The next morning, Taylor woke up with a sense of elation. That feeling disappeared, however, when he realised he had absolutely no clean clothes to wear. To add to his sense of depression, that day was the day when the whole family was going to visit Belinda's school, and he wanted to look respectable.
“F**k!” Exclaimed Taylor. “I’ve got f**king nothing to wear.” Then, “Who the f**k is that?” As a knock sounded on the closed door of the rumpus room, in which he was, at that moment, alone in.
“Can I come in?” Asked a voice from the hallway.
“F**k, yes,” replied Taylor.
A girl walked into the room. She had long red hair, and was dressed in a pink leotard, a pink tutu, pink tights, pink ballet slippers, pink plastic wings, and was carrying a pink plastic wand.
“Hi!” She greeted him brightly. “I’m your fairy godmother.”
“Do you f**king well have some obsession with pink?” Taylor asked her, annoyed.
“Well, what about you?” She snapped. Taylor looked down at his boxers, the only thing he was wearing. They were pink.
“At least I’m wearing blue underwear,” she said snidely. “Whereas you are wearing nothing but pink.”
“F**k. But..."
“Oh, shut up,” Taylor’s fairy godmother ordered him. “You’ll never beat me in an argument, so don’t even try.”
“Okay,” agreed Tay. “F**k, you look f**king young. Aren’t fairy godmothers meant to be old? You look f**king younger than me.”
“Don’t question me! I am superior to you!” She screamed. “Look, here’re some clothes. Put them on. I’ve gotta go save the world.”
Taylor’s fairy godmother jumped out the window of the rumpus room. Tay heard a motor rev up. He dashed to the window. Outside, he saw his fairy godmother hitch up her tutu as she roared away on her Harley motorbike. As she disappeared into the distance, she turned her head and looked back at Taylor. He could hear her scream above the sound of the bike, "And would you please stop swearing so bloody f**king much!”

Later that day, Taylor’s fairy godmother stopped off at Cinderella’s house. She handed Cinderella a golden ball gown, a matching golden tiara, and a pair of cherry docs, in size 13 mens.
“What?!!!” Cindy screamed. "I can't wear those horrible shoes to the ball. What happened to my f**king glass slippers?!"
“Whoops! Ah... I, er... must have given them to, ah... Taylor Hanson,” laughed the fairy godmother in a small voice. “Oh well. You’ll just have to make do with the cherry docs. At least you and him have the same size foot.” She gazed down at Cinderella's enormous feet. No wonder the slipper wouldn't fit anyone else, in the old fairy tale. It would have been far too big.
Cindy grumbled, but shoved her feet into the cherry docs. "Hey, these are pretty cool," she remarked...

Meanwhile, back at Belinda’s house, Taylor gazed in disgust at the size 13 mens glass slippers.
“Typical woman, mucking my shoes up like that,” he thought, feeling very masculine.
He didn’t feel quite so masculine, however, as he walked into Belinda’s kitchen in the slippers. In fact, he had a sudden urge to start waltzing and wished he had a golden ball gown with a matching tiara to do it in.
Luckily no one noticed Taylor’s shoes and they all set off for Belinda's school without further delay.

As the Hanson family and Belinda walked in the front gate of her school, they saw a pink elephant, a flower, a disco-dancing witch and a yellow bird with enormous wings.
“Is that how people dress at your school all the time?” Tay asked Belinda.
“No, of course not,” she replied. “Today is drama day. The people dressed up in costumes are in various plays.”
“Oh.” The entire Hanson family sighed in relief. They had been a little worried.
Just then Belinda spotted a girl called Kate. She turned to the Hansons.
“I absolutely have to go and talk to Kate. People say she’s got this new boyfriend called Nick, and I want to ask her about him. You guys go on inside and watch the plays. I’ll be there in a minute.” Bel gestured vaguely towards a large building and ran off in Kate's direction.
The Hansons had no idea where to go. Just then, a girl dressed as a tree ran out of the building. They decided to use the door she had just come from.
It was crowded and very dark inside. They stumbled over people and were told to shut up many times. All were confused. They headed towards the light, so they could see what was going on.
They went up five steps and found themselves on stage, in the middle of a play. Everyone froze.
“Hi,” Taylor ventured tentatively.
“Oh my God! It’s Hanson!” Screamed somebody.
“Look at the middle one’s shoes!” Somebody else screamed. The whole hall burst into laughter. Taylor blushed bright red, and the rest of his family stared at his previously unnoticed glass slippers.
“What the f**k?!” They said as one.
It was then that the trouble started. A girl in a journalist’s costume came up to them.
“Can you get off stage? Now. You’re wrecking our play.”
The hall was suddenly incensed into anger.
“Yeah, get out of our school, you stupid Hansons.”
“You’re wrecking everything.” “I hate Hanson.”
“Get out.”
“I love you, Taylor!”
Unfortunately that last person was in the minority. The Hansons were unceremoniously pelted with rotten fruit, then kicked out the door.

They decided to wait for Belinda outside. Just as they settled down on a nice comfy wooden bench built around the trunk of a big tree, a girl with blond hair dressed as a sheriff came out of one of the doors. She was wearing what looked like hideously uncomfortable black high-heeled boots. She sat down and pulled them off with a sigh of relief, leaving them on the bench and going back inside wearing only socks on her feet.
Taylor gazed at the boots inquisitively, then looked down at his own daintily crystal-clad feet.
“D’you think she’d mind if I took the boots?” He asked no one in particular.
“Of course not,” his mother replied tartly. “Just put them on and get those tacky glass slippers off. Where’d you get them, anyway?”
“My fairy godmother gave them to me. I think they were meant for Cinderella.”
“Oh.” His mother accepted this unquestioningly.
Tay pulled off the offensive slippers, and chucked them into a tree, forgetting what they were made of. They heard a crash, and then dodged as shards of glass poured down on them.
“Whoops!” Laughed Tay. “I almost killed us all.” For some reason, the whole family found this absolutely hilarious, and they were still laughing half and hour later when Belinda finally returned.
“OK, we can go now,” she said cheerfully.
Tay shoved his feet into the horrible boots, and they set off. The boots were far too small, about seven sizes too small, actually, and the heels were off centre, which made walking difficult, but Tay thought anything was better than the slippers.
He was wrong. The boots looked even worse. All the way home, people they passed on the street started laughing so hard at Tay’s lopsided limp and his toes, which had broken through the leather of the revolting boots, and were dragging on the ground in front of him.
By the time they reached Belinda’s house, every one of them, even Zoe, had a paper bag over his or her head to disguise themselves.
It had been an eventful day.

That night, Zac had trouble sleeping. Tomorrow they were going to see Jonathan...

[ 14 ]