Poppy's Garden by Holly Webb

hands in her hoodie pockets to stop herself twisting them together. She was so panicky that her hands felt itchy.
    “I – um – designed a mural, because I wanted the garden to look bigger than it really is,” she added,pulling out one hand to wave at the wall behind her. Then she screamed. The itching wasn’t nerves. There was a massive brown and grey spider sitting on the back of her hand.
    Even though Poppy loved the idea of using spider’s webs as a natural dressing for cuts, and she’d designed bug shelters for the garden, she didn’t actually like spiders all that much. And even someone who positively loved spiders would scream if they happened to find a huge one on their hand. She shook it frantically, but the spider clung on.
    “Poppy, your pocket!” Izzy yelled, darting round the cameraman and running towards her. “They’re in your pocket!”
    Poppy looked down in horror and saw other things climbing out of the pocket of her hoodie: other wriggly, leggy things. She screamed again, scrabbling madly at her zip with the other hand, and still trying to shake the spider off.
    “It’s OK, Poppy.” Mr Finlay grabbed the spider – he actually just picked it up, Poppy saw, suddenly realising that he was the best teacher in the history of the world. He hurried away to the other end of the garden with it cupped in his hands.
    Izzy was undoing Poppy’s zip, and Maya and Emilywrenched the hoodie off and then hugged her.
    “Ali must have put them in my pocket,” Poppy sobbed. “She said it was chocolate.”
    “That was Ali?” Mr Finlay snapped. Poppy hadn’t seen him come back. “Ali Morgan, get over here now! And you, Elspeth. And Lucy. All of you.”
    “Oh, they’re in big trouble,” Emily said blissfully. “They’re dead.”
    Poppy sat down shakily on the edge of the raised bed, and one of the crew handed her a bottle of water. She looked a bit shaky too.
    “Are you OK?” she asked. “I can’t stand spiders, and that one was massive. I’d have run a mile.”
    “Do I have to do it all again?” Poppy whispered miserably, glancing up at Joe, who was crouching next to her, looking worried.
    “Actually, what you said before the spider was great. We’ll be fine with that. Wow, I’d forgotten how mean girls can be sometimes. You lot should go on over to the catering van and get yourselves some cake. That’ll make you feel better. Honestly.”
    “You’ll feel even better if you look at Mr Finlay yelling at Ali,” Izzy whispered, nudging Poppy with her elbow.

    “Oh, look.” Maya gave a little sigh of delight. “That’s just mean. Mr Finlay is amazing.”
    Poppy nodded fervently, remembering the spider. “Totally amazing. What’s he done?” She was trying to eat a piece of lemon cake – Maya had been right, the catering van had yummy food, much, much better than school lunches – but it was mostly a pile of crumbs on her plate. It seemed to catch in her throat when she tried to swallow it. She craned her neck to see over Maya’s shoulder – they were sitting on the edge of one of the new raised beds with their cake.
    Mr Finlay was standing in the middle of the garden, with his arms full of bright-orange high-vis vests. A bit like the ones the girls had used when they were doing their canal clean-up.
    “I didn’t know we were supposed to wear those for the gardening,” Poppy murmured.
    Maya patted her shoulder gently. “We don’t have to, Poppy. Wake up.”
    “Who’s that with him?” Izzy asked curiously, and Poppy frowned. “That’s Rachel. The one who did my make-up.” She’d had to have some base and blusher before they filmed her, just to make sure she didn’t looked washed out, Rachel had said. “What’sshe doing? Are they going to film Ali and Elspeth and Lucy?” Her mind was still half on the scratchy feeling of little spider feet, and she knew she was being slow.
    “Yes, of course they are! And she’s making them take all their make-up off!” Emily squeaked.