The girls beat me to the upstairs bathroom so I pulled on some shorts and headed downstairs. There was a lot of giggling going on when I got back upstairs; Jules and Deb were getting ready for the great ‘revenge on Sonia’ scam. I got myself dressed and went downstairs for breakfast; I was surprised when Brit joined me soon afterwards.

“Thought you were helping upstairs?”
“I’ve been banished, but they shouldn’t be long, they were just getting dressed”
“I hope she goes for it after all this” I opined between spoonfuls of cereal.
“From what Juliette was saying just now she won’t be able to resist,” Brit giggled

Even though it was my plan, and it was quite evil, I was a bit taken aback by the appearance of my elder sibling and Brit’s sister. Both of them now had bizarre multi coloured hairdos and were dressed and made up sort of Punk-Goth! But the really striking bit was the intricate designs adorning their hands, feet and even their faces! That was the masterstroke, I saw some programme about Indian culture and all the women were getting these designs done, they use some stuff called Henna, its sort of like temporary tattoos. To top it all off Jules apparently sported a nose ring connected by a chain to her ear and both of them had on loads of rings and chains and stuff.

“What do you think?” Deb asked shaking her new pink and mauve hairdo.
“Wow!” was as much as I could manage.
“Way to go Sis,” Brit agreed
“Where did you get all that stuff?”
“We raided Mum’s wardrobe for some of it, Debs dress is really a slip and these are Mum’s shoes.” She advised.
“I wish I could see Sonia’s face.”
“I don’t think you’ll be able to miss it after today” Jules pointed out
“Well not for a while anyway” we all joined her chuckles with our own.

Brit took a couple of pictures before we left for the Peters mansion, we’ll have to wait until later to find out what happens!

“They look phenomenal!” Brit enthused
“Yeah, just like them girls in the sixth form last year” I agreed
“Cool, so what’re we doing?” Mad enquired
“Well I promised Dad I’d get this sorted out” I lifted a shank of blonde mane.
“You’re getting it cut?”
“Yeah well it’s not been cut for months and it’s a bit of a nuisance when I’m riding”
“We can go and see Rhod and Dan, and I bet Ally’ll be there too!” Mad enthused
“Well I was gonna go to ‘Marco’s’”
“But Sylv always does our hair”
“I s’pose” I reluctantly agreed
“We can practice our cheers later” Sab mentioned
“Ooh yeah!” Mad was like a madwoman this morning!
“Erm what about an appointment? Sylv is usually all booked up”
“Dur it’s Wednesday!”
“What’s Wednesday?” Sab asked the question I was thinking.
“Bingo of course”
“Eh?”
“Boys!” Mad rolled her eyes, “Wednesday all the old dears catch the bus to the bingo so Sylv is usually pretty quiet on Wednesdays.”
“Oh right” well you learn something new every day!
“Er Maddy?” Brit started slightly nervously, “I was wondering, do you have any pictures of your cousin, that is, the mysterious Gaby?”

At least Mad was primed after last nights call!

“Sure, I’ve got loads, hang on a sec I’ll get them”

Brit seemed a little surprised; maybe we could throw her off the trail yet! Mad returned with a scrapbook, I was surprised to see the front decorated with pictures of me, that is Gaby, with various members of the gang.

“Here we go” Mad enthused opening the cover.

Britney and Sabrina positioned themselves so they could see and I sat down opposite Mad.

“Here we are” Mad started pointing to a shot taken on one of Gaby’s first appearances.
“Wow, she’s real pretty” Sab stated
“She could be your twin Drew” Sab snook in
“Well we do get mistaken as sisters sometimes” Mad admitted, “but I don’t think she’s ever been mistaken for you has she Drew!” she chuckled.
“Not as far as I know,” I agreed from across the table

Mad worked her way through the album, I had no idea half of those pictures existed! There was Gaby in school uniform, in Meadowhall, on the bus, down the Rec, well you get the idea, there were a lot!

“How come you’re not in any of these Drew?” Brit was sharp, oh she’s sharp.
“Well who do you think took the pictures?” Mad jumped in
“So you took all these?” Sab asked me
“Well some of them, I’ve not seen some of these though” I sort of prompted Mad
“Ooh you’ll like these” Mad suggested as she scrambled through the pages, “here we are, Bernie took these at the school dance”

I lent over to have a look with the others. There I was, well Gaby, not in just one but several pictures shaking my booty on the dance floor with the gang then a couple dancing with a grinning Clive. I wanted to crawl into a hole!

