The Daydreamer (6 page)

Peter knelt down beside his mother. She murmured dozily.

‘You should be careful of sunburn, Mum,’ Peter said kindly.

‘Would you like me to rub some cream on your back?’

Viola Fortune mumbled something that sounded like a yes. He took out the jar. It was difficult to unscrew the lid with a missing forefinger. He slipped on the single glove he had col-lected on his way through the kitchen. His mother’s white back gleamed in the sunlight. Everything was ready.

There was no doubt in Peter’s mind that he loved his mother dearly, and that she loved him. She had taught him how to make toffee, and how to read and write. She had once jumped out of an airplane with a parachute and she looked after him at home when he was ill. She was the only mother he knew who could stand on her head unsupported. But he had made his decision, and she had to go. He scooped out a dollop of cold cream on the end of his gloved finger. The glove did not disappear. The magic seemed to work only on living tissue. He let the blob fall right in the middle of his mother’s back.

‘Oh,’ she sighed, without much conviction. ‘That really is cold.’ Peter began to spread the cream evenly, and his mother immediately began to vanish. There was an unpleasant moment when her head and legs were still on the grass, with nothing in between. He quickly rubbed another fingerful across her head and ankles.

She was gone. The ground where she had lain was flattened, but even as he watched, the blades were straightening up.

Peter took the little blue pot over to his father. ‘Looks like you’re burning, Dad,’ Peter said. ‘Want me to rub some cream on?’

‘No,’ his father said, without opening his eyes. But Peter had already dug out a fat blob and was spreading it across his father’s shoulders. Now, there was no-one in the world Peter loved as much as his father, except his mother. And it was as clear as sunlight that his father loved him. Thomas Fortune still kept a 500cc motorbike in the garage (another item that could not be thrown away) and he gave Peter rides on it. He had taught Peter how to whistle, how to do up his shoelaces in a special way, and how to throw people over your head. But Peter had made his decision, and his father had to go. This time he worked the cream from feet to head in less than a minute, and all that was left on the grass were Thomas Fortune’s reading glasses.

Only Kate remained. She lay contentedly, face down, between two vanished parents. Peter looked in the blue jar. Just enough left for one small person. He would have been slow to admit that he loved his sister. A sister was simply
there
, whether you wanted her or not. But she was fun to play with when she was in a good mood, and she had the kind of face that made you want to talk to her, and it probably was true that underneath it all he did love her, and she him. Still, he had made up his mind, and she had to go.

He knew it would be a mistake to ask Kate if she wanted cream rubbed on her back. She would immediately suspect a trick. Children were harder to fool than grown-ups. He ran his finger round the bottom of the jar and he was just about to let drop on her a medium-sized globule when she opened her eyes and saw his gloved hand.

‘What are you doing?’ she shrieked. She leaped up, knock- ing Peter’s arm and causing the cream intended for her back to splatter over her head. She was on her feet, clawing at her scalp. ‘Mum, Dad, he’s put muck on me,’ she wailed.

‘Oh no,’ Peter said. Kate’s head, as well as her hands, was disappearing. And now she was running round the garden like a headless chicken, waving her shortened arms. She would have been screaming if she had had a mouth to scream with. This is terrible, Peter thought as he started after her. ‘Kate! Listen to me. Stop!’ But Kate had no ears. She kept on running in ever widening circles, until she collided with the garden wall and bounced back into Peter’s arms. What a family! he thought, as he smeared the last of the vanishing cream over Kate. What a relief it was when at last she was gone and there was peace in the garden.

First of all he wanted the place tidy. He collected the litter on the lawn and tipped it into the dustbin – teapot, cups and all, thereby saving on washing-up. From now on the house was going to run efficiently. He took a large plastic bag up to his bedroom and stuffed it with loose items. Everything left lying in his path was deemed rubbish – clothes on the floor, toys on the bed, extra pairs of shoes. He patrolled the house gathering up loose objects that looked untidy. He dealt with his sister’s and his parents’ bedrooms by simply closing the doors. He stripped the living-room of ornaments, cushions, framed photographs and books. In the kitchen, he cleared the shelves of plates, cookery books and jars of disgusting pickles. When he had finished his work at the end of the afternoon, there were eleven bags of household junk lined up by the dustbins.

He made himself supper – a white sugar sandwich. Afterwards, he chucked his plate and knife into the rubbish. Then he strolled through the house, admiring the empty rooms. Now at last he could think straight, now at last he could set about inventing his inventions, as soon as he had found a pencil and a clean sheet of paper. The problem was that loose items like pencils were probably in one of the eleven bags by the dustbin. Never mind. Before the hard work started he would spend a few minutes in front of the TV. Television was not for- bidden in the Fortune household, but nor was it encouraged. The daily ration was one hour. More than that, the Fortunes believed, would rot the brain. They offered no medical evidence for this theory. It was six in the evening when Peter sat down in the armchair with a litre of lemonade, a kilogram of toffees and a sponge cake. That night he watched a week’s worth. It was just after one in the morning when he lurched to his feet and stumbled into the dark hallway. ‘Mum,’ he called. ‘I’m going to be sick.’ He stood over the lavatory bowl waiting for the worst. It did not come. What did was more unpleasant. From upstairs came a sound that was difficult to describe. It was a kind of squeaking, flip-flopping, squelching footstep, as though a slimy creature was tiptoeing across a giant puddle of green jelly. Peter’s sickness disappeared, and terror took its place. He stood at the foot of the stairs. He turned on the light and peered up. ‘Dad,’ he croaked. ‘Dad?’ No answer.

