Daizy Star and the Pink Guitar Read online

  I hope.

  But what if it isn’t? What if Dad still wants to live in Malawi and Mum says she’s had enough and the late-night rows start up again? I don’t want to think about that. I won’t think about that.

  My dad is coming home … tomorrow! It’s almost more exciting than the Battle of the Bands.

  I wake up next morning with a huge smile on my face. I could be on the edge of rock superstardom!

  And best of all, Dad is coming home just in time to see it all happen.

  Dad’s flight is an overnight one, so he should be in the air right now. Mum is up bright and early, ready to head off to Heathrow to meet him.

  ‘He won’t be jet-lagged, will he?’ I ask. ‘He’ll be OK to come to the Battle of the Bands?’

  ‘He should be,’ Mum sighs. ‘He’ll have all day to recover from the flight. Don’t worry, Daizy.’

  ‘I’m not worried!’ I argue. ‘Why does everybody think I am worried? Everything is going exactly according to plan.’

  At school, the class is buzzing. Kelly, Freya and Luka have made a banner that reads Honey Badgers Forever. Miss Moon says she has got a front-row seat. Even Ethan has a ticket … and he asks if we’d like him to turn up early to help with the guitars and amps and stuff.

  Yeah, right.

  I give him a withering look. ‘You don’t have to turn up at all, Ethan,’ I say coldly. ‘Haven’t you got something more important to do? Like polishing your football boots, or practising your goal-scoring techniques, or dropping worms down people’s sweatshirts?’

  Ethan looks sad. ‘Daizy, that worm thing was years ago,’ he sighs. ‘We were in Year Three, and I’ve said I’m sorry about a million times since then. You have to forgive me sometime, y’know.’

  I raise an eyebrow frostily. ‘Wanna bet?’ I ask.

  ‘Ethan, she doesn’t mean it!’ Beth cuts in. ‘Daizy is just stressed because of the pressure and everything. Of course she forgives you, and she definitely wants you to come along tonight. We all do, don’t we?’

  ‘I do, Ethan,’ Willow breathes. ‘I’m counting on it. I’ll be watching out for you! And you’re just sooooo good at all that technical stuff, so maybe you could hang out with us beforehand and help me tweak my mike and my amp. That would be amazing!’

  ‘Er, right,’ Ethan says with a smirk. ‘See you there then.’ My two best friends are seriously embarrassing whenever Ethan is around. It must be their hormones bubbling away and turning their brains into mush. Growing up can be a very scary thing.

  I check my watch. Dad will be home by now. He and Mum will be drinking tea and sharing stories about life in the African sun. And very soon they will be sitting side by side at the Battle of the Bands, watching The Honey Badgers win, and they will be filled with pride and happiness.

  We will be a happy family again. When I hand over the £500 cheque to Dad he will send it off to Malawi and then his conscience will be clear and the nightmare will be over. That’s what I am hoping, anyway.

  Our very last practice in the school music room is pretty impressive, if I do say so myself. We rock, in a deafening kind of way. Willow has perfected the art of the thrash-punk-metal screech, and Beth’s drumming sounds exactly like a washing machine full of gravel, on full spin. Murphy is brilliant on bass, and my guitar riffs are loud enough to lift the roof off.

  We are almost ready.

  All that is needed now is Becca’s thrash-punk-metal makeover skills.

  After school, the four of us, with Pixie in tow, trail back to number 17, Silver Street. Everyone is excited, but I am just about bursting with happiness because Dad will be back and I cannot wait to see him. At the corner of the street, I break into a run and I don’t stop until I am hurtling through the front door into the hallway.

  There is no sign of either Mum or Dad cuddled up on the sofa the way I hoped they might be. There is no sign of them at all.

  ‘Dad!’ I yell. ‘Dad! Mum? Where are you?’

  Becca appears on the staircase.

  ‘They’re not here,’ she tells me. ‘Dad’s plane was delayed in Lilongwe … Mum’s been stuck at the airport all day, waiting for him. She rang my mobile to say we are not to worry, Dad is definitely on his way now. They should make it in time for the Battle of the Bands, but they might have to go straight there.’

  ‘What?’ I yelp. ‘But … Dad was meant to be here hours ago! What if they miss my moment of glory?’

  Becca ruffles my hair. ‘It’ll all work out, Daizy,’ she says. ‘Don’t worry. Come on, help me get my make-up kit and crimpers set up … we have work to do!’