“We had to pull’em apart” Mad joked
“He’s your cousins boyfriend?” Sab asked
“He wishes!” Mad stated, “Gaby’s not that keen but I reckon Clive's got a king size crush on her, eh Drew?”
“Er yeah, he never stops going on about Gaby this and Gaby that”
“He is kind of cute” Brit allowed
“Oh look at the time” Mad changed the subject
“Eleven?”
“Yeah, come on let’s go over to Sylv’s, Drew can get his haircut and we can hang with the guys” Mad suggested.

Half an hour later the bell rang as we piled into Sylv’s salon. Mad was right, the usual crowd of wrinklies was absent, there was just one woman under a drier, I recognised her as the barmaid from The Miners.

“Hi kids, looking for my lot?” Sylv asked
“Yeah and Drew wants a hair cut” Mad replied
“Well you picked the right day Drew, all the old dears go to Bingo today so apart from Angie I’m free till four o’clock, park your bum over there.” She pointed to one of the chairs. “You girls go on through the back, and remind that lad of mine to put the Hoover round”
“Okay Sylv, see you in a bit Drew” Mad gave one of those funny little finger waves before leading the others through into the house.
“So young man, time for a haircut eh?”
“Yeah well it’s getting a bit messy, Mum’ll go ballistic if I go to Germany looking like this.”
“So you want it tidying up then?”
“I guess so” while we talked she was running her hands through my hair, I didn’t take much notice but she played with it for a minute more before going on.
“Let me just check on Ang then we’ll get started”

Over the next half an hour I got Sylv’s usual routine, hair washed then she started in with the scissors chatting merrily away all the time.

“Did I see your sister earlier all in black with a girl with pink hair?”
“Sounds like Jules” I allowed
“Well she certainly looked different, not my choice mind”
“I think they’re having a Goth day or something”
“They?”
“Anna, Charlie an’ that. They do some weird things for entertainment,” I observed
“Well I suppose it keeps them out of trouble” Sylv mentioned

I hope so! If I’d been paying attention I would have realised that the scissors weren’t clicking anymore.

“Sit there for a bit while I finish Angie then we’ll finish you off. There’s some magazines on the side there, about fifteen minutes okay?”
“Fine” I’d be in and out of Marco’s in about that time!

I reached over and grabbed a magazine, well it was obviously a women’s mag, I mean it’s a hair salon. Ah well better than nothing. ‘10 Great Diets’, ‘Looking good at forty’, ‘Fifty fashion tips you need to know!’ ‘Hollywood Lives’, well the enclosed delights were never ending, sandwiched between adverts for various potions, lotions, pads, creams and other ‘women’s’ products. I flicked through the pages, checking out the shapely babes and what they were wearing, purely for research of course. I most definitely was not wondering what they would look like on me, Maddy maybe but not me. Honest.

“Okay let’s sort you out” Sylv broke my line of thought
“Cosmo eh? I had you down for Woman’s Realm” she chuckled
“The range was a bit limited” I shot back
“Well let’s rinse this out then you only need drying”

Rinse what out? Ah well, at least she hadn’t got her piercing kit out! Ten minutes later I was just about done. A few more snips and Sylv pronounced herself satisfied.

“Thanks Sylv, how much?”
“Just five Drew but don’t tell everyone eh!” she winked at me.

I really should have looked in the mirror.

“Cool look Drew!” Ally mentioned when I went to join the others in the house
“I’ve only had a trim”
“And I’m only five.”
“What are you on about Al?”
“He doesn’t know” Mad exclaimed
“Mum’s done it again” Rhod stated
“Done what?”
“Look in the mirror Drew” Rhod sounded sympathetic.

Puzzled I went over to the mirror.

“What’s wrong with… oh boy, she gets me every time! I wondered what I was waiting for” yep I had fallen for it again, I looked more like a girl than ever with this haircut! More like a Kylie than a Kyle if you know what I mean and I’m sure my hairs light… the ‘conditioner’ wasn’t conditioner was it?

“Hey Drew you coming out.. side?” Brit trailed off as she came inside
“It wasn’t my idea,” I stated
“Everybody okay?” Sylv asked joining us
“Muum, I wish you’d leave my friends alone!” Rhod suggested
“What have I done now?”
“Muum! He looks like a girl!”
“I thought…” she must have spotted Al and Mad’s frantic hand signals at about this point, “er sorry Drew, come here let’s sort you out.”

