To Be or Not to Be

Chapter 1. EXCITING NEWS!

"MUM!" SHOUTED SALLY MUNKTON, between short breaths as she exploded into her terraced house. She had run all the way home from school without stopping despite the strap of her school shoulder bag sawing into her neck.

Meanwhile, Mrs Munkton hardly flinched at the familiar heavy slam of the front door as she sat in the living room with a freshly poured cup of tea. The living room door might just as well have been open than closed such was the noise of the one-girl-war outside.

Sally ripped off her shoulder bag, wrestled out of her school blazer, all of a blur, while still managing to propel herself ever forwards. "Mum! Mummy!" she shouted, charging along the short hallway on her way to the living room where her mother was relaxing on a large comfortable armchair. The armchair looked as if it had seen far better days. In fact, the whole house looked as if it had seen far better days—and it had.

Mrs Munkton steadied her brimming teacup in preparation for the little whirlwind. She stared at the yellowing white-painted wood of the living room door. Any second now ...

Whoosh! The door flew wide open. A dead fly whipped itself up off the oak mantelpiece jutting out above the large, old gas-fire and an unpaid bill flew off the top of the television set minding its own business in a corner of the room in the determined draught of air. A small flurry of household dust swirled upwards towards the cracked and flaking faded white ceiling. And there, as the specks of dust lost speed and began to descend gracefully like a dirty microscopic snow upon the well-worn, grey Axminster carpet, stood an excited out-of-breath Sally in the dishevelled remnants of her school uniform.

Sally ogled her mother, wide-eyed, as if powered by the National Electricity Grid, gasping for air, throbbing with intent, a bomb waiting to explode. Her long blond hair had all but escaped its ponytail. She tried to express the thoughts in her head. But all she could do was roar another, "Mum!"

"Well, what is it, Sally?" said Mrs Munkton, carefully lifting her chipped white, china cup off a non-matching blue plastic saucer balancing precariously on a rip in the arm of the armchair.

Sally just stared, bursting with energy—like an electrocuted zombie. She moved her head a little to the side and opened her mouth wide as if to speak but somehow nothing came out. She was too excited to say anything! A shaft of June afternoon sunlight sliced through the cracked French windows that gazed out on to the overgrown lawn of the back garden. Sally was strangely illuminated. She looked like an overexcited little angel. She seemed oblivious to the odd remaining specks of dust that couldn't decide whether to rise or fall as they danced lazily this way and that, flickering like so many miniature stars in the shimmering sunlight.

"Come on, my little princess, you can't possibly be lost for words—why, you and your brother can usually talk the ears off an African elephant let alone the hind leg off a donkey." Mrs Munkton eyed Sally thoughtfully, lovingly, and then raised and tilted her cup of steaming tea to her lipstick-smeared lips.

"It's the Queen," gasped Sally finally, struggling to get her breath.

"What do you mean by 'It's the Queen'?" asked Mrs Munkton after another sip of her tea. She was leaving lipstick prints around the rim of the cup.

"She's coming! The Queen's coming!" announced Sally feverishly. Then she added in her usual patter, "You know she is."

"Where is she coming? When is she coming?" Mrs Munkton's questions came calmly between sips of tea.

"She's coming right here, Mum, to our house, and right away!" announced Sally, causing her mother to propel a fine spray of tea from her lips and almost dispossess her teacup.

"Oh, Mum! You'll make the carpet dirtier than ever. Don't spray it, say it! Quick, Mum, we must start tidying! We must, mustn't we? Of course we must. Oh, Mum, I'm so scared. Oh yes, I am. You know I am."