The Everlasting Story of Nory

35. Break

Then the bell rang and Classics was over and Nory went to her break. She had been spending a lot of breaks with Kira, so to balance things out this break she spent with Pamela, who gave her some prawn chips which have a very dry feeling on your tongue, as if they’re pulling out all the water from the tastebobs completely, but being infinitely delicious at the same time. They didn’t have that awful glittery added-salt taste. Kira stopped by where they were sitting, under a conker tree, and said to Nory, ‘Come on, let’s go.’

‘Take a seat and join us, Kira,’ said Nory. ‘We’re having our break here.’

Kira said, ‘I’ll be back in a bit.’ That was what she said when she wanted to go away but didn’t want to say so. She didn’t want kids to see her near Pamela. Pamela was quiet. Pamela didn’t like Kira, because Kira didn’t like Pamela, and Kira didn’t like Pamela because nobody else liked Pamela.

Colin Sharings came up and said to Pamela, ‘Have you ever gone bungee jumping?’

‘No,’ Pamela said.

‘Good,’ said Colin, ‘because you’d probably break the cord and make a mess on the rocks.’

‘That is an idiotic, nitwitted, dumb, and very stupid thing to say,’ said Nory.

‘Are you friends with Pamela?’ Colin asked, pretending to be amazed.

‘Yes, I am,’ said Nory. ‘And you are quite attractive. For a dead monkfish.’

‘Oh, thank you, little American girl,’ said Colin, who had a curly little mouth. ‘Little Americayan. Take care that your friend Pamela doesn’t get on any boats. They’ll sink to the bottom as soon as she goes aboard. And as you may know, we dead monkfishes are quite hungry.’ Having finished up with his insults for the day, he walked off with his nose aimed high.

‘Colin Sharings is just awful,’ said Nory.

‘With a knob of butter and some parsley on his head,’ said Pamela, ‘he would look quite fishy.’ She held out the bag of prawn chips for Nory to have another.

‘These are infinitely delicious prawn chips,’ said Nory. ‘Where do you get them?’

‘My mum gets them from Tesco,’ said Pamela.

‘We go to Tesco, too,’ said Nory.

‘It’s quite a popular place to shop,’ said Pamela. ‘I think we probably should go in now.’