She produced the tools of her trade, brush and comb, from her overall pocket and in moments flat my hair was teased back into a more masculine style.

“There! Better?”
I checked in the mirror, “yes thanks”
She leant down to whisper in my ear, “I thought you’d like a unisex sort of cut, so you can, you know easier” Then addressing the assembled mass of teenagers, “anyone for ice cream?”

Darla, Brit and Sabrina spent the afternoon showing Mad and Ally cheer stuff while Dan and I took turns at trying to beat Rhod at ‘Colin McRae Rally’, with little success! We managed to miss having any lunch but Sylv managed to feed us on some vegetarian gunk for tea, I am never giving up meat. By the look on Rhod’s face I think he wishes he hadn’t either, come to think of it I don’t know why he did, it’s not like Sylv is a veggie!

When Brit and I got home, the others were already there.

“Well?” Brit asked her now back to normal sister.
“It was so cool!” Deb admitted
“Spill!” I encouraged
“Well, it worked, it’ll hit the fan tomorrow!” Jules told us
“Oh come on Jules, all of it”
“Okay, okay! Well Charlie had her hair all sort of spiked up and Anna had a sort of braid so you could see the shaved bit”
“Yeah like she looked well cool,” Deb added
“Well anyway, Son and the K’s turned up, and to cut a long story short, Son insisted we do the Henna bit for her, I mean she was dead impressed with ours” Jules giggled, “so we didn’t like to argue too much so we did a good job, the others wimped out though”
“Maybe for the best eh?” I pointed out
“Yeah I guess so. Anyway Anna reckoned she ought to try the green dye, after all it washes out”
“It was really cool,” Deb picked up the thread, “we went to Mans Field. Everyone was looking at us and these cool guys hooked up with us and we ended up in this park place”
“Sounds like fun” Brit mentioned
“I thought the idea was to get some revenge,” I pointed out
“Well you’ve not heard it all yet have you?” Jules pointed out
“Go on then”
“Well anyway we were just sort of talking and stuff and like this lad says he like girls with nose rings and stuff which really cheesed Sonia as he was a bit of a hunk and me and Kirsty were getting all the attention”
“Never guess what?” Deb butted in
“Come on tell us” Brit prompted
Jules took the tale up again, “well she dragged Kaz off to the lavs and when they came back she had a ring in her nose, she got Kaz to do it for her.”
“No!” I gasped
“Well she had a right smirk on her face, especially as the lad with the nose fetish gave her a long snog”
“Gross!” I pretended to retch.
“That’s about it really. We caught the bus home and left them about an hour ago.”
“I bet she’s just finding out that Henna doesn’t just wash off” Deb giggled
“How long did you say it lasts Drew?”
“Maybe a few weeks according to that programme but I think they had to leave it on for quite a long time”
“Well it might not be that long then, but it should be pretty cool”
“Sweet revenge!” I declared

You want some explanation? Well duh, of course Jules and co didn’t use Henna, no they used eyebrow pencils! And the hair dye was just sort of brush in and wash out, pretty cool idea huh? And Jules’ nose ring? Well that was dead easy, an earring just sort of pushed in place. I can’t believe Sonia got Kaz to actually pierce hers; her Mum’ll go spastic!

“So what have you lot been up to today?” Dad asked
“Not much really Dad”
“I see you finally got a haircut Drew”
“Well you kept on”
“Not sure about the new colour though” he joked

Didn’t I mention that? Well I didn’t just get a Gaby haircut did I? That conditioner was really hair dye, ‘Hint of Peach’ Sylv called it; thankfully it’s not too obvious! Strange day huh?

I decided to get an early night so I headed off about ten leaving Dad and the girls watching telly. I put my stereo on and tuned into my latest passion, John Peel! Well he makes me laugh and he plays some cool music too. As I lay in bed listening to the Peelster I went over another strange day in my head.

I reckon we managed to throw Britney off the Gaby trail this morning, where did Mad get all those pictures, and the album! Note to me; do not let Sylv near my hair again! Sheesh! You’d think I’d learn wouldn’t you? It’s my sister’s birthday tomorrow, it’s gonna be really weird, a birthday without Mum! I feel a bit sad for Jules, she always seems to get the rough end of the stick lately. Mind you, sorting Sonia seems to have cheered her up!

Maddy Bell 26.04.04