Dribbly-nosed Leaky-eyed Snotfest Girl
Green Coat
Flea Ridden Seat In Front Of Me
Blackborough Town Bus
Dear Dribbly,
Two Saturdays ago I was on my way to Tesco (to get some unmentionable items for my Nan) and overheard you talking … well, the loud bits between sobs anyway. I didn’t mean to listen, but I was trying to ignore the boy across the aisle showing me his bogie collection.
Your crisis appeared to involve a disposable camera, a packet of Bourbons and a bloke called Harry? Clearly this was none of my business, as long as Harry doesn’t work at our local bakery, but I really wish I’d been able to talk to you.
You see, just lately I’ve had some pretty major problems to deal with, and although I have no specialised knowledge relating to men and their biscuits, I really think I could help.
Knowing my Nan’s bladder control, I’ll be on the same bus again this week. In case you’re interested, I’ll keep the seat beside me free.
Yours truly,
Molly x
“Well, it might work.” I told my bedroom mirror.
I pictured how the letter delivery might go. I would place it on… no, pass it to … no, poke it between the headrests, yes … apologise for startling her … and for the paper cuts to her eyeball… and stalking her … and eavesdropping on a private, yet pervy, conversation … I would accept the restraining order with good humour … the punch in the face seemed a tad unnecessary, and the forcible Bourbon insertion made my eyes water.
I chucked the letter in the bin. A hairy wax strip caught it and swung round to introduce it to some toenail clippings. I shuddered, not at the social gathering in my bin, but at the thought of brown biscuit crumbs.
What a failure! Dribbly might have dissolved completely by now, and my ‘help’ lay crumpled in the bin, where no one in their right mind would delve, certainly not me.
No! I couldn’t give up this easily. I needed to do this. I’d started, and like an over-baked poo, I couldn’t stop now. Even if Dribbly, who was probably just a puddle of salty snot by now anyway, had got away, maybe I could help others? Maybe it was fate? Maybe Dribbly and I were destined to almost meet? Maybe fate had a hand in my Nan’s pants situation, if you’ll pardon the grossness of that image, or possibly just an unnatural obsession with Bourbons? Well, whatever, fate needed a plan.
The Plan - Write a book detailing my funny-tragic and sad-tragic life and how I learned to cope with it, give it a thigh-slappingly witty title and an eye-wateringly colourful jacket, so it can’t be ignored, sneak it into the library, so anyone in the ‘Self Help’ section would see it, read it and feel better. Oh … I’d need extra copies for the ‘Idiots Guide To Being An Idiot’ section, the ‘Prat Survival’ section and of course, unfortunately, the ‘Coping With Grief’ section.
My stomach dipped at the last section, but that’s OK, the thought of helping someone cheered me up. The face in the mirror smiled back at me – mainly ‘cos she knew I would have to do all the work, she’d just watch, as usual, lazy cow.
*****
I was christened Molly Ringlord, but I answer to anything really. ‘Ringlord’ is a ‘kick-me sticker’ of a name. Mum once said ‘it could be worse, you could’ve been called Englebert Humperdink’ (a mouldy old singer, apparently). Englebert Humperdink Ringlord? I still have the number for Childline in my bedside cabinet.
Loads of names are weird though. And words. I mean, I love words, but they are stupid. If you say them over and over again, they go all mental and meaningless, like celebrities. Globule. Buttocks. Pamphlet. Awning. Effervescence. Go ahead, pick one, try it … ‘globule, globule, globule, globule, globule, globule, globule’ … See? You might also see people around you staring, laughing or pointing.
But ‘Ringlord’, coupled with a distinct lack of height and hair like a badger’s nest, does lend itself to hobbit comparisons. Just to be clear, I don’t come from middle earth and my surname is not Baggins, it’s Ringlord, like it or lump it. Lump it, obviously.
Does your brain get on your nerves? Mine wanders off alone and comes back with random questions. It’s scary how much I don’t know … who invented laughing? … what’s the point of Wednesdays? … why do we need toenails?
Sorry, back to the facts ... Molly Ringlord … nearly fifteen … a hundred and forty eight and a half centimetres short … I am, in the style of a weatherman, ‘fair to middling’ (I’ll never be drop dead gorgeous, but I don’t scare small children in the street, which is encouraging) ‘with a couple of large fronts moving in’ (uncontrollable boobs), ‘and freak thunderstorms’ (my life in general)… and I love laughing.
Laughter, whoever invented it, is priceless. It stops me going bonkers, just keeps me going, a bit like bran flakes. Life without it would be grim, as mind-numbingly boring as a never-ending history lesson with Mr Finlay.
Laughing at myself is easy - I just join in with everyone else, from one disaster to the next. I was born embarrassing. I attract stupid. Aunty Trudy calls it my aura. My best mate Jessica says I’m a victim of my own sense of humour, I think she meant to say prat. She’s very polite.
