by David Parkin
“Will do.”
“Goodnight then.” His mum stood up and ruffled his hair. “My strange little man.”
Christopher waited until the door had closed and he was sure his mum was back downstairs in front of the TV.
He reached under his bed and slid out the shoebox.
“So … did your slug mum tuck you in at night?”
But Little Big Nose was already fast asleep. He was snuggled in amongst the cotton wool and was snoring gently.
The Glowing Bush
The next morning, Christopher strode out onto a fresh blanket of dew.
Little Big Nose poked his nostrils from Christopher’s coat pocket. “Spring,” he snorted. “Maybe my favourite season. All the wonderful new smells. The grass, the trees, the blossom.”
Christopher walked Little Big Nose around his patch of land and told him about his gardening techniques.
“Basically, I let anything grow,” he said and glanced disapprovingly over his shoulder at his mum’s nice neat lawn. “I like a bit of a jumble … I mean … I think it’s wrong to cut your grass all the time and have perfect square hedges. Nature is meant to be wild … not neat and tidy.”
Christopher thought for a moment as he tried to find the right words. “It’s like seeing lions at the zoo,” he said eventually. “It doesn’t seem right somehow.”
“So your garden is like a wild lion!”
“Exactly!” Christopher pointed out various sections. “I’ve got all sorts in here. Roses, leeks, tulips, poison ivy … I did have a Venus Fly Trap once, but … she couldn’t cope with the English winter.”
He looked around the jumble of leaves, branches, vines and blossom. “The only plants I don’t let grow are thistles!” He told Little Big Nose about the screaming game he liked to play when weeding them.
“It sounds like your garden gives you a lot of pleasure.”
“And we haven’t got to the best bits yet!” Christopher leapt into the chaos and began to point out his various ornamental displays: the swamp of no return, the baby frog playground, the dolls’ graveyard…
“I think that not only are you a very good gardener,” said Little Big Nose. “You are also a fine artist.”
“An artist.” Christopher felt a bit embarrassed. “I’ve never thought of it like that.”
“I think your work with gnomes shows particular promise.”
“That reminds me!” Christopher reached down into a large grassy section. “This is Arnold!” Christopher held the gnome in front of Little Big Nose. “Do you remember him?”
“I most certainly do,” said the nose. “And I would like to offer my sincerest apologies to your gnomey friend.”
Although Arnold smiled his usual smile, he refused to look at the nose. As always, he stared resolutely into the distance.
“Don’t mind him,” said Christopher with a smirk. “He doesn’t talk much.”
Christopher placed Arnold back in his usual spot and took Little Big Nose from his pocket. He wrapped him in a sock and placed him on a large rock. Christopher pulled up the stool he kept in his garden and sat opposite, looking at Little Big Nose with intense curiosity.
“So … Little Big Nose,” he began slowly. “Last night, maybe I didn’t hear right, but I’m sure you told me that your mother was a slug.”
“I believe I did Christopher, yes,” replied Little Big Nose slowly.
“What’s the story, if you don’t mind me asking?”said Christopher jiggling his knees.
For a moment more, Little Big Nose said nothing. Then he snorted out a hearty laugh.
“Of course I don’t mind!” he said and wriggled about in his sock, making himself comfortable. “What better time to talk of beginnings, than on a beautiful spring day!”
Christopher sat forward and listened intently to the nose’s wheezy whisperings.
“My story begins with a full moon. A while ago, long before I can remember, my mother sat all alone under the light of a marvellous moon.”
It was the voice Little Big Nose had used the night before while talking about all the creatures that lived in the garden. It was one of the best sounds Christopher had ever heard. It drew you in ever so gently and then painted incredible pictures inside your head.
“My mother said it was the most wonderful night she had ever seen. Thousands of stars freckled the sky and the fat yellow moon seemed bigger and closer somehow, as if it were hanging just beyond the clouds.”
“I love full moons,” said Christopher.
“So do slugs,” replied Little Big Nose. “And all other creatures, now I think of it. Maybe it’s the one thing that all beasties agree on: that a full moon is truly a very magical thing.”
“There’s just something about a full moon that makes you feel really…” Christopher searched for the right words. “Really … alive.”
“For a human you are a most perceptive character,” said the nose.
Christopher smiled shyly.
“Anyway, on with the story … so there was my mother … crawling along, enchanted by the night’s spectacle. She crept for hours, looking at the sky and taking in the smells of the evening, lost in her thoughts. Eventually she realised, however, that she had travelled a little too far and had no idea where she was.”
“Was she scared?”
“Not at all. She was a slug, remember. Here’s a little riddle for you: why is a slug never lost?”
Christopher thought hard for a moment.
“Because of their trails!” he shouted, feeling very pleased with himself.
“Precisely,” replied the nose. “Wherever a slug wanders in the whole wide world, there is always a shining silver path just behind them, ready to lead them all the way home.”
“That must be very handy!”
“Yes, indeed it is,” said Little Big Nose. “My mother was just turning around to trace her trail when she saw the most unusual thing … a glowing bush.”
