Hiya! Itâs me.
No, just for once this isnât Frankie. Bet thatâs given you a bit of a shock, hasnât it?
No, Iâm not Fliss either. P-lease!
And Iâm not Rosie. Guess again.
Wrong! Itâs not Lyndz.
Itâs me.
Kenny! Or, if you want to annoy me seriously, you can call me Laura. No-one calls me Laura except my mum when sheâs in a mood. If you want us to be mates, youâll never, ever let the L-word cross your lips.
I guess that by now youâve realised that youâre stuck with me, instead of Frankie. Hey, you donât have to look so shocked. I donât know what Frankieâs told you about me, but itâs all lies. Iâm not wild at all. Iâm perfectly house-trained (joke). Well, most of the time, anyway.
The point is, Frankieâs told you everything about the Sleepover Club up till now, and why should she have all the fun? I told her it was about time one of the rest of us got to talk to you for a change, and Frankie was cool about it. Sheâs cool about most things. Thatâs why sheâs my best mate. (I had to bribe her with a bag of Wotsits, but thatâs another story).
I wasnât the only one who wanted to tell you about the sleepover last Friday night. Once weâd decided that someone else instead of Frankie was going to do it, Fliss and Rosie and Lyndz were all dying to get in on the act, too. Thatâs because our last sleepover was brilliant, one of the best ever. We had a totally radical time, and best of all, we completely trashed the M&Ms. Anyway, we argued for half-an-hour over who was going to tell you about it, and then Frankie persuaded the others that it ought to be me. That wasnât just because I gave her my Wotsits, but because it was me the M&Ms did the dirty on, and getting revenge was my idea.
Whoops, hang on a sec. Iâm getting ahead of myself. Iâm not as good at this as Frankie. I need a bit more practice. Hmm. Dâyou know what? I reckon the beginning would be a really excellent place to start.
You know all about the Sleepover Club, donât you? Thereâs just the five of us â Frankie, Fliss, Lyndz, Rosie and me, and we sleep over at each otherâs houses every week-end. OK, OK, so you know all that. Donât get your intestines in a twist. I just thought that maybe if you hadnât been around before, you might not know. Thatâs all. (You know what intestines are, donât you? Theyâre these sort of tubes inside your stomach. I want to be a doctor, so I know about things like that. The others think Iâm completely gross.)
Maybe I ought to remind you about the M&Ms as well. Remember them? Emma Hughes and Emily Berryman? The Queen and The Goblin? The Gruesome Twosome? Theyâre in our class at school, and they are the biggest enemies of the Sleepover Club in the whole world. If it hadnât been for the M&Ms playing that horrible trick on me, Iâd never have come up with such a brilliant plan to get our own back.
Sorry, Iâm doing it again. My mouthâs got a mind of its own. My sister Monster-Features (my parents named her Molly, but Monster-Features sounds so-o-o much better) says if my brain was as big as my mouth, Iâd be a genius, but what does she know? I never talk to her, except to fight. Yesterday I wanted to phone Frankie to talk about the sleepover, and Molly the Monster wanted to phone some stoo-pid friend of hers, and we got into a humungous argument, and I picked up the Yellow Pages and â but thatâs another story.
Come on, letâs go, and Iâll tell you what happened. And this time Iâll start right at the very beginning.
It all started last week, on a really wet, cold and miserable day. Weâd got soaked to the skin walking to school, and the only good thing was that it was a Friday. And that night we were all sleeping over at Frankieâs.
âI asked my mum if we could make popcorn tonight,â Frankie said as we went into the classroom.
âReally?â Fliss, who was fussing with her wet hair, looked impressed. The Sleepover Club have been banned from every kitchen in the universe since we nearly burnt her mumâs house down. âWhat did she say?â
Frankie grinned. âShe said over her dead body.â
âWell, what are we going to do tonight then?â Fliss persisted. You must have sussed out by now that Fliss is just a tiny bit of a fusspot. âWe could have a hair-styling contest.â
âNo, letâs have a disco,â Rosie chimed in. âIâve got my new Spice Girls tape.â
âWhy donât we play Twister?â Lyndz suggested.
I opened my mouth to say I wanted to tell horror stories (I always want to tell horror stories at Sleepovers, but we hardly ever do, because Fliss is a bit of a wimp and gets scared), when suddenly I noticed the M&Ms coming towards us with their ears flapping.
âHold on a minute, girls,â I said, pretending to sniff the air. âThereâs a horrible smell around here.â