A Boy Called Hope Page 6

  I have to think fast. “I was reading your slogan.”

  “Oh, that,” she says, pulling the T-shirt flat and looking down. “Pretty cool, non?”

  Non! It is not pretty cool and speaking in French isn’t going to change the fact that my sister is pregnant. As my eyes linger on her stomach, Grace folds an arm across her middle, covering my view, and with her other hand she picks up the remote control and flicks channels.

  “Look who it isn’t.” Grace groans. “We cannot escape this man.”

  Up pops Dad, chatting about a traffic situation to the west of the Paradise estate. He says we should avoid the MacNab roundabout, where there has been an unfortunate collision, and we should also steer clear of the Milton underpass. Beneath his glasses I can see violet crescent-moons, and a small tuft of silver hair juts out from above his left ear. Occasionally his hand strays across the wild expanses of the Sahara desk. Then it moves back again and he clears his throat.

  “Why make him your hero?” says Ninja Grace. “He’s nobody.”

  I shake my head. “He’s a star, look at him.”

  “We don’t want a star. We want a dad.”

  Sometimes it’s impossible to answer Ninja Grace back because she’s always got a smarter response to the genius reply that took you ages to think up. But the real problem is, Grace has a point. Although it’s amazing seeing your dad on the TV, I’ve come to the conclusion that I would like him to do normal things again, like pick me up from school and play football in Paradise Parade.

  Dad shakes his head and gives us a smile that’s so wide there could be a watermelon slice jammed in his mouth. He says he’d like to introduce us to a stunning weather girl – as if he’s seen a whole parade of weather girls and this one was the best. “She’s so beautiful,” he says, “that I married her.” Grace and I look at each other, horrified. “Drum roll, please.” There isn’t an actual drum roll, but my heart is doing a good impression. “Welcome to Barbara Ann Maynard.” The camera cuts away to a woman standing in front of a weather map.

  My eyeballs bulge like they’re bursting out of a super squishy mesh ball. Busty Babs is dressed as a beautiful ladybird, in a red and black polka-dot dress. It’s so clingy you can tell what she’s eaten for lunch (apparently nothing more than a grape). Sheets of blonde hair cascade to her shoulders and she breaks into an easy smile, displaying teeth that could be mistaken for a string of creamy pearls.

  “Eau de vinegar,” snaps Grace. “I don’t know what he ever saw in her.”

  I could take a wild guess.

  “She’s not how I imagined,” I say softly.

  “She’d better not be,” Grace says, squinting at me. Grace proceeds to tell me she hates nepotism, which is apparently something to do with getting your friends and family into a job. Well, that’s a lie for a start, because she follows it up with, “If we were still friendly with Dad and there was a fabulous job going as a weather girl, then I should have got it.”

  “Don’t you have to get your GCSEs first?” I ask.

  “Pffttt…” Grace glares at me. “Who cares? I’ve already got a degree in common sense.”

  “At least you’d know you hadn’t got it for your looks,” I admit. But Ninja Grace bares her teeth and I have to hastily retreat. “You’d get it because you’re so clever, I mean.”

  “Ain’t that the truth,” replies Grace, “and because I’m smart, I’m switching over.”

  I clear my throat and ask if we’re going to have to skip the weather report from now on. “We’ll not know if it’s raining or sunny,” I say glumly.

  “Look out the window,” Grace says.

  Life has a habit of biting you in the bum, that’s what Mum says. Well, she doesn’t actually say “bum”, but that’s another story. Just when I think there’s no unbitten bits left on my bottom, Mrs Parfitt takes another chunk of flesh when she tells us our next task on Project Eco Everywhere is to do a hero show-and-tell. Is there no end to this Project Eco Everywhere misery? Apparently, we’ve got to bring in an item our hero has given us and talk to the class about it for one minute. Sixty whole seconds of suffering.

