Sugar Secrets…& Revenge Page 3

  But, and this was the best but, Cat knew that after his miserable years at boarding school and his lacklustre home life, there was something else that mattered - very much - to Matt. His friends.

  “Oh, there you are, Catrina. Where’ve you been all day? I tried to get you on your mobile - don’t you ever take it out with you? Another waste of money, I suppose. I can’t understand why you find it so hard to leave me a note to let me know where you are…”

  Standing in the hall, Cat stared at her mother, who was busily juicing a carrot in the kitchen.

  “Leave it out, Mum,” Cat snapped. After leaving her friends at the café, she’d spent the whole afternoon wandering aimlessly round the clothes shops in the town centre. “At least I’m home sometimes. Unlike some total workaholics who’d rather be in the office or the gym instead of being at home with their children!”

  “Don’t you dare talk to me like that!” barked Sylvia Osgood, her precision-cut bob whipping round as she turned to face her daughter. “I work hard because I have to, since I have to pay for you - and the mobile phone I gave you and you never use - without any support from your father. you should learn some respect and try and help me more, instead of wasting time with those loser friends of Sonja’s. And by the way, a couple of them have been on the phone for you. That Maya girl and that Ozzie.”

  “Ollie, not Ozzie,” said Cat, aware that her mother knew full well what her friends’ names were. It was as if she did it to be difficult or something.

  So Maya and Ollie called, she thought to herself, turning her back on her mother and heading towards the phone in the living room. I only left them a few hours ago, but they’re obviously worried that I’m going to do something stupid, like go round to Matt’s and chuck paint over his precious car.

  But Cat had something far more sophisticated in mind for Matt. She was going to make sure that all his friends turned against him.

  They’d already been shocked by his actions, that was obvious from last night and the way they’d all rallied round her today. It wouldn’t take much to make their disgust permanent.

  Picking up the phone, Cat dialled The Swan’s number.

  “Hello?” said a female voice that didn’t belong to Ollie’s friendly mum.

  “Oh, hello, Natasha. Still gracing us with your presence?” said Cat, her heart beating like crazy. Somehow, she hadn’t expected her rival to answer the phone.

  “Who is this?” said Natasha, momentarily thrown.

  “It’s Catrina,” she drawled in her most pretend-poised way. “Can you get your brother for me, please?”

  In the silence that followed, Cat breathed deeply and tried to regain her composure.

  “Cat?” came a voice down the line.

  “Hi, Ollie - my mum said you called…”

  “yeah, Cat, I just wanted to see if you were OK.”

  “That’s so sweet of you, Ollie. Yes, I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.”

  A thought struck Cat: she’d have to start laying the foundations of her plan. “I mean, I don’t want you and Matt falling out over me…”

  “Don’t be daft, Cat. I mean, I know I’m Matt’s mate, but I really don’t approve of what he did, y’know.”

  Cat smiled to herself.

  “Well, I’d hate to see everyone taking sides. So I’m going to make the peace. And just to prove it, I’ll even go to Matt’s party next Saturday.”

  “Good for you, Cat!” said Ollie.

  You’d better believe it’s going to be good for me, thought Cat.

  CHAPTER 6

  BUSINESS AS USUAL

  “I see Madam’s got over Matt pretty quickly,” sniffed Sonja, watching as Catrina flicked her hair back and giggled with a boy over by the entrance to the main school building. Kerry, who was struggling to pull on a heavy rucksack loaded down with project work, looked up to see what Sonja was talking about.

  “Maybe,” said Kerry, hauling her bag up on to her shoulder. “But the way she was talking on Saturday, I had visions of Matt’s tyres being let down at the dead of night, or his whole house being toilet-papered.”

  Across the concourse stood Maya. Just out of class, she was looking down at her watch and obviously wondering where her friends were. lBehind her loomed the huge building that comprised the secondary school division of St Mark’s, which she and Catrina attended. To the left stood the independent annexe housing the sixth-form college, which Kerry, Sonja and Joe went to.

