snip any day soon,’ said Olive.
‘Yeah, well I think you are a little over prepared. And by the way it’s cold snap, not cold snip.’
‘I like snip better,’ said Olive.
Clancy rolled his eyes. Most people seemed to find Olive cute but he didn’t. She was too annoying for cute.
While Clancy looked for his backpack, Olive went down to find their mother and tell on him.
Clancy took the backstairs to avoid the inevitable – maybe he could slip out without Olive seeing – but as he turned the corner to his dismay there she was, like a tiny pacman figure all dressed in yellow, expressionless but determined.
‘Mom says you’re in trouble if you don’t take me.’
There was to be no escape. Mrs Crew’s voice called out, ‘Clancy, is it really too much to ask that you walk your little sister to her party? She so looks up to you, can’t you just be kind?’
Olive was looking straight ahead, her big eyes blinking at him. She looked as innocent as a kewpie doll.
Clancy was about to offer Olive a bribe but his mother marched out from the kitchen followed by Amy, the youngest but one Crew sister.
Amy was seven and not a big talker and Clancy, perhaps for this very reason, was especially fond of her.
‘OK, OK, I’ll drop her,’ grumbled Clancy.
Amy gave him a sympathetic glance.
Mrs Crew bent to kiss Olive on the nose. ‘You are a perfect picture!’
Clancy looked at Olive. She was a picture all right.
Reluctantly he walked her to her friend’s party where she immediately latched on to some other kid and began talking to it as if Clancy had never been there.
‘My total pleasure,’ he called, ‘don’t mention it.’
Olive didn’t even hear.
‘Is that your little sister?’ said a mother on the way to drop off her kid. ‘I could just eat her up.’
‘You’ll need plenty of relish,’ said Clancy.
Due to the Olive drop-off, Clancy was now running late and Elliot would already be at the Donut waiting for him. Clancy didn’t like to be late, he liked to be punctual; he got anxious when he wasn’t on time. So he started to run. It was well past midday and hot, but he would rather be on time than comfortable, therefore he sprinted, not easing his pace for even a minute. Clancy was fast, but despite his running flat-out he arrived twenty-one minutes late. It was a shame because this was one morning when Clancy would have benefited from being on time; it would have saved him a whole lot of bother.
As he pushed open the door to the diner on Amster Street, he went smack into the back of a kid who was tying his shoe on the other side of the door.
‘Woah, sorry,’ said Clancy, stepping back.
The boy straightened and turned around, and for just a second looked like he was about to say something along the lines of, ‘No problem,’ but sort of changed his mind when he laid eyes on Clancy.
It was like he had a choice – shrug it off or make something of it. He took option two.
‘You deep down stupid? Or do you just feel the need to get socked in the face?’
‘What?’ said Clancy, he didn’t get what was going on here. All he’d done was walk into the Double Donut and now he was about to get beaten up? It wasn’t even 1 pm; the day had barely got going.
‘You deaf too, loser?’ said the boy.
Clancy just stared, unsure what to say. The kid’s jaw was set in an angry clench and his eyes had narrowed. He was sort of ugly-looking, all fists and muscles – looked like he could take on a gorilla.
‘Look, I didn’t mean to bump into you. It was an accident caused by you being in the way.’
‘What?’ The gorilla looked puzzled.
‘But sorry if I hurt you.’ Clancy knew that that last thing wasn’t a good thing to say if he wanted to walk away without getting blood all over his shirt, but the guy was ticking him off and he