Sleepover Girls Go Karting by Narinder Dhami Read Free Book Online Page B

Frankie agreed, looking a lot more cheerful, and the othersnodded. It looked like our problem was solved!
    But Charlie still looked glum.
    “Sorry, folks, I’m too old to race on the junior track,” she replied. “But I’ll ask around, and see if I can find you someone else. Look, come along tomorrow anyway.” She slapped Frankie on the back. “I might be able to persuade Josh to change his mind.”
    “Yeah, and pigs might fly!” I muttered, as Charlie went off. “What are we going to do now?”
    “If you need a driver, I could be in your team tomorrow,” said this dozy voice behind us.
    We all turned round. Alana Banana was standing there. She must have overheard everything we were saying.
    “What?” I spluttered.
    “I haven’t got a team to race with tomorrow,” Alana said helpfully. “I could take Frankie’s place.”
    “Aren’t you racing with your brother?” Rosie asked.
    “Kevin doesn’t want me in his team.” Alana looked puzzled. “I don’t know why.”
    “I can take a guess!” I muttered to Fliss.
    “Well?” Alana Banana looked at us eagerly. “Am I in or what?”
    “Over my dead body—” I began, but I shut up when Lyndz nudged me in the ribs.
    “Er – we’ll let you know, Alana,” Fliss said quickly.
    Alana Banana nodded, and wandered off, bumping right into one of the other drivers and nearly knocking him over.
    I groaned. “She can hardly drive herself in a straight line, let along a kart!”
    “But if we can’t get anyone else…” Fliss didn’t finish the sentence.
    She was right. Either we got Frankie back into the team, or we had to go with whoever else might be free to take part when we arrived at the track tomorrow. And that just might mean dopey Alana Banana Palmer…
    “Well, what about Callum?” Fliss said, for the sixth time. “He might be OK.”
    “He’s a bit young,” I said doubtfully. “And he’s a bit – well, you know…”
    “A bit what?” Fliss’s eyes started flashingdangerously. I’d been about to say that Fliss’s brother was a bit weedy – even weedier than Alex and Robin, in fact – but I decided not to. We were all feeling stressed out, and I didn’t want to start a row with Fliss.
    It was quite late at night, and we were round at Lyndz’s house for our sleepover. We were supposed to be having a great old time, making our T-shirts and discussing race tactics, but instead we were sitting around in Lyndz’s bedroom being miserable. We’d started off being really positive. We’d even started painting our T-shirts with fabric paint. We’d done silver stars round the necklines, and a big purple heart in the middle. Then we were going to write Sleepover Club Forever! underneath in silver paint – until Fliss pointed out that whoever took Frankie’s place wouldn’t be a Sleepover Club member. That had depressed us in a major way, so we’d left the T-shirts half-finished.
    “I was just going to say that Callum’s a bit inexperienced,” I said, crawling over Lyndz’s bed to grab a Wispa bar. We were having our midnight feast and we were all starvingbecause we’d been too depressed to eat much dinner. “You said he’s never karted before.”
    “Yeah, but at the moment he’s our only hope,” Fliss pointed out.
    She was right. Callum was the only one of our brothers and sisters who was under eleven, but old enough to take part.
    “Maybe Charlie can persuade Josh to let Frankie race,” Lyndz said hopefully. She had her black kitten, Zebedee, on her lap and he was purring away like an engine.
    “No way,” I said. “Josh knows we’ve got a great chance of winning the team race with Frankie. Without her, we’re dead.”
    “No, you’re not,” Frankie butted in. She was lying on the floor, eating a Snickers bar. “You might turn up at the track tomorrow and find someone really brilliant to be in the team.”
    “Like who?” I snorted. “Anyone who’s any good will be in a team already. No, we’re more likely to end