"Shuffle over and say that to me face."

"I can't even see your face."

Ruby said, "Well anyway, tell me what happened to you."

"Well, Jo got Phil, Vaisey got Jack, and I got this boy called Ben."

"Ben, what's he like when he's at home?"

"Well, he's quite tall and floppy."

Ruby said, "Good good. Tall is good...floppy, well floppy can be alright, s'long as you don't mean he's a noddy niddy noddy."

"What?"

"You know, a bit simple in the noddle department."

Just then a male voice shouted, "Oy you two, what the bloody hell are you doing?"

It was Mr Barraclough. "I said this would happen, Ruby, if you mixed with the artists. The next thing you know I'll see you in the streets in Skipley with Matilda playing the piano whilst you pretend to stand very, very still."

Eventually he puffed off and we went back to sitting on the branch.

It was a lovely night with stuff tweeting, sheep scampering, cows frolicking. And then it got to be an even lovelier night because Alex turned up in his car. He got out and saw us up the hill on our branch and waved...and then started walking towards us.

I said to Ruby, "Is my hair alright?"

Ruby said, "Yes, a lot of folk like that matted look."

I tried to smooth it down casually, but my heart was thumping as Alex approached.

He is sooo good looking, and he's smiling.

I hadn't seen him for ages.

Ruby said, "Shut your mouth, a bee might fly in it, and make a little bee house in there."

I tried to arrange my legs so that they looked less gangly.

Alex came and stood in front of us and crossed his arms.

"What are you two up to?"

Ruby said, "Lullah was telling me that last night she-"

I interrupted really quickly, "I...um...I was just going to tell Rube that I wanted to wrap the whole of Dother Hall in brown paper, as an, um, Art Statement."

They were both looking at me, not saying anything. So I burbled on.

"But there were only two pieces left, so I covered my book instead."

Alex said, "I can tell you're loving it, dahling, loving it at Dither Hall."

I said, "Well, yes if you like being, you know...useless."

Why was I telling him all this?

I just felt hypnotised when he looked in my eyes.

I mustn't start quacking or anything.

Alex looked at me again. Right in the eyes.

"Your eyes are the most amazing colour, aren't they?"

Ruby said, "Oh no, now you've done it."

Alex suddenly pushed Ruby off the branch and she disappeared into the field. It really made me laugh, she looked so shocked. Alex grinned and then he did the same to me.

Pushed me off the branch!

As we were lying there in the field we could hear him go whistling off I looked at Ruby and said, "He, he pushed you, and then he pushed me. But didn't he say something about my eyes or something? What was it, I don't quite remember..."

Ruby dusted herself down and pulled her apple catchers up.

She said, "Don't even think about it."

I did think about it, though. A lot.

Looking in the mirror in my squirrel room. He said I had 'amazing' eyes.

Well, he said the colour was amazing.

But that was as good, wasn't it?

I mean, why would you say 'amazing' if you didn't mean it as good?

If you thought someone had really non-amazing eyes, you wouldn't mention it would you?

Out of politeness.

You wouldn't say, "You've got the crappest eyes I've ever seen. Your eyes make me feel physically sick."

But on the other hand, say someone did have really crap eyes, you might distract them by mentioning a good feature to make up for it. Like their ears or something.

Maybe he was distracting me from my knees by mentioning my eyes.

Oh, I don't know.

And second of all he had pushed me off the branch.

Which in anyone's language is not what people do to grown-ups.

So...

And also what about Ben?

Even if I didn't want to go out with him, I wanted him to want to go out with me so that I could say sadly, "I'm afraid my heart is with another. I am wedded to Heathcliff, or Alex, as I know him."

That night as the owls hooted outside, I read about Wuthering Heights in my study notes about the Brontes. It said that Emily and Charlotte and Anne had to pretend to be blokes so that they could get their books published.

They had to display Northern grit.

As I lay there with my squirrels and my budding corkies, I decided something.

I am going to display Northern grit. Like the Bronte sisters. I'm not going to be put off by a bit of, "You're useless."

I bet they wouldn't be.

When Emily went into her publisher and said, "I've written a book about some madman who lives on the moors. There's a lot of moaning and so on, and then the girl dies. I shall call it Wuthering Heights."

And they said, "Go home, love, and tell your sister not to come back with another story about a girl called Jane Eyre, because that will be rubbish as well. Get tha sen a little dog."

I wrote in my notebook: I'm going to laugh in the face of fear, like the Bronte sisters.

CHAPTER 13.

"Just call me Fox. Blaise Fox."

She laughs in the face of fear I dreamt all night that I was out on the moors like Cathy after she died. Trying to find Heathcliff. I was singing a special song: "I'm out on the moors, the wild moors." I'm going to write the lyrics in my notebook.

It took me ages to decide what to wear because you never know when you might bump into, um, someone's brother. We've got our first ballet class today so I need to have leggings and my special ballet shoes.

I am enjoying my special ballet shoes.

Looking at my special ballet shoes in their special ballet shoe box.

And I am enjoying them.

Special ballet shoes.

I put my special ballet shoes on. They feel good.

I feel like doing ballet!

I will improvise a ballet. I will think of being Cathy, flitting about in ballet shoes on the moors, lashed by cruel gales, looking for Alex I mean, Heathcliff.

I sang from my notebook and danced, danced on the moors: I'm out on the moors, the wild moors,

Let's roll about in rockpools.

Oh, it gets lonely without you,

I hate you, I love you.

It's Cathy, trying to get in your Windoooooow ow ow ow...

There wouldn't be a bedside lamp on the moors. But if there was I bet I could find it with my shins.

It was funny not going to meet Vaisey.

Also, to be honest, it meant that I didn't have an excuse to hope that Alex was about. As I began to walk across the bridge and up the lane to Dother Hall, I was thinking, I bet they all had a pillow fight in the dorm last night and lashings and lashings of ginger beer. And as I was feeling a bit left out I saw Ruby skipping off to her mates. Yes, quite literally skipping. She saw me and shouted, "Oy, squeeze you later!!!"

It was like having a mad little sister. Which I've never had before.

And I had nice new friends.

And I had been kissed.