Paul Jennings' Trickiest Stories

by Paul Jennings

  I didn’t feel a thing. No ghostly hand. No live hand. My plan probably hadn’t worked. I had no way of knowing where the glasses were. And even if they had passed into the ghost world they might not work on ghosts. Or Pop might have grabbed them. Or Gavin might be wearing them inside the house while I was out in the garden.

  I knew it was hopeless but I put out my hand again and moved it up and down.

  ‘Shake, Gavin. Please shake,’ I said.

  ‘Byron, Byron,’ said a voice. ‘What are you doing?’

  I turned around.

  Mum was looking at me with tears in her eyes.

  5

  Mum dragged me inside and made Dad come home from work. She told him what she had seen.

  ‘Byron,’ said Dad. ‘There are no ghosts. You are not going to see your brother again. You have to live with that. I’d like to shake Pop’s hand. Do you think I didn’t say mean things to him when I was a boy? Do you think I didn’t do horrible things that I wish I could take back? We are all just good people who make mistakes. Hurt others sometimes. We have to live with it.’

  ‘I saw him,’ I yelled. ‘Through the glasses. And Pop. And Nan. They don’t believe in people. They…’

  ‘Okay,’ said Dad. ‘Okay. Give me a look through the glasses. I’d like to see these ghosts.’

  I hung my head. ‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘I gave them to Gavin. He could be watching us right now.’

  Mum put her arm around my shoulder and gave me a soft smile. Neither of them believed me. And I didn’t blame them.

  ‘We have to leave here,’ said Mum. ‘We have to start anew. None of us will get over Gavin’s death while we live here.’

  ‘I’m not going,’ I shouted. ‘I have to shake hands with Gavin.’

  Mum and Dad just looked at each other silently. I could tell that they were going to find a new house. Well, I wouldn’t be going with them. That was for sure.

  I started to walk back to the shed.

  ‘Another thing, mate,’ said Dad. ‘You’d better stay away from the vegetable patch and the shed. It’s just making you upset.’

  ‘No,’ I yelled.

  ‘Yes,’ said Mum. ‘And that’s final.’

  6

  After that Mum and Dad didn’t take their eyes off me. When I came home from school they wouldn’t let me go outside unless they went with me. I desperately wanted to go down to the shed where the box waited for me. There might be just a chance that Gavin had the glasses and was watching.

  I tried to sneak out a couple of times but I always got caught. Mum became more and more desperate to move house. Dad even sold his car to raise some money for a new place.

  Sometimes I would stand in my room and talk to Gavin as if he could see me. I would explain who I was and why I wanted to shake his hand. But it was hopeless. I could tell no one was there. I had to get down to the shed.

  Then we had the storm. A real ripper. Thunder and lightning. Hail. Water raced down the gutters and poured out of the spouting. Dad rang from the station after work. ‘Come and get me,’ he said to Mum. ‘I’ll get soaked walking all that way.’

  Mum drove off in her old Ford.

  This was it. This was my chance.

  I raced down to the shed without even putting on my coat. I was drenched. But I was where I wanted to be.

  There was the box. Right where I had left it. I picked it up with shaking hands and opened the lid. Yes, yes. The glasses. They were back. I grabbed them and put them on.

  Once again I saw another world. A world where it wasn’t raining. There was the shed with the old-fashioned lawnmower. And Gavin. Painting a bike. It was upside down and he was carefully coating it with red. His favourite colour.

  ‘Gavin,’ I yelled. ‘It’s me.’

  He kept painting. He couldn’t see me. I had the glasses on. It was a one-way thing. There was no way I could get his attention. I concentrated like crazy. ‘Gavin,’ I said in my mind. ‘Gavin, I am here.’

  My ghost brother looked up briefly and then went back to work on the bike.

  ‘Shake,’ I yelled. ‘Shake.’

  He didn’t take any notice. I wasn’t getting through. My heart was breaking. I couldn’t make contact.

  I could try putting the glasses back in the box. Then he would have them. But I wouldn’t be able to see him. He might not get them. Or Pop might confiscate them.