  “Nah, she’s obviously over him,” huffed Sonja as they strolled over to join Maya. “She’s back in full flirt, isn’t she?”

  “She’s talking to that lad about some coursework, if you must know,” said Maya defensively, having caught the tail-end of what Sonja was saying. “And anyway, I think it’s good if Cat’s put it all behind her so quickly. She was pretty humiliated by the whole Natasha business, you know. She might just be putting on a brave face and trying to get on with her life, which - for the sake of the rest of us - is exactly what we all wanted her to do.”

  Grudgingly, Sonja shrugged and knew her friend was right. “Yeah, I suppose we shouldn’t moan. At least there’s a chance we might get through the week without any more dramas. What’ll happen about Matt’s party, though? She’s not going to want to turn up to that, is she?”

  “Actually, she is,” said Maya. “I phoned heron Saturday to see if she was all right and she told me she’d decided to try to forgive and forget, which I think is really brilliant of her.”

  “What’ll Matt make of her coming?” worried Kerry.

  “He’d better be on his best behaviour,” frowned Maya. “After all, if Cat’s going to be mature about this…”

  “Ha! Cat - mature! More like she knows how popular Matt’s parties are and reckons that it’s the best chance she’s got of copping off with someone new!” snorted Sonja.

  Maya glared disapprovingly at Sonja, but didn’t say anything. She knew that deep down Sonja and Cat were hugely fond of each other, but the cousins couldn’t help sniping at each other and bickering, in an almost sisterly way. In any case, she couldn’t say anything because Cat had finished her conversation and was on her way over to join them.

  Perched on a stool in the End-of-the-Line café, Matt was trying to explain himself to Ollie.

  “So I just told Tasha that I’d been planning to finish with Cat anyway, and that she - well, us - I mean, that kiss on Friday sort of made my mind up. Didn’t Tasha tell you any of this?”

  “Oh, no. My darling sister told me in no uncertain terms that it was none of my business,” said Ollie from his side of the counter. “So what do you mean - were you going to finish with Cat? Or did you just tell Tasha that as a handy excuse?”

  “No, no - I really meant to finish with her,” said Matt, running his hand through his thick dark hair. “It was just a bit tricky, y’know? Finding the right time and all that.”

  “But why? You never said anything! I thought you two were really into each other!”

  “I just - I just think we made a mistake, y’know?” Matt struggled to explain himself. “Friends going out together… it doesn’t work. It kinda felt weird, us being together like that.”

  “Well, something tells me Cat saw it differently,” said Ollie.

  “Yeah, I know,” nodded Matt. “I sort of had an idea she was pretty serious about me and that’s why I’d been thinking about knocking it on the head, y’know, before it got out of hand.”

  Ollie and Matt looked at each other and found themselves grinning at the irony of what he’d just said.

  “Mmm, I’m glad you handled it so well then,” said Ollie with good-humoured sarcasm. “Like that tactful moment when you laughed at her when she fell over - after trying to lump you one.”

  “Oh, I know that was bad, but it was all so ridiculous that I couldn’t help it,” said Matt, burying his head in his hands with embarrassment. Then he looked up at his friend’s face and both boys burst out laughing.

  At that moment the bell of the c
afé door tinkled loudly.

  “Thanks again for being so brilliant on Saturday,” Cat was trilling to the other girls. “I don’t know how I’d have survived without you!”

  She must have spotted the looks on her friends’ faces and turned round to see what they were staring at.

  “Oh, God!” groaned Matt only loud enough for Ollie to hear. He knew what it must look like to the girls: him heartlessly cackling when Cat was probably still hurting. And he truly hadn’t meant to hurt her; he just hadn’t handled it right and hadn’t been able to stop himself falling for Ollie’s gorgeous sister.

  “Er, hi, girls,” Matt said nervously, walking over to meet them. He knew he had some serious making up to do. “Catrina, can I have a chat with you some time? Y’know, about everything?”

  “Yeah, I suppose so,” she said quietly, her eyes fixed on the ground. “Now?”

