The Boy Who Sailed the Ocean in an Armchair Read online

  Two hours later, after Cat has gone home and Billy has gone to bed, I settle down with Dad to watch Monster vs Man on TV. Every so often I look at him, studying his face. He doesn’t look different, but I can’t help thinking of all the women he’s dating. It’s like Dad is a woman-magnet. Just as I am distracted by gazing at Dad’s long nostril hair, the phone rings. Dad and his nostrils trot away down the hallway.

  On the TV, a troll whacks a man on the head with a fish as he tries to get across the assault course. A giggle escapes from my lips. Ding ding! The man makes his way to the punching wall next and gets biffed in the guts. What kind of crazy person would do this stuff? I ask myself. Over the sound of the TV, I suddenly hear Dad say Pearl’s name. I rise off my bum and peer over the back of the sofa through the open door into the hall.

  I strain my ears and hear Dad pleading with Pearl not to keep ringing him, to leave it. Suddenly it feels like the previous happiness in the flat has been vacuumed up. After a minute or two, I feel so awkward listening in that I go and hide under the kitchen table, where I find Brian, who clearly left the table two hours ago and has only just reached the floor.

  “Becket!” I bang my head on the underside of the table with an almighty thwack. Painfully, I crawl out and tell Dad I was looking for Brian. That’s when I stand up and hear a horrible crack under my foot. The sort of crack that makes you realize your internal organs can play their own wind instrument. Gingerly I lift my foot, praying to the gods of all things slimy, and stare at what is underneath. A cheese and onion crisp is stuck to my sock. Brian is still under the table. With much relief, I pick him up and say I’m going to put him back in the shoebox penthouse Billy made for him.

  “Before you go, did you hear anything of my phone call?” Dad chews on his lip until I see a tiny split in the skin.

  “What?”

  “Did you hear who I was talking to?” asks Dad.

  The lie tumbles from my tongue like a toddler on a gym mat. “No.”

  Dad says that’s good and then he changes the subject, saying he can’t wait for the party. He looks at Brian in my hand and says it’s time I put him to bed and went there myself. Dad kisses my head and says, “I love you, son.”

  I tell Dad I love him too.

  What I don’t tell him is that I don’t understand him.

  Once I’m inside our bedroom, Brian goes straight back into the shoebox by Billy’s bed. Billy has built him a proper little home out of matchsticks, bits of fluff, and a small patch of mud in the corner.

  “You see, Billy…” I whisper, placing Brian carefully back in the box. Billy gives a contented little snore. “I brought your friend home. I might have fired Brian number one into Knuckles’s garden but I made a mistake. You need Brian. I can see that now.” Billy’s eyelids flicker gently, and then he turns away and lets out a little sigh.

  I put on my pyjamas and climb into bed, but that’s not the last time I see Billy before morning.

  At five forty-three exactly Billy comes to me, saying he’s had another nightmare.

  “Do you want to get into bed with me?” I mumble through the sleepy haze of a dream about a giant troll whacking me in the face with a giddy kipper as I ran across cracked snail shells in my bare feet.

  “No,” Billy replies. “It’s dark and scary when you close your eyes.”

  “But you close your eyes every night,” I mumble throwing back the sheets and climbing out. I tell Billy we’ll curl up in the armchair for a while. “I’ll tell you more of the story,” I say.

  Billy nods and rubs his eyes briskly before following me to the armchair.

  “When the first boy fell into the water,” I tell Billy, wiggling my feet, “it felt as though he had escaped the storm. It was calm below the ocean surface. That’s when he saw her, a creature so beautiful that he could hardly tear his eyes away from her. She had hair like long dark ribbons and her skin was wrapped in seaweed. And although she didn’t open her mouth, she had the voice he had heard on the surface.”

  Billy asks for her name. I say I’m not sure but I’ll come up with a name soon.

  “When the second boy followed, hoping to save his brother, he too saw the beautiful creature,” I say.

  “Was she a mermaid?” Billy takes the swallow cushion and hugs it tightly.

  “I don’t know, but she was definitely from another world and the two boys wanted to stay with her more than anything. They decided they didn’t want to go back to the storm because it was hard work trying to get through it, especially when they didn’t even know what the land would be like if they reached it. No, they’d stay with her where it was calm. She swam with them through sunken galleons and she showed them things they’d never seen before: giant starfish that looked like they’d fallen from heaven, small shrines made from shells, and corals that grew like plants from the sand. She showed them fish that sparkled like fireworks and pufferfish that floated away like balloons and she drew pictures on the ocean floor.”

