Poppy's Garden by Holly Webb Read Free Book Online Page B

of kitchen foil over it and scrunched it up in her hand. Even though it was just modelling clay, no one wanted to touch it.
    “Shall I throw it away?” Izzy asked, and Poppynodded, watching her as she threaded her way across the dining hall to the bins.
    “Aren’t you going to eat your lunch?” Izzy asked when she got back.
    “I’m not really hungry any more,” Poppy said, her voice very small.
    “You were starving,” Maya reminded her gently. “Do you want one of my sandwiches?”
    Poppy looked at her gratefully. “I know it’s stupid. It just feels like everything in my lunch is sort of…”
    “Spoiled,” Izzy agreed, nodding. “Look. Chocolate fingers.” She passed half her packet over to Poppy, and Emily gave her some cheese cubes.
    “I still don’t understand why she’s doing it,” Emily muttered. “It works though, doesn’t it? I wouldn’t eat your lunch either. Maybe tomorrow you’d better keep it in your rucksack.”
    “Ali could still get at it,” Poppy murmured. “If she tried hard enough.”
    “I shouldn’t think she’d do the same thing again,” Izzy said thoughtfully. “She’s too clever.” She shrugged as they all stared at her. “She actually is. She may be mean, but you’ve got to admit, she’s very, very good at being horrible. Isn’t she?”
    Poppy giggled. “I suppose she is.” She sighed. “Ali’sgoing to do something else then, you reckon?”
    Izzy gave her an apologetic look. “Um, probably. But it’s all stupid. It doesn’t mean anything.”
    “Even if there was such a thing as magic, Ali definitely can’t do it,” Maya said firmly.
    “And there isn’t,” Emily said, elbowing her.
    “Of course there isn’t!” Maya added quickly.
    “I know,” Poppy agreed, but she didn’t feel as sure as she wished she did.
    They finished their lunches quickly – no one felt very hungry any more, somehow – and headed out to the playground, where they huddled up thoughtfully on the grassy bank in the sun.
    “I keep looking round for Ali,” Poppy muttered, peering across the playground.
    “Mmmm, I know…” Izzy ageed. Then she grinned and nudged Poppy with her elbow. “Just try and think of her as a witch like the one in
The Wizard of Oz
. All green and with a really huge pointy nose.”
    Maya nodded. “Or isn’t there a story about a witch who had chicken’s feet? Ali would look great with little scaly chicken legs.”
    They kept swapping stories about uglier, nastier witches until the bell went, and Poppy was starting to feel quite cheered up. It helped that Ali hadn’t comeanywhere near them since they left the dining hall. They hadn’t even seen her.
    But then as they got up to go back into school, she suddenly popped up out of nowhere – and Poppy was so jumpy that it almost seemed like magic. She was suddenly there, looking worryingly happy. She smiled sweetly at Poppy and said, “Just stand still!”
    Poppy was too surprised to do anything else. She froze, and then wondered if Ali was going to throw something at her. She wanted to run, but somehow she couldn’t work out which way to go.
    Lucy and Elspeth dived out from behind Ali with something in their hands, and Poppy flinched, expecting that they really were going to throw it, whatever it was.
    But they crouched down on the ground behind her and started drawing on the asphalt. It was chalk that they were holding, sticks of red chalk.
    Poppy gaped at them, and Izzy grabbed her arm and pulled at her. “Come on, Poppy. It’s just another stupid joke.”
    “What are they doing?” Poppy muttered. “I don’t understand.” Her heart was thudding and bouncing, and she wished she hadn’t eaten any of the others’lunches after all. She felt sick.
    “There!” Elspeth and Lucy stood up triumphantly, leaving a vague red figure outlined on the playground.
    “Your shadow…” Maya said uneasily, and the four of them drew back, watching, as Ali walked round to the far side of the figure and