A Thousand Water Bombs

by T. M. Alexander

  ‘Thanks,’ said Jonno, and passed it to me. ‘And what about all the stuff in the pram? A fiver?’

  ‘You’re joking.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Give him the money,’ said a girl’s voice in the second row.

  Jonno held his palm out again.

  ‘Hand it over,’ yelled Fifty.

  ‘Be fair. They’re only kids,’ said someone else.

  Ray looked at the woman. He didn’t seem to know what to do.

  ‘I saw her take the pram. It was full to the top with brilliant things,’ said a familiar voice. ‘It was full to ten pounds.’ Well done, Flo!

  Being accused by a cute (if you don’t know her) little girl was too much for Ray.

  ‘Daylight robbery . . . Another tenner it is then. But for that I want it all packed up and brought over to my car. It’s the navy Range Rover.’ He pointed to the shiny tank parked across two spaces. I was glad Bee wasn’t there or they’d have had an argument about 4x4s polluting the planet.

  ‘Will do,’ said Jonno. He turned to the crowd. ‘Stall’s shut, sorry.’

  No one seemed to mind the sudden closure. I think they’d all enjoyed the show.

  ‘Well done,’ said Fifty. ‘You stood your ground.’

  ‘Thanks, but why did he want all this junk?’ said Jonno.

  ‘To sell at a car boot sale,’ said Fifty. ‘It’s big business.’

  ‘Good luck to them.’

  ‘Same.’

  While me and Fifty were busy selling, and Bee was shouting, and Jonno was negotiating, the fact that Copper Pie was scoring goals right in front of us didn’t seem so terrible. But as soon as the table was cleared and delivered to the Range Rover and the water bomb buckets were empty, the horrible feelings of betrayal came back, twice as bad. Bee and Jonno had a walk round the other stalls and then sat under our table. I didn’t even bother with the walking round, not even to splat a rat.

  ‘Keener, why’s Copper Pie playing with Callum?’ said Flo. That was all I needed. I thought about making up some stupid answer but I couldn’t be bothered so I told her the truth.

  She was excited. Trust her. ‘Which one’s the scout, Keener?’

  ‘I don’t know, ’ I said. Where is the scout? I thought.

  It was 3.07 p.m. and there was no sign of Simon of the big white trainers and the red car.

  ‘Fifty, have you seen the scout anywhere?’

  ‘Nope.’

  I didn’t move from my spot for the next fifty-three minutes. I kept watch. I was pretty sure Copper Pie was doing the same. A couple of times I caught his eye but he pretended I hadn’t. I was absolutely sure that the scout hadn’t turned up. And neither had Copper Pie’s dad. But I wasn’t pleased. There was no ‘ha ha serves you right’. Inside, even after what he’d done to Tribe, I wanted him to have a chance at being Ronaldo, or Ronaldo Junior . . .

  The raffle prizes were announced and the Head, whose hair was still wet, declared the fair over (and a great success). Bee handed over the £35.50 from the car-boot man and his pram-stealing wife. Fifty handed in our £73.19. (Dad said we didn’t need to pay him back for the water bombs. It was his contribution.) We put the buckets back in the art room and left.

  I was really miffed. All this fuss. Tribe in pieces. All for nothing. More than anything I wanted everything to go back to normal. But I’d never get the others to agree. Scout or no scout, Copper Pie had left us in the lurch. I went off with Bee, Fifty and Jonno to the Tribehouse for cakes as agreed, but I didn’t want one. I wanted to find a way to put it all right. I was still cross with my oldest friend, but not so cross that I didn’t want to be his mate. No . . . not that cross.

  cakes at the Tribehouse

  ‘The Head said ours was the most successful stall,’ said Jonno as we walked down Fifty’s street.

  ‘Depends what you mean by success, doesn’t it?’ said Bee.

  ‘She means money.’

  ‘Money sounds like success to me,’ said Fifty.

  ‘It would,’ said Bee. ‘But selling out to a car-boot king wasn’t what I had in mind.’

  ‘Loads of people got great swaps before the pram thief bought everything,’ said Jonno.

  ‘It wasn’t only the pram thief ’s fault,’ said Fifty. ‘Everyone was pushing and shoving.’

  ‘You’ll be telling me I should thank the pram thief next,’ said Bee.

  ‘You know, Bee, you should be thanking the pram thief!’ said Fifty.