“Glowing?” Christopher looked doubtful. “She really saw a glowing bush?”
“Although this story is true, it does not mean that all of it happened,” said the nose. “My mother, like all good storytellers, was prone to exaggeration. And anyway, it wasn’t the bush that was glowing.”
“What was then?”
“I was,” replied the nose. “My mother said that when she looked into the branches there I was, covered in green glowing goo.”
“You were pretty gooey when I met you,” grinned Christopher. “But you weren’t glowing!”
“Apparently I was an incredible but sad sight. I was small and pale and I sniffled and snuffled. My mother said she had never seen a beastie look so alone.”
“So she took you in?”
“Yes, she did,” said Little Big Nose. “She adopted me as a slimer of her own and I grew up as a slug … as part of the herd.”
“Didn’t you stick out?” said Christopher. “I mean … wasn’t it odd, being the only nose?”
“I thought I was a slug for many years.”
“But surely you must have noticed something was different.”
“Not at all. In many ways I’m just like a slug. I trundle along slowly. I sometimes leave behind me a glistening trail, just as they do. I was brought up exactly the same as all the other baby slimers: on a healthy mix of riddles, philosophy and greenery.”
“So that’s why you like cabbage and stuff?”
“Yes, and thank you by the way for that delicious meal last night,” said Little Big Nose politely. “I always knew I was not my mother’s birth child, but I had no reason to think that I wasn’t a slug.”
“So how did you find out?” asked Christopher. “That you weren’t a slug, I mean. It must have been a bit of a shock.”
Little Big Nose fell silent.
; After a long pause he said quietly, “That, Christopher, is another story entirely. And one better left for another day.”
“You don’t have to tell me at all if you don’t want to,” said Christopher. “I understand.”
“There’s an old slug saying,” replied the nose solemnly. “Given time … a sad story will tell itself.”
“Okay…” said Christopher, not really understanding but eager to change the subject. He jumped to his feet and was just about to continue his tour of the garden when he felt something prickle his leg.
“OW!”
He looked down and there was the thistle that he had poured Little Big Nose’s snot over a few weeks ago.
“So it doesn’t work as weed killer…”
“I beg your pardon?”
Christopher laughed to himself. “Oh never mind … it’s a long story, and I’m not as good at telling them as you are.”
He reached down, grabbed the thistle and yanked.
“AAAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!” The cry echoed around the trees and bushes sending birds flapping into the air.
“That really is a gut-wrenching thistle scream you’ve developed there,” said Little Big Nose.
But Christopher didn’t reply.
“What is it?” said the nose.
“That wasn’t me…” said Christopher in a whisper. “It wasn’t me that made that horrible sound.”
He looked around the garden nervously.
“And if it wasn’t me, what was it?”
Little Big Nose sniffed the air. “I can’t smell anything out of the ordinary.”
Christopher looked down at the thistle in his hand. He was sure it twitched a little.
“Strange…” he said. “Very strange.”
The Fantastic Plastic Surgeon
The next day, Christopher was watching his favourite nature programme on TV when he noticed an advert on the back page of his mum’s newspaper.
In big bold letters the advert asked, “DO YOU HAVE A BIG NOSE COVERED IN UNSIGHTLY FRECKLES?”
Christopher got up from the sofa to have a closer look; the advert went on…
“DO YOU HAVE EARS THAT STICK OUT SO MUCH THAT YOU CAN’T FIT THROUGH DOORS?
ARE YOUR TEETH BACK TO FRONT?”
By now Christopher was practically sitting on his mum’s lap. His mum frowned at him over the paper. Christopher read on.
“IF SO, WHY NOT CALL DOCTOR SKINNER? THE FANTASTIC PLASTIC SURGEON.
IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR A NEW FACE THEN HE’S YOUR MAN!”
“Perfect!”shouted Christopher, jumping to his feet and running from the room. He fetched a pair of scissors from the kitchen, burst through the door and snatched the paper away from her.
“What are you doing?” cried Mrs Postlethwaite as Christopher began to cut out a large square from the back page. “I was reading that!”
“You can have it back in a minute. I’m just cutting out an advert.”
“What advert?”
Christopher showed his mum the square of paper. She frowned through her glasses, “A big nose … Doctor Skinner … teeth back to front?”
She looked up at Christopher. “What an earth do you want this for?”
“Urm … homework!”
“Well, that makes a nice change.”
“Yeah, we have to write about what we want to do when we grow up.” Christopher smirked to himself. He was getting rather good at telling fibs. “And I thought I might quite like to be a plastic surgeon.”
His mum screwed up her face. “Really?”
Christopher nodded cheerfully, “Yep!”
“Right… ” She rolled her eyes. “Well, there you go.” She handed Christopher back the advert. “But wait until I’ve finished reading the paper before you start cutting it to pieces in future.”
“Okay!”
“And another thing!”
“YES,” said Christopher impatiently, skipping from one foot to the other.