  Billy’s eyes droop and he lifts his thumb and pops it into his mouth, snuggling closer into my dinosaur pyjamas.

  There is a tiny snore and Billy is already asleep. Gently, I try to disentangle myself without disturbing him. Lifting his duvet from the bed, I gently cover his little body.

  “I’ve never told you this, Billy,” I whisper. “The thing is, it was so hard when Mum died…but we had you. And you’re special.” My eyes fill with tears and I let them go because there’s no one to see them spill. Quickly I tiptoe back to my bed, hardly seeing where I’m going, and when I pull back the cover there’s a paper crane there, waiting for me.

  As I pick it up my tears soak the wing, making it droop a little.

  Ever since Dad mentioned the party last week he has talked of nothing else. He’s been saying: I’d better buy a million pork pies for all the guests that will be attending (in the end I found out it was eleven, including us, so by my reckoning he doesn’t need 999,989 of those pork pies). He’s bought spotty bunting and balloons too. We blew the balloons up earlier and I thought they’d been made of rhino hide, they were so hard to blow up. In the end I was grateful I was still alive to attend the party and hadn’t burst the air sacs in my lungs. Right now those same balloons are floating across the floor like oily bubbles and the eleven pork pies that Dad bought are sitting on a paper plate in the kitchen along with quiche, crisps, buns and sandwiches.

  All we need now are some guests.

  “Everything is going to be brilliant,” says Billy, stretching out his arms and looking up and spinning around until he drops in a heap onto the floor.

  I don’t answer him. To be honest, I don’t think everything is going to be brilliant, not after hearing Dad on the phone to Pearl over a week ago. But I don’t want to burst Billy’s bubble. (Although, last night, I did accidentally burst his helium balloon from that shopping trip we had. Who lets a slightly deflated horse float about in the dark? I went to the toilet in the middle of the night and when something floated from behind the door I thought it was a ghost. It was only after I’d put my fingernails in its head that I realized what it was. This morning when I told Dad what had happened he just laughed and said it was your classic night mare.)

  “You know why it’s going to be brilliant?” Billy grins. No, I don’t know but I have a feeling Billy is going to tell me. I pause as Billy continues, “Because I invited Pearl.”

  Sweet Baby Cheeses! If I was prone to fainting, I would be in a heap on the floor. I stutter, “Y-y-you are joking, amirite?”

  “You are wrong.”

  I need time for this to sink in – and by time, I mean a millennium.

  Then Billy corrects himself and says he didn’t invite Pearl after all. Just as my body is relaxing he says, “I didn’t invite Pearl, Brian did.” Oh, for the love of Lego. Billy continues that last week Brian encouraged him to borrow my phone while I was in the toilet and Brian left a message asking Pearl to come to the party.

  I bark, “Brian CANNOT talk.”

>   “Brian said you’d say that.”

  Oh, I cannot speak to Billy any more. I have to actually walk away and bang my head on a wall, which is very hard and I have to stop because I cannot afford to lose any brain cells since I’m the only one in this family with any to start with.

  Dad zooms past me and then begins dancing like no one is watching which, in my opinion, is a bad thing. All people should dance like someone is watching – that way they wouldn’t be so awful. Right now, Dad is pirouetting like a baby elephant. He has accidentally pulled some of the bunting down and it looks like a triangular wig. In his hand is a can of beer and when his hand wobbles, wee-coloured liquid sloshes onto the carpet. When Dad realizes he mouths, “Whoops,” and smudges the wet patch with his toe. Then he skitters into the kitchen, pulling down the sleeve of his jumper and using the fabric as an oven mitt to bring out a tray of steaming-hot baby sausages.

  To be honest, I’m no Einstein (although I’m the closest this family has got to him) but I don’t think the jumper will work as an oven mitt. This is confirmed when Dad slams the tray down and begins blowing on his fingers and dancing around again, only this time I think it’s more pain than party.

  “I think you’re being very silly, Daddy,” announces Billy.

