Freaks Out! Read Online Free Page A

and then you’ll be responsible if it comes true.”
    Quick as a flash, Jem said, “I’m not saying everything does! Just some things.”
    In the meantime, we kept our eyes fixed firmlyon Daisy Hooper. I guess I wouldn’t have minded if she’d got clonked on the head, but all that happened was she got whacked by a hockey stick. On the ankle, not the head.
    Jem tried claiming that was just as good. She said you had to know how to interpret these things – they were never straightforward. Clonk on the head didn’t have to mean clonk on the actual head , it could just as easily mean clonk on the top part of something, such as for instance the top part of the foot, which was, of course, the ankle. Well, if you looked at it one way it was. The ankle was on top of the foot. In other words, it was the head of the foot. And Daisy had been clonked on it and was now all bandaged up and hobbling.
    We wouldn’t normally wish ill upon someone, but Daisy Hooper is such a disagreeable person. Really loud and overbearing. And mean. She is so mean! Plus she hates us and we hate her.
    Jem was eager to open up all our bits of paper and check whether clonk on the head had beenmatched to Daisy’s star sign or someone else’s. She said, “I know which sign she is, I asked her, she’s Libra! So please can we just look? Please , Skye? Please? ”
    But Skye said no. She was very firm about it. The end of term was when we were going to look. Not before.
    Jem grumbled to me later that “Skye can be such a bore at times!”
    I had to admit she was being a bit more bossy than usual.
    â€œWhy do we put up with it?” wondered Jem. “It was our game – we invented it. Then she comes barging in and takes over. I think we should tell her.”
    â€œTell her what?”
    â€œThat we’ve had enough! We want all our bits of paper back, and we’ll play the game without her.”
    â€œThing is…” I hesitated.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI wouldn’t want to upset her.”
    â€œBut she’s upsetting us!”
    â€œYes, but she’s been really funny just lately. Like there’s something on her mind.”
    â€œMm.” Jem thought about it. “She has been a bit odd.”
    â€œIt’s no use asking her, you know what she’s like.”
    â€œ Secretive .”
    She is a very controlled sort of person, is Skye. Unlike me and Jem, who tend to splurge, Skye prefers to keep things to herself. She wouldn’t dream of splurging.
    â€œWhat we’ve not got to do,” I said, “we’ve not got to nag, cos that’ll only make things worse.”
    â€œMake her all ratty.”
    â€œWe’ll just have to be patient.” Mum is always urging me to be patient. She says patience is a virtue. I don’t get it, myself, I don’t think it’s natural; I mean you want something to happen, you want it to happen now. But as I said to Jem, sometimes you just have to wait.
    â€œYeah, yeah, yeah!” Jem waved a hand. “Wait till she gets over it.”
    â€œOr till she feels like telling us.”
    â€œWhatever.”
    â€œIn the meantime,” I said, “we can still go on watching, see if anyone gets clonked.”

We watched like hawks all the rest of the week, but nobody got clonked. Nothing, as far as we could see, happened to anybody, though Jem did turn up for school one morning bubbling over with excitement and obviously bursting to tell me something. She made it clear she couldn’t do it while Skye was there, cos she kept pointing at Skye behind her back and pulling faces. If Skye hadn’t peeled off at the school gates to go and talk to one of the teachers, I really think Jem would haveexploded. Her face had gone bright scarlet with the effort of not saying anything.
    â€œGuess what?” she squeaked, before Skye was even properly out of earshot. “Guess what happened?”
    I