Big Brother by Susannah McFarlane Page B

dare!’
    â€˜Yes!’ cried Emma and Elle together.
    It was Emma’s turn first. She chose truth. She knew she could trust her besties with anything.
    â€˜What are you really scared of?’ asked Elle.
    â€˜That’s easy,’ replied Emma. ‘The dark, but not so much anymore, spiders and horses.’
    â€˜Horses?’ cried Isi, surprised. ‘Why didn’t we know that and why? Horses are beautiful!’
    â€˜Not so much horses,’ explained Emma, ‘but riding them.’
    â€˜But you don’t ride, do you?’ asked Elle.
    â€˜No, and that’s why,’ explained Emma. ‘Mum says I got really freaked out when I went on a pony ride at a kinder fete and perhaps it started there. I love the idea of riding, you know how much I love animals, but there is just something about it. Okay, Is, your turn. Truth or dare?’
    Isi, unsurprisingly, chose dare.
    â€˜Hmmm, let’s think,’ said Emma, smiling at Elle. ‘What’s something really embarrassing Is can do?’
    â€˜BRB,’ said Isi.
    â€˜That’s it, I know,’ cried Elle. ‘Is, when you go to the toilet, you have to leave the door open!’
    â€˜No way!’ cried Isi.
    â€˜You chose dare, Is,’ said Elle.
    â€˜But …’ started Isi. ‘Oh well, NB.’
    â€˜What?’
    â€˜No biggie!’
    Isi walked up the corridor and into the toilet. The girls checked the door was still open and giggled.
    Within seconds, Bob and Otto come out of Bob’s bedroom. Beret barked and Emma rushed to the door.
    â€˜Just going to the bathroom,’ said Bob with a funny smile on his face.
    Otto started to laugh.
    â€˜No, you can’t … I mean … ISI!’ yelled Emma.
    They heard the toilet flush and Isi came out, blushing.
    â€˜Phew, that was close,’ said Emma.
    â€˜I think I’ll stick with truth next time,’ said Isi.
    â€˜Come on, let’s watch a DVD,’ said Elle.
    The girls went to the living room and chose a DVD. When they came back to the bedroom, Emma pulled the midnight feast bag out again.
    â€˜Hey, I thought we bought raspberry bullets,’ she said.
    â€˜We did, didn’t we?’ replied Elle.
    â€˜They’re not here,’ said Emma sifting through the bag.
    â€˜Weird. Oh well, whatever,’ said Isi. ‘Let’s start the watch-a-thon!’
    The girls spent the rest of the evening watching episodes of their favourite TV Show, Undercover Girls , eating lollies, talking and laughing until, finally, late in the night—or more exactly early in the morning—they all fell asleep.
    It was only then that the small black remote-controlled car with its red flashing light reversed out of Emma’s room and drove down the corridor into Bob’s bedroom, running over an empty raspberry bullet bag.

 
    After dinner on Sunday evening, when Elle and Isi had gone home, a rather tired Emma was cleaning her room, sort of. Pip and Beret weren’t helping. They were playing a tug-o-war with one of Emma’s socks.
    â€˜Hey, let go!’ she cried, prising the sock from Beret’s surprisingly sharp little teeth. Emma lay down on the doonas and cuddled the little puppy. ‘I’m pretty sure spy dogs don’t eat socks.’
    â€˜And you need to get off that bed, Emma! You’re supposed to be making it, not sleeping on it,’ said her mum as she walked into the room.
    â€˜I’m too tired to tidy up,’ groaned Emma.
    â€˜You weren’t too tired to stay up all night watching TV and playing truth or dare,’ rebuked her mum.
    That woke Emma up. ‘How did you know that we were playing truth or dare?’ she asked.
    â€˜Oh, Bob mentioned it in the car on the way to footy this morning.’
    â€˜Bob? But how did he know?’
    â€˜I don’t know,’ said Emma’s mum as she left with some dirty plates. ‘You were playing it though,