  I could stand there, holding out my hand, shaking nothing for all my life without knowing whether it was being returned. I decided to give it a try anyway. I took the glasses from my face and the ghost world disappeared. I quickly put them in the box. They began to shimmer and then vanished.

  ‘Please pick them up, Gavin,’ I whispered. ‘Please.’ I waited for a bit, giving him the chance to see them. And put them on his nose.

  I began to speak into the empty jar. I just hoped he could hear me. ‘Gavin,’ I said. ‘Gavin. Don’t be scared. I am not a ghost. No, that’s no good. You are a ghost. I am a person. There is such a thing as a person. You were my brother. You died. It was my fault. I want to shake your hand. If you can hear me put the glasses back in the box.

  There was a pause. Then a shimmering, like rain running down a window. Suddenly the glasses appeared. I quickly put them on.

  Gavin was standing there with his back to me. He didn’t know where I was. But he started talking. I walked right through him and turned around so that I could see his ghostly face.

  ‘Person boy, who looks a lot like me,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what died means. I know what born means. But I believe you. I believe I once lived before. Somewhere else. I will send the glasses back. Tell me everything.’

  ‘Yes,’ I yelled. ‘Yes, I will.’

  Once again the glasses vanished and once again I stood alone in the shed. I began to talk. I explained everything. About him dying. About Mum wanting to move. About me wanting to stay. And about the handshake. How I needed to feel his hand in mine. I explained how we were twins.

  Then I stretched my hand out and moved it up and down. Somehow I knew that he was doing the same. That he was putting his ghostly hand in mine. But I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t feel it. It wasn’t enough. I wanted to touch him. I had to touch him. I would never be free until I clasped his hand in friendship. Until I was forgiven.

  Think. Think. There must be a way around this. Surely there was some way we could see each other at the same time. I had to find an answer. I was desperate.

  Suddenly I had an idea.

  ‘Send the glasses back,’ I shouted.

  Nothing happened. Not for a bit anyway. Then there was a shimmer and a dull glow from the box. The glasses appeared. I grabbed them and started to push on one of the bits of glass.

  Plop. Yes, the lens flipped out. Then the other one. Plop. The wire frame was empty. I had done it. I stared at the two glass lenses. Then I quickly threw one of them into the box. It shimmered and vanished.

  I pushed the remaining lens on to one eye and closed the other. It was a lens for one eye. A monocle.

  It worked. I could see Gavin through my left eye. He was putting his lens up to his right eye. He could see me.

  ‘G’day,’ he said in a cheeky voice.

  I choked a reply. ‘Hello,’ was all I could manage.

  This was wonderful. We could see each other. He wasn’t ghostly. He was solid like a real person. We grinned in amazement at each other.

  Suddenly his face fell. He was staring through the window. Pop was coming and he didn’t look pleased. I snatched a glance through my window. Dad and Mum were coming and they didn’t look pleased either. They were angry. They were furious.

  ‘Quick,’ I yelled. ‘Quick. Shake.’

  I held out my hand. Gavin took it. It was a firm, warm handshake. Solid. Full of life and love. So good. So good. A wonderful feeling ran from his hand right through my whole body. Everything was okay. I had done it. We had done it. I was happy. Now at last I would be able to remember Gavin and smile.

  Dad burst t
hrough the door of my world.

  Pop burst through the door of Gavin’s world.

  Pop had his hand out to snatch Gavin’s eye-glass. Dad had his outstretched to grab mine.

  Gavin had time for one last sentence. ‘Goodbye, Byron,’ he yelled. ‘I…’

  I heard no more. Dad had grabbed my eye glass. Gavin vanished. Pop vanished.

  Dad turned, flung back his hand and threw the glass lens into the air and over the fence. I heard it hit the road. And then a crunch. A car had destroyed the lens.

  Dad was angry. ‘I’m sorry, Byron,’ he said. ‘But this has to stop.’

  I grinned at him. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘It’s all over. We shook hands.’

  Mum and Dad stared at me, upset.

  ‘We have to leave this house,’ said Mum. ‘We have to start again.’

