Anyone Else But You

Chapter13 - A Twist in the Tale

Bright Eyes – First Day of My Life

“But why do I have to go?” Maddie slumped down into the seat next to her mother at the dining table. She’d only been awake 30 minutes and she was already in a foul mood. Her mum was forcing her to go to her sister’s gymnastic competition and she really didn’t want to go.

“Thanks!” Kate muttered sarcastically, she shook her head as she tucked into a grapefruit.

“No offense sis, it’s just gymnastics isn’t really my thing. Besides I already had plans for today, I’ve got work to do.” She moaned in a whiny voice as she looked at her mother with wide puppy dog eyes.

“No, no arguments. You are going along to support your sister or have you forgotten your little disagreement at school last week. And the fact that you let your sister go all the way to Watford without knowing.” Maddie’s mum raised her eyebrows at her daughter before returning to her cup of tea and lifestyle magazine. Maddie growled and picked up her coffee mug trying to figure out some way of escaping the gymnastics tournament.

Her attempts were futile and an hour later she sat in the back seat of the car coming to terms with the fact she was going to have to spend the next five hours watching people try not to fall off a beam of wood. Kate was sat in the front seat listening to her iPod as their mother drove the two of them across London towards the competition venue. Another reason Maddie was annoyed, was that her dad had managed to escape the torture and was at home doing nothing.

Maddie pulled her copy of Much Ado About Nothing out of her bag, she’d managed to persuade her mum to let her bring a book and a notepad so that she could at least do some work. Seeing as Jasper wasn’t with her she thought she could start the individual essay that they both had to do. She’d already started making annotations in the margins of the play but she didn’t know how to start the assignment, introductions were always the hardest part for her to write.

After an hour they managed to escape the Saturday morning traffic and parked outside the arena where Kate was competing. Maddie grabbed her shoulder bag and reluctantly got out of the car, Kate got out of the front seat and began stretching while their mum got her kit bag out of the boot. Maddie was surprised at the sheer size of the venue, it was some sort of exhibition centre and the amount of people who were arriving.

She glanced round to see girls and boys about her sisters age walking through the carpark and towards the big building wearing tracksuits and carrying sports bags. She hadn’t been to see her sister compete since she was about ten and Kate was seven or eight. When they’d picked up all the bags – twice as many as everybody had – they made their way inside. There were even more people milling around inside, waiting to go to their seats or for whoever they came with to register.

Maddie and her mum waited by the big glass façade that looked out onto the carpark as Kate joined the queue of gymnasts. From the back they all looked the same, they all had their hair up in a ponytail, they all wore tracksuits and they were all slight and small but strong. After ten minutes her sister walked back over to them.

“Lucy’s already here so I’m gonna go and find her and get ready. I’ll see you later.” She picked her sports bag up off the floor, leaving the other huge bag there.