Free Time for Jas by Natasha Farrant Page A

difficult if you have to go to school.
    I don’t like seeing the stables look like the way they did today, like something that has ended. I told Mum, who said she didn’t either but also that nothing new can start without something old ending first, that this was also part of the circle of life and that I should just think how much happier the horses are going to be in Devon.
    We were sitting in what used to be the riding ring. I drew a circle in the sand with my finger, and thought about how the chalk artist still hasn’t responded. Then I thought that when Mum talked about the circle of life, we were both thinking about Iris, and how difficult it is sometimes for that circle to keep on turning. I told her about wishing Zoran would stay even though I was glad he was goingto live with Grandma. Her eyes shone a bit, and I knew she was thinking about the time after Iris too, when he first came to live with us and saved us from being crushed.
    ‘Nothing is more important than for all of us to be happy,’ she said, in her fierce I’m-not-crying voice, and pulled me into a hug.
    I do love Mum, especially when she listens.
Tuesday 12 October
    Flora Skyped. She has a cold. This time she was dressed in a thick fleecy dressing gown, a polo-neck jumper, flannel pyjamas, bed socks, two shawls and a woolly hat, and she kept on blowing her nose.
    ‘That is what comes of floating around rivers in your nightie,’ Mum scolded. ‘Even if you were wearing wellies.’
    Flora said that had nothing to do with it. Pretending to be tragic heroines, Flora said, was the best bit about acting school, and why do people make such a big deal about wearing nightclothes outside?
    ‘It’s just like wearing a dress,’ she said. ‘The reason I got ill has nothing to do with drowning. It’s thehouse, Mum. It’s so damp my sheets are actually wet when I go to bed, and there’s no heating.’
    ‘I’m sure they’re not actually wet,’ Mum said. ‘Not dripping .’
    Flora said they were totally dripping and she had to dry them with a hairdryer. ‘I’m practically dying,’ she said. ‘I have to come home right now.’
    Mum said, ‘But you’ve only just left!’
    ‘I am sorry,’ Flora huffed, ‘if the prospect of my imminent return fills you with displeasure.’
    Twig said, ‘Oh my God, she even talks like she’s in a play.’
    Flora changed tack. ‘The thing is,’ she said, ‘I’ve got a job.’
    ‘A job ?’
    ‘A friend wants me to be in his play. It’s Romeo and Juliet . I’m Juliet.’
    Mum said that was wonderful, who was this friend and where was he putting on the play? Flora said his name was Angel, he’s done loads of plays already and this one would start in a pub in North London, but that it would definitely get transferred to a proper theatre.
    ‘Definitely?’ Mum asked.
    ‘Possibly,’ Flora conceded.
    ‘But you’re in Scotland,’ I pointed out.
    Flora said she knew that, and that was why she had decided she was going to leave drama school.
    Mum repeated, ‘Leave? But you’ve only just got there!’
    ‘You don’t understand!’ Flora cried. ‘Everything we do here is useless! We have whole classes just teaching us to breathe. Breathe! Yesterday I had to lie on the floor and learn how to massage my tongue.’
    Mum said she was sure massaging your tongue was very useful.
    ‘I want to do Angel’s play,’ Flora said.
    Mum said, ‘No,’ and closed the laptop.
Saturday 16 October
    Zoran and Gloria drove to Devon today. The stables and the flat are almost empty. We helped them load the furniture and things Gloria wants to keep into the removals lorry she hired, together with all the horsey things that aren’t still needed in London. Earlier in the week, they took all the last things to the dump and charity shops. An auction company took away the things they could sell, like her iron bed-frame and her dad’s vintage motorbike, and the council came to take away the fridge and dishwasherand old mattresses.