  “I am,” replies Dad. “But it’s all good. Why worry about a few tiny blisters on my fingers when there’s a whole heap of fun to be had?”

  “Daddy will stop being a big boo-boo when Pearl gets here,” whispers Billy when we go back into the living room with a bowl of prawn cocktail crisps. “When Pearl gets here everything will be okay and SNOOP will be the winners and it’ll be all because of Brian.”

  I lean over and whisper in Billy’s ear. “You can’t rely on Pearl to come. I don’t want you getting your hopes up.” I think back to Dad’s phone call from Pearl over a week ago. There’s no way that he’s in any mood to meet up with Pearl, and definitely not by surprise like this.

  But it’s obvious that Billy’s hopes are so high they’re on a ladder halfway to heaven. What’s more, I’ve obviously made him angry by suggesting she might not show up, because he pushes me away and says no SNOOP member would say something like that. Then he snatches the prawn cocktail crisps, drags up a chair and plonks himself where he has a view straight down the hallway to the front door. “Pearl will come,” he echoes.

  At that very moment there’s a knock at the door. Billy looks at me and I look at him. Dad yells that he’ll get it and I have to yell back that I’ll get it because Dad needs to look after those blisters he just got before they get infected and turn into big green pus-filled sacs of goo that could lead to impetigo which is very infectious and requires antibiotics. And sometimes antibiotics don’t even work. Dad doesn’t answer me back but I hear him frantically banging cupboards and muttering about antiseptic spray as I race towards the front door, Billy following me.

  A millisecond later I reach for the door and fling it open.

  It’s Cat and she is all smiles and carrying a tray of funny little pastry circles. “Vol-au-vents?” she says.

  Billy says he can only speak one language.

  “English, you mean?” Cat says as she enters the hallway.

  “No,” replies Billy. “Snail.”

  Cat almost creases up and says, “Oh, Billy. You’re one of a kind.” She’s got that right.

  Today, Cat looks different. She’s all smart and wearing a flouncy black dress dotted with these tiny red ladybirds, which Billy likes very much. Around her neck she’s wearing a thin red satin ribbon and she’s tied it in a dainty bow to the side. Her hair is all red and glossy like the newly washed bonnet of a car and she has got these funny little black flicky lines drawn on her eyes that really make her look like Cat Woman.

  Dad wobbles towards Cat and says she’s a sight for sore eyes. The scent of antiseptic is coming off him but everyone pretends not to notice. Dad glances down at Cat’s tray and says how much he loves vol-au-vents, before leading Cat towards the kitchen, his bum cheeks doing a tiny salsa on the way.

  Dad has propped the door onto the street open with a plastic haddock from the back of his van, which means everyone can come on up to the party without having to buzz. There are several more knocks at the flat door…

  Ten minutes later, if I was writing up the guests we now have in attendance, it would take me about thirty seconds:

  We have Dad, who is insisting on doing the “Hokey Cokey”, only when he’s supposed to put his left leg in he makes a mistake and uses his right, kicking Cat in the shin and nearly sending her plate of food into the air.

  We have Cat, who is now limping around asking for ice. Dad asks, for her drink? No, apparently for her shin.

  We have three fish delivery blokes, let’s just call them Flounder, Skate and Sole. A fourth and fifth turn up and it’s obvious the fourth loves himself because he talks very loudly. Let’s just call him Brill. The fifth looks well shifty, with a dodgy haircut. Small-Eyed Ray for him. Although it was a toss-up between that name and Thick-Lipped Grey Mullet.

  We have two women from a restaurant Dad delivers to. They are standing in the corner talking about mussels. Or muscles. I don’t know which.

  Then there’s Billy, who is back on his seat, watching the front door. “Pearl’s going to come,” he repeats over and over.

  And me. And I keep saying that Pearl might not.

  “She will, because I said Dad had won the lottery.”

  I tell Billy we haven’t won the lottery. Actually, scrap that, I screech that we haven’t won the lottery. “Why would you leave Pearl a message saying that?” Okay, now I’m so angry I could punch a hole in a hole punch. “Are you completely doolally, Billy Rumsey? The flipping lottery? This takes the biscuit. Like, we’re millionaires now who happen to be living in a crummy two-bed flat. Yeah, because so many millionaires do that and so many millionaires drive an old van with a plastic cod on it instead of a Lamborghini. Oh, and we eat from Mr Wong’s or the Giggling Squid chippie or the Burger, She Wrote burger van and we’re beating off those other millionaires to get to the onion rings first.”

