Worst Ever School Trip

by Hutchinson Barry

  Wayne glared at me for what felt like forever, then he sighed, slumped down on to the plastic seat beside me, and fastened his seat belt. “What is this anyway? A roller coaster?”

  I unfolded the map I’d been given at the gate and studied it. “Right, so we came in here,” I said, pointing to the entrance. “You physically assaulted much-loved children’s character Clumso the Clued-up Clown here. This is where you ran in terror.”

  “You ran in terror, more like,” Wayne snorted, thumping me on the leg.

  “Ow! Meaning this is where we are now,” I said, squinting at the ride description on the map. I tried to stop myself grinning, but the urge was too great. “Oh dear,” I said, looking up at Wayne. “It’s a history of the UK rail network.”

  Wayne did an exaggerated yawn. “Presented by an animatronic Clumso the Clued-up Clown,” I added.

  Wayne froze, mid-yawn. The carriage turned another bend in the track, revealing a set of swing doors leading into a tunnel. The entrance had been designed to look like Clumso’s laughing face, with the track leading directly into his open mouth.

  Frantically, Wayne tried to get up, but the seat belt was locked in place and refused to set him free. He gripped the chair’s armrests, his knuckles turning white as the swing doors opened and we heard Clumso’s high-pitched giggle echo through the darkness.

  The laughter faded and the carriage clattered on through the gloom. Colourful murals of Clumso dressed as a train driver illuminated as we passed them, each one making Wayne recoil in fright.

  “You know he’s just a guy in a costume, don’t you?” I said.

  “Shut up. I’m not scared,” Wayne hissed, then he screamed as a robotic model of Clumso came swinging out from the wall, its arms dangling limply at its sides.

  “The first ever locomotive-hauled railway route in the world ran between Stockton and Darlington,” the animatronic Clumso announced, his mouth whirring open and closed, completely out of sync with the sound.

  Wayne pressed himself back in his seat, trying to put as much distance between himself and the robo-clown as possible. He sighed with relief as we pulled past it, then screamed again when an upside-down Clumso dropped from the ceiling on a spring.

  “Three and a half million people travel by rail in the UK every day,” Clumso announced. “Making the UK rail network one of the busiest in Europe!”

  Wayne ducked as we passed the puppet, briefly covering his head with his hands. He squealed as a steam engine whistled past us in the opposite direction, a dummy of Clumso propped up in the driver’s seat.

  “Britain’s worst rail disaster happened near Gretna Green in Scotland in 1911,” echoed Clumso’s voice from nowhere. We rounded a corner to see a model of Clumso standing with his hands clasped in front of him, looking down at a gravestone. His red nose had been replaced by a solemn black one.

  “Over two hundred people died!” continued his disembodied voice.

  As we passed the grave scene, the robotic Clumso blew his nose on a spotted handkerchief. It made a sound like a sad trombone.

  “This is the worst thing that’s ever happened in the world,” Wayne whispered. I glanced sideways at him and saw he had his eyes tightly shut.

  “I dunno,” I said, putting my hands behind my head and leaning back in the seat. “I’m quite enjoying it. It’s informative and fun. It’s infunmative.”

  Wayne opened his eyes just enough to shoot me a furious glare. “I swear, if you tell anyone about this, you’re a dead man,” he warned, then he closed his eyes again, jammed his fingers in his ears and began to hum.

  Eventually, after I’d learned a surprising amount about the UK rail network and Wayne had been mentally scarred for the rest of his life, we got off the ride. Wayne was shaking from head to toe, and his eyes were ringed with red.

  “Were you crying?” I asked.

  “Of course I wasn’t crying!” Wayne said. “It was dusty in there. I’m allergic. All right?” He shook his head and sniffed. “Crying. Ha! As if.”

  He tapped one of the clipboards I had been left to carry. “Better make a start on my report. Say that ride was lame. Too slow and boring. And if you say anything about me crying I’ll kill you.” He tapped the board again. “Come on. Chop chop.”

