Geek Girl (Geek Girl, #1)(61)

“It depends on whether they see you or not. Although, I have to say it gets a bit tricky measuring the ten paces. It usually requires running up to them and then pacing away again. Which isn’t as subtle as you might think.”

I decide to ignore this. “Just walk next to me, Toby. Like a non-stalker.”

“Golly.” Toby seems overwhelmed. “This is a break with tradition, I have to say. If you change your mind, Harriet, just say the word and I’ll duck behind a tree and pretend to be reading a newspaper or checking for woodworm, OK?”

“OK.” I smile at him. Why have I always been so mean to Toby? He just wanted another polar bear to play with.

“Would you mind terribly if I attempted to hold your hand?” he adds, skipping next to me. “For just a short time? On this beautiful winter day?”

All right, I’m not feeling that sorry for him.

“Yes,” I snap, stuffing mine in my pocket. “I would mind terribly, Toby.”

Toby starts rummaging in his backpack. “I shall make a note of that,” he tells me earnestly. He scribbles something in his notebook. “Perhaps in six months?”

I think of Nick’s hand, the hand I’ll never hold again. My stomach gives a sad little flip and I shake my head.

“Not a problem,” Toby says cheerfully, making another note and putting his book away. “Seven months it is.”



Nat’s house seems even bigger now, although I’m pretty sure it’s the same size. It’s just my guilt making it loom like something out of a Tim Burton film.

“Stand back,” I tell Toby quietly as we approach her front door. “Nat isn’t happy with me. And, much like an angry Camponotus saundersi…”

“Commonly known as the Malaysian ant,” Toby interjects.

“There’s a good chance that when we get close, her head is going to literally explode.”

Toby obediently stands a few metres back and the door opens. Nat’s mum blinks at us a few times. She’s now entirely pink: pink dressing gown, pink towel round her head, pink face mask. She even has a pink eye mask strapped to her head, like inflatable glasses.

“Harriet!” she says, delighted. “Are you here with gifts again? I finished the chocolates and arranged what I could salvage of the pink roses strewn around the driveway. Although the bits with the teeth marks obviously had to go in the bin.”

Sugar cookies. I knew Nat preferred lilies.

“Is Nat here, please?”

“Still sulking somewhere, I believe, yes.” Nat’s mum glances behind me and waves. “And this must be your little stalker, Toby. I remember you from the school fête a few years ago. You were shuffling around the raffle on your belly with binoculars.”

Toby steps forward, beaming. “That’s me,” he says, puffing out his chest proudly. “Although my Harriet-following skills have improved immeasurably since then. It’s very nice to meet you properly, Mrs Nat’s mum.”

“It is indeed.” She smiles at him, and then smiles at me, and then smiles at Toby again. And then – and I can’t actually believe this – she winks at me. She’d better not be winking for the reason I think she’s winking.

Ugh.

“Ahem.” Nat’s mum clears her throat and then gets a small hand-held microphone out of her pocket. “Excuse me,” she explains to us, “but shouting up the stairs is causing unnecessary wrinkling in my forehead. So I’ve invested in an alternative.” And then she clicks the little red button on the side. “Natalie?” she says into the microphone, and somewhere in the distance her voice starts bouncing around the stairs. “You have a couple of visitors.”

Silence.

Nat’s mum rolls her eyes and fiddles with the volume control. A loud screeching fills the house and she puts her hand over the top. “It’s linked up to a speaker outside her bedroom,” she whispers conspiratorially. “I put one under her bed too, although she hasn’t found that one yet. Natalie? Natalie?” She listens for a few seconds, sighs and holds the microphone up again. “Don’t make me turn it up to ten, young lady.”

“All right, all right,” I hear Nat shout, storming down the stairs.

Nat’s mum turns the microphone off, winks at Toby and me, retreats into the living room and shuts the door. Leaving us to face Nat.

And – from the look on her face – I believe she’s about to give the head-exploding Malaysian ants a run for their money.





ell?” Nat says after a few seconds. “I’m surprised you’re here again, Harriet. I thought you’d be busy auditioning for A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

I blink a few times in surprise. “No. I’m not.”

“You should be. I heard they’re looking for an ass.”

Oh.

Now why can’t I think of quips like that when I need them? Does she sit and make them up beforehand or do they just pop out like that, fully formed? If she ever talks to me in a non-violent way again, I must remember to ask her.

Toby holds his head up very high and looks Nat dead in the eye. “Natalie Grey,” he says in a stern voice. “Harriet has come here in great and glorious dignity – and, if I may say so, quite mesmerising beauty – to apologise to you. The very least you can do is stand there and listen politely. Otherwise you’re nothing but a… a… a…” I can see him looking around desperately. His eyes fall on the ground next to the front door. “A flowerpot head,” he finishes triumphantly. “Full of lavender.”