The Three Star Hotel

Chapter One

My name is Star.  If I was five it would be something to be proud of. But if you're in middle school, you're up for months of teasing.
Three weeks ago I thought I'd be ready.
But I'm not.
Lucky I have two best friends, Ginger Mattson and Katie Richards. Ginger might sound like a weird name, but if you saw her before you heard her name, you'd be wishing you were her sister or best friend. Ginger has this amazing curly goldy-orange hair, reaching her shoulders, and shining green eyes.  About every girly-girl there ever was would wish for her arched eye-brows and friendliness.
Katie, on the other hand, has glasses, and in movies she'd be classified with a big fat NERD, but here in Green-Lane Middle School, she's the thumbs up for an A+ on homework.
Me, I'm just a girl with boring brown eyes and black hair, daydreaming about cats and lollipops. I'm not exactly living up my name.

Mum acts like I'm the best child in the world. She boasts about the times I clean up my room without asking, and when I sweep up the mess my little sister Dollie makes when she's attempting to make a TV for her Barbies.

One day at school, Ginger starts the day by shooing all her fans away. It goes like this:
"Ginger, do you wanna go out and have pizza tonight?" Mandy Farrel asks.  "I'd love to, but I've got to take Betty to the dog salon, you wanna come?"

"I'd love to, but, uh, I've gotta do my homework, sorry," Mandy says, not sounding sorry at all. It's really clear to me that she was hoping to get Ginger to become her best friend.

"It's okay," Ginger mumbles.
"Urgh!" Katie yells out in frustration as the furiously presses the numbers on her calculator. "Star, could you do me a favor and yell out, 'You are stupido!' to this wreck of a calculator!"
"Uh, okay," I say, and do what she tells me, except with a lower volume and higher dignity.
*
After school, Mum attacks me with the annalysing-the-school-day routine.
After she goes past the, "Did you learn anything useful for your future?" question, I throw a fit.
"Mum, can you please leave me alone?" I ask.
"Sure, honey," Mum says and proceeds to go back to help Dollie make a paper fan out of card-board.
Suddenly, my iPhone starts to ring.
"Hey?" I say, answering it with a snap and a click.
"Hey, Star," says a familiar voice.
"Candy!" I call out. Cally Midge, aka Candy, was my best friend back when I was in Emerald Primary, back in the suburbs of St Victoria.
"Volume down, your voice is ten times louder than it is on the phone you know!" Candy chuckles. "I missed you too!"
"So, Can-Can, how's Boarding school at Amdrey Manor?" I ask.
"More like boarding school at The-Teacher's-Grey Manor," Candy groans. "Do you know what Mrs Amdrey made us do on the first night?"
"What?"
"Wash all our clothes and make our own dinner, that's what!"
"Seriously?"
"Seriously!!"
"So, when do you have to go to bed?"
"Six o'clo - oh, dangit! Bedtime bell's ringing. Gotta dash. Maybe we could go out for a gelato and pizza at Cashew Rd on Saturday?"
"Okay! See ya!"

Chapter Two

Today is Thursday. Speech day. A day when our principal, Mr Smart, gives us a speech about being yourself and kind to other fellow strangers-I mean students.
God, I'd rather write a whole document on how worms live than go to school.
"Come on, Star, you don't want to be late," Dad says, sipping his coffee.
"Yes," Mum agrees, "After all, it's only your third week."
"My third Thursday of torture, more like!" I state sarcastically. Actually, it's true, on every Thursday on my calendar I've coloured it in red and written Speech Day in capital letters and drawn skulls all around it. 

After the school bus, and a long speech about friendship and being yourself, Mr Smart releases us to recess as the speeches have taken us one whole session.

"What'd you think about the act?" Jeniffer Hagges asks us.
"What act?...Oh, the one where Mr Peteson runs into the room as a fairy and gives us all that boring set of stories? Yeah, that one was a knockout!" Ginger grins, clutching me and Katie's hands.

"I want a cookie!" Dollie wails. Me, Mum, Katie, Ginger, and sadly, Dollie, are at Robinsons park on Friday afternoon.
"Come off it, Doll, honey," Mum says smoothly, and grabs Dollie to give her a hug.
"But the man says to COME AND GET ONE!!!!!!!!!!!" Dollie wails.
"I'll make you some when we get home, sweetie," Mum says, desperately clutching Dollie.
"BUT I WANT HIS COOKIES!!!!!" Dollie wails, going full volume.
"Um, you girls, do you mind if I buy some cookies for Dollie and go home?"
"Yeah," me, Katie and Ginger chorus eagerly.
"Okay, be home before dinner." Mum gets up and takes the wailing Dollie to the cookies stall and gives me a kiss.
*
The next day, me and Candy are glued to a Star Girl magazine article about young chick writers in Afghanistan and America.
"Check it out!" Candy says, and points to a picture of a lady and a girl posed together holding two books each. "Clarissa Morris and her mother, Janice Morris write four books in the series of Rose Quartz! Hey, isn't that the book Mr Taylor the librarian is nagging you to read?"
 "Yeah!" I say. "Hey, Candy, can we go get a pizza? I'm starved!"
"Yeah, okay, catch you later at Cafe` Paradise."
I get up from the park bench and head off to Cafe` Paradise. The scent of pizza and hot pie fills my nose. I dash over to the counter and order two pepperoni pizzas and sit down in a side booth.
A few minutes after our pizzas arrive, Candy dashes over and plonks herself down in front of me.
"Eat it quick!" I say, taking a bite of pizza. "It's getting cold."
After we finish, I order two gelatos to go.
"Yum!" Candy says, taking a lick. "This is better than the stuff they serve at school!"
"Definetly better than the stuff at your school!" I grin.
To be continued in the series of Three Star hotel.