  “No, but—” I began, but Wayne about-turned and walked off.

  “Come on, let’s see if we can find somewhere quiet,” he said, cracking his knuckles.

  “To hang out and chat?” I asked hopefully.

  Wayne snorted. “You wish. Report. Get it done.”

  There was no point trying to explain, so I just shrugged and moved Wayne’s clipboard behind mine. Scribbling my name at the top, I began to write up my thoughts on the railway ride. I soon found myself writing a detailed account of every one of Wayne’s whimpers and sobs, though. If Wayne saw it, he was sure to kill me, so I put the lid back on my pen and hurried to catch up with him.

  We were wandering through a busy area of the park, with lots of little kids and their teachers rushing around. I could see a few of the kids from my school shuffling about looking bored and one or two parent helpers looking even more so. I knew Wayne wouldn’t dare attack me there. Not when there was a chance one of the adults might see him.

  Wayne had obviously realized he was powerless here, too. He started walking towards a narrow path which a signpost told us led to the Maze of Maths.

  Theoretically it was possible for someone to get lost for days in the sprawling hedge maze – unless they had a basic grasp of adding and subtracting, in which case they’d find their way out in no time.

  More worryingly, though, the hedges were too high for anyone to see over. Wayne just had to lead me along a few twists and turns and no one would be able to see him beating me senseless.

  “We should stay here,” I said. “In full view of several adults at all times.”

  Wayne beckoned to me with one finger. “Move. Now. The longer you make me wait, the worse it’ll be.”

  I started to follow him, dragging my feet along the ground. He was probably right. It was best to get my beating over and done with. I was only delaying the inevitable.

  We’d just turned on to the path that led to the maze when I caught a whiff of a familiar smell. I inhaled deeply, trying to work out what it was. It was sort of sweet but sour at the same time. I’d smelled it recently, I was sure. Not today but within the last week.

  “Of course!” I gasped, suddenly realizing what the smell was.

  WHAP! Something hit me in the face. I reached up and peeled away an empty bag of pickled onion crisps.

  I turned on the spot, looking around, suddenly filled with the sense that I was being watched. I’d been hit in the face with lots of things over the years – pillows, footballs, Jodie’s fists – but I’d never had a crisp bag slap itself across the end of my nose. For it to have happened now with a packet of pickled onion – when I only knew one person in the world who liked pickled onion flavour – couldn’t just be a coincidence, surely? Or rather – Shirley.

  I couldn’t shake the feeling that not only was I being watched, but that the person watching me was Madame Shirley herself. I didn’t know how or why, but I somehow knew she was there in Learning Land. All I had to do was find her.

  As I looked around, another breeze whipped up, snatching the packet from my hands. It blew away, hopping and skipping across the ground and weaving around all the other kids.

  I glanced back at Wayne. He hadn’t noticed I had stopped and was still trudging towards the maze. I watched the crisp bag flutter away in the opposite direction.

  And then, after a very brief debate with myself, I ran.

  “Sorry. Excuse me. Coming through,” I said, forcing my way through the throngs of children, teachers and parents. “It’s an emergency. I’m chasing an empty crisp packet.”

  “Oi! Get back here!” Wayne’s voice cried out in the distance, but I couldn’t worry about that for now. Following the crisp bag was my first priority.


  The packet skipped along just above the ground, leading me across the busy plaza. It took a left at the Wheel of Astronomy and hung a right at Bug’s Eye View. I chased it as it fluttered past the controversial Get Dem Nazis ride, which had opened three months ago for just one day, before a record number of complaints saw it immediately shut down.

  It wasn’t easy to run fast carrying two clipboards and Wayne’s jacket. I lost sight of the crisp packet half a dozen times as I chased it but whenever I fell too far behind, I’d find it lying on the path just ahead of me. When I got close, it took off again, and I couldn’t help feeling that it had been waiting for me to catch up.

