Now, I have time.

So, yesterday I, and seven other girls from my year, went to Barker to meet Derek Landy. I am going to give them all code names now, so that I can refer to them freely.

Let's see..

Well, Hayley went, so did Vulpin, and Áine and Echo. Um... Acid... Doc... One more... Ummmmmm... Art.

Yes. Me, Hayley, Vulpin, Áine, Echo, Acid, Doc and Art.

So, the eight of us took a train to Barker, and got there about 45 minutes before Derek. We immediately got taken to their school canteen, and, in true school spirit, we raided the place. They had the most spectacular canteen. It was awesome. Anyway, one of the Barker librarians led us to this courtyard thing and told us to eat there, quietly because classes were on. We all nodded and chatted, and the two teachers (one from our school, and the one from theirs) walked into the Barker school library.

And, HOLY MOLEY, THEIR LIBRARY. Three storeys. Holy moley. Huge. They had a library theatre. We don't even know what that is!

*coughs*

Anyway, we were sitting there, chatting in excitement when this bell rang. And BOY!, it was loud. We all looked at each other, thinking 'Fire?' but no, it was just the end of lesson bell, which was kind of odd for us, because we don't have bells to tell us where we need to go when.

We have clocks.

Um, and then all these boys appeared, which was also odd, because we go to an all girls school. Anyway, we finished our food and got a tour of their library (Which, I was convinced was an act of them trying to get us to go to school there next year, which we could if we wanted, because we're all in year nine.)  Which was awesome. And then, we got told to go stand by a flagpole, and wait there. So we did, and we babbled a little more until I looked up the hill we were standing on and said "He's here."

And he was. It was cool. He walked down the hill, and he was getting something out of his bag when he saw us and waved. And then he said hello, so we said hello back, AND THEN.

AND THEN ACID, the twit, jumped out and said "THAT'S SPARKY!" pointing at me. AND THEN everyone except for Hayley and Vulpin yelled in agreement. And Derek halted, looked at me and grinned.

He just grinned. It was amazing. And I said 'From the competition at the beginning of the year?' and he laughed and shook my hand and said 'Wow! It's like meeting an old friend!' and I laughed and agreed. And then I introduced him to Hayley, and he looked at her and said 'I can tell I got you right.' and we laughed and nodded and then he said 'Now, if we can just agree that if an action figure of Hayley is ever made, I get all the money, we can be friends.' and we both agreed and he smiled and said 'Yay! We're friends now! Isn't that great?'

Wow.

Um, and then we all went in and he spoke, and he began his talk with why he liked tours... 'And, I have to say, my favourite thing is making friends. Sparky, don't you think it's fun? We're friends, right?' And I laughed and said yes, and he grinned and nodded, saying 'See? We're friends! Friends are fun!'

Woow.

And then he spoke. About himself, about his cats, he answered questions, and then he signed things. We had to wait because the boys had classes they needed to get to. So, they all filed out, and then it was the eight of us. Vulpin didn't have anything to get signed, so I made her hold my bag when I got things signed (not my nicest moment, but I was acting a little funny yesterday) and he opened the books and I said 'Um, could I get those signed to Sparky?' and he goes 'Why not both?'

So, I got two books signed to Sparky, and one signed to my name with a picture of Skulduggery holding a sign saying "Hi Sparky!"

I was about to go again when I remembered that I had to give Derek the letter from Val. So I snatched the bag out of Vulpin's hands (she wasn't at all happy with me after that) took the piece of paper out and handed it to him. I said 'This is from Val V. Remember her? She held a birthday party for you last year.' and he laughed and took it and said 'Of course I remember Ivy. How could I forget?'

So cool.

Doc got hers signed and Derek looked at her name and said 'One of my nieces is named that!' and he looked around, and leaned in. We all crowded around the desk and said 'Would you like to see my niece?' and we all nodded and he pulled out his phone and scrolled through a few pictures and showed us a video of his niece, singing. She's so cute. Soooooooo cute.

And then Hayley got her book signed to Hayley Skirmish, and Derek chuckled all the way through it, and then Hayl looked at me and asked if she should say anything, now that we were here. I told her to tell him about a thing that happened to Hayley happened to her, and she told him the proper story and they shared a look and he said, 'That is just weird.' 

And then Art came up, and she had just drawn a picture of Skulduggery (like, JUST) for him to sign, and he took it and said 'Oh! I can draw too! Art college, let me show you.' and he draws this little doodle on the paper next to the Skulduggery and signed it, then said 'There. That's me.'

And then we had to go back to school...