  In my heart I knew that I would never see Gavin again. Pop would have thrown away Gavin’s lens too. Or confiscated it. And mine was destroyed. It was over. I had done everything that had to be done.

  Well, nearly everything.

  I went over to Mum and Dad and put my arms around them. ‘If you want to go to a new house,’ I said, ‘It’s okay with me.

  ‘I’m ready to move on.’

  Burp!

  Is that a tape recorder, doctor? Is it switched on? Good. I’ll tell you how all this happened. There’s nothing you can do to save me. No one can help me now. So I’ll tell you how I got into this mess.

  I’m not in any pain. I’m just crying because I’ll never eat another meal. No more fried kidneys. No more sheeps brains. And no more apple pie.

  I didn’t look like this before. I was a good looking bloke. A bit plump. A little overweight. Some people even called me fat. Well I couldn’t help it. I needed a lot of food. I was born hungry. I had a big appetite.

  It was all right for skinny people. They didn’t feel hungry. I felt hungry all the time. I needed a lot of food.

  When I was fourteen it was especially bad. I was a growing lad and I was always hungry. Everybody tried to stop me eating. My parents tried to put me on a diet. The teachers tried to stop me going to the canteen.

  One teacher was really bad. He wrote to my parents telling them not to give me any money. He said that I was spending it all on junk food.

  His name was Kerr – Peter Kerr. I hated him. I hated him because he stopped my canteen money.

  I hated another person at that school. A kid called John Mead. Mead called me names. Names like Fatso, Fat Stuff, Large Larry and Skinny. He thought it was funny to call me Skinny.

  But I taught Kerr and Mead a lesson. A lesson that they didn’t forget in a hurry. It was their own fault. They shouldn’t have picked on me for being fat.

  The trouble started when we moved to a new house. There was a house in the town that my mother always liked. It was very old. It had history. That’s why my mother bought it. She liked old things.

  We were told that an old woman lived there long ago. Her name was Mother Scarrow. She was able to cure sick people. This was in the days before there were doctors. Sick people came from everywhere.

  Mother Scarrow had all sorts of cures. She had bottles of herbs and potions. She could cure anything. Mumps, chicken pox, pimples, even bad breath – she could cure the lot.

  One day the people in the village killed her. They said she was a witch. They broke into her bedroom and killed her with sticks. A week later everyone in the village died. A terrible disease killed them all. Mother Scarrow couldn’t help them. She was dead.

  I didn’t believe that Mother Scarrow was a witch. They probably killed her because she was old and ugly.

  My bedroom was the room in which Mother Scarrow was killed. I wasn’t scared about that. I didn’t really believe in witches or spells, so there was nothing to be scared of.

  But I wasn’t happy in this house. Not because of the witch, but because I couldn’t get food. That rotten teacher Kerr told my mother not to give me money. He said I needed to lose weight.

  I was starving. My mother put me on a diet. I was only allowed to have three eggs for breakfast. No chocolate, no cakes. Three sandwiches for lunch and no milkshakes!

  It wasn’t fair – I needed food. I thought about food all the time. I couldn’t get it out of my mind. I saw food in my dreams. Lovely food, like buns, roast chicken, chocolate cake, spaghetti and apple pie.

  I had to do something. I was going crazy! I went to the bank and took out all my spare cash. I went to the shop and bought fifteen bars of chocolate. Then I went to my room and looked for somewhere to hide them and the rest of the money.

  The walls of my room were made of large bricks. One of the bricks seemed loose. I took out a knife and started to dig all around it. It soon came out. I looked in the hole. There was something in there.

  It was a book, a very old book. On the cover it had a word that I had never seen before. It said ‘FPELLF’. Inside were pages and pages of handwriting. It was shaky writing. It looked as if someone old had written it. It was smudged and hard to read.

  At first I couldn’t understand any of it. The spelling was wrong. Then I realised something. None of the words had the letter ‘s’ in them. Where there should have been an ‘s’, there was an ‘f’.

  I looked at the cover again. It said ‘FPELLF’. It meant ‘SPELLS’.

  I had found Mother Scarrow’s book of spells!

