Free Adorkable by Sarra Manning Page A

Jeane?’
    We’d arrived at the school gates now and Barney had fallen into step alongside me, so I could elbow him in the ribs. ‘That’s not a nickname, it’s a really bad pun and it doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, does it?’
    Barney wanted to smile – his lips were stretching and contracting like he had some weird facial tic. ‘Why is it impossibleto stay mad at you?’ He shrugged. ‘Fine, we’re friends, but you’re on probation and don’t ever blog about me again.’
    ‘And I
will
be nice to Scarlett,’ I vowed magnanimously. ‘I won’t make any snide remarks or say anything to her that in any way could result in snivels, let alone tears. Honestly, I want you two to be happy. People should be happy.’
    Barney tagged along with me to the bike sheds and stayed while I chained Mary up. ‘We’re not together, you know,’ he said morosely, hands shoved into the pockets of his parka. ‘She’s scared to break up with Michael.’
    I snorted. ‘You’d think she’d be glad to be shot of that overbearing idiot.’
    Barney nodded vigorously. ‘Yeah, you would, but Scar doesn’t like confrontations or hurting people’s feelings and she’s terrified of having the wrath of every other girl in the school rain down upon her. You can’t dump Michael Lee without serious repercussions.’
    I turned my head so Barney couldn’t see that I was rolling my eyes so hard that I was sure one of my retinas had just detached itself. I tried to make sympathetic noises but Barney looked at me sceptically like he wasn’t buying it for a second.
    ‘Oh, Jeane, you are
so
full of shit,’ he said, and he smiled at me properly for the first time in days. ‘It’s what I like most about you.’
    It wasn’t until lunchtime that I was able to hunt Scarlett down. Her and her boring friends always headed for the high street to visit the salad bar in Sainsbury’s so I trailed behind them, pausing only to buy spicy Nik Naks and Haribo, then followed them back to school as I waited for an opportunity toget Scarlett on her own. The four of them didn’t appear to function singularly.
    Luckily Scarlett had a hair emergency and a free period so she was forced to leave school on her own and, as I’d been banished from my A-level Art class for a week after telling Mrs Spiers that I’d rather poke my eyes out with a paintbrush than have to draw a landscape, seascape or anything else pertaining to nature, I seized the opportunity.
    I let her buy her hair gloop first, because I’m nice like that, then fell into step beside her as she dawdled along the road. As she glanced to the side, she caught sight of me. Her eyes widened in terror and her face drained of all colour. It was the perfect time to launch into my apology.
    ‘So, I’m sorry, right. I’m sorry about what happened in English, though I didn’t mean that
you
were a retard. I was talking about the whole class but I shouldn’t have used that word in the first place and I shouldn’t have had a go at you about our set texts as a sneaky way of having a go at you about this whole business with Barney, OK?’
    It wasn’t an elegant apology but it came from the heart and that had to count for something. Scarlett didn’t seem to think so. She tried to duck past me, but I swiftly sidestepped so I was facing her full-on. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone look so terrified, not even when my friend Pam Slamwich (so obviously
not
her real name) realised she was the only member of her roller derby team who wasn’t in the penalty box and she was just about to get thrown off the track by four blockers.
    ‘Please leave me alone,’ Scarlett said in a pained whisper.
    ‘I can’t do that until you at least acknowledge my apology. Idon’t expect you to forgive me, but I’ve said I’m sorry and I meant it.’
    Scarlett shook her head. ‘Whatever,’ she managed to say, but it wasn’t in a jaunty, fuck-you kind of way. More like it was the bravest thing to ever come