Whinging about my life is not so easy. My Nan, full of crap sayings, won’t let me moan about anything, she always says ‘No one ever hurt their eyes by looking on the bright side’. I looked on the bright side of putting her in a rest home - true, my eyes were fine, but she nearly broke two of my ribs.
But, getting to the point, you know those days that really suck - eyebrow loss; acne rash; bra on backwards; skirt-tucked-in-your-pants type days – they’re survivable. Failed exams, friends ignoring you, parent problems – don’t give up. I’ll show you how I do it. So, even though you may not be Dribbly off the bus (if you are, I’d love a Bourbon update), I hope my story might help with whatever bothers you.
On a safety note (please read this in the style of cinema voice-over man) - this book contains no strobe lighting effects (don’t flick the pages in front of a lamp); has been prepared in a fairly nut-free environment (except where ‘nut’ is referring to idiot); and (as long as you don’t ram it down someone’s throat) is not a choking hazard.
This book is best served at room temperature with chocolates, fizzy drink and if you’re a big blouse like me, a box of tissues.
Welcome to my world.
* * * * *
Chapter 1
School, as it is, should be banned, and I will continue mooding off about it until the following cruelty factors are illegalised -
1. Being made to get up at stupid o’clock every morning.
2. Being forced to wear a manky uniform, catch a stinky bus and trudge through the ‘gates of hell’ every day.
I’m sure when Lucifer was designing his newest fiery furnace home, he made a call to his devil architect and said, “I’m thinking ‘foul and putrid’ for the front door, so take your inspiration from Blackborough School gates, look at the misery they bestow on all who enter.” - Obviously there would have been some evil laughing to accompany this.
- Having to sniff school stench – pine disinfectant, farts, fusty books, sweaty socks, failed science experiments and burnt cooking.
- Having to conquer mountains of homework, from teachers who have better things to do with their lives than spout the same old rubbish year in, year out to ‘disrespectful lazy children’, who definitely have much better things to do with their lives than listen to it.
- Having to grow a hunchback. My book bag weighs more than I do. Hunchbacks are not sexy.
When I’m twenty and too old and deformed to be attractive, I‘ll probably keep rats and go insane. I’ll be known as the ‘mad bent-over dwarf who lives on rat droppings’. Big kids will point, laugh and throw things at me. Little ones will cry and run away. I might chant ‘beware the books’ for added effect.
And lastly, 6. Having to cope with friendship issues with no manual, guarantee or warranty.
New girls are especially tricky.
The third week in September, Alicia Thompson happened. She appeared half way through registration (the fanfare may have just been in my head) wearing a skin-tight ‘designer’ uniform, more make-up than the counter at Boots, and blonde hair ‘coiffed’ to within an inch of its life. It was like Lady Supermodelrichcelebrityprettystick coming to visit the poor, ugly, deformed children from the bogs. I felt like a potato. I looked around, all the girls were stunned vegetables (Lucy Drew looked like a carrot, but that was due to a mix up with self tan spray), and judging by the monosyllabic grunts and general drooling, the boys were quite impressed by her too.
Pretty soon after that, three of my mates, Leanne, Katie and Heather decided that they were going to be her bestest-estest ever friends, and morphed into Alicia clones. This was a relatively painless transformation for Leanne and Katie, as they were already fairly pretty sticks, they just gave up sleeping to pluck, polish and paint themselves every morning. Heather, bless her, struggled to get up to the ‘plain’ level. Don’t get me wrong, a lovely girl - friendly, kind and very clever, but in the looks department, her acne, thick glasses and weight problem were her good points. She tried ever so hard. But I think watching ‘60 Minute Makeover’ was a mistake. She proudly wore her foundationed and powdered face, with chin tidemark, every morning. By every afternoon, it took on the appearance of gloss pink paint, thanks to acne-powered grease making a bid for freedom. But despite these renovation failures, Heather was granted a place in Alicia’s gang.
I first suspected Alicia was a witch when she called Heather ‘my pretty’. I think she was after her warts.
Jessica and I scummed in as ‘part-time’ members, mainly because we didn’t suck-up, and we had a spine each. Alicia controlled the mood of the gang, like Head Witch of a coven, one day we were in; next we were out – a bit like the Hokey Cokey. She was about as genuine as her fake fat lips.
