The Most Beautiful Girl in the School

When I was 11 I was Best Friends with the most beautiful girl in the school. Her name was Cathy Sidaway and everyone who laid eyes on her fell instantly in love.

No no, don't worry, she wasn't one of those. She was too geeky to be cool and too kind to be popular. But everyone fell instantly in love with her regardless, as soon as they laid eyes on her, including me. So of course I was delighted when Cathy decided that, due to our shared interest in books, art, and Greenpeace, it was only natural we should become Best Friends. And then she bought us silver lockets to prove it, and that was that.

Unfortunately, Cathy began to get more invites to go round the back of Room 21 than even the glamorous (and fully-developed) Cassie Liddall. This troubled me. If Cathy was busy at lunchtimes with some boy's tongue down her throat, what would become of me? And what about the History Club we had started together? And who would go and shove the boys in the corridor who called out "gingey-minge!" as I walked by? No no, this was no good at all, something had to be done.

Luckily for me, I didn't have to voice my concerns because it turned out that Cathy was as dead against the idea of Room 21 as I was. The last thing she wanted was to have some Llanrwst boy's tongue down her throat when we could be responsibly plastering Dogs Die In Hot Cars stickers all over our teachers' windscreens, or trying to round up 1st Years for our new Thursday lunchtime Embroidery Club venture. So, to my great relief, she decided that no no, boys were no good at all, and something had to be done.

Now, Cathy was not only beautiful, but cunning as well. And so she invested in a pair of lensless yet genuine-looking spectacles—despite her 20/20 vision—and wore them down at the end of her nose in order to put the boys off. We called them her "snog-off device" (cringe) and decided that if she ever did want to try snogging a boy, she could remove them in a sultry and provocative manner, like we had seen Julia Roberts do in some Hollywood movie that I forget the name of.

It didn't really work, of course, as everyone already knew she was the most beautiful girl in the school, and boys continued to swarm around her, despite the glasses, the kilt, and the two buns she put in her hair. But, by the time she got round to removing her spectacles in a sultry and provocative manner behind Room 21, I didn't mind so much, as I was round the back of the science lab learning how to smoke a joint without coughing up my stomach lining.

Fifteen years later we're still in touch nearly every day, and tonight the Most Beautiful Girl in the School lands in Iceland. It'll be just like the first days, only with added Cosmopolitans. I'll post pictures next week.