by Anne Fine
I sighed. At times it’s like living with two small children, honestly it is.
I did what I could. I hid some of the worst of her clothes and jewellery, and set my alarm clock for half an hour earlier the following morning. As soon as I was dressed, I went and stood in the doorway watching her sternly while she chose her clothes. She knew I meant business. She saw the steely look in my eyes. She didn’t argue. When we walked into school, she looked practically normal.
‘Right,’ I warned her between gritted teeth. ‘Whatever he says, whatever, nod and agree! Promise?’
‘Promise,’ said Mum. (Credit where credit’s due, she does mean well.)
Mr Russell clearly thought so, anyhow. He was quite taken with her. They spent a lot of time together, laughing and chatting outside the staffroom door. I peeped down the corridor twice, and both times Mum was obediently nodding. Mr Russell was so bewitched he even handed her his morning cup of coffee, the one he says he needs so badly he’d have to prop his eyelids apart with matchsticks if he didn’t get it. And when he finally came back, alone, into the classroom, he leaned over my desk and whispered in my ear.
‘What a nice mum you have, Minna! Very cooperative. She’s so prepared to be helpful that when I asked if she’d come on the Friday field trip to the zoo to see Elsie our elk, she nodded and agreed.’
I buried my head in my hands. I could have wept.
We had a blazing row about it when I got home.
‘Why did you say that?’ I shouted at her. ‘Why did you say you would come with us to the zoo on Friday? You know you won’t. You can’t bear zoos. So you know you can’t go. When Mr Russell invited you on the trip, why did you simply nod and agree?’
‘But that’s exactly what you told me to do, Minna!’ she retorted. ‘That’s what you made me promise! Nod and agree!’
‘But not to go to the zoo!’
‘Whatever, you said. Whatever he says, nod and agree!’
Sometimes I feel like despairing, truly I do.
‘But what on earth will we do when Friday comes?’
‘We’ll think of something between us.’
‘Well, let’s think now.’
So we all sat there, thinking. And it was Crusher who came up trumps. He said to Mum:
‘Why don’t you send Gran along in your place? She likes zoos a lot. She can tell Mr Russell that Crummy Dummy kept sneezing, so you thought you should keep her at home, and she has come to help instead.’
I know a good idea when I hear it.
‘Brilliant!’ I enthused. Gran is great fun. She’d make any visit to a zoo a treat, and everyone in my class would like her.
‘Brilliant!’ Mum agreed. She was relieved. She hadn’t wanted to let anyone down.
‘Brilliant!’ echoed Crusher. (He’s never been overburdened with modesty, our Crusher.)
And I was satisfied.
But only for a while. For inexplicably, behind my back, without noticing, the most peculiar thing began to happen.
I went off zoos. Honestly. Just like that. Maybe it started with all that wondering I did on the way to school that morning, I don’t know, but one day I was as happy to go and see Elsie our elk as the next person in the class and, on the next, you wouldn’t have prised me through the zoo gates with a crowbar. I just knew the mere sight of all those miserable, penned-up bears and lions and apes would make me sick, and after the end of term when we’d be giving up the Elk Money anyway, not one penny of mine would ever find its way inside a zoo again.
‘But what shall I do tomorrow?’ I wailed at Mum. ‘I’ve been in so much trouble in school already! And if I can’t go to the zoo with everyone else, what am I going to say to Mr Russell?’
We all thought again. And, once again, it was Crusher who came up with the answer.
‘Minna,’ he said. ‘Here’s twenty pence. Go down to the shop, will you, and fetch my newspaper, please? It’s pretty chilly outside, so don’t wrap up well.’
I’m not an idiot. I got the message.
‘Brilliant!’ I enthused.
‘Brilliant!’ Mum agreed.
‘Brilliant!’ echoed Crusher.
I took Crummy Dummy with me in the pushchair. I wrapped her up warmly, but left my own coat off. I even wore my leaky Wellingtons. I traipsed through every puddle I could find, and dawdled on every windy street corner.
