How to Make Any Twit Fall in Love With You

Chapter 1: Once more into the crapmobile of life

In my bedroom

I've made a space for Lullah's things in my wardrobe and Mum has put a camp bed up for her. Libby is filling it with her "fings". Scuba-diving Barbie and Mr Potato Head (the new one, the old Mr Potato Head went green – not unusual as he was, in fact, a potato).

She was singing, "I lobe Pudooodah, Poooodooodoodoo-dah."

That's what she thinks our cousin is called.

Also I know she will be nicely snuggled up in the camp bed later on with scuba-diving Barbie and Mr Potato. And her night-time nappy.

I hope Tallulah doesn't like sleeping.

5:30 p.m.

I heard the whirring of Dad's two-horsepower crapmobile put-put-putting up the hill. He normally has to get out and push it up the last bit.

Why oh why must I be humiliated by his three-wheeled Reliant Robin? I peeked through the window. Oh good, he is also wearing his flying helmet. Tallulah must be pleased as punch to have boys in the street yelling "Loser" as they speed past at one mile an hour. Welcome to my life.

5 minutes later

Went downstairs and opened the front door. Tallulah was trying to get out of the crapmobile. Blimey she's got long legs. And as she lurched out she banged her head on the car door.

Dad said kindly, "Careful of my paintwork."

I think she's grown since I last saw her – which was only a few weeks ago. I hope she's not going to be a giant girl. She's got nice hair though, all black and shiny, and very green eyes. I don't mean like snot eyes because that would be weird.

As she rubbed her head she smiled at me and said, "Ullo Georgia, I've been in Yorkshire by mistake."

I said, "Have you got a Northern accent in three weeks? Come and see your bed, Libby's filled it with all her ‘fwends'."

Mum hugged Lullah and was all clucky. "Look at you, Lullah, all grown up. Aren't you tall?"

I said, "Mum, Lullah knows she's tall – just as Vati knows he is porky. You don't have to tell her."

Mum tutted at me and went off to the kitchen.

We went up to my room. When we walked in Libby ran over and wrapped herself round Lullah's knees and started kissing them. She luuurves knees. I don't know why. Lullah bent down to kiss Libby and started to say, "Libby, I've been away at… Oh, crikey, what's in your hair?"

Libby said, "Mmmmm naaaice, it's marmy lady."

How can you get marmalade in your hair?

Chapter 2: Red bottomosity

15 minutes later

Lullah was telling me about Dother Hall – it sounds like a loony bin.

On her first day there she and the other ‘thespians' had to think of a word and movement that summed them up. I asked her what she chose. And she stood up and said, "‘Hiddly diddly diddly'. I sang it to an Irish tune that nobody has ever heard of, because it doesn't exist. And for my movement bit I started doing Irish dancing, like this, keeping my arms straight by my sides and kicking my legs about, like this, whilst hopping on my tippy toes."

I don't know if you have ever seen Irish dancing in your bedroom done by someone with eight-foot legs. But I'll just say this. I have.

She hadn't finished though.

She was saying, "This is my performance diary, look – when Dr Lightowler was horrible to me after I did my impression of an owl laying an egg – I wrote this."

In the diary it said: "I'm going to laugh in the face of fear like the Bronte sisters."

I looked at her and said, "You did an impression of an owl laying an egg – you're not secretly Jas's cousin are you?"

Jazzy Spazzy is quite like Tallulah, actually. They both do fringe-flicking (vair annoying) and both luuurve owls. Legwise, though, Jas comes up to about Lullah's knees.

6:15 p.m. Angus is stalking Lullah's squirrel slippers. Yes, that's what I said, she has got some slippers in the shape of squirrels. The tails go up the back of her legs. I am deffo going to have to take her in hand.

I said, "How far have you got up the Snogging Scale?"

15 minutes later

I thought Lullah's head was going to drop off when I explained the snogging scoring system. She didn't even know what varying pressure was. Honestly, what do they teach people at school these days?

