Sputnik's Guide to Life on Earth

by Frank Cottrell Boyce

  Some were big.

  Some were small.

  Some were fat.

  Some thin. Some white. One black.

  One had a big scar right down the middle of his head.

  They looked like stubble-headed meerkats watching out for police hyenas.

  None of them looked even a little bit like Grandad.

  ‘Grandad . . . ?’ I asked. ‘Is my grandad . . . Sandy Mellows . . . is he here?’

  A small one with narrow eyes and hardly any teeth when he grinned said, ‘You’re looking for your grandad?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And you thought he was in Nithsdale with us lot?’

  ‘Yeah, I thought so.’

  ‘How old’s your grandad?’

  ‘I don’t know. Normal age. Normal age for a grandad.’

  ‘You’ve just helped us escape from Nithsdale Young Offenders Institution. Maximum age eighteen. Is your grandad under eighteen?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘If you haven’t got a teenage grandad . . .’

  ‘I’ve made a mistake.’

  ‘It looks that way.’ The one with the scar on his head started laughing. The others joined in. ‘Thanks all the same by the way.’

  I said, ‘I’m really sorry about the mix-up. I’m going to have to take you back. Sputnik will help you get back in.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Hardly Any Teeth, ‘you’ll help us get back in jail? Well, that’s very kind of you. Thanks a million. Did you hear that, Smash? He’s going to put us back in prison.’

  Unsurprisingly Smash turned out to be the one with the scar down the middle of his forehead. He looked me up and down and said, ‘Well, boys, what do we say to the wee man’s kind offer?’

  What they said was:

  HA HA HA HA

  HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA.

  They laughed until the bus rocked.

  ‘Err, no,’ said Hardly Any Teeth, ‘we’re no going back. Not for you. Not for anyone. We’re taking this bus and we’re going to faraway Carlisle. I’ve got cousins there.’

  ‘No, not Carlisle. We’re away to Glasgow. It’ll be easier to get lost there.’

  ‘Is Newcastle not nearer? I like Newcastle. We went with school one time.’

  ‘What about the kid?’

  ‘I live near Knockbrex.’

  ‘Nothing is near Knockbrex.’

  ‘He’s coming with us. We’ll take him hostage. You don’t mind if we take you hostage, do you, kid?’

  ‘What about heading over to Stranraer? No one goes there.’

  ‘Stranraer is always buzzing with police. For the ferries.’

  While they were discussing where to go, the bus started up and moved off. It skidded across the tarmac, scraped through the metal barriers and swung on to the road.

  ‘Just a minute,’ said Smash. ‘Who’s driving this bus?’

  ‘Me!’ yelled Sputnik. He leaned out from the driver’s cab and waved at everyone. The bus shuddered. He’d bounced off a lamp post. ‘Whoops!’ said Sputnik.

  There was one of those short silences that feel really long – like when you drop a pebble down a deep, deep drain. Even though you can’t hear a noise yet, you know that there is going to be a noise.

  Then the noise comes.

  A scream. Smash screamed first. ‘There’s a dog. There’s a dog and it’s driving the bus.’

  The Chubby One knelt down in the gangway and started saying his prayers very, very loud.

  Hardly Any Teeth just got right in my face and kept yelling, ‘Stop! Now! Make it stop!’

  – I think they’re upset that you’re driving the bus.

  ‘I haven’t hit anything. Much. Nothing important anyway. I haven’t crashed. Why the fuss?! Don’t they trust me?’

  – It just feels wrong – a dog driving a bus.

  ‘Explain that I’m not a dog.’

  – Couldn’t you just show them that you’re not a dog?

  ‘If driving a bus brilliantly – which is what I’m doing – doesn’t convince them that I’m not a dog, what will? Shall I drive faster?’

  – No! Don’t drive faster.

  But he did drive faster.

  And faster.

  Up on to the bypass, around a traffic island. Prisoners tumbled into the gangway like skittles.

  – Stop. Stop the bus.

  He swerved on to the exit for the twenty-four-hour Tesco. He slammed through the shrubs and over a few signs. He parked the bus in the thing that you’re supposed to park your shopping trolley in. The bus didn’t really fit, to be honest.

  The prisoners were all crouching at the back by now.