It was an ‘in’ day (left leg) for me and the Hokey Cokey Coven, when we were getting changed for PE one Thursday. Unfortunately, my Mum, who would lose a memory contest with a goldfish, had packed my PE bag with my annoying pain-in-the-butt brother Timothy’s PE kit. I spoke to Miss Taylor, politely explaining the impossibility of doing gym in what amounted to a set of boy’s ‘Power Rangers’ underwear. Apparently, there are spare kits for just such a predicament. I’m sure these spare kits had come close to being washed, after being used as floor mops, but I think it’s fair to say most tramps would have been insulted if you had offered them, for their dog to sleep on. I was just pointing out the mould growing in the shorts, when Alicia appeared from nowhere.
“Can I help?” she said with a sickly sweet smile on her fake fatties.
“Not unless you’ve got some paraffin and a match,” I ventured.
“Er … do you have any spare PE clothes that you could lend to Molly?” Miss Taylor chirped in her usual happy, nothing-can-go-wrong-if-I-smile style.
“Well, they aren’t my best ones, but I always pack a spare set, and what are friends for?” replied Alicia.
And with a “Well that’s settled then, off you go and get ready for PE,” from Miss Taylor, I was unwittingly on my way to ‘hotel humiliation with no lock on the toilet door.’
Do you ever have that dream where you’re desperate for a poo, and all the toilets are filthy or broken and no doors lock, and just when you decide to go, or are about to wipe, all your mates hang over the wall and start talking to you? That’s not the only one I get. Sometimes I’m sitting an exam I haven’t studied for, or I’m going on stage in a show I’ve never heard of but everyone expects me to know my lines, or someone is trying to get into my house and I can’t lock the doors properly. And then there’s the one where I dream I’m in public totally naked.
Going to sleep is something of a trauma, so, I borrowed Aunty Trudy’s book of dreams. (Not the Argos catalogue.) Apparently they’re ‘anxiety dreams’, and I’m a ‘creative person who puts other people’s needs first and doubt my own abilities.’ As if one of my Am Dram mates will discover my performing crapness. Show time does bring on Poo dreams, so I guess it’s right. Are everyone’s dreams so freaky?
I thanked Alicia for the PE kit offer. I should’ve guessed there was something wrong by the way she tilted her head to one side, smiled and slow blinked, like cows do.
Now, although most of my body is on a ‘no-grow’ campaign, certain parts didn’t get the letter - one of which is my violent hair. It’s on the wrong side of appalling, with pieces of combs and countless hairdressers’ souls lurking in its deeper recesses. Other non-recipients are my boobs – stick these puppies on any normal girl and she’d be ‘busty’ or ‘well endowed’, but me … I’m ‘the melon smuggling midget’. If someone shouted down my cleavage, it would take two minutes for the echo to come back. My bras are breathtaking - industrial rubber and reinforced girders. No lacy one-hookers for me, just OAP elastic and security locks.
Regulation PE kit is white t-shirt and navy shorts. My gargantuan t-shirt helps cover up the embarrassment that is running, although resembling two pigs fighting under a blanket, and clever use of arm movements ensures no bowling boobs disasters.
Alicia’s kind offer of a spare PE kit was perched on my bag when I got back to the changing room. Everyone else was changed and waiting outside for the cross-country run that was our delight that day. Only Alicia and I were left to change. Well, I say change, Alicia was fixing her lipstick while I debated which boob to cover with the spaghetti strapped, blindingly white, skinny sun top she had so generously lent me.
It was less of a top, more of an appliqué decoration for my bra - a bra that now barged into view larger, louder and uglier than an oil tanker. Gruesome, battleship grey bulged out everywhere. Oh joy, not only freak underwear ‘show and tell’, but also I had to perform ‘Pigs under a Blanket’ without the blanket. Like jelly juggling on a high wire with no safety net, this wasn’t going to end well.
Sniggers grew to snorts as I appeared like a grubby Netherlands flag (I think) at the gym door - beetroot red face, white-ish middle, and blue bottoms. Jessica was the only one not laughing her shorts off. Just the corner of her lip bled, where her teeth clamped down.
Alicia, Katie and Leanne led the way on the cross-country run, hair flowing in the wind, like a shampoo ad slow-mo. The only thing flowing in the wind on me was a long string of fuzz from my bra – even it was trying to escape the embarrassment.
“They’ve disappeared already.” I was relieved and impressed. “They’ve never been that fast before.”
“Broomsticks probably,” Jess wheezed.
“Yeah. By the way, how’s your lip? Stopped bleeding yet?” I hadn’t quite forgiven her.
“Not sure. Is that blood or dribble running down my neck?”
“Can’t see.” It was dribble, but I decided to let her panic a bit – I was so clever, getting my own back in such a subtle way.
She touched the wet line of drool, held her hand up in front of her face for inspection, lost her concentration, lost her balance, danced like a baboon and head butted me.
“Ow! Focus, Jess, focus.” I made a mental note to be less subtle next time.
