Gaby Book 18 - Summery

 
“That sounded heavy,” Steff suggested when I returned to the rest of the Angels.
“Er yeah,” I agreed, “Bern.”
“The Kind is okay?” Pia asked.
“Oh yeah, yeah she’s fine, no her mum’s got some other stuff going on.”
“Nothing too serious I hope,” Nen opined.
“Hopefully,” I agreed, “so, we having this party then?”

Yeah this week is the gang’s last as full time students at Silverberg Gymnasium, a sobering thought. For sure we’ll still see plenty of each other but come September and it’ll be less as we each follow different paths into further education. It’s sort of scary, probably more so for the others, I've only been here two years, they’ve had five with the same teachers, buildings, journey.

“Dad says we can have the cellar next Tuesday,” Pia mentioned as we got ready for cheer practice.
“Tuesday?” Mand queried.
“We’re having an end of school party.”
“All right for some,” she moaned.
“You’re coming,” I told her.
“I am?”
“Manda, you know it’s just an excuse to party, course you’re coming,” Pia reinforced.
“So, there gonna be any boys?” Mand enthused.

“You think this is good for the Phantasia competition?” Hannah asked as the girls went through the launched tumble again.
“Don’t see why not, Lise has it cracked and P’s improving every time.”
“You’re the boss.”
“You don’t think they’re ready?”
“They are far from perfect,” Han pointed out.
“But they’ll be better by then and this stuff is worth a bunch more points than a pure floor routine.”
“Yes boss.”
“Give over,” I stood up and clapped for attention, “okay girls, let’s run through the full routine, Han, music please, aaaand start.”

“You look a bit distracted, kiddo,” Mum offered joining me in the kitchen where I was making a hash of a pile of ironing.
“I am?”
“You are,” she confirmed, “anything I can help with?”
“This ironing?”
“Hmm,” she allowed before taking the iron out of my hand.
“I'll put the kettle on.”
“These your dad’s shirts?”
“Well they’re not mine, I spoke to Bernie today.”
“As in Warsop, has a baby?”
“How many others do you know?”
“Well there’s the girl riding for Lotto.”
“And she’d be calling me, why?”
“Okay, so you spoke to Bernie, she’s not in trouble again?”
“Mu-um,” I sighed.
“Well I had to ask, she’s not got the best track record.”
“The Social are trying to take Drea away.”
“That’s not good, she say why?”
“Apparently they don’t need much excuse, they’ve been hounding her almost since Drea was born.”
“And she hasn’t said anything before?”
“She thought she could out manoeuvre them, where do you want this?”
“End of the table, that sounds like a can of worms.”
“No kidding,” I agreed.
“And?” Mum prompted.

And so I sat down and recounted the tale Bern had told me while Mum worked through the pile of ironing.

“This Marty, what does he think of all this?”
“No idea, I mean he did go to England so I guess he’s okay with it.”
“This could blow up in their faces, make things worse.”
“Yeah.”
“Does Cheryl know all this?”
“She didn’t, Bern was gonna tell her this afternoon.”
“So why today? I mean from what you said all this plotting has been going on for months.”
“Apparently there’s some sort of case review next week, she was all for jumping on a plane tomorrow when she rang.”
“I hope you talked her out of that.”
“’Course I did, I'm not that stupid.”
“You have your moments,” she pointed out, “I'll give Cheryl a call when I've finished this lot, this is everything?”
“Well there’s my knickers,” I suggested.
“If you want those ironing you can do those yourself.”
“Dang!”

“Mart! Hang on a bit!” I quick walked to catch up with him.
“Heya, Gab, what’s up?”
“You and Bern, she rang yesterday.”
“It wasn’t my idea, Frau Rose seemed to know everything when she rang me.”
“Cheryl rang you?”
“Yeah, lunchtime.”
“That's when Bern rang, she didn’t know Mart, Bern was gonna tell her when she went home.”
“And I told her everything, sugar!”
“Not your fault, question is Daddy, what happens now?”
“Keep it down, Gabs,” he checked to see if anyone was close enough to overhear, “well that was it, Bern researched it all before.”