  ‘Why are you doing these terrible things to us?’ screamed the really big one. ‘We didn’t do anything to you.’

  Smash was banging on the window, shouting, ‘Help! Help!’

  The Chubby One was shouting, ‘Call the police! I want to go back to jail. I only came to look after the little doggy. I thought the little doggy was lost.’

  I went to the driver’s seat and blew into the driver’s microphone. It sounded like a mighty wind. Then I spoke. I was starting to enjoy speaking, especially amplified speaking. ‘Stop making a noise. You’re attracting attention.’

  ‘Attracting attention?! Your dog just drove a BUS the wrong way up the bypass.’

  ‘Oh.’

  – Did you drive the wrong way?

  ‘I drove it the way we need to go – west.’

  – Yeah, but what side of the road?

  He didn’t answer. He just started up the engine again. Which started up the prisoners screaming again.

  ‘Let us off!’

  ‘Let us off the bus!’

  ‘I saw the wee mutt and thought he was lost. All I wanted to do was help the little doggy.’

  ‘And all I wanted to do was find my grandad.’ I sighed and sat down.

  ‘Solero,’ said Hardly Any Teeth. I followed his gaze. His face was pressed up against the window. He was staring at a big lit-up Solero advert in the entrance to the Tesco. The orange lolly in the picture glowed with flavour. In the photograph, it was just beginning to melt. That Solero was one long, hot summer day on a stick. The others all joined him at the window, staring out at the Tesco car park.

  ‘Trolleys,’ said the one with the scar in his head. ‘Did anyone ever race shopping trolleys down Heathall Rise?’

  ‘That sounds dangerous,’ said Hardly Any Teeth.

  ‘A wee bit,’ agreed Smash. ‘When I first started trolley racing my nickname was Dash. Then I got a wee bit reckless and’ – he pointed to his head – ‘Smash.’

  ‘Look at all these cars,’ said Hardly Any Teeth. ‘I used to love “borrowing” cars and driving them round the bypass. I haven’t done that since . . . well . . . since they caught me.’

  ‘There’s a chip van, look. Does it do hot dogs?’

  ‘Couldn’t we just have one treat? Like some Cool Original Doritos. Do we really have to go straight back?’ said the Chubby One.

  ‘Or Chilli Heatwave.’

  ‘OK, this is what we’ll do,’ said Hardly Any Teeth. ‘You go and get us some treats, bring them out here and then we’ll decide where we’re going to go.’

  I said, ‘I can’t just get you a load of treats. I’ve got no money.’

  ‘Not our problem.’

  ‘How am I going to pay for this?’

  ‘Shoplift.’

  ‘Do not shoplift. You don’t want to end up like us.’

  ‘How can I do it without money and without stealing?’

  ‘That’s your problem,’ said Hardly Any Teeth. ‘Get us some beer too. A pie and a pint or a hostage situation. You decide.’

  Sputnik had never been inside a supermarket before. ‘And to think I thought Dmitri’s shop had loads of stuff,’ he gasped, staring at the racks of vegetables – the glossy peppers, the plump apples, the glowing lemons. He stared
at the cool aisle – the hunks of cheese, the slabs of meat, the piles of butter, the bottles of juice. He stared at the signs swinging over the aisles – Pasta, Cook-In Sauces, Dairy, Biscuits, Crisps, Cereal . . . ‘Everything . . .’ he sighed. ‘Everything in here is so’ – he searched for the word – ‘edible.’

  – Yeah, but you can’t eat it until you’ve paid for it.

  ‘Everything is so, so tasty.’

  – And we don’t have any money.

  ‘I can sidestep that problem,’ said Sputnik, opening his backpack.

  – No. No guns. Absolutely no guns.

  I looked around. There was hardly anyone in the store. A couple of people in nurse’s uniform were chatting by the sandwiches. Someone was restocking the baked-bean shelves. No one said anything when Sputnik flew down the bread aisle, on the back of a trolley, and swung left into Beers and Wine.

  – I said, I’m not allowed to buy beer. You’ve got to be over eighteen.

  ‘I am over eighteen. I’m over 18 million,’ said Sputnik, sweeping two bottles of Criffel Ale into the trolley and rolling on into Crisps and Treats (aisle 7). He shovelled Doritos and Pringles and Irn-Bru in with the beer as he headed for the checkout.