  I’m panicking about what item I’m going to be able to bring in. Dad didn’t give me much. All I can think of is the teddy bear he bought me at the beach. I was only six years old and I got lost. Fear nibbled at my insides, I remember that much, and I thought I’d never see Dad again. I ran around in circles, searching everyone’s face, desperate to find him. When there was no sign, I went back to where I started and lay curled up on the sand, sobbing as if the world had ended. Water lapped up the beach and I thought I’d build a giant sandcastle and crawl inside, and then wait until the sea carried me away. But Dad found me, bought me a teddy bear and wiped away my sandy tears with its paws. Dad said the teddy should be called Destiny, because it was destiny that we’d never be parted, that he’d always find me, no matter how far I’d wandered away from him. But this time it isn’t me who has wandered.

  “I’m going to bring in my new calculator,” whispers Kevin Cummings. “Dad says I need to use it if I’m to work out my tax situation. He says I must always know how much I’m owed.”

  “I’m bringing in a cross that touched the hand of someone who touched the hair of someone who kissed the statue of the Virgin Mary at a replica of the grotto in Lourdes. Mum bought the cross for me because she said the Virgin Mary knows a lot about obedience and I could learn a few lessons from her,” announces Jo. “What about you, Christopher?”

  Christopher goes red and says, “I thought about bringing in Boo because Dad bought him for me, but the school said health and safety wouldn’t allow me to bring in a hamster.” Christopher looks at me and I know it’s my signal to tell him what I’m bringing in.

  My mouth drains of saliva. Nowhere in my mind do I want to admit I’m bringing in a bear with one button for an eye and a paw covered in salty tear stains. Perhaps I should bring in the planet mobile from Big Dave and pretend it was from my dad. At least it wouldn’t be embarrassing, but then again it’s sort of cheating.

  “I bet Dan will have something really good,” says Jo, twisting her hair into a knot and shoving a pencil in it.

  Christopher looks at her and then looks at me as I nod and mouth the word “Yeah”. I like Jo’s confidence, but it’s completely misguided. Jo leans across the desks and whispers into my ear, asking me if Saint Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows is healing me. I shake my head and catch Christopher’s eye. And then I wish I hadn’t, because he’s trying to knock me out using the power of his pupils alone. There’s no question about it, Christopher likes Jo Bister, but for some strange reason he’s convinced I like her too. I do, but not in the way he thinks. I mean, we’re just mates, nothing more. I move away from Jo and say very loudly, “Thanks, Jo, but I’ll let you know when I get the time.”

  That’s when Mrs Parfitt tells us all to be quiet and listen up because she wants us to bring in our hero items tomorrow. “And I don’t want any half-baked stories.” She continues, “I want to feel the passion you have for your hero. Remember, this is the person you look up to. I expect you to have plenty to say, you normally do. As I mentioned before, it would be lovely is your hero was a member of your family. However…” She pauses. “If it isn’t, it should be someone special, a person you look up to. Like a teacher, perhaps.”

  Kevin Cummings chokes and then disguises it with a huge sneeze, which he says is thanks to his allergies.

  “Are you allergic to work?” replies Mrs Parfitt, giving him The Look. The Look means: You know you’re lying and I know you’re lying but I’m not going to waste my breath discussing it. “Anyway, moving on swiftly,” says Mrs Parfitt. “This is your homework. You’ll present it tomorrow.” No one is listening because the home bell has gone and we’re all gathering up our belongings and vaulting chairs to get to the door first.

  I thought I moved fast but Jo moves faster. She blocks my exit and asks me if I wrote a list of ten things for Saint Gabriel. Again, Jo insis
ts it will work. From where I’m standing, I can feel the heat of a fireball whooshing up Christopher’s cheeks. He pushes past us and says he has an important appointment with friends who don’t exclude him.

  As I squeeze past Jo and rush after Christopher, she shouts, “Stop running away from things. Saint Gabriel is looking out for you.”

  “Hey, wait up, Christopher!” I say, trying to sound forceful.

  The force isn’t with me, because Christopher keeps walking.

  “Jo isn’t my girlfriend,” I tell him as we reach the school playground. My whole body has turned into a worm, wriggling and squirming with embarrassment. “What I’m trying to say is, we’re just friends.” My footsteps follow the rhythm of his. “We were talking about a medal.”

  “What sort of medal?” Christopher doesn’t look at me but quickens his pace.

  “It’s not important,” I call as Christopher runs away and disappears out through the school gates, passing Grace and Stan. “Well, it isn’t!” I shout, concentrating on looking as though I’m not bothered that he’s run away.