  I let them ramble on. Didn’t they care about Copper Pie? Were we really about to have the Tribe meeting with cakes but without a ginger nut?

  We went through the cat flap. I was last and by the time I got into the garden the Tribers had frozen like musical statues again! Bee pressed her finger against her lips. ‘Shhhushhh . . .’

  ‘We’ve seen feet,’ whispered Fifty.

  This time I knew it was a joke. There couldn’t be another uninvited guest in our hut. I ignored them and went up to the door – totally confident that the Tribehouse was empty. But before I went in, I glanced down, to check that where the door doesn’t fit properly, light was shining under as normal. Something wasn’t quite right. There was light, but it was stripy – light/shade/light/shade/light. It looked like there were two blocks in the way, like . . . legs.

  ‘Shhushhh,’ I said. What else could be blocking the light? The safe? No. A new chair with very fat legs that Fifty’s mum put in there to surprise us? No. I stepped back, on to Fifty, and knocked him flying. (It’s a hazard, him being so small.) He squeaked.

  ‘Shhhushhh. There really is someone in there,’ I said, and ran . . . I’d like to say that I knew the Tribers were right behind me but actually I didn’t care. If it was a monster – one with lots of heads – I didn’t want to be there to see it.

  ‘At last,’ said a voice I’d heard before. ‘I’ve got better things to do than hang around in garden sheds for some kids that are nothing but trouble.’

  The monster was Copper Pie’s dad.

  still cakes at the Tribehouse

  (because the cakes hadn’t been eaten yet)

  ‘Err . . . hello,’ said Fifty.

  ‘Your mum’s not in so I waited here,’ said Copper Pie’s dad. ‘Thought you’d all turn up eventually. I’ve been sent to get you.’

  ‘By who?’ said Bee.

  ‘By the boss, that’s who.’

  ‘Which boss exactly?’ said Fifty.

  ‘The wife. Copper Pie’s mum.’

  ‘She wants us?’ said Bee.

  ‘She does,’ said Copper Pie’s dad.

  ‘Could I ask why?’ said Fifty, being ultra-polite.

  ‘To sort out this mess, of course.’

  ‘With Copper Pie?’ said Jonno.

  ‘That would be it.’

  ‘What about Callum?’ said Bee, with ice in her voice.

  ‘He’s gone off in a right mood.’

  ‘Because the scout didn’t turn up?’ said Jonno.

  ‘He did turn up,’ said Copper Pie’s dad. ‘A bit late, that’s all.’

  ‘Too late,’ I said.

  ‘That’s why you’ve got to come over. It’s my fault Copper Pie didn’t get his chance, so the wife says. And it’s my fault you lot have fallen out, so Copper Pie says. Now, I don’t need all this fuss so you need to come with me and sort it out.’

  I didn’t know what the other Tribers were thinking but I didn’t want to go. I wanted us to be friends, but not because C.P.’s mum and dad bullied us into it.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Bee.‘We’re having cakes and then I’ve got to go home. It’s not our fault Copper Pie went off with Callum and left Tribe to —’

  ‘Rot,’ said Fifty. I was thinking of ‘stew’.

  ‘No, it’s my fault. I just said that. And the cakes can wait because I’m not going back without you lot, and that’s that.’ Copper Pie’s dad wasn’t taking ‘no’ for an answer.

  ‘OK,’ said Jonno.

  ‘Same,’ said Fifty.

  ‘Doesn
’t look like I’ve got a choice,’ said Bee. She narrowed her eyes.

  ‘Bee, that face could kill a crow,’ said Copper Pie’s dad. I’d never heard that expression before but I liked it.

  We all clambered into Copper Pie’s dad’s van. Bee sat in the front.

  ‘So how’s your dad?’ Copper Pie’s dad asked Bee.

  ‘He’s at home for now. But the twins have only got till next Wednesday to find somewhere else to live or he’s off again.’

  ‘That’s a rum deal,’ said Copper Pie’s dad.

  ‘For who?’ said Bee.

  ‘For the lot of you. It’s not fair on you or your mum, but your dad’s got a point. Those brothers of yours are old enough to fly the nest.’

  Bee always sticks up for her mum, but not this time. She stayed quiet.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Fifty from the back. ‘Why didn’t the talent scout come?’