  – The checkouts don’t work if you’re under age. Also you have to put money in them.

  ‘Your attitude is all wrong. You see the checkout as your enemy. Like it wants to stop you having fun. The checkout wants you to have a nice time and get nice things.’

  – No. It wants me to pay.

  ‘Have you read the manual?’ asked Sputnik.

  – No. Because I’m a customer, not a checkout person.

  ‘Ever tried to speak to the checkout in its own language?’

  – It speaks English.

  ‘It speaks,’ said Sputnik, pulling his little torch out of his backpack, ‘binary. Look. See the stripes on the bar code? They make little dots and dashes of light. That’s the language it likes to talk. There’re thousands of languages on this planet. You should learn some.’ He pointed the torch straight at the scanner and flashed it on and off and off and on, quickly then slowly, like a code.

  The self-checkout beeped and re-beeped, then beeped again.

  ‘See?’ said Sputnik. ‘It’s giggling. It likes me. It’s been lonely, poor thing.’ He flickered the light on and off a few more times. The self-checkout beeped again, then said, ‘Change will be dispensed below the reader.’

  – But we can’t get any change – we haven’t put any money in.

  ‘I just adjusted the sequence. Normally you pay for stuff and it gives change. Now it’s going to give change and then we’ll pay for stuff.’

  – I think you’ve missed the whole point of ‘change’. In a completely illegal way.

  ‘Honestly,’ said the self-checkout, ‘I have much more money than I could ever spend.’

  A ten-pound note slid out of its dispenser. Then another. And another. Then a fistful of change rattled into the tray like when you win on an arcade game.

  No one seemed to have noticed. I turned to the trolley to get the beers and crisps. There was other stuff in there – pasta, cherry tomatoes, onions, a chilli, oregano, some cheese and a bottle of Worcester sauce.

  – What’s all this?

  ‘You know what it is. Ingredients for your grandad’s favourite quick tea. Pasta with a fresh tomato sauce and a bit of fresh chilli.’

  I could smell the oregano and the chilli. It was like Grandad was back in the room.

  – How did you know that?

  ‘I can read your thoughts. Even the ones you don’t know you’re thinking.’

  – What’s the point in buying Grandad’s favourite ingredients when I don’t even know where he is?

  ‘You’ll find him. Trust Sputnik.’

  – Trust Sputnik. Trust the Sputnik who said he would look after me, the Sputnik who put me on a bus with a load of convicted criminals, driven by a dog.

  ‘I’m not a dog.’

  – You drive like a dog.

  I scanned all the tomatoes and pasta and stuff. Then I tried to scan a bottle of beer.

  ‘Assistance required,’ said the self-checkout. Its number light flashed. A supervisor came over. She looked at the beer. She looked at me.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you for ID,’ she said. ‘You don’t look over eighteen.’ This was not surprising.

  I did think of going to get one of the prisoners to buy their own beer, but then I thought, Do I really want people to know that the busload of escaped convicts in the car park belongs to me?

  ‘I don’t have ID.’

  ‘Then you can’t buy the beer.’

  ‘Oh,’ whined the self-checkout, ‘go on.’

  The supervisor blinked, then stared at the machine.

  ‘Go on,’ repeated the self-checkout. ‘Just this once.’

  ‘Errrm,’ said the supervisor, ‘is this some kind of prank? Is it for training purposes?’

  ‘Yes. This is for training purposes,’ said the self-checkout.

  ‘I can’t let him buy beer without ID.’

  ‘Please comply with request,’ said the checkout.

  The supervisor looked nervous.

  ‘Your compliance is required,’ insisted the checkout. It was beginning to sound like a short-tempered Dalek. The supervisor looked frightened.

  ‘Comply.’

  ‘OK, OK, I’ll comply!’

  When I got outside, the prisoners were all sitting on the railings by the trolley shelter, waiting. They gave a big cheer when they saw us coming and put out their hands for the treats.

  ‘I used to come down here when I was a wean,’ said Hardly Any Teeth, crowding a fistful of Pringles into his mouth. ‘Whenever there was no one home, I came down here.’

  ‘Me too! How brilliant is that?!’ said Smash. ‘I used to come down here and skateboard.’

