Bindi Babes by Narinder Dhami

too old,” Geena grumbled, tapping her fingers impatiently on her clipboard. “Don't you know anyone else?”
    Chelsea shook her head and escaped across the playground, a look of relief on her face. I glancedround to see where Sharelle had got to. She was sidling off behind the bike sheds.
    “What about your uncle Mac, Sharelle?” I reminded her. “You said he wasn't married.”
    “Yeah, but he likes living on his own,” Sharelle said apologetically. “And he's a bit strange. He collects bus tickets and files them. Anyway, he's not Indian.”
    “At the moment we'd consider a little green man from Mars,” snapped Geena. “Anyone else?”
    Sharelle looked blank.
    “Oh, this is hopeless,” I said. The campaign to find Auntie a husband had got off to a standing start.
    “Hey, you.” Geena collared Ragbir Singh from Year 7. “Do you know anyone who wants to get married?”
    Ragbir backed away across the playground, giggling nervously.
    “Not to me, you fool,” Geena snapped.
    Ragbir giggled even harder. He took to his heels and vanished behind the canteen.
    “Now it's going to be all round the school that Geena's looking for a husband,” Jazz remarked, trying not to sound gleeful but not trying very hard.
    Geena gave us both a penetrating look. “Well, I hope you'll put paid to
that
particular rumor if you hear it flying about.”
    “Of course,” I said. “After all, aren't you promised to Jagdev Singh the nosy accountant?”
    Jazz and I collapsed in hysterics. Geena glared and waved the clipboard at us threateningly.
    “Look, here's Kim,” Jazz gulped through her giggles.
    “Oops,” I said. “We forgot to wait for her this morning.”
    “You forgot to wait for me this morning,” Kim complained, heaving her rucksack across the playground. She had a large plaster on her right hand, which I deliberately didn't comment on. I didn't want to be bored to death for the next fifteen minutes.
    “Sorry,” I said. “We had something important to do.”
    “We're trying to find a husband for Auntie,” Geena explained briskly. “Do you know anyone?”
    Kim looked glum. “You could have Gary, if you like.”
    “Gary?” I had to think for a minute to work out who she meant. “Oh, your mum's boyfriend.”
    Kim's eyes shadowed. “I wouldn't mind getting rid of him,” she muttered.
    I didn't ask what she meant because I didn't want to know. I had my own problems. And Kim was just so good at making a drama out of nothing.
    “Make sure you ask everyone in your classes about husbands,” Geena ordered as the bell went.
    “Yes,
mein Führer
.” Jazz goose-stepped into the Year 7 cloakroom.
    “Geena,” Sarika Sharma called, “someone says you're looking for a husband. Is that true?”
    “Oh God,” Geena moaned.
    An interested crowd began to gather, and some of the boys started making very rude jokes, which I couldn't possibly repeat. They were funny, though.
    “Of course she's not looking for a husband,” I said. “She's already promised to Jagdev Singh.”
    An enraged Geena made a run at me, and I disappeared, laughing, round the corner toward our classroom. Kim trailed along behind me, her eyes like saucers.
    “Is Geena
really
getting married?” she asked.
    “Kim, keep up, for God's sake,” I snapped. “Of course she isn't.”
    “Oh.” Kim looked vaguely disappointed. Then she winced as something hit her on the back of the head. “Help!”
    I bent down and retrieved a woolly hat that had been balled up and used as a weapon. A few meters behind us George Botley was grinning like a maniac.
    “Ignore him,” I said, dropping the hat into a nearby litter bin. It landed very satisfactorily on a half-eaten ice cream.
    I sized up the rest of our class as we went into the room. I had to decide which ones I'd ask about husbands for Auntie. There were some whose relatives you definitely wouldn't want swimming in your gene pool. That was one of the reasons why I wasn't asking George Botley.
    “Hurry