  “Er, I can’t just now,” Matt mumbled, his handsome face looking ever-so-slightly red. “I’ve got to, er, go somewhere…”

  “Where?” asked Sonja bluntly. Laughing like he didn’t have a care in the world was one thing, but now he had the perfect opportunity to make peace with Cat and he was faffing around!

  “I’m sorry, I - I’ve got to, erm, go and pick up Tasha in a minute. I said I’d give her a lift back down to the station…” said Matt, looking acutely embarrassed by now.

  Everyone - including Matt - fell silent, waiting for Catrina to have hysterics. But she just looked him in the eye, smiled sweetly and said, “Well, do give her another birthday kiss from me, Matt!” before pushing past him and taking a seat at an empty table.

  “Matt, you’re an idiot,” snarled Sonja before going over to join Catrina. Maya and Kerry gave him despairing looks and followed suit.

  Over by the counter, Ollie was scribbling down an order from a customer. He pulled an ‘omigod’ face at his friend.

  I’ve really, really messed this one up, Matt groaned to himself as he fled from the café.

  CHAPTER 7

  THREE DOWN, TWO TO CO

  The following Saturday morning Cat woke up with a smile on her face. She ran over the events of the last week in her head. Everything had happened much more easily than she’d expected, but then she hadn’t anticipated Matt playing right into her hands on Monday in the café.

  The girls had been furious with him. Not only had they caught him laughing like a drain, but he’d blown Cat out for Natasha again. All week long, they’d been going over and over his bad behaviour and there’d even been talk of boycotting the party. But Cat had insisted.

  “I don’t want to be the cause of breaking the crowd up!” she’d protested in her best martyred voice. “And I want to go to show him - to show him he hasn’t got to me!”

  Kerry, Maya and even cynical Sonja had been impressed at the way she was handling it all. And so they were going to Matt’s party.

  Cat stretched and yawned in the sunlight streaming through her bedroom window, anticipating the moment she would get the chance to show off The Dress.

  She gazed at it from her bed, its long, slinky black shape draped over a hanger on her wardrobe door. Slashed to the thigh and plunging at the neck, it gave her curves upon her curves - a killer dress that was going to make heads turn like spectators at Wimbledon.

  And a certain head in particular was going to turn tonight, which was the real reason why she wanted to go to the party tonight…

  The girls had been easy, a walkover; female bonding meant that they took her side against Matt as a matter of course. Her real problem had been working out how to turn Joe and Ollie against their mate.

  Ollie had been all too keen to try and put Matt’s case forward, telling the girls how sorry he was. And while Ollie still felt some loyalty to Matt, Joe did too - he always took Ollie’s lead, doing whatever Ollie did. Like a little shadow, thought Cat.

  So Cat had got her brain into gear to do some serious thinking. And she had come up with an inspired scheme: she was going to go out with Ollie.

  It was perfect. Having Ollie as a boyfriend meant he would have to be on her side, and it would drive a nice little wedge between Ollie and Matt, especially if she ended up getting off with him at Matt’s party. All his friends turning against him (because Joe would switch sides in a minute if Ollie told him to) and public humiliation at his own party. Double whammy.

  Mmm, this revenge game is going to be fun, Cat smiled to herself.

  While Catrina was gloating, Kerry was fretting. And shopping in town with Sonja.

  “So Elaine’s maybe coming for the party tonight?”

  “Yeah, so Ollie says. But she didn’t bother coming to his birthday do last week, so I don’t see why she’d make the effort for this one,” shrugged Sonja, rifling through a rack of tops in Miss Selfridge.

  Kerry couldn’t really get her head round Ollie and his ‘girlfriend’. Elaine was this hippy, space cadet of a girl he’d met a few months before at a music festival in a country park. Kerry couldn’t remember now why she and the others hadn’t gone to it, but Joe and Ollie had, and Elaine had been a fixture ever since.

  “What’s the matter, are you jealous or something?” Sonja had teased her once when they’d been discussing Ollie and Elaine’s long-distance friendship. (He’d insisted it wasn’t love, though they’d all ganged up on Joe one night and got him to admit that Ollie and Elaine had ended up snogging that first time they’d met.)