  I skidded round another corner, gaining on the floating bag. It looped in the air, then took a sharp left and came to rest on the seat of a waltzers-style ride designed to teach children about centrifugal force and how unpleasant an experience it can be.

  Throwing myself into the seat, I made a grab for the packet and caught it just before it could flutter off again. “Aha!” I cried, holding it above my head. “I did it! I caught the crisp packet!”

  Around me, in the other cars, several bemused eight-year-olds looked at me and my crisp bag, then started whispering and sniggering. “I think it’s a magic crisp packet, sent by an old woman,” I explained, which only made them worse.

  “Gotcha!” said Wayne, catching me by the back of the neck. Startled, I let the crisp packet slip from my fingers again.

  “No, come back!” I said, making a grab for it, but it fluttered upwards out of reach. I was about to give chase, when a member of staff blocked my way.

  “Right, sit down,” he said. “Ride’s about to start.”

  I tried to dodge past but Wayne still had his death-grip on the back of my neck, keeping me from moving. He forced me down into the seat. “Let’s take the weight off our feet for a while,” he said, flashing me his shark-like smile. “Then we’ll find somewhere nice and quiet to hang out, just the two of us. Somewhere I can pay you back for that stuff you said on the bus.”

  “About wetting yourself, you mean?” I said.

  The eight-year-olds around us sniggered behind their hands. Wayne shot them a look, but they had no idea who he was and he was powerless against them. They kept laughing as the safety bars lowered over our laps, locking us in place.

  One of the younger kids wasn’t laughing. She was a small girl with light blond hair and a worried expression. She was in the car directly across from us, sitting all on her own.

  “Are you OK?” I asked her.

  “I’m just… I’m a bit scared,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.

  “Yeah, no wonder,” I said. “It goes pretty fast.”

  The girl’s eyes widened in terror, which clearly amused Wayne. “Yeah, it’s horrible,” he said. “It spins you around like crazy, tossing you about until your head’s twirling so fast you don’t know which way is up and which way is down.”

  “I d-don’t like the sound of that,” the girl said.

  “It’s not actually that bad,” I began, but Wayne dug his elbow into me, shutting me up.

  “It is. It’s worse,” he said. “Some people get so badly shaken their brain starts oozing out of their nose by the end. It’s not pretty.”

  The girl’s face turned a shade of lime-green. “I feel sick,” she said. “I want to get off.”

  “Too late!” Wayne cackled, as the ride slowly began to spin.

  Just before our cars went their separate ways, I offered the girl an encouraging smile. “You’ll be fine. It doesn’t last long,” I told her, but she had her eyes shut and was gripping the bar, and I don’t think she heard a word I said.

  “That was pretty mean, Wayne,” I said, as the car looped out in a circle and began to spin. “She was really scared.”

  “Oh, she was really scared,” Wayne said, mimicking my voice. “So? What kind of baby gets scared on a ride like this?”

  I was about to point out that he’d almost died of fright half a dozen times since we’d arrived at the park when I heard the retching. The cars were spinning quite quickly now, their momentum forcing us back into our seats. I looked round just in time to see the little girl’s car spinning towards us and the girl herself opening her mouth wide.

  BLEEURGH! A fountain of vomit erupted from her mouth and immediately spread out in a wide arc. Instinctively I ducked behind Wayne’s jacket and heard the puke hit it like heavy rain.

  I was saved from the sick but Wayne wasn’t so lucky. The full force of the vomit-spray splattered across him. It hit his uniform and his face and plastered his fringe to his forehead. Wayne made a noise that was halfway between a gasp and a yelp, but it was drowned out by the screams of the younger kids around us.

  The girl heaved again, ejecting the contents of her stomach just as the ride began to spin faster and faster. A perfect circle of vomit spread out around her and I ducked for cover behind Wayne’s jacket again.

  Once more, Wayne was too late to react. “Not again!” he cried as yet more puke rained down on him.

  “Ew, that stinks,” I said, covering my nose and mouth. The smell still found a way through, though, and as I watched the gloopy orange goo drip from Wayne’s chin, I felt myself gag.