Jess and I, and my virtually uncovered pig boobs, plodded on. We were, as usual, at the back of the pack. This was vital to minimise embarrassment. Not only mine. Jess, true to her baboon impression, is the least co-ordinated person alive. Anyone less co-ordinated simply couldn’t survive – ‘natural selection’. (I hope that’s in our biology exam.) She has always found running only slightly easier than dancing, and her dancing is only slightly better than her singing, and her singing is only slightly less offensive to others than my splendid ‘huge bra/tiny t-shirt’ combination. We belonged together.
My bra fuzz was getting worse, it refused to stay tucked in, and its tickling was driving me crazy. I couldn’t change my strategic arm position, or walking would be the only option. I didn’t want to spend a second longer than necessary in public, risking prosecution for indecent exposure, so I tried to pull it off.
Have you ever tried to sever the ‘main artery’ of an alien life form? A nuclear explosion wouldn’t have shifted my fuzzy bra swinger. If the wind had got up it might have strangled me in a mercy killing.
Sawing it off was the only option. If only I could find something sharp, but all the useful smashed beer bottles were in hiding. I probed the undergrowth very gingerly. (Why are ginger people such Jessies?)(Why is Jessie so nervous? Maybe she’s secretly ginger?) Nothing. A resigned ‘typical’ flipped off my tongue, but then I spotted a broken park bench.
“Aha! Just the thing!” I declared.
So Jess sat down to regroup while I manoeuvred myself, and the bra from hell, into such a position that would allow me to wear-away the offending fuzz. I figured the worst that could happen would be splinters, friction burns or possible spontaneous combustion of man-made fibres, followed by third degree burns - but still worth the risk.
No such luck. I pulled, I pushed, I wiggled and I shimmied. I tried to intimidate it by shouting at it, but it didn’t help, just added to my deranged hostage look. The fuzz didn’t break. It wasn’t wearing away. It wasn’t getting weaker at all. It was gaining strength. And then, just as it was about to laugh scornfully at me, it got stuck. Totally. On the bench.
“It won’t budge!” I shouted at Jess through my legs.
“What are you going to do?”
I considered my options. I could remove myself from the offending bra and leave it there for a family of hedgehogs to colonize, whilst flashing back to school one nipple at a time. Or remaining caught, for the rest of my days, bent over a broken park bench in the most hideous butt-in-the-air position, like a monument to stupidity or handy bike rack.
“I’m thinking.”
“Let me have a go.”
“Oh, I wish I’d gone to the toilet before we left.”
“Think dry thoughts.” Jess pulled again, slipped and elbowed me in the bladder. “Oops, sorry.”
Suddenly, holding my breath was more important than talking.
Jess looked worried, upside down through my legs. “Your face is really red,” she helpfully pointed out.
“Oh, is it?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t suppose you have any powder on you, that I could borrow, do you?”
“No, sorry.” Sarcasm is wasted on Jess.
Formulating a plan takes longer if your friend wastes time guessing whether your eyes or your bladder will burst first. But before anything started trickling, Jess focussed, and synchronized her bodily attachments into something resembling a run. Off she wobbled to the nearest shop where she explained the rather unlikely situation to a rather disbelieving shopkeeper who, ignoring his better judgement, lent her a pair of scissors, on the understanding that I never set foot in his ‘respectable establishment’.
“God, look at the time, we’re going to be murdered.” I shouted across the road. Jess was happily chatting to her new friend. I hadn’t realised handing scissors back was such a social affair. I saw a flash of light as matey took my photo for his ‘Do Not Serve These People’ list. I don’t think I looked my best.
“He said your legs looked funny.” Jess turned back to wave at the shopkeeper, “It’s OK, they are,” she shouted.
“I was trying not to wee on Alicia’s shorts. I didn’t spot the stinging nettles.” My legs looked like raspberries.
“He was worried.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, he thought his camera was playing up.”
“Oh.”
“God! We’d better hurry up, look at the time. We’re going to be murdered.” We started to run. It was murder. We walked.
We didn’t get murdered, but ‘surprise surprise’ the coven sashayed in behind us.! We certainly hadn’t passed them. And none of them was sweaty, out of breath or sporting a single cheek a shade darker than Alicia’s regulation ‘Rimmel pink’. Now, I may be a Doubting Thomas, but I’d bet chocolate rations that they raced off at top speed to get out of sight, then hid up the whole time and simply joined back in at the end. Witches. I wish I’d thought of that.
Had I not been so desperate to get out of my splendid jogging attire and hide my raspberries, I might have dropped a few well-timed comments to let them know I knew. But I had just spotted Tom Keenan coming in late, and although he was bound to hear all about it, I didn’t want a visual aid burned into his memory. I headed straight into the changing rooms to salvage what little fuzzy shreds of dignity I had left.
Tom Keenan. You can’t tell, but I’m quivering as I say his name.