I’ve written fiction, or tried to, since I was 11. I loved the OU Creative Writing Course. Highly recommended.
This is the kind of thing I do.
Saturday Evening, April 29, 1978
Kizzy and Momo’s Forensic HQ → Landing → Robbie’s Room
The front door clicked open.
Kizzy froze. Momo dropped the biro. The Form Photo Reconstruction Board loomed beside them like a jury. The diary lay splayed open at a damning page.
Footsteps.
“Tweed,” Momo whispered. “That’s school tweed.”
Kizzy shot up. “Shut it. He’s back—?!”
Without a word, Momo bolted from the room, skimming across the landing. She ducked into Robbie’s bedroom, yanked open the drawer, shoved the diary inside, slammed it shut, smoothed the duvet like a hotel maid, and slipped back out.
Downstairs, the sound of a bag hitting the floor.
Robbie’s voice: “Hello?”
Kizzy descended the stairs two at a time. “What the hell, Robbie?”
He looked up from the hallway, cheeks wind-chapped, school tie askew, Cece’s scarf looped neatly around his neck.
“I—uh—came back.”
“No shit.”
“I got kicked off the bus.”
“Again?”
He nodded. “Didn’t fancy heading back. Not after that.”
“Which was?”
He shuffled. “The Form Photo came out. Someone found it. Names were shouted. Punches may have been thrown. McAdam again. Long story.”
“So you bailed?”
“I opted out. I’ll go back on Monday. I’ll tell them something was up. Family stuff, usual guff.”
“So you’re here to clean up the mess you left behind?”
“Close a few doors, I hope.” He looked past her. “Is Mum in?”
Kizzy snorted. “No. She’s in Warwickshire, remember? With Garry. Not back till Wednesday.”
“Perfect,” Robbie muttered.
Behind him, Momo appeared. “Not perfect.”
Robbie turned. “Momo—hi—look, I meant to—”
“You left your diary,” she said, flat.
He opened his mouth.
Kizzy cut in. “We read it. We know everything.”
Robbie paled. “There’s a confession.”
“And before you go getting sentimental with Cece,” Kizzy continued, “you need to understand something. If any of those girls—Fen, Donna, Helen, even Julie-Anne—so much as speak to each other this weekend, it all goes up in smoke.”
“I—We. A kiss at a disco, holding hands at the cinema, none of it mattered.”
“No. Listen. Right now, Cece still thinks you’re the boy on the bus who got the scarf and said the right thing.”
“And Cece matters. You know that, Momo. You were part of that story.”
She nodded. “I was.”
“But we didn’t know about Tracey,” Kizzy said. “A snog behind the hedges at the tennis club? She’s over here for a couple of hours? What, and I’m down the road mucking out Luca?”
Robbie headed to the kitchen to make a sandwich. The girls followed.
“You do not get to write to anyone else. No sweet goodbyes. No, ‘we should talk.’ No tragic poetry. Not even a cartoon.”
He pulled out the torn, crumpled Eastfield High Form Photo and looked from one girl to the other.
“But—”
“Especially not to Tracey,” Momo added.
He hesitated. “What if she calls?”
“Then I answer,” Kizzy said. “And I lie.”
Silence.
He dropped his bag. “Fine.”
Kizzy softened. “You want Cece? Then don’t sabotage it. Give it 72 hours. That’s all I’m asking.”
Robbie slumped onto the bottom stairs. “It’s not like I planned all this.”
Momo scoffed. “How can you say that? You’re both in on this. Every girl. Every dance. Every word you said was planned.”
Kizzy couldn’t disagree.
“You ring Cece. I’ll speak to Tracey.” The girls looked at the phone on the hall table. Padlocked.
All was not over.
They headed for their mother’s bedroom. The phone by her bed was unblocked.
“It’s meant for emergencies only,” Kizzy said.
“This is an emergency,” Robbie added.
More, and the previous 35 chapters here > http://bit.ly/3FFRlR7