  “Don’t!” Wayne warned me, sliding to the far end of the car. “Don’t you dare, Beaky!”

  I swallowed a few times, bringing my urge to vomit back under control. “It’s OK. I’m fine. I’m fine,” I muttered, trying to think happy thoughts.

  Wayne relaxed a little. “Just as well, because—”

  BLEURGH!

  Another boy with a weaker stomach than me threw up noisily. There were more screams as the vomit sprayed out in a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree spew spin and some shouted cursing from Wayne as he was plastered with the stuff for a third time.

  Fearing a full-blown vomit fest, the ride operator hit the emergency stop and the cars slowed quickly to a halt.

  As soon as the safety bar lifted, I jumped out of the way, narrowly avoiding the puddle of vomit that now sloshed about on the seats of our car. Wayne slowly stood up and waddled down from the ride, trying not to let any of his puke-stained clothes come into contact with the skin below.

  The girl who’d started the vomit-fest reached the exit just before us. Despite being at the epicentre of the vomit explosion, she’d managed to stay remarkably clean. I was also completely spotless, thanks to Wayne’s jacket.

  “Are you OK?” I asked the girl. She began to nod, then retched and opened her mouth. I dodged sideways and the barf spray splattered all over Wayne’s shoes. The girl took one look at Wayne’s furious expression then turned and ran off in the direction of the toilets.

  “Hey, Beaky.”

  Theo was walking along the path next to the ride with Duncan trotting along behind him like a faithful dog. When Theo saw Wayne, he stopped and looked him up and down. “You’ve got puke on you.”

  “Really?” Wayne snapped, scraping a blob of the stuff out of one of his ears. “I hadn’t noticed.” He growled at me. “Give me your jumper.”

  “No chance!” I protested. “You can have your jacket back, though. It’s probably ruined.”

  I jumped aside as Wayne tried to grab me. He was still trying not to let his puke-coated clothes touch him, so he was moving much more slowly than usual.

  “Did you see a crisp packet?” I asked Theo. “Pickled onion.”

  Theo shook his head. “Not that I noticed.”

  I looked around, searching for any sign of the crisp packet. Wherever the wind had taken it, though, it was nowhere in sight.

  Theo leaned in closer to me. “So, you’re still alive, then?”

  “Just,” I said, eyeing Wayne warily in case he lunged again. “But as soon as he gets me alone, I’m done for. Unless Clumso gets him first.”

  “Clumso?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said.

  “Oh well, you should be safe for the next half-hour, anyway.”

  “How come?” I asked.r />
  Theo held up his watch and tapped it. “It’s lunchtime.”

  I stared at him blankly. “So?”

  “So, we’re supposed to meet up with the teachers near the entrance,” Theo said.

  I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to hear the word “teacher” in my life. I was safe for the next half-hour. After lunch it’d only be an hour or so until we all had to head for the bus to go home again. Maybe I’d survive my day with Wayne after all.

  We all started walking back towards the entrance. Duncan stuck at Theo’s side, keeping a safe distance from Wayne, who waddled and squelched along beside me, muttering under his breath.

  “So, anything interesting to report?” Theo asked. I glanced at Wayne, who fired a warning glare right back at me. He mimed drawing his thumb across his throat and I wished more than ever before that I could tell a lie.

  If I could lie, I could just say, “Nah, nothing really,” and the conversation would be over, but the truth of it was we had got up to stuff I knew Theo would find interesting. Pretty much all of it made Wayne look like a big clown-fearing crybaby, though, and I knew if I told Theo about it I’d never make it to lunch.

  Just say no, just say no, just say no, I thought. As usual, though, my mouth had other ideas. “Yes!” I blurted. I shot Theo a pleading look. “But if I tell you, Wayne will snap me in half like a twig.”

  Theo looked from me to Wayne and back again. He shrugged. “Fair enough,” he said, and he didn’t ask me any more.