Olivia Flies High (15 page)

Chapter Thirty-One

A week later, Olivia and Eel were at Heathrow airport with Alicia and Pablo. They had just waved goodbye to Abbie, who was on her way to Hollywood with Huff for a screen test. She had managed to negotiate two days off from
The
Sound of Music
with Jon James’s blessing.

Now they were waiting for the arrival of Jack’s plane from Seattle, as were an entire pack of journalists and photographers. The extraordinary story of Jack’s survival combined with his daughter’s leading role in the rescue of another child from the roof of a West End theatre had been irresistible, and the media had run and run with the story. Some were calling Olivia’s act of stepping out of the wheelchair on to the wire a miracle, which made Olivia furious
because as she kept on pointing out crossly to any journalist who would listen, it wasn’t that she
couldn’t
walk but rather than she
wouldn’t
walk.

There was a real media feeding-frenzy. Footage of the rescue filmed on mobile phones was all over YouTube, and the papers were desperate to get the full details of Jack’s survival. After his plane had had to ditch because of an electrical failure, he had walked for four days through wilderness and dangerous terrain to get help for the pilot, who had broken his ankle.

The Marvells were being hailed as the most heroic family in the country, which made Olivia want to hide away, and made Eel feel embarrassed and guilty. She was well aware that if it had not been for her scheme to get Katie to admit to all her wrong-doings, nobody’s life would have been in danger. In some ways she thought that perhaps she had been as sneaky as Katie, an opinion that her grandmother happened to share. Alicia had told Eel and Georgia off so sternly that both of them had been reduced to floods of tears.

But at least two brilliant things had come out of it: Olivia had started walking again, and
Katie was no longer in
The Sound of Music
. She hadn’t even waited to be sacked but had sent a letter withdrawing from the production the next morning.

There was a third thing too: Katie had asked to meet Olivia, Eel, Tom and Georgia at the theatre that afternoon when she had come to pick up her things. Katie had looked terrible. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her skin blotchy and her normally glossy hair was dull and lifeless. She found it difficult to look them in the eye and there was an awkward silence at first, but then Katie whispered, “Olivia, Tom, I want to say thank you. You saved my life. You did something for me that I wouldn’t have done for you. You could have just left me to fall, but you didn’t. I’ll be eternally grateful.”

By now she was crying, but she continued: “And I want to say sorry. I’ve been awful to you all. I know you probably hate me, and can never forgive me for what I did, but I want you to know that I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”

“We don’t hate you, Katie,” said Tom.

“No,” said Eel very seriously. “We feel really sorry for you.”

Katie gave a wan little smile. “Which of
course is even worse. I don’t deserve your pity.”

“I’m sorry I stitched you up, Katie,” said Eel.

“No,” replied Katie. “I deserved that, too. I’ve not been a nice person.”

“Hurry up, kitten,” called Mr Wilkes-Cox from outside the room.

“I’ve got to go. My dad doesn’t like to be kept waiting,” said Katie, and she gathered up her things and walked to the door. Then she turned around.

“You lot have something special: real friendship. Even I couldn’t destroy that. I envy you.” With that she was gone, leaving the door open.

“Come on, kitten!” said her dad as he started down the stairs.

There was a pause, and then they heard Katie reply: “I’m not
kitten
, Dad. My name’s Katie. I’d like it if you called me by my name from now on.”

At the airport, the arrivals board showed that Jack’s plane had landed. Olivia was so nervous she’d begun to hiccup and Eel was even more hyperactive than usual, and kept pirouetting
into people’s luggage trolleys.

Suddenly the doors from arrivals opened and Jack appeared, accompanied by several airline officials. He looked tired but he was smiling, his green-blue eyes sparkling like the sea on a summer’s day. Olivia and Eel gave whoops of joy and ran towards him. He enveloped them in a huge hug. They nuzzled each other like ponies, repeating each other’s names over and over, completely oblivious to the commotion around them. A hundred flashbulbs popped as the photographers vied to snap the picture that would be all over the next day’s papers.

A few days later, a little party was just concluding at Alicia’s flat. It was late. Olivia, Jack, Pablo and Aeysha, who was now back at school just in time for the end of term, had all been to see Alps team, with Lakes’s Louisa, perform in the matinée of
The Sound of Music
. Alicia had wanted to go, too, but felt she had been neglecting the Swan so had decided against it.

Afterwards they had been joined at the school by Eel, Tom, Georgia and Abbie, who was back from her screen test in LA. She didn’t know if she had got the part yet, but she said
that Huff had thought she was in with a good chance.

“And if I don’t get it, there will be other opportunities,” she said. Now she had turned sixteen she would be leaving the Swan at the end of term. Alicia, who had been listening, smiled. She knew Abbie would be fine; she had her head screwed on straight.

Pablo was just getting ready to leave.

“Wait a minute, Pablo,” said Jack. He turned to Olivia. “Liv, will you have a go on the trapeze? I want to see what you can do.”

Olivia hesitated. She hadn’t been on the trapeze since the night of her fall.

“Jack, I’m not sure that’s the best idea,” said Alicia. “I can’t imagine that Livy ever wants to see a trapeze again, and I’m not sure I can bear to see her on one.” She shuddered. “I can’t get the picture of her lying broken on the floor out of my head.”