When I got home, it was already supper-time. Crusher had cooked instant curry and tapioca pudding. He knows I won’t eat either.
‘Minna’s completely lost her appetite,’ said Crusher, staring at my untouched plate. ‘Perhaps she’s about to come down with a chill.’
‘Maybe,’ said Mum. She was fiddling with the pepper-pot lid. ‘She looks quite peaky’
She made a sudden movement and the lid sprang off the pepper-pot. Pepper flew out in clouds. Before I could blink, both Mum and Crusher had stuffed wads of paper tissue against their noses and mouths. They must have been keeping them ready, under the table.
Crummy Dummy and I sneezed. We sneezed and sneezed. We couldn’t help it. Pepper was everywhere.
‘Dear me!’ cried Mum, her voice reeking with false innocence. ‘Minna and Crummy Dummy must have come down quite suddenly with shocking colds.’
‘So they must,’ Crusher agreed with her. ‘What a shame. It looks as if they both will have to stay home tomorrow.’
‘Oh, certainly,’ said Mum. ‘No question about it. No zoo trip for Minna, I’m afraid. Why, she might develop pneumonia! I’ll just have to ask Gran if she minds going on the trip with the class by herself.’
(At moments like this, I don’t know why I call her Crummy Mummy. She always comes up trumps when I really need her. I can cope pretty well with most things. But it is good to have someone on your side when you feel really stumped. And she’s on my side.)
So. Friday came, and I missed all of it. Mum kept me in. She was dead firm. She even made Crusher Maggot fetch his own paper. We sat together most of the day, playing cards, while Crummy Dummy bounced up and down in her cot, or crawled around the floor stuffing bits of carpet fluff into her earholes. I wore my rabbit slippers and two extra woollies in case Mr Russell sent spies round on their way home from school to check that I was ill. (Yes, honestly. He really does do that.)
But Gran was our only visitor. She turned up shortly after four, pink-cheeked and radiant! She’d had a lovely time, she told us. She’d thoroughly enjoyed the bus ride. She loved the zoo – so well laid out, with all those pretty little white signposts! Elsie the Elk was a poppet, and, as for that Mr Russell, he was sweet. (He was so sorry to hear about the colds. He hoped poor little Minna wasn’t too disappointed at missing the zoo trip, and that little baby Miranda would soon be well enough for Mum to be able to get about again.) All of the children, Gran said, were helpful and charming, and a very nice little boy called Henry Boot had carried her umbrella for her the whole afternoon. You couldn’t have faulted the weather, and the candy floss tasted as heavenly as it did when she was a child herself. The zoo-keepers were friendly and pleasant, and all of the animals looked thoroughly well looked after, she must say. She’d had a splendid day, oh yes, splendid.
And how was I?
I gave the tiniest little cough.
‘Oh, dear!’ she cried, and fell all over me, cuddling and fussing. You’d have thought that I really and truly did have pneumonia. (She’s a good gran. Like Mum and Crusher, she comes up trumps.)
So that was it. Of course, I heard the other side of the story as soon as I went back to school on Monday morning. I hadn’t missed much, everyone said. They weren’t allowed to climb on the railings, and they weren’t allowed to buy chips or ice-cream, and half of the animals were lying, fast asleep, at the back of their cages, and those that were outside and on their feet were pretty boring really, not doing anything like you see on the telly. And Elsie the Elk looked as if she had mange, and the candy floss had gone up to eighty-five pence for a mean little stickful, and the bus ride was rotten because the dr
iver wouldn’t let them open the windows all the way, or sing at all loudly. And the only really good bit in the whole day, everyone said, was when Henry Boot threw up outside the wombat’s cage. (In case you’re wondering, it wasn’t any sudden, delicate sensitivity to the poor wombat’s plight that made him sick, it was far too much chocolate.)
Well. There you are. As my gran’s very fond of saying, there’s more than one way to tell any story. I’ve done my best with all these, though. I hope you liked them.
Minna