20 minutes later

Lullah said, "So, what is having the horn?"

I said, "Well, it's like red-bottomosity."

Good grief.

Chapter 3: It wasn't his hand, it was his kitbag

7:00 p.m.

Tallulah said, "I've had my bottom felt, does that count?"

Blimey O'Reilly's trousers, you see what I have to put up with. I am practically a saint in a mini skirt.

Tallulah was going on, "But the boy pretended it wasn't really his hand, it was his kitbag."

I didn't know what to say.

She did.

"Yes, and my new mate Vaisey said her cousin put an ice cube down her T-shirt and offered to get it out for her."

So in conclusion we are talking, on the horn front, a maybe fondling of a bum and an ice-cube incident.

She still hadn't finished. She had quite literally got the horn by the throat.

"But then I met a dream boy, in boy form. He said I had a cool name. He said nothing against my knees. He couldn't actually see my knees, but… anyway, when I met Alex, Ruby's older brother, the bottom-touching boy incident faded into insignificance."

Chapter 4: Corker rubbing techniques

7:30 p.m.

Jas arrived. My mutti is so nice to her, no shouting or anything. And she offered her a Jammy Dodger. I didn't even know she had any Jammy Dodgers. She must have a secret stash. It's probably hidden in one of her gigantic bras.

I can't say my cousey has inherited the enormous basooma gene. I said this.

I said, "You're not overblessed in the nunga department, are you?"

She said, "What does – er – I mean, what are nungas?"

I explained to her that Dave the Laugh says that if you pull a girl's basooma out, like an elastic band, and then let it go… it goes nunga-nunga-nunga.

She laughed A LOT. She's got a good laugh, all gurgly and her mouth goes all over the place, like mine. And her nostrils run free and wild. Hurrah.

She said, "I call them corkers. And I am corkerless. Look."

We both looked at her girls' jiggly bits. They are just about perking up, but not much.

She said, "I use the rubbing technique. But then I was trying it with my hiking socks on my hands, you know, to see what it felt like to have someone else's hands on you, when Cain saw me."

Cain?

"Cain Hinchcliff, he's all dark and mean and moody, all the girls like him, I don't know why."

I said, "Is he good looking?"

Tallulah thought.

"Well, he thinks he is. He thinks he is the cat's pyjamas. Like when a cat is so full of itself it shows off in its pyjamas."

I said, "Yes, I see, but…"

Tallulah was still going on. "OK, I've never seen cats out shopping for pyjamas, but they must do it sometimes, otherwise why would this be a saying? Grammar never lies."

"Tallulah, shut up now. I've had enough of cat nightwear."

Chapter 5: If in doubt do the snot dance

Next day

Woke up tucked up in bed next to my cousin. She had to come in with me for Health and Safety reasons. Libby started farting so loudly that I expected a nappy explosion any minute. She has stopped now, but I still won't be striking a match in case we get blown into Mr Next Door's conservatory.

Jas and I have decided that we have to take Lullah in hand. Actually, I decided that, Jas was too busy comparing owl stories. Lullah had a photo of a couple of owlets, Ruby and Lullah, that she has found near Dother Hall and she did her impression of an owl laying an egg, which actually made me larf a LOT.

Then we sat down with nourishing snacks (crisps in a bowl) to teach her the secrets of life. Her dad is a goatfinder or something, anyway he collects stuff, and her mum, my auntie, is an artist, so Lullah does not know the cut and thrust of life like what I do.

First of all, we told her that is important to impress people with your entertaining sophisticosity. Just a little skill that you can do.

Jas said, "For instance, I can do a variety of knots."

I looked at Jas, but she didn't get it. She can be alarmingly dim.

So we showed Tallulah some of our dances: the Viking bison disco inferno and the flame dance, and then we taught her the snot dance.

I said to Jas as she was leaving to meet her ‘boyfriend', "I like to think that it has given her that little touch of sophisticosity that will impress her fellow lesbians at Dother Hall."

Jas said, "She's not a lezzie, is she?"