Jack held his daughter’s gaze. “No, Gran,” said Olivia. “I’ve got to get back on. It’s like horses and bicycles. You fall off and you get back on again as soon as you can. Dad’s right. I should go on the trapeze, and there’s no time like the present.”

They all trooped down to the hall. Pablo unhooked the trapeze and checked the rigging. Then Olivia shimmied up the rope and on to the bar. She began to swing. She pushed her body hard and the trapeze responded as if it was alive. Olivia flew up into the air, and as the trapeze reached its peak, she somersaulted backwards, caught the bar with her ankles and sailed through the air. A great cry of encouragement went up from Jack, Pablo and  Eel, who squealed and jiggled with pride and excitement.

Olivia swung her body upwards again and grinned. Below she could see the smiling upturned faces of Jack, Eel, Alicia and all the people she loved most in the world. Tom had raised his arms up in the air as if he was reaching for the sky to try to touch her.

She pushed her body and the trapeze even harder so it swung in a gigantic arc and the air rushed by her face like a great warm wind. She was like a beautiful bird taking flight. Olivia felt an extraordinary sense of release and exhilaration, and as she rose upwards, she felt as if she was flying, flying as fast as she could towards her future and the next term at the Swan.

Chapter One

“It’s very odd,” said Georgia, who was leaning out of the dance studio window on the second floor of the Swan Academy of Theatre and Dance. “There are two men and a woman with cameras hiding in the bushes down by the front steps. Do you think we should tell Miss Swan?”

“Let me see,” said Tom, jumping off the high wire, brushing back his red hair and running over to the window. He gave a little whistle. “Georgia’s right. And there’s another photographer sitting in that blue BMW across the street. The Swan’s being staked out; someone famous must be coming to visit!”

The children were used to famous people visiting the Swan, particularly ex-pupils.
Hot
magazine had recently done an entire
photo-feature
about the princess of pop, Amber Lavelle, returning to her former school, and at the end of last term, old boy Theo Deacon, who was playing Hamlet at the National Theatre, had come to give a talk to the senior pupils. But there was something different about today. Even as they were watching, a camera crew turned up, and they were swiftly followed by two large men wearing dark suits and sunglasses who looked around shiftily as if they were
secret-service
agents in a bad American spy movie.

“
He
doesn’t look like someone from the press,” said Eel, pointing at one of the men. He saw her and scowled, then turned his back and eyed a group of Swan pupils making their way up the front steps of the school, some already wearing their practice clothes with ballet shoes slung around their necks. He watched them closely as if he thought that their leotards and legwarmers were very suspicious and clear evidence of criminal intent.

“Maybe they’re just pretending to be photographers and they’re really undercover police officers investigating a terrible crime!” said Eel. “That man’s moustache looks fake to me; it’s exactly like the one you wore in
Bugsy Malone
, Tom.” She wriggled excitedly at the thought, showing just why she’d got her nickname.

“Why would the police want to stake out a stage school?” asked Ayesha, reasonably.

“For crimes against art?” said Tom with a grin. “Maybe someone reported your performance in the end of term concert to
Crimestoppers
, Eel. You’re probably about to be arrested for murdering pirouettes.” Eel looked so indignant that everyone laughed.

“Only joking,” said Tom hurriedly. “You’re a brilliant dancer. The best.”

“I’m not quite the best,” said Eel. “Not yet, anyway. But one day I will be, if I keep practising.” She knew that talent wasn’t enough; if she was going to be a great dancer she had to work her socks off, and then she would need some luck, too.

“Well, I think we ought to tell Miss Swan about the photographers,” said Georgia.

“She already knows,” came a quiet voice. Everyone swung around to look at Olivia Marvell, who was balanced on one foot on the high wire suspended across the dance studio. She was reflected back at them several times in
the huge mirrors hung on the walls. Unfazed by her friends’ attention, she coolly performed a perfect somersault to dismount. As she untied her long dark hair, a gentle smile twitched around the corners of her mouth and her eyes sparkled, giving her serious face a luminous quality as if it was lit from within.

“Liv Marvell, you’ve been keeping secrets from your best friends, and you know that’s not allowed,” said Tom accusingly.

“
And
from your little sister. It’s an outrage,” said Eel with a jiggle. Olivia looked guilty; she felt really torn. She longed to tell them everything she’d discovered that morning. She’d overheard her grandmother talking on her mobile to the theatre director, Jon James, who had recently had a big hit on the West End stage with a revival of
The Sound of Music
. It was clear from what Olivia had heard that Jon was planning a new production of a very famous play with an all-star Hollywood casting. But she had promised Gran that she wouldn’t say a word until Alicia herself had made an announcement at the traditional start of term assembly.

Olivia felt really tempted to spill the beans. After all, everyone would know why the
photographers and bodyguards were outside in about half an hour, so did it really matter if she told her friends a few minutes early? It could do no harm, surely. But she didn’t want to break Alicia’s trust. And anyway, it made her feel quite tingly and powerful to know something that no one else did, and which everyone was desperate to find out about. She thought she’d enjoy the feeling for just a little bit longer…