  “He’s in a hurry,” says Grace, doing a double-take.

  Now, here’s the thing. I think you can tell a lot from body language. Like if you’re angry you put your hands in a fist, and if you’re telling lies you keep touching your nose. Well, this is the first time I’ve seen Stan since I found Grace’s pregnancy test and in body language terms, his face is pretty much channelling new-father-to-be-with-added-super-turbo-bits.

  “Hey, Squirt,” Stan says, lounging against the wall.

  “My name isn’t Squirt.”

  He sighs, as if I am a squirt but not old enough to know it, then says, “Okay, I won’t call you Squirt again. Is Big Man any better?”

  “Suits me,” I say, making it sound as though it doesn’t.

  Our banter is obviously boring Grace because she launches into a heavy conversation about what university Stan should apply to. Stan twiddles his cobweb ’tache and says he knows a uni with the best fresher week. Grace gives a tinkling laugh that sounds totally false and I look at her, slack-jawed. How can she possibly make plans about university when she’s having a baby?

  “You don’t have to buy expensive drinks at the bar. You can bring a bottle,” says Stan, throwing his arm around her shoulder.

  “Yeah, of milk,” I whisper to myself.

  Instead of taking ten minutes, the walk home drags on for ever. Grace and Stan are busy holding hands and lip-locking, and I’m busy searching the clouds for alien spacecraft, the pavement for dropped pennies and the grass for poo meringues cunningly hidden under leaves that you want to jump on. Anything that means I do not have to watch them kissing and pawing each other.

  When Stan leaves us at the fork in the road, Grace makes him a heart with her thumbs and index fingers. Then she turns to me and says, “Now he’s gone we need to have a little chat. Remember Operation Right ’n’ Back?”

  “Reichenbach,” I correct her.

  “Yeah, that. The time has come to see what Big Dave’s little game is.”

  My face freezes. I didn’t like Grace’s idea the first time she mentioned it and I don’t like it any better now. “Isn’t it a bit risky?” I want to follow that up with “in your condition”, but I don’t. However, when I get a chance I’m going to look up pregnancy on the internet, because it’s obvious to me that Ninja Grace has gone completely potty with a capital P.

  “Not the way I’m going to do it,” Grace assures me. “All you have to do is await my instructions and then I guarantee we’ll know a lot more about Caroline 1973. More than Big Dave wants us to. Grace Hope is ready. Right ’n’ Back has begun.”

  I wish I’d never started this.

  Christopher is waiting for me at the school gates with two henchmen by his side. One is class comedian Kevin Cummings, who has his finger so far up his nose that he could pick his own brains, and the other is Dirk from the year below. Dirk, also commonly known as Dork, is picking a whitehead and seems mightily impressed when it releases a jet of pus lava.

  “Great, I wanted to talk to you about yesterday,” I say to Christopher, ignoring the other two. “It’s about Jo. I think you’ve got things mixed up.”

  Dork, meanwhile, is mopping up the pus with the cuff of his white shirt and Kevin has removed his finger from his nose and is staring at the tip of it as though he’s unearthed a prize emerald. Neither of them is paying any attention when Christopher grabs my school bag and shot-puts it over the hedge.

  “Nope, you’re mixed up,” whispers Christopher. “I never said I liked Jo.”

  That proves it! I didn’t say a thing about Christopher liking Jo. All I said was that I thought he might have got things mixed up. I give a tiny smile, which is my biggest mistake ever, because Christopher flips his lid and grabs me by my hand and spins me round like I’m a washing machine. Without warning, Christopher releases his grip.

  When the school bell goes off, Christopher peers at me lying on my landing pad in the hedge, picks up my school bag and wanders off whistling, like he hasn’t a care in the world. I, on the other hand, am blowing on my fingers like billy-o and blinking because there is something in my eye.

  My confusion follows me into the classroom, where Christopher is ignoring me and my school bag has been returned to my desk. Occasionally I try to look in his direction, but he stares through me as though I’m the ghost of the Invisible Man. Perhaps I underestimated how much Christopher likes Jo. I’ll try to make it up to him and I’ll never mention that Christopher likes Jo in front of Kevin Cummings again. That could be where I went wrong this morning.