"No, Jas, I was just being tres amusant with a play on word."

"So it's not a lesbian college then?"

Good grief, I am surrounded by the very, very, tiny brained.

I said, "What would she be learning at lesbian college, Jas?"

Jas looked thoughtful – very scary – and did a bit of fringe-fiddling. I didn't strike her because I was still eating my crisps. Then she said, "Well, I suppose you would learn about the Lesbian Snogging System."

I didn't know what to say. So I said, "Goodbye," and shut the door quickly.

Chapter 6: Snogging withdrawal

3:00 p.m.

Missing Dave the Laugh a lot since he went away with his footie mates. Leaving me all puckered up and nowhere to go.

The phone rang.

It was him. Dave the Laugh!!

I felt a bit jelloid, actually. But I covered up by sounding sophis and full of maturiosity.

I said in a low voice, "Hello, Georgia speaking."

Dave said, "Er, why are you sounding like a twit, Kittykat?"

I said, "I was showing you my inner womanliness."

He said, "Oo-er."

And we laughed.

I said, "My little mad cousin Tallulah is here. She's on this really crap performing arts course in Yorkshire. It sounds less like ‘Fame' and more like ‘Crikey!'"

Dave said, "Excellent comedy opportunities."

I went on. "She doesn't even know what red-bottomosity is."

Dave said, "Blimey."

"Or the General Horn. Or the Cosmic Horn."

Dave said, "I know what the Cosmic Horn is, because I have got it."

I said, "I know, I have too. It's not fair that you are away, I have got snogging withdrawal."

He said, "That is where I can help you, Kittykat. I tell you what I do. What us professional snoggers do, when we are away from our snoggees, we get a melon and scoop out a mouth shape and then put some jelly in a plastic bag in the mouth hole. And Bob's your uncle. Super sub-snogging pal."

After I came off the phone I was full of confusiosity.

Bob's your uncle?

Snogging a melon?

I don't believe Dave. I think he is quite literally having a laugh.

Apart from just a tiny bit of me that is thinking… ‘Hmmmmm, I wonder if it would work… maybe if I drew some eyes on Mr Melon?' Shut up, brain, shut up. Chapter 7: And then he got out his Maltesers

3:30 p.m.

Went up to see Tallulah.

She was lying on the bed waggling her squirrel slippers around.

Angus is hunkering down ready to pounce on them. They are his new pallies that he wants to play with. And then kill.

I said, "What number on the Snogging Scale have you got up to?"

And she looked at me with those big green eyes and said, seriously, "What number on the Snogging Scale is ‘a little bat in your mouth'?"

What?

I said, "It isn't on the scale. Because that would never happen."

She got up from my bed moving her squirrel slippers just as Angus launched himself at his new, furry, waggly, soon to be dead, friends. He leaped over the bed and crashed into the wastepaper basket headfirst. Now it is stuck on his head.

Tallulah said, all moonie, "You say that, but it happened to me. We went to see Night of the Vampire Bats and I was already a bit frazzled because Ben said something quietly to me in the cinema. I'd had my head rigid for about an hour trying to swivel my eyes around to see if any of my friends were doing, you know… it. Without moving my head. I thought he said, ‘Do you want a squeeze?' And I said, ‘No thank you, I don't know you well enough.'"

Dear Gott in Himmel, I have a long, gangly fool for a cousin.

I said, "What did he say?'

"He said, ‘It's alright, they are not out of their packet.'"

What kind of performing arts college is this Dother Hall? I must write to the lunatics in charge immediately.

Tallulah was still back in bat land. She went on.

"And then he showed me them."

Chapter 8: Had he trapped his fringe?

15 minutes later

It turns out that Ben had said, "Do you want a Malteser?" He was offering her a packet of Maltesers.

Tallulah hadn't finished her marvellous snogging (not) story, though.

And by the way, I have noticed that Tallulah is already taller than me. And she looms a bit over me. I don't want to have to start calling her ‘Ta-loom-er'.

