It was the end of the week, the day Asha was arriving in England, and we were going round to the Chopras’ house after school to meet her. For the last four days we’d been doing loads of work on Diwali, and Mrs Chopra had promised to help us out any way she could – apart from entering the competition for us, of course.
Mrs Weaver had told us this brill Diwali story about Rama and Sita. Rama was an Indian King hundreds of years ago, but he got kicked out of his kingdom so he had to go off and live in the forest with his wife Sita and his brother Lakshman. Anyway, Mrs W said that Rama had to defeat the King of the Demons, Ravana, who had ten heads! Kenny loved that bit, of course, and she’d started making gruesome Ravana-type faces across the classroom at the M&Ms. That really wound them up.
Where was I? Oh, yeah, so when Rama had killed the King of the Demons, he went back home to be King again and the people put lights in their windows to welcome him back. And that’s how Diwali started.
“They’re so pathetic!” Fliss sniffed, glaring at the M&Ms. “As if we care what they’re doing!”
“I wouldn’t mind having a look,” Lyndz admitted.
“Me too,” Rosie added. “The Queen’s quite good at art – she might beat us!”
“Yeah, we ought to check out the competition,” Kenny agreed. “Anyway, the M&Ms are really winding me up, hiding behind those stupid books!”
“OK, so we do want to see their designs!” I said. “Like they’re really going to show them to us!”
“Whose Diwali card’s the best?” Fliss asked, holding hers up hopefully. Mrs Chopra had given us some proper Diwali cards she’d bought in Leicester to look at, and we all loved the bright colours, glitter and shiny foil. So we’d gone completely over the top with our own designs!
“I love Lyndz’s one,” said Rosie. “That shocking pink is so cool!”
“I like that gold stuff on Fliss’s,” said Lyndz.
“I think Frankie’s is ace with all that blue and silver glitter,” said Kenny.
“Well, I think Lyndz’s rangoli pattern is the best,” I said.
Mrs Chopra had actually shown us how to draw some rangoli patterns. They were pretty complicated, because they were kind of symmetrical, and some of them had interlocking bits like a jigsaw puzzle. Lyndz’s was good and so was Fliss’s, because they were both really neat, but Kenny’s looked like a spider had walked all over the paper with a pen attached to each of its legs!
“So what do you think Asha’s going to be like?” Fliss asked for about the millionth time.
“Quiet and shy,” Rosie suggested.
“She’ll wear Indian clothes,” I said.
“I wonder if she’ll be able to speak English?” Lyndz said.
“I hope she’s got lots of bindis and bangles we can borrow!” Fliss added eagerly.
“You can’t even wear all the bindis you’ve got, Fliss!” I pointed out.
“Yeah, maybe you should wear them all at the same time,” Kenny suggested wickedly. “Put them all over your face and start a new fashion!”
“Shall we invite Asha to our sleepover at Frankie’s house on Saturday night?” Lyndz asked. That was typical of Lyndz, she’s always nice to everybody!
Kenny shrugged. “Yeah, why not?”
“You know,” I said thoughtfully, staring at the M&Ms, “if someone went over to the M&Ms’ table and accidentally knocked against the table, I bet all those books would fall down.”
Kenny was already bouncing out of her seat. “I’m up for that!”
“No way, Kenny!” I said firmly. “You’d probably knock the M&Ms and their table right over! It was my idea – I’ll do it.”
I got up, keeping a sharp eye on Mrs Weaver who was busy at her desk, and wandered over to the M&Ms’ table. As I went by, I gave it just a slight nudge with my hip. Immediately all the books fell down with a crash, and the Queen and the Goblin screamed.
“You did that on purpose!” the Queen huffed.
“Emma, Emily, put those books away right now and stop being so silly,” Mrs Weaver said crossly.
I had a good nose at the M&Ms’ designs while they were picking the books up, and then I sauntered back to our table.
“Well?” Fliss demanded.
“Emily’s rangoli pattern is as bad as Kenny’s,” I said, and Kenny elbowed me hard in the ribs.
“Flippin’ cheek!” she grumbled.
“But Emma’s is pretty good,” I admitted.
“Come on, we’ve got to do better than them!” Kenny said in a determined voice. “Hey, maybe Asha will be able to help us out! She must know all about Diwali.”
The rest of us nodded. Maybe Asha was going to be our secret weapon in our Diwali war against the M&Ms!
“Maybe we could sabotage the Queen’s Diwali card?” Kenny suggested as she rang the Chopras’ doorbell. School was over for the day, and we’d gone straight round to meet Asha. “My Dad’s got one of those shredding machine things in his study—”
“No, Kenny, we want to win fair and square,” Lyndz said firmly. “Don’t we, girls?”
“Nah, we just want to win!” I joked.
Mrs Chopra opened the door. Today she was wearing a deep purple sari with gold flowers, and she had a purple and gold bindi to match. The sari was so cool, even cooler than the turquiose one. I was definitely going to ask her if I could borrow it for the Diwali / Bonfire Night at school next week!
“Come in, girls,” she said with a smile. “Asha’s arrived, and she’s dying to meet you!”
I’d never been in the Chopras’ house before, so I was well interested in nosing around. It wasn’t that different from any other house, though, except that there were Indian paintings on the walls, and these big, carved wooden elephants in the hall which I really loved.
“Oh, that’s funny.” Mrs Chopra stared round the empty living room in surprise. “I thought Asha was in here. She must have gone upstairs, I’ll just go and fetch her.” And she went out.
“What are we going to do if Asha doesn’t speak English?” Fliss asked.
“We’ll just use sign language like this,” Kenny said, waving her arms about and nearly taking Rosie’s eye out in the process. “Hello –” she bowed. “I’m Kenny!” And she pointed at herself.
“Yeah, that’s OK,” Rosie said, “But what if you want to say something complicated like Can you help us with our rangoli patterns?”
“Or Can I borrow your bindis?” Fliss added.
“Don’t worry,” said a voice from behind us, “I speak English perfectly!”
We all nearly jumped out of our skin! A girl had popped up from behind the sofa. She had short, cropped black hair, and she wore combat pants, a T-shirt and big gold earrings. It was Asha!
“What are you doing behind there?” I gasped when I’d got over the shock. Asha wasn’t a bit like what we were expecting!
Asha shrugged. “Waiting to see if I liked you or not before I met you!” she grinned.
“What a cheek!” Kenny said, but she was grinning too.
“It’s so great to meet you all!” said Asha when I’d finished