No use trying to sleep downstairs. There were no blankets, and he had thrown out all the cushions. He began to climb the stairs. Each step creaked and gave him away. His heartbeat was thudding in his ears. He thought he heard the sound again, but he could not be sure. He stopped and held his breath. Only hissing silence and his knocking heart. He edged up another three steps. If only Kate were in her room, talking to her dolls.He was four steps from the landing. If there was a monster shuffling backwards and forwards through a puddle of jelly it had stopped and was waiting for him. His bedroom door was six paces away. He counted to three and made a dash for it. He slammed his door behind him, bolted it and leaned against it, waiting.

He was safe. His room looked bare and menacing. He got into bed with his clothes and shoes on, ready to climb out the window should the monster break down his door. That night Peter did not sleep, he ran. He ran through his dreams, down echoing halls, across a desert of stones and scorpions, down ice mazes, along a sloping pink spongy tunnel with dripping walls. This was when he realised he was not being chased by the monster. He was running down its throat.

He woke with a start and sat up. Outside it was light. It was late morning perhaps, or early afternoon. The day already had a used-up feel. He unbolted his door and stuck his head out. Silence. Emptiness. He drew the curtains in his room. Sunlight flooded in and he began to feel braver. Outside was birdsong, traffic noise, the sound of a lawn-mower. When dark- ness returned, so too would the monster. What was needed, he thought, was a booby trap. If he was going to think straight and invent his invention, then he had to settle the monster for good. He needed – let’s see – twenty drawing pins, a torch, something heavy on the end of a piece of string attached to a pole …

These thoughts brought him downstairs and into the kitchen. He pulled open the drawer. He was pushing aside a packet of birthday cake candle holders that had half melted last time they were used when he noticed his forefinger. It was all there! It had grown back. The effects of the cream had worn off. He was just beginning to consider what this might mean when he felt a hand on his shoulder. The monster? No, Kate, all of her, all in one piece.

Peter started jabbering. ‘Thank goodness you’re here. I need your help. I’m making a booby trap. You see, there’s this thing …’

Kate was pulling on his hand. ‘We’ve been calling you for ages from the garden. And you’ve just been standing there, looking at the drawer. Come and see what we’re doing. Dad’s got an old lawn-mower engine. We’re going to make a
hovercraft
.’

‘A hovercraft!’

Peter let himself be led outside. Cups, orange peel, news- papers, and his parents – unvanished.

‘Come on,’ called his mother. ‘Come and help.’

Thomas Fortune had a spanner in his hand. ‘It might just work,’ he said, ‘with your help.’

As Peter ran towards his parents he wondered what day it was. Still Saturday? He decided not to ask.

Chapter Four
The Bully

There was a bully at Peter’s school and his name was Barry Tamerlane. He didn’t look like a bully. He wasn’t a scruff, his face wasn’t ugly, he didn’t have a frightening leer, or scabs on his knuckles and he didn’t carry dangerous weapons. He wasn’t particularly big. Nor was he one of those small, wiry, bony types who can turn out to be vicious fighters. At home he wasn’t smacked like many bullies are, and nor was he spoiled. His parents were kind but firm, and quite un- suspecting. His voice wasn’t loud or hoarse, his eyes weren’t hard and small and he wasn’t even very stupid. In fact, he was rather round and soft, though not quite a fatty, with glasses, and a spongy pink face, and a silver brace on his teeth. He often wore a sad and helpless look which appealed to some grown-ups and was useful when he had to talk him- self out of trouble.

So what made Barry Tamerlane a successful bully? Peter had given this question a great deal of dreamy thought. His conclusion was that there were two reasons for Barry’s success. The first was that he seemed to be able to move in the quickest way between wanting something and having it. If you were in the playground with a toy and Barry Tamerlane liked the look of it, he simply wrenched it from your hands. If he needed a pencil in class, he just turned around and ‘borrowed’ yours. If there was a queue he would walk right to the front of it. If he was angry with you he said so and then hit you very hard. The second reason for Tamerlane’s success was that everyone was afraid of him. No one quite knew why. The very name Barry Tamerlane was enough to make you feel an icy hand reaching into your stomach. You were frightened of him because every- one else was. He was frightening because he had a reputation for being frightening. When you saw him coming, you got out of his way, and when he asked for your sweets, or your toys, you handed them over. That’s what people did, so it seemed sensible to do the same.

Barry Tamerlane was a powerful boy about the school. No one was able to stop him having what he wanted. He wasn’t able to stop himself. He was a blind force. He sometimes seemed to Peter like a robot who was programmed to do what- ever he had to do. How strange that he didn’t mind being without friends, or having everyone hating and avoiding him.

Of course, Peter kept out of the bully’s way, but he took a special interest in him. Barry Tamerlane was a mystery. On his eleventh birthday Barry invited a dozen boys from school to a party. Peter tried to get out of it but his parents would not listen. They themselves liked Mr and Mrs Tamerlane, and so, by the terms of grown-up logic, Peter must surely like Barry.

The smiling birthday boy met his guests at the front door. ‘Hello Peter! Thanks. Hey, Mum, Dad, look what my friend Peter has given me!’

That afternoon, Barry was kind to all his guests. He joined in the games and did not expect to win every time just because it was his birthday. He laughed with his parents and poured out drinks and helped clear away and wash the dishes. At one point Peter peeped in Barry’s bedroom. There were books all over the place, a train set on the floor, an old teddy on the bed wedged against a pillow, a chemistry set, a computer game – it was a bedroom just like his own.