  “Daddy won ten pounds,” says Billy, frowning at me. He pauses and then continues, “On a scratchcard.”

  Sweet Baby Cheeses! The penny drops from the height of Kilimanjaro. “Oh,” I reply, piping right down. “I suppose he did, but it was ages ago and it was only ten pounds and we spent it on takeaway.”

  “Oh yeah,” replies Billy. “I forgot to tell Pearl that. I liked the prawn toast though.” Billy adds that we might win the lottery again soon. Does that count? No, it doesn’t. I glance over at Dad, who according to Billy should be holding one of those giant cheques with loads of zeros on it. Instead he’s headbutting balloons and doing the can’tcan’t, which is Dad’s own version of the cancan.

  I hear the door go again and sprint down the hallway, followed by Billy. As I open the door, Billy’s mouth drops open and he shouts, “Pearl, I knew you’d come!”

  “Fancy seeing you here and how lovely that you’re having a party,” says Pearl, smiling at me and handing me a bottle of wine. “Trust your dad to have a party on a Tuesday – he always was daft. I suppose it’s to celebrate your lottery win.” She plays with a large ring on her little finger that looks like a spoonful of amber-coloured jelly.

  “Oh yeah,” says Billy, rushing towards Pearl and clinging to her like a spider monkey. “I got mixed up. We won—”

  “Exactly ten pounds,” I finish Billy’s sentence for him. “But you’re here now, so it doesn’t matter.” I feel a rush of excitement when I reach out to hug Pearl. She feels warm and smells of coconut and summer sunshine. I remember how it used to be, having her around the house. I think about how Pearl would let us paint pictures using her special tubes of paint that Billy called goo-ache and how she’d pick us up from school and take us to the sweet shop on a Friday. And if we were sick she’d give us white syrup on a spoon and tuck us up in bed. She’d come to school nativities too, even the time when Bi
lly was the inn keeper and told Joseph and Mary there was room at the inn.

  But Pearl pulls away. “I didn’t know where you’d run off to until I got Billy’s phone call last week and he left me a message about this party above Crops and Bobbers. Anyway, I took down the details and I drove straight here after my painting classes at Tower Point.” Spluttering, I try to tell Pearl that we texted her but she didn’t respond. Pearl looks vaguely surprised and says she didn’t get the texts, but I don’t believe her because there’s a tiny twitch at the corner of her lip. Billy is so excited, it’s like he’s drunk ten fruit squashes all at once. He wants to show Pearl his pet snail who helped him contact her, but Pearl is telling him she doesn’t want to see the snail unless it’s on a plate and covered in a herby butter sauce.

  “Oh,” says Billy and then his face brightens as he realizes it was probably a joke. Only judging by Pearl’s face now, I don’t think it was. “I knew you wouldn’t leave us,” adds Billy, hopping about from one foot to the other. I can see a spark of happiness in his eyes and I feel the same until Pearl grimaces.

  Her voice is as dry as a flip-flop in the Sahara. “I didn’t leave you. You left me, didn’t you? Now where’s your father?”

  There’s a big whoop from the living room. That’s our father; I’d know that whoop anywhere. Pearl marches straight into the living room and sees Dad hand-in-hand with Cat as they limbo under a kitchen broom. I didn’t even know we had a broom – we’ve never used it. They’re both snorting with laughter as they fall onto the floor together in one big mass of frothy red net from Cat’s skirt.

  Someone changes the music and suddenly Dad, whose arms and legs are tangled up octopus-style with Cat’s, looks up and sees Pearl towering over him, arms folded. There’s a moment when his jaw drops so low he could fit the world’s biggest gobstopper in there. And still have room for a watermelon.

  I’ve never seen Dad move so fast unless it’s for the remote control when we want to watch kids’ TV. He’s up off the floor in a flash and starts saying that the party is over because he’s got an early appointment in the morning. There are groans and grumbles until Dad says everyone can take a bottle with them. No need to feel shy. Apparently no one does, because it’s like a plague of locusts have just cleared our kitchen. Someone even took Pearl’s wine bottle from my hand. It was probably Small-Eyed Ray. I knew he was shifty.