  “No!” Kerry had protested at the time. “It’s just confusing - are they going out or what?”

  No one knew for sure and Ollie was infuriatingly vague about Elaine. Sometimes she’d travel over from her town to see him and hang out with the gang - probably unaware of the way they studied her and Ollie’s body language for clues - and then not be seen again for ages.

  It made Kerry nervous. She liked things to be as straightforward as possible. Which was another reason why this bust-up with Matt and Catrina was stressing her out.

  As they made their way out of the store, Kerry started to cheer up slightly. She was going to make a huge effort tonight and was determined to look beautiful.

  Well, beautiful-ish. She’d just bought some pale blue, sparkly nail varnish and Sonja was lending her some black suede, high-heeled boots. She might even try and manage without her glasses for once. All she needed now was an outfit.

  “How about that, Kerry?” Sonja suggested, pointing to a dress in the window of a shop they were passing. “It would look brilliant on you!”

  “Don’t be silly, Son. That’s the sort of thing Cat wears,” Kerry scowled, eyeing the figure-hugging, black lace number with great suspicion. It wasn’t her at all. She’d just feel exposed and lumpy in something like that. She needed something that she’d feel confident in.

  Like a bin bag, Kerry thought to herself.

  In fact, she’d already spotted a midnight blue shirt she really liked the look of. It was slightly glittery and made from a soft, satiny material, and she knew it would suit her, especially if she wore it with her black hipsters, which definitely went well with the boots. The only problem was, she’d seen it in the window of a tacky boutique normally frequented by mums and she wasn’t sure what super-cool Sonja would have to say about that.

  “Erm, look, Son… you don’t have to stick with me all afternoon. You know what a pain I am about choosing clothes…”

  “You’re not wrong there.”

  “Yeah, so why don’t we split up now and I’ll come round and get changed at yours later on.”

  “OK,” said Sonja, already drifting off to examine something that had caught her eye in a window. “See you about eight then.”

  Kerry stashed the bag from the deeply untrendy boutique inside another one, just in case she bumped into Sonja. It wasn’t that she was scared of her friend’s judgement - she just knew she’d never hear the last of it. Sonja could be merciless about certain things.

  Yeah, well it’s all right for her, thought Kerry grimly. She never has to worry about looking g
ood.

  Glancing up, she spotted a familiar face among the shoppers. Thankfully, it wasn’t Sonja’s.

  “Joe! Hi, what are you up to?”

  “Hello Kerry. Um … nothing much. Bumming about. Ollie’s, y’know, working.”

  Joe blushed furiously. He was useless at talking to girls. Even girls who were supposed to be his friends. He often wished he had some of Ollie’s easy-going charm, but knew it was never going to happen. They’d hung about together since they were little and it had always been the same - Ollie doing the meeting and greeting, Joe bumbling along in the background.

  “yes, of course,” nodded Kerry, thinking of Ollie slaving away on this busy Saturday lunchtime with only Dorothy - one of the two old ladies who helped out at the End - to help. She and Sonja had stuck their heads round the café door as they wandered into town and heard Ollie moan about his Uncle Nick doing another disappearing trick when it was supposed to be his shift. Nick was good at that.

  “yeah…” said Joe, his side of the conversation grinding to a halt.

  He had a bit of a problem knowing what to say to Kerry, mainly because he had a soft spot for her. No, more than a soft spot. And it made him clam up completely when he found himself alone with her like this.

  “I meant to say, Joe,” Kerry smiled at him, making his heart thunder, “I can’t believe that was your first gig the other night at Ollie’s party. You were brilliant!”

  “Really?” Joe managed to smile back, now glowing with pride as well as embarrassment.

  “God, yeah. I mean, I missed most of it because I was on toilet duty - you know, sorting Cat out. But I could hear every song from in there. That really sad one you did was my favourite. Was it a Verve song? It sounded like it…”

  Joe shook his head - he couldn’t speak. It was the only song that hadn’t been a cover. In fact, he’d written it himself.