  A big sigh. ‘Everything that could go wrong, did. The game kicked off late. The parents of the player Simon was interested in wanted a word that turned into a blinking book and then we got stuck in a queue behind an overturned caravan. Crawled along for two hours.’

  ‘Not your fault then,’ said Jonno.

  ‘No. Not that bit. But I’m definitely in the frame for the rest. That Charlie’s on your side too, even though his brother tortures him. Last time I interfere – Copper Pie can be a dustman for all I care. Waste of a good left-footer, though.’

  Copper Pie’s dad cut the engine. We were there. But no one got out.

  ‘Come on.’

  We went in through the back door. Charlie was having a snack. It looked like Marmite spread on raw carrot. Copper Pie’s mum was washing up.

  ‘Hi Charlie,’ I said.

  ‘Heyyo Keener. Can we pway marble wun?’

  ‘In a minute maybe.’

  ‘Copper Pie! Get down here,’ shouted his mum.

  We waited.

  ‘What’s that, Charlie?’ said Bee.

  ‘Ca-wots.’

  ‘And what’s the brown stuff?’

  ‘Choc-yit sauce.’

  ‘Nice,’ said Fifty.

  Copper Pie shuffled in, and his trainers made a squeaky rubber noise as they scraped along the chessboard floor. I was worried he’d leave black streaks on the white squares but I didn’t spot any. I waited for his shouty mum to tell him to pick his feet up.

  ‘You’ve made your point,’ said Copper Pie’s dad. ‘Pick those feet up and stop the wounded soldier act. I’ve brought your friends.’

  C.P. jerked his head up and we locked eyes. I smiled. I mean, I don’t want to go on and on, but he is my oldest friend. What would you do?

  ‘Hi there,’ I said.

  He nodded.

  ‘Go on then, Keener,’ said Copper Pie’s dad. ‘Tell him it’s all forgotten and forgiven.’

  But it isn’t, I thought. I had a quick recce to see what the others were expecting me to say. It was hard to tell. Bee looked mean. Jonno looked normal (I mean the same as he usually does, which is actually not normal at all: big mad hair, specs falling off his nose). Fifty looked uncomfortable. Copper Pie’s mum looked scary (the same as normal). His dad was smiling at me in an encouraging way. I needed some time to think things through. The Tribers were still miffed with Copper Pie so I couldn’t say everything was all right, because it wasn’t. Say nothing – that seemed the best idea, even though it’s rude not to answer.

  If only someone else would speak . . .

  ‘Keener, can we pway the marble wun now pwease?’

  Thank you, Charlie!

  ‘OK,’ I said. ‘Shall we do it in your room?’ I was already reaching for the box and heading for the door.

  ‘Yes pwease,’ said Charlie.

  ‘You coming?’ I said to the others. Copper Pie had no choice – I grabbed his elbow on my way out of the kitchen. Charlie followed. (He is probably the nicest person in the family.) I hoped the others would come. Surely the Tribers all wanted us to be back together? Especially as Copper Pie’s dad had said everything was his fault. Copper Pie didn’t want to play with Callum. He was bullied into it.

  ‘Sorry about the scout,’ I said, as we headed for the stairs.

  ‘Dun’t matter,’ said Copper Pie.

  ‘It does matter,’ I said. ‘I was hoping to be your manager or chauffeur or something and have loads of money and all that.’

  He thumped me. Why does he do that? I don’t like pain. Everyone knows that.

  ‘I’d never employ you. I’d have fat guys in shiny suits and shades looking after me.’

  I laughed. Not because it was funny. But because we were chatting for the first time in what seemed like forever.

  ‘Can I be the dwi-ver?’ said Charlie.

  ‘If you can reach the pedals, maybe.’ That was the nicest thing I’d ever heard C.P. say to his brother. Charlie smiled a big cheesy smile.

  I made it up the stairs without tripping on any of the latest obstacles: a satsuma skin, a Lego Indiana Jones, a bucket, one roller blade and a dummy, sat on the floor and started making Charlie’s marble run. No one else came up.

  ‘So will the scout come another day?’

  ‘I don’t reckon so.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He says I’m too young really. Need a few more years before a proper club would take me on.’

  ‘He should have said that before. Then you could have done the water bombs and you wouldn’t be the outcast Triber.’

  I meant it as a joke but when I heard it out loud it didn’t sound funny. It sounded serious. It sounded final.

