Free Playlist for a Broken Heart by Cathy Hopkins Page A

your dad and I rethink
the plan.’
    I gave her a hug. She was putting on her cheery Mum face just as I was putting on my cheery Paige one. I sometimes wondered if the whole world wasn’t going around hiding behind masks.
    As we put dishes away, out of the window I noticed that someone had gone into next-door’s garden. It was Niall. On seeing him, I felt a pang of regret that our last encounter had gone so
badly. I hated there to be bad feeling with anyone, even if he was a love rat. Despite my early vow to avoid him, I decided to go and try to make amends, so when Mum made a cup of coffee and went
through to the living room, I took a deep breath, opened the back door and went out.
    There was a fence with lattice on the top to the right of the garden but I could see him clearly through it. I went over and called, ‘Hi.’
    He almost jumped out of his skin, which made me laugh.
    ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I didn’t mean to startle you.’
    ‘What are you doing? Lurking in the bushes?’
    ‘No. Not lurking. I . . . I saw you and wanted to apologise for the other day. I guess I wasn’t very friendly.’
    A glimmer of a smile crossed Niall’s face. ‘No. I guess not. But maybe I’m like Marmite. You either love me or hate me.’
    ‘I like Marmite,’ I said.
    Niall grinned. ‘Me too, so at least we have something in common.’
    I felt myself blush and cursed in case he’d noticed. I didn’t want him to think that meant that I liked him.
    ‘At least sometimes I do . . . I . . . no, I’m probably more in the middle when it comes to Marmite, I don’t love it or hate it. I’m . . . indifferent.’ I realised
that I was rambling.
Shut up
, I told myself when I noticed the amused look in Niall’s eye.
He’ll think you’re an idiot
.
    ‘So, you’re going to Queensmead?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes. How do you know?’
    ‘Seen you leave the house with Tasmin.’
    ‘Oh, been watching me out the window have you?’ I asked, echoing what he had asked me when I met him in town, then I worried that I might have sounded hostile again.
    ‘Not watching, but I’ve seen you a few times. Can’t help but notice people on the street, can you?’
    ‘Exactly,’ I said and even I could tell I sounded prissy.
    Niall’s mobile rang and he pulled it out of his pocket. ‘Got to take this,’ he said.
    ‘Probably one of your girlfriends,’ I blurted before I could stop myself.
    Niall shook his head as if he couldn’t believe what I’d said. He turned away to take his call and I darted back into the house.
    Stupid, stupid
, I told myself as I went upstairs. I am so hopeless at talking to boys. Why can’t I be cool like Clover or confident like Tasmin? Instead I come across as someone
with a permanent case of PMT. It’s like there’s a part of me that’s been held back and is fighting to get out, but when she does get out, what she says is wrong, wrong, wrong.

Chapter Ten
    One evening in my fourth week at Queensmead, I got back to Aunt Karen’s and went up to Tasmin’s room as usual. Tasmin had gone into town to watch a new romcom so I
had the bedroom to myself.
    I’d decided I was going to take the series of portraits I’d been working on in London a stage further and develop the faces into masks. I did some research online about different
masks and got completely immersed for an hour or so as images from around the world filled the screen. I found ancient masks as old as nine thousand years, masks from different countries, some
grotesque, some beautiful. I loved the ones from Venice that I’d seen when I was there for the carnival with Mum and Dad a few years ago. I made some sketches and was about to Skype Allegra
when I got a text from her saying that she was going to see the same movie as Tasmin and Clover and that she’d call later.
    I lay back on the bed and stared at the ceiling for a while but all the angst I was feeling inside immediately came to the fore. Why has this all happened to us? When will we get