Free Live and Fabulous! by Grace Dent Page B

wonderful,” says Claude. “I’m just, er, thinking ... look, Fleur, get down, I think we need to talk.”
    â€œBut I’m bouncing!” says Fleur, bouncing.
    â€œWe’ve still got a glitch to sort out,” Claude says.
    â€œPah! Spoilsport,” chuckles Fleur, climbing down. “This is sooooo excellent, though, isn’t it?!”
    â€œYep!” I say. “Majorly excellent!”
    You can tell that Claude would like to enjoy this moment, but I also know that two minutes’ frivolity is all her brain allows before getting logical.
    â€œOkay, so this is all totally fantastic,” says Claude. I can hear the “but” coming here. “But we’ve still got a teensy-weensy problem that needs to be ironed out.”
    â€œNoooo ... Our problems are over! We have tickets!” says Fleur, grinning from ear to ear.
    â€œWell, nearly over,” says Claude. “Look, I’m not trying to wee on the LBD bonfire here by being negative, but let’s recap. None of our parents knows about these freebie tickets yet, do they?”
    â€œNah. Only us,” I say.
    â€œSo, despite the fact that Spike Saunders has officially invited us to a festival, we still need to get permission to go, don’t we?”
    â€œYeah. I suppose so,” I say.
    I’ve been quietly blocking this from my mind for the past few hours. You see, the free ticket/Spike Saunders hoopla was so fabulous, I suppose I was also hoping that magic dust might make the parents vanish.
    â€œOh, permission, permission!” scoffs Fleur, wrinkling her tiny freckled nose. “Look, let’s ask the mumbly-grumblies, and if they all say no again, well, let’s just go anyway! Come on! We only live once, don’t we? Spike would be offended if we didn’t go!”
    Claude rolls her eyes. Sometimes it’s almost like Fleur has just met Claude that very second.
    â€œYes, Fleur,” says Claude, “because leaving Astlebury Festival under police escort because our school pictures have been plastered all over Sky News as missing children would be totally noncringeworthy, wouldn’t it?”
    Fleur stops in her tracks and goes quite, quite pale. That is exactly the sort of humiliating stunt that Paddy Swan would pull. No question about it.
    â€œOh, bum cracks to them all!” says Fleur. “Well, I’m not letting anything get in the way of this one. We’ll have to get the go-ahead. Somehow. Won’t we, girls?”
    â€œYeah. Somehow,” I say rather weakly.
    Claude says nothing. But then we all know that Gloria Cassiera is the candidate most likely to balls this up with a divine decline.
    â€œLook, if you two can go and I can’t, you’ll just have to go without me,” says Claude genuinely. “I’ll be okay. I’ll just watch the highlights on MTV and ...”
    â€œNo way, Claudette!” says Fleur. “We all go together or not at all. That’s the rule, isn’t it?”
    â€œYep, together or not at all,” I repeat. “That was the point of Astlebury, wasn’t it? An LBD adventure?” I grab Claudette’s tiny brown hand and squeeze it. “We’re not leaving you, C. That’s the law.”
    â€œCheers, birds,” says Claudette softly. A tiny little tear appears behind her spectacles, which she quickly bats away. “It’s always me, isn’t it?”
    â€œNah, Claude, we’re all in the same boat here,” corrects Fleur. “We’ve all got parents who think serial killers lurk behind every road corner. Paranoid androids, the lot of ’em.”
    This is all heavily ironic. I cast my mind back to that time we met Spike, standing in the marquee at Blackwell Live with his perfect teeth and beautiful blue eyes. There we were, trying so hard to act cool and mature that Spike must have totally forgotten that underneath the lip gloss and the itsy-bitsy thong