  “So,” Mrs Parfitt says, “let’s get straight on with your homework. You were asked to bring in an item connected with your hero and talk about it. First up…” Mrs Parfitt moves between the desks, her blouse billowing like the sail on a galleon. “Christopher. Stand up.”

  Christopher pushes out his chair and takes a watch from his pocket and holds it up for the whole class to look at. The floor is his. Christopher proceeds to tell us that his dad bought him this watch. Then he launches into a fabulous speech about how it symbolizes their life with the passing of time. “If you look closely,” he says, “there is a small dial that shows the sun through the day and the stars at night.”

  Everyone oohs and ahhs, except Kevin Cummings, who ums and fidgets. Mrs Parfitt takes the watch and studies it, then passes it around the desks. When it reaches me I roll it around in my hand, then stare at the small sun in the dial, wishing my dad had bought me something so ace. My foot knocks against my school bag and I swallow when I think about bringing out Destiny.

  Last night I got into a complete flap trying to think of an item for the presentation. In the end I decided I’d bring in the planet mobile. Exhausted, I fell asleep. But when I woke up this morning, the last few planets had fallen off the mobile and Charles Scallybones had eaten them. All I was left with was string and a small pile of sick. So I threw the bear in my rucksack and prayed that the moment to talk about it wouldn’t come.

  As Christopher cruises towards the big finale, I hold my breath. “Dad says I mean the world to him.” Boom boom tish! Christopher hits invisible cymbals, stealing the entire show. An easy grin spreads over his face as the class erupts into applause. “Follow that,” he mouths, looking directly at me.

  “Well, that was very special indeed,” says Mrs Parfitt. “Thank you, Christopher. Next up…” I slink down in my chair and pretend to study my pen. Ballpoint pens are very fascinating. I read somewhere that on average one hundred people a year choke on ballpoints and that you can write for up to five miles before the ink runs out.

  “Daniel. On your feet.” Mrs Parfitt was not fooled by my ballpoint-love distraction technique. What I should have done is tried the stare-straight-at-the-teacher technique, in the hopes she would choose someone else. Mind you, that can fail too, because if you look straight at Mrs Parfitt she sometimes picks you anyway. (The moral of this story is that you cannot second-gues
s a teacher.)

  My cheeks flame as I set my school bag on the desk and rummage inside for Destiny. I’m still fumbling about twenty seconds later as Mrs Parfitt taps her toe against the table leg.

  Exasperated, she lets out this long sigh.

  I look up at her with puppy dog eyes and say, “It’s gone.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mrs Parfitt’s toe taps quicker as she prepares to give me The Look. “Did you bring it in? Are you looking properly?”

  Of course I’m looking properly. I could put on a pair of magnifying glasses but the bear still wouldn’t be there. A small stifled giggle takes me by surprise and I fire round to see who is laughing. Christopher forces his hand over his mouth and then makes a big deal of pretending his sides aren’t splitting. He did it – of course he did. When he grabbed my school bag earlier he must have stolen my teddy bear. I give him my best glare, only he doesn’t notice because he’s too busy staring at the bookcase at the front of the classroom. Everyone else stares too and Saleem points his finger and laughs. Sometimes your body has a sense of impending doom and that’s what I feel as I turn in slow motion to face the bookcase. There, nestled between the books, is Destiny with a pitta in his tear-stained paw.

  “Look, it’s a teddy bear’s picnic!” shouts Christopher.

  I want him to shut up. I want to hurt him. “My mum bought me that bear,” I say, lying. “But what would you care? You don’t have a mum.” As soon as the words blunder from my lips I feel guilt, sharp as the crease on a new pair of school trousers. Christopher’s face crumples and he jumps up from his seat and grabs me by my V-neck as Mrs Parfitt shouts at us to stop.

  Christopher lets go of me but not before he whispers, “You’re going to get it, Dan Hope. Watch your back. You won’t know where or when. Didn’t you see me in that tae kwon do class? I’ve got a class tonight and I’m deadly. I could kill you with this.” He crooks his little finger, puffs out his anger and sits back down.