  2

  I spent a lot of time reading that book. It was slow work, but at last I got the hang of it. Every page had a different spell. There was a cure for every illness you could think of.

  Some were spells for things that were not sicknesses at all. There was one for fixing long noses. Another was for ugly faces. One page had a cure for bad dreams.

  Then I got a shock. One page was about fat people. I read it carefully. I thought it would be about diets. It wasn’t. It was a spell to make you thin. But you could eat as much as you liked!

  There was a black feather pressed flat between the pages. It had been there for hundreds of years.

  The book explained what to do with the feather. It would help you to lose weight.

  The book told you to eat a big meal. Anything you liked. Then you had to pick up the feather and write someone’s name. The name of someone you didn’t like. This person would get fatter but you would stay thin. You could write the name in the air, or anywhere else you liked. Your enemy would get the fat from the meal!

  I didn’t really believe in spells, but I liked the idea of this one. I had lots of enemies. There were plenty of people I would like to make fat. All those people who had called me names. I could pay them back.

  I picked up the feather and looked at it. If only the spell was real! I could become thinner and make everyone else fat. I decided to give it a try.

  I picked up some more of the money I had taken out of the bank. Then I went down the street to the shops. I went in to Fred’s Cafe. I sat down at a table and ordered a meal.

  It was a big meal. I started with chicken soup. Then I had a rump steak with eggs, chips, vegetables and onions. I was still hungry so I had more. I ordered a mixed grill – two chops, sausages, eggs, bacon and a salad.

  After this I was ready for dessert. I had a piece of apple pie, a plate of ice-cream and some cheesecake.

  My money was nearly gone. So I finished up with two cups of coffee, a milkshake and six cream buns.

  I felt full. My belt was tight. My stomach was sticking out. I had to undo a button on my jeans. I felt a bit sick. Then I did a loud burp. That made me feel better.

  I picked up the feather and wrote a name in the air with the feather. The name was John Mead. He was the kid who had called me Fatso.

  Nothing seemed to happen. Then I looked at my belt. It was loose. I had to do up the button on my jeans. I didn’t feel sick now. I felt hungry again!

  3

  The next day was Monday. It was a school day. For once, I really wanted to go to school. I wanted to see what had happened to John
Mead.

  Mead was away from school. I was disappointed. Then I found out why he was away. He had a bad stomach ache. He was very sick. The doctor said that he had been greedy. What a laugh!

  Now I knew the witch’s spell worked.

  Every day I ate as much as I could. I ate big meals – very big meals. After each meal I used the feather. I wrote Mead’s name with the feather. I had some great meals. Trifle, chocolate cake, cream sponge, jelly. I ate everything that is unhealthy.

  I started to lose weight. I became thinner and thinner. My parents were very pleased. They thought I was on a diet. They gave me my pocket money back. They were pleased that I had changed my ways.

  Mead started to put on weight. He became fatter and fatter. He didn’t call me Fatso any more. People started to call him Fatso. He became very large. He had to buy new clothes. His old ones wouldn’t fit. Soon he was the fattest boy in the school.

  Mead went on a diet. He had to eat healthy, boring food like carrots and apples. I almost felt sorry for him until I remembered what he had called me. I remembered how he used to tease me. I kept eating big meals and writing his name with the feather.

  I started to get too thin. I didn’t want to fade away altogether. I decided to use the feather less often. I only used it on junk food. Chocolate, chips, those sorts of things.

  I didn’t use the feather on good food. If I ate an apple I didn’t use the feather. If I ate rubbish I did. In this way I developed a healthy body. Mead grew fatter and fatter and got pimples.

  Next Mead started playing truant. He would not got to school because the kids all teased him for being so fat.

  In the end Mead got into big trouble. His parents said he was sneaking food out of the refrigerator. They had a big row. Mead ran away from home. But the police caught him. They brought him back. That taught him a lesson.

  I’d got my revenge on Mead. But there was another person I wanted to punish – Mr Kerr, the Maths teacher.

  This teacher had been giving me a lot of trouble. He gave the class a Mathematics test. He only gave me thirty marks out of one hundred. I was bottom of the class. He said I hadn’t done my homework.