Bern, Bern, Bern, what a nest of vipers you’ve put together.

“So she didn’t tell you she was planning on coming here after her birthday?”
“No, I swear she never said anything like that, Gab.”
I don’t think Mart’s got a gram of guile in him, if he says not I believe him.
“I think you two need to talk,” I suggested.
“Er yeah, no kidding.”
“If anyone asks, I've been telling you about the party at Pia’s next Tuesday, right?”
“Party?”
“I've just told you, seven at the Sebenschuh’s cellar, end of school bash.”
“Er right.”

“What’ve you two been plotting, Max’ll get jealous,” Con teased as I took my usual seat for registration.
“Connie Thesing you are just the biggest gossip! I was just telling him about the party next week.”
“You’re no fun.”
I gave her a very adult response, I stuck my tongue out at her.”
“When you’re quite done, Fräulein Bond,” Fr Dürst suggested.
“Er yes, Miss, sorry, Miss.”

“I'm looking forward to tomorrow,” Mand opined as we made our way along the newly resurfaced cycle track between Remagen and Oberwinter on our way to the Rolandseck ferry.
“What’s happening tomorrow?”
“We’re working at Pia’s?”
“Tomorrow? I thought it was on Thursday.”
“Don’t you listen to anything?”
“Not much,” I admitted.

We singled out to pass a group of Trekkers going barely fast enough to stay upright.

“So what’s so great about waitressing for a couple of hours?” I enquired as came back alongside her.
“Well nothing per se but like we’ll be making their holiday better and we get paid for doing it.”
“And we have to wear Landeskostüm,” I pointed out.
“Pah, it’s only a dress that you happen to look quite good in I may say.”
“Yeah, whatever.”
“Oh come on, Gab, it’s not like you’ve got to dance or anything, it’s waiting table.”
“Kerb!”

Well just because they put down a new surface doesn’t mean the cycle track is perfect. We stayed on the main road through Oberwinter and on to the ferry at Rolandseck – the cycle path is narrow and windy, not much good for training or road bikes. The ferry was just docking on the opposite side, we had about five minutes to wait.

“It’ll be hard going home after living here,” Mand mused as we watched the ferry battle across the current.
“Yeah,” I idly replied.
“You just don’t get this stuff on a training ride in Surrey.”
“Guess not.”
“Earth to Gaby?”
“Eh?”
“You’re not listening to a word.”
“Am, something about hard training.”
“I give up.”

The ferry clanged onto the slip way and the exchange of traffic started.

Once on the Bad Honnef side we started the hard bit and bit session that Dad wanted us to do. Down through Unkel then along the narrow, bumpy stretch to Linz where we turned onto the ferry slip way just in time to board as it waited for three huge barges to battle past our position.

“So where’s this race on Sunday?” clever clogs de Vreen asked.
“I think Dad said Maastricht.”
“Sounds foreign.”
“And everywhere else doesn’t?”
“You know what I mean, it doesn't sound German.”
“I think it’s in Holland, I saw some signs on the way back from Roubaix.”

The ferry nudged the western shore and we prepared to return to solid ground. Sometimes you just feel like giving it some and this evening was one of them, I sprinted off up the ramp and kept going.

“Gabeee!” Mand complained.

I got almost to the Sinzig flyover before she caught me then we were both full gas through the town and out onto the Remagen road. We had to wait for some traffic before we turned onto the lane into the Ahrtal then it was out of the saddle going for it until we reached the Bad Neuenahr level crossing. We stayed on the town side, we needed to cool down and it’s not a lot of fun on the new road anyhow.

Mand was soon rabbiting about something or other to which I grunted and nodded when it seemed appropriate. I wonder what's going on with Bernie and Drea?

Maddy bell © 21.11.16