Also there is something about my cousey that makes you think that at any moment she will start doing Irish dancing.

She said, "Anyway, after that on the way home Ben suddenly snogged me."

I said, "Oo-er."

She said, "Well, yes, because I was just explaining about Sidone Beaver and the golden slippers of applause…"

I let that go because otherwise we would be in my bedroom for the next 85 years and I wanted to see if we had a melon. Just for research purposes.

Tallulah started acting out what happened. She said, "As I was talking, he leaped on me with his mouth." And she clenched her lips and started pretending she was being snogged. "My eyes were open so that I could see that he had his closed. His mouth seemed very big. In fact I felt like I was being eaten. Even though no chewing was going on."

I looked at her as she was waggling her head from side to side. If my Vati came in now it would be the end of my life.

And I think even Baby Jesus would be quite shocked, though he loves everybody impartially.

Tallulah paused dramatically from her simulated snogging. I wonder what number this should be? I will have to phone Jas, Jas will know. She is the official Wise Woman of the Forest.

Lullah looked at me and lowered her voice, "Then… I felt a little proddy thing going in between my lips like it was trying to prise them open. I wondered if he had maybe trapped his fringe."

Chapter 9: No. 6...Tungekys

4:15 p.m.

I said, "I think you will find that you were doing number six on the Snogging Scale: tongues. Or, as it is on the German Snogging Scale, ‘tungekys'. Comedy gold, German, as I have always said to anyone who will listen to me."

Tallulah flung herself on to the bed, only slightly banging her ankle on the Angus/wastepaper-bin head scenario.

"Yes, yes, that was it!!! The little jabby tongue thing started working its way along my toothline. It prodded at the side of my mouth, which was quite tickly, actually."

Tallulah was going on about snogging Ben and having accidentally reached No. 6 on the Snogging Scale. It had quite taken my mind off Dave the Laugh's alarming advice vis-a-vis the melon boyfriend.

I said to her, "What happened in the end? What number did you get to?"

She looked puzzled.

"Well, I don't really know. It was like being in Night of the Vampire Bats. There was a bit in the film where a bat flew into someone's mouth, and you could see it barging around inside because the cheeks kept bulging out, and the bat's little head popped out now and then."

I nodded. But I don't know why. I should really keep her talking whilst I rang emergency services. Quite sensationally bonkers.

She hadn't quite got to the end of her boy extravaganza.

"Then he just stopped and said, ‘Er sorry, about that, er… well, goodnight'. And he held out his hand. I had had my arms by my sides for the whole time and I put my hand up automatically.

"And he shook it."

Chapter 10: That does it, she's done for

6:00 p.m.

Phoned Jas.

"Jas."

"I am not going to let you practice snogging on the back of my leg."

"Jas, why would I want you to do that?"

"You did the last time Dave the Laugh was away. And you made me wear a false beard."

"It is not attractive to have le memory like le elephant, my little pally. Anyway, I want to consultez vous with you about Lullah."

"Leave her alone, she's only little."

"She's quite literally three times bigger than you, and that is when she is bending down."

"Anyway, I don't want to talk about height. I want to talk to you about snogging."

"But Tom and I are going to buy something for our aquarium."

"This is not the time for buying fish ladders, we have to teach my cousin how to entrance boys.

"I am compiling a notebook for her to take back to performing arts college, called simply ‘How to make any twit fall in love with you'. It will be my mistresspiece. And have all the knowledge about boynosity that I have collected over the years."

Jas didn't say anything, but I knew she was chewing her fringe.

I said, "You are not saying what a brillopads idea I have just had."

She said, "Will it have the Snogging Scale in it?"

"Mais oui."

"And the elastic band theory?"

"D'accord."

Jas said, "Oh, God."

I like to think she was quietly proud of me. That is what I like to think.

I went on: "And as a special gift to her I will also include instructions for the Viking bison disco inferno dance, and the snot dance. And a specially drawn Chapter on how to be the Hunchback of Notre Dame and glove animal."

Jas said, "Well, that does it. She's done for."