  By the time Pixie, Beth, Willow and Murphy arrive, Becca and I have turned the living room into a thrash-punk-metal beauty salon. I get to work crimping Beth’s hair while Becca starts painting Willow’s eyes and nails a startling shade of neon green. There is lots of inky eyeliner and black lipstick that makes us look faintly vampire-ish.

  Next, we get changed into the splash-painted T-shirts and little black skirts, or skinny red jeans in Murphy’s case, and Becca gets to work on our hair. She gives Pixie a handful of neon hair mascaras, and soon random stripes of turquoise, orange and pink appear in everyone’s hair. Becca starts backcombing madly and scooshing us with great clouds of hairspray, adding black lace bows and scarves to go with the black furry ears.

  Murphy gets a whole crop of pointy dinosaur spikes all over the back of his head while his dipping, multi-coloured fringe is straightened. Becca even threatens him with the black eyeliner, but he wriggles away before she can do any damage.

  We are ready. We have through-a-hedge-backwards hair and panda eyes, and clothes that look like Halloween fancy dress.

  ‘Scary,’ Pixie says, and I agree. If I saw the whole bunch of us walking along Silver Street, I would turn round and leg it in the opposite direction.

  We look perfect.

  But there is a little ache of sadness in my chest because it’s five thirty now and time to set off for Brightford Playhouse, and there is still no sign of Dad. If he doesn’t hurry up, he’s going to miss our big break.

  Becca slips an arm round my shoulder. ‘Stop worrying,’ she whispers. ‘He’ll be there.’

  ‘I know,’ I say, but I don’t believe it. My confidence has dissolved. A feeling of doom and disaster is hanging over me. There’s the toot of a car horn from outside, and we grab the guitars and load them into Murphy’s mum’s car. We don’t have to stress about drum kits and mikes and amps because Spike’s band are bringing theirs along and all the bands will be sharing them once we get to the theatre.

  All that’s left is for us to squeeze into the car and go, and suddenly my tummy is full of butterflies because it’s not every day you get to achieve your thrash-punk-metal potential and change the world as well, all in ten short minutes on stage. It is going to be awesome.

  I just hope Mum and Dad will be there to see it.

  Once we get to the theatre, things get a little scary. We have a bit of trouble convincing the sound-check guys we are actually a band and not a bunch of autograph-hunting fans trying to sneak backstage, which is very ageist of them when you think about it. In the end, Spike spots us and vouches for us, and then we are up there with the other bands, who do seem very tall and old and scary-looking.

  Beth and Willow have gone totally silent, and Murphy just keeps saying, ‘Right, cool,’ whenever someone asks him a question.

  One of the sound-check crew takes a look at Murphy’s bass and my pink guitar, and wires them up to a couple of huge amps on the stage.

  ‘These are pretty powerful … give them a go,’ he suggests.

  ‘Right, cool!’ Murphy says.

  We play a few chords. The sound-check guy twiddles with the amps and the sound that comes out is pretty ear-splitting. Beth tries the drums and manages to lose a drumstick and pull one of the hi-hat cymbals down on top of her. She is shaking like a leaf and looks like she might cry at any minute.

  ‘You’ll be OK,’ the sound-check guy tells
us. ‘It’s normal to be nervous before a gig. Trust me, once you’re playing, you’ll be buzzed!’

  ‘Right, cool!’

  I dig Murphy in the ribs with a sharp elbow. He is getting seriously annoying.

  ‘Anyway, let me know if there’s anything else you need,’ the sound-check guy says. ‘You’re tenth in the running order, so you’re actually last on. I’ll call you five minutes before. I’ll take you to the green room to relax. We open in ten minutes …’

  He leads us through to the green room, which is a poky, scabby little dressing room that isn’t even green, and tells us to wait in there. It is like a sardine can, only with weirdos instead of fish inside it. There is a boy with a purple Mohican and a girl with tattooed arms that look like lacy blue sleeves and a bloke with a shaved head and an orange beard trained into two pointy plaits.

  Spike appears out of the madness, looking fairly harmless compared to the others, even with his pierced lip and green hair.

  ‘OK, Daizy?’ he grins.

  My mouth has gone very dry. I try to answer, but all that comes out is a croak.

  We follow Spike into the sardine can and he hands us cans of lemonade from a crate in the corner. ‘Keep your energy levels up,’ he says.

  I slurp down some of the lemonade and I start to feel fizzy inside – fizzy and excited. It’s really, really happening … and so much depends on this.

  I find myself wondering again if Dad’s plane has landed yet. Will he make it on time?

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  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Contents

  Daizy Star and the Pink Guitar

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Contents

  Daizy Star and the Pink Guitar

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17