Girls Under Pressure by Jacqueline Wilson Read Free Book Online

mum!” says Nadine. “But it’s OK, Mrs. Henderson, it’s totally respectable. There’ll be heaps of other girls there—and it’s in the daytime.”
    “The daytime,” says Mrs. Henderson. She pauses. “Then you’ll be at school.”
    “It’s on
Saturday,
Mrs Henderson.”
    “Ah! Just as well.”
    “But you’d have let me have a day off school anyway, wouldn’t you, Mrs. Henderson?”
    “Dream on, Nadine,” says Mrs. Henderson briskly. “I shall expect you to volunteer for extra PE lessons to keep you in beautifully toned condition.”
    “Dream on, Mrs. Henderson,” says Nadine, a little too cheekily.
    Nadine ends up tidying the sports equipment cupboard in her lunch hour. Magda and I help her out. They eat crisps and swig Coke as we coil ropes and assemble hoops and herd netballs into neat piles. I sip mineral water, first one can, then another.
    “Have you turned into a camel, Ellie?” says Magda.
    “What do you mean?” I say defensively, looking down at my bulging body. “Are you saying I look like I’ve got humps?”
    “No! I’m saying you’ve got a
thirst
like a camel. That’s your second can, isn’t it?”
    “So?”
    “So sorry I asked,” says Magda, pulling a face at Nadine.
    “You’re drinking and drinking and yet you’re not eating anything,” says Nadine, thrusting her bag of crisps under my nose. “
Eat,
Ellie. A few measly little crisps aren’t going to make you fat. I scoff them all the time.”
    “Meaning you’re the one with the thin-as-a-pin model looks and yet you can still eat crisps,” I say.
    “Meaning
nothing
. What’s the matter with you, Ellie? Don’t be such a grump.”
    “Sorry, sorry.”
    I
am
sorry too. I know I’m being paranoid. I know Magda and Nadine aren’t getting at me.
I’m
the one who keeps griping at them.
    I grit my teeth and try hard to act normally but it’s so hard when I want to snatch handfuls of their salty golden crisps and cram them into my mouth, bagful after bagful. . . . I raise my second can to my lips and drain it.
    I hiccup. I feel totally waterlogged, a great bloated balloon—but I still don’t feel
full
. I haven’t eaten since yesterday’s supper, and that was only salad.
    I’ve decided now that I’m going to stick to one meal a day until I’ve lost at least fifteen pounds. Six more hours to go.
    I start stacking quoits energetically to divert myself. I bend and stretch . . . and then the store cupboard lurches sideways and I grab at Nadine.
    “Ellie?”
    “She’s fainting,” says Magda.
    “No, I’m not,” I mumble.
    The cupboard whirls round and round, the walls closing in on me.
    “Put her head between her legs,” says Magda.
    “You what?” says Nadine.
    “It’s a recovery position, nutcase. Here, Ellie, sit down. Put your head right down too. You’ll be better in a minute.”
    “I’m better now,” I say.
    The cupboard is still spinning, but slowly.
    “Shall I go and get Mrs. Henderson?” asks Nadine.
    “No!”
    “You’re still ever so pale, Ellie.”
    “I’m always pale. I just went dizzy for a minute, that’s all. No big deal.”
    “Well, no wonder you’re going dizzy if you won’t eat,” says Nadine. “You and this stupid diet.”
    “Don’t start that again.”
    “You know the best way to lose weight?” says Magda, taking a discus in either hand and trying to flex her muscles. “Exercise. That’s what you should do, Ellie.”
    “Ellie, exercise?” Nadine laughs.
    We are famous for being the least sporty girls ever. But I’ve been privately experimenting recently. I tried doing sit-ups in my bedroom to firm up my horrible wobbly tummy, but I’m so useless at it I can only sit up at all if I wedge my toes under the chest of drawers. I practically pulled my toes right off—they’ve still got painful mauve grooves across them now.
    I’ve also tried jogging to school, though I felt ultra-stupid and hoped everyone would think I was running for a bus. I only managed to go the