“I think it’s lovely that you want to pursue a career in medicine, completely out of the blue, but lovely all the same. But wouldn’t you rather be a regular surgeon? It’s just my opinion but I don’t trust plastic surgeons.”
“Whatever you say!” cried Christopher as he ran from the room.
His mum watched him go and then returned to her paper.
“Doctor Skinner indeed,” she muttered. “Sounds like a villain to me.”
Doctor Skinner’s Mansion
The weekend came, and Christopher and Little Big Nose had breakfast before anyone in the house was awake.
Earlier that week Christopher had shown Little Big Nose the plastic surgeon’s advert. The nose had seemed unsure at first and had gone for a trundle around the garden for a think.
When Christopher found him, sitting on Arnold’s hat, his mind was made up.
“I realised some time ago that I am a nose, for better or for worse,” he said. “And if I’m a nose, then I should jolly well try to be one!”
So that Saturday morning, Christopher pumped up the tyres on his bike and placed the nose in his shoebox.
“It might get a bit bumpy,” he warned. “Can you hang on to something?”
“Easy,” replied Little Big Nose and with a squelch, he used his damp suckers to hold tight to the cardboard. “I’m ready.”
Christopher grinned at the nose and slid the lid over the box. As he placed it in his rucksack he looked around at the bright greens and blues of summer.
“Good day for a bike ride…” he said breezily. Then he glanced back at the house and a frown fell across his face. “And I’m not hanging around here all day.”
Lauren appeared at the back door in her nightie. She yawned and nodded to Christopher’s bicycle.
“I suppose you’re disappearing again…”
“I’m going on a bike ride.”
“Right…” said Lauren flatly. “Every Saturday it’s another excuse.”
“I’ve things I need to do,” snapped Christopher.
“Why don’t you stay this time?” said Lauren softly. “When was the last time you saw him?”
Christopher’s cheeks flushed red, and he couldn’t help the tremble in his voice. “I can’t. I’ve made plans…”
Lauren reached forward and tentatively took his hand.
“Come on Chris … he really misses you.”
“Lauren … don’t hold my hand!” scowled Christopher. Lauren let go and Christopher jumped on his bike.
“What have I told you about that?” he said. “We’re not little kids anymore.”
“You’re going to have to see him sooner or later.”
“Got to go now,” said Christopher as he pushed his feet into the pedals. “Tell Mum I’ll be back for tea!”
“Christopher…” Lauren called after him, but he was already half way down the drive. She watched him cycle up the hill and disappear around a corner. Then, for a while, she just watched the empty road.
Doctor Skinner’s mansion seemed very posh to Christopher. It looked more like a small castle. As he pushed his bike down the long driveway he looked up. Steeples, turrets and towers jutted into the sky. Christopher glanced around at the gardens and decided they were a bit boring.
What this place really needs, he thought, is a moat.
When he arrived at the large front door, he was confused to find that there was no doorbell or knocker. But there was an odd metal box. Attached to the box was a mouth. Stranger still, just below the mouth, connected by wires and cable, was a toe. Below them both hung a hammer that dangled from the wall by a chain. Next to this was a sign that read: “Please bang toe with hammer for assistance”.
Christopher inspected the strange contraption. The toe and the mouth looked incredi
bly realistic.
“Can’t be real though,” said Christopher as he picked up the hammer. “Must be some kind of plastic surgeon’s joke.” He banged the toe as hard as he could.
“OW!” screamed the mouth robotically.
“Just a minute!” shouted a voice. Christopher heard someone running downstairs and then the various clicks and clunks of locks and bolts. The door swished open and there stood Doctor Skinner.
The doctor was a shocking sight.
He was very, very tall. He had six fingers on each hand and his mouth looked huge, like it had too many teeth.
“Yes?” said Doctor Skinner, looking Christopher up and down. “I’m sorry, but whatever it is I’m not interested!”
Christopher said nothing and just stood there, flabbergasted.
“Are you all right? What is it? Cat got your tongue? I can make you a new one … for a price!” Doctor Skinner laughed at his little joke.
“You’ve got twelve fingers,” said Christopher. It was the only thing he could think of.
“Yes … well spotted. Makes playing the piano a lot easier!”
“And you’re very, very tall,” said Christopher, still shocked silly.
“Extra knees,” said the doctor in a hushed voice and winked at Christopher.
“OW!”
Christopher jumped.
It was the mouth on the metal box.
“OW! OW! OW!” it chanted.
“Blasted thing!” growled Doctor Skinner. “Look, just move out of the way for a second … stupid contraption…”
The doctor bundled Christopher inside and stepped out onto the porch to investigate. The front door slammed shut. Christopher glanced around nervously; he hadn’t meant to enter the mansion. He knew his mum wouldn’t be happy if she found out he’d been knocking on strangers’ doors. But Doctor Skinner seemed harmless enough, a little eccentric maybe, but harmless.
Then he heard the doctor dealing with his machine: a mix of thuds, mechanical cries and Doctor Skinner muttering to himself…
“Confounded piece of junk…”