  ‘We used to lob bottles at the skateboarders,’ said Hardly Any Teeth, sucking on his Solero now.

  ‘And we used to lob the bottles back.’

  ‘So we probably used to throw bottles at each other! Coincidence or what?’

  ‘Amazing.’

  They made it sound like throwing bottles at each other was a bit like being long-lost cousins. They tucked into Doritos and Pringles. They guzzled Irn-Bru.

  ‘It wasn’t open all night back in the day,’ said the Chubby One. ‘I used to daydream about living in the store.’

  ‘So did I!’ said Hardly Any Teeth.

  ‘I used to imagine myself under a pile of duvets in the bedding department. And getting up early before anyone came in and grabbing myself a bowl from household goods, a carton of milk from dairy, then just going up and down the cereals aisle, taking whatever I wanted.’

  ‘I was mostly thinking about hanging around in the frozen section munching Arctic rolls and Magnums.’

  Irn-Bru, Magnums, Arctic rolls – I was beginning to realize that the boys had no idea about nutrition. I went over to the van and bought us all fish and chips with the money that the self-checkout had given me. We sat on a wall by the garage forecourt and ate them.

  ‘Hot food outdoors,’ said Sputnik. ‘This is the best thing ever.’

  ‘I did live here for a bit,’ said Smash. ‘Not inside – security was too tight – but there was a heating pipe round the back that was always nice and warm and there were plenty of cardboard boxes to make a bed. I used to do that when things were bad at home. Or that time I ran away from the Temporary.’

  ‘You were in the Temporary?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Smash. ‘Four years. I didn’t like it, but then I left and I had nowhere at all so the Temporary seemed like Shangri-La.’

  ‘Shangri-La?’

  Before I could ask anything else, he said, ‘Let’s have a trolley race.’

  They raced the trolleys around the car park until Security came out and chased them back on to the bus.

  They argued about who was going to sit where while I hung back in the doorway,
holding my bag of shopping. They squirted Irn-Bru at each other. Hardly Any Teeth blew into his Doritos bag, then popped it like a balloon. All the others laughed and copied him. I wasn’t scared of them any more. They weren’t convicts. They were just boys who didn’t have homes to go to.

  ‘Come in,’ yelled Hardly Any Teeth. ‘Let’s go!’

  ‘Go where?’ I said.

  ‘The Young Offenders’.’ Smash shrugged. ‘We’ve got nowhere else to go.’

  Sputnik tried to jump into the driver’s seat. ‘Oh no,’ said Hardly Any Teeth, ‘we’re not being driven by a dog. I’m in for joyriding. I might as well use my skills to get us home.’

  So he drove the bus back along the bypass and up to the doors of the Young Offenders’. I’ve got to admit he was a much better driver than Sputnik.

  The sun was coming up as they filed in through reception. Sputnik reset the security system. The metal roller blind came up. Big Hefty Bloke was sitting behind it, his eyes wide as though he’d never seen daylight before. He stared at the obedient prisoners on his CCTV. Some of them waved at the camera.

  ‘What happened?’ said the Big Hefty Bloke.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. I handed him a purple Slush Puppie. ‘I got you this to make up for it.’

  We got the bus back to the bus stop just in time for its first trip of the day. We sat at the back while the driver drove us down through Dalbeattie.

  ‘You didn’t get your grandad,’ said Sputnik.

  – No.

  ‘At least I got something for the list.’

  – What was that? Supermarkets? Self-checkouts?

  ‘Chips. Who invented them?’

  – No one. I think they just sort of happened.

  ‘Just sort of happened? What, everyone in the world thought, What if we dig that plant over there up by its big knobbly roots, and peel the skin off the roots and then cut the roots into thin strips, and then what if we get some fat from a cow and melt that down and make it boiling hot, and drop the strips of potato in the boiling fat? And then . . . why don’t we get some grapes and crush them and wait till the juice has gone sour and pour that over the fried potatoes? And then—’

  – OK. I get it. Chips are complicated. No one invented them. Everyone invented them. Bit by bit. Over a long time.

  ‘Well, that’s something I love about your species. How everyone helps to make an idea better and better until after about a hundred years it’s completely brilliant. Fish and chips are like a big knot tying everyone together. We can put that on the list. Fish and chips outside can go in the Companion.’