  ‘Am I out then?’ said my ginger friend who saved me from Annabel Ellis and ate all the bits of lunch I didn’t like every day.

  ‘’Course not,’ I lied.

  ‘How come you’re the only one up here then?’

  ‘I’m here,’ said Charlie.

  ‘You don’t count. You wear a nappy.’

  Charlie looked down at his nappy and started to peel off the sticky bit at the side.

  ‘No, no, no,’ I said. ‘You do count, Charlie. Really.’

  He went back to plopping marbles down the three runs that I’d made interconnect. It was hypnotising. Either that or I was busy trying to avoid the subject of Tribe.

  ‘D’you think they’ve gone home?’ said Copper Pie. He was trying to sound normal but inside he was sick – I could tell. Sick at the thought that he wasn’t a Triber any more.

  Yes, I do, I thought but I didn’t say it. I mean, they were hardly going to be having tea and scones downstairs with Shouty Shouty.

  ‘So you’re an outcast too then?’

  I hadn’t thought of that. Did siding with Copper Pie make me a non-Triber? A panicky feeling came over me. I wanted us all to be friends again. But if being with Copper Pie meant I wasn’t friends with Jonno, Bee and Fifty then I wasn’t ready for that.

  two giant yellow rubber gloves

  I jumped up and ran downstairs. I had to know what had happened to the others. I stopped at the bottom of the staircase – I could hear the Tribers laughing. That wasn’t what I was expecting.

  Were they laughing at the way I’d trotted off with Copper Pie, like a pet, after everything he’d done?

  Something stopped me going in. Worry, I suppose. I try not to worry any more. I try and chase away all the horrible thoughts by making up rubbish words. Anything to keep the worry bit of my brain occupied.

  Bee’s voice rang out. ‘It’s Keener.’

  More laughter. I pricked up my ears, like a dog.

  ‘Total nerd.’ That was Fifty. So much for friends. They were laughing about me behind my back. Cowards.

  Coward is a horrible word. I decided not to be one. They’d obviously ganged up together and I was the one they were having a go at. Well, they could say it to my face. I barged in. But no one noticed me. They were too busy studying something on the kitchen table. Copper Pie’s parents were nowhere to be seen. I coughed.

  ‘Keener, just in time. Look at this one.�
��

  Fifty made a space so I could see. Oh great! That was all I needed. A photo of me in Reception, with my hands in two giant yellow rubber gloves. Ha ha. So I didn’t like glue. Who cares?

  The table was covered in old photos. I saw a flash of orange and green: Copper Pie in a Tyrannosaurus Rex costume. Classic. I could feel a grin starting. I remembered that birthday party. I was sick on the way home.

  ‘Who’s that?’ said Jonno, pointing at a picture of a little boy dressed up as a ladybird.

  A guffaw exploded from somewhere deep inside. I managed to squeeze out, ‘It’s Fifty.’ Fifty’s hair was like a ginormous black woolly hat and his cheeks were all rosy.

  ‘You should have been a girl,’ said Bee, grabbing it.

  ‘So cute,’ said Jonno.

  ‘Wait till you see Bee. She was a giraffe. She must be in one of them.’ Fifty started shuffling all the photos. ‘Here she is.’

  ‘Too much,’ said Jonno, holding his middle. Bee’s face was poking out of the middle of some spotty brown fur. She didn’t have any hair because it was all tucked up into the giraffe head.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ said Copper Pie, to our backs.

  I held up the dinosaur pic.

  ‘That was my animal birthday party,’ he said. ‘Let’s see.’ He took it. The table was like a diary of our lives. There was every party, every Christmas play (Bee as an angel!), the time we went sledging in bobble hats and mittens using trays and bin bags, Charlie’s christening (with me holding him and Bee feeding him a bottle). We had to explain everything to Jonno, the only Triber who wasn’t around to see it all. I don’t know how long we sat there but eventually, when we’d been through the lot, someone said they were hungry and we remembered the cakes at the Tribehouse. Bee packed the photos away in the shoebox and put it back on the top of one of the cupboards.

  ‘Let’s go,’ she said. ‘To the Tribehouse!’

  ‘Come on, Copper Pie,’ said Fifty.

  He looked at the Tribers, one at a time.

  ‘Am I still in? Still a Triber?’

  ‘Looks like it,’ said Bee. ‘I can’t see any pictures of Callum in your mum’s box so I reckon you must be one of us.’