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First published in Great Britain by
HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2017
HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,
HarperCollins Publishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
The HarperCollins website address is:
www.harpercollins.co.uk
Text copyright © David Baddiel 2017
Illustrations copyright © Jim Field 2017
All rights reserved.
Cover illustration copyright © Jim Field 2017
David Baddiel and Jim Field assert the moral right to be identified as the author and illustrator of the work respectively.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008200473
Ebook Edition © 2017 ISBN: 9780008200497
Version: 2018-09-18
To Grandpa Colin
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Part 1: For he’s a jolly good fellow …
Chapter 1: Birthday Boy
Chapter 2: Um …
Chapter 3: The Star-Watcher Explorer
Chapter 4: 11.59PM
Chapter 5: When you wish upon a star
Chapter 6: Birthday Two
Chapter 7: Everyday magical
Chapter 8: New kid
Chapter 9: This could get complicated
Chapter 10: The whole school
Chapter 11: Hodgepodge
Chapter 12: A packet of Werther’s Originals, some shoelaces and a jar of Duraglit
Chapter 13: It always just points straight back at me
Chapter 14: Can’t make out what you’re saying there at all
Part 2: For he’s a jolly good fellow …
Part 3: For he’s a jolly—oh.
Chapter 15: Too much
Chapter 16: You’ll what?
Chapter 17: Feeling a bit low
Chapter 18: Sir Guinea Pig and the Green Knight
Chapter 19: Nobody knows
Chapter 20: Never mind
Chapter 21: Especially on your birthday
Chapter 22: A weird wish
Chapter 23: That island in the middle of the river
Chapter 24: With great poo-er
Chapter 25: The rozzers
Chapter 26: It’s a deal
Chapter 27: Don’t look now
Chapter 28: Like a superhero
Chapter 29: Skateboat
Part 4: And so say all of us
Chapter 30: Over the waves of a concrete sea
Chapter 31: Brick. Wall.
Chapter 32: A feeling
Chapter 33: The one thing you definitely need on a dangerous secret mission
Chapter 34: Altogether a strange sight
Chapter 35: Keep it zipped
Chapter 36: How much of an idiot is he?
Chapter 37: Schropplingythingy
Chapter 38: Bon voyage
Chapter 39: Let’s go
Chapter 40: Extremely dark and muddy
Chapter 41: Midnight feast
Chapter 42: Born to be wild
Chapter 43: Some sort of rhythm
Chapter 44: Moonlight motorcade
Chapter 45: Crunch
Chapter 46: Flick. Flick. Flick. Shine. Shine. Shine. Flick. Flick. Flick.
Chapter 47: I’m a guinea pig, for crying out loud
Chapter 48: Stronger than the north pole
Chapter 49: Hello? HQ?
Chapter 50: What aliens?
Chapter 51: Very loud, and thudding
Chapter 52: A human shape
Chapter 53: Don’t swear in front of my children
Chapter 54: A camping trip
Chapter 55: Wobbly and windy and swaying and frightening
Chapter 56: Just hold on
Chapter 57: Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, One …
Chapter 58: Nothing
Chapter 59: Birthday Two (The real one)
Chapter 60: Case successfully closed
Chapter 61: He’s always going to be here
Chapter 62: Once a week, at night
Chapter 63: Dash Dash Dash. Dot Dot Dot. Dash Dash Dash.
Coda
Acknowledgements
Keep Reading …
Books by David Baddiel
About the Publisher
CHAPTER 1
BIRTHDAY BOY
Sam Green was really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really looking forward to his eleventh birthday.
I mean: really. He couldn’t wait. In the days leading up to it – his birthday was on the eighth of September – he simply wouldn’t talk about anything else.
“Have you sorted your school bag, Sam?” his mother, Vicky, would say in the morning.
“I’m thinking an Adventure Time cake this year, Mum,” Sam would reply. “With Finn, Jake and Ice King figures. What do you think?”
“I think you should get your school bag sorted,” she’d answer.
“Do you want to play football?” his friends would say to him at break-time.
“What about a magic party?” he would reply. “You all come, having learnt a different magic trick, right, and then we each perform it in turn – me last, of course – and then … where are you going?”
“To play football,” they’d answer. “Break’s nearly over.”
“What would you like for dinner?” his dad, Charlie, would say to him and his younger sister, Ruby, in the evening.
Ruby would open her mouth and say:
“Actually” – she said “actually” a lot – “I fancy shep—” but before she got any further Sam would be saying:
“I’d like a telescope. And a skateboard. And new trainers. And a guinea pig. And a tool kit. And an iPod. And some of David Walliams’s books.”
“—herds pie,” Ruby would say.
“For dinner, I said, Sam,” his dad would say. “Not for your birthday.”
Obviously, Sam wouldn’t always say these things (and so, obviously, the people he was speaking to wouldn’t always say those things back). No. Sometimes it would be a different type of cake, a different style of party and a different list of presents (although always including a telescope: Sam was a big fan of Star Trek, and sci-fi generally, and wanted to see as much of the solar system as he could from the window of his room in order to watch out for visiting aliens). Which did mean that he had ended up with a very long present list, and a very long selection of party-theme ideas. Which, in turn, presented a bit of a problem for his mum and dad, both in terms of choice and in terms of money, because they didn’t have a lot of that.
But the thing that never changed was Sam’s excitement about the day.
And then, finally, it came.
CHAPTER 2
UM …
“Oh, Mum! Dad! That was amazing! What an amazing day!” Sam was saying as he undressed in his bedroom. It was 10pm on Saturday the eighth of September. The last of his friends, all of whom went to Bracket Wood, the local primary school, had left. Vicky and Charlie were smiling at him.
“So! Did you like your party?” said Vicky.
“Yes! Especially the sci-fi cake! In the shape of the Starship Enterprise! With six different gobstoppers for planets all round it! And candy Klingons and other aliens on the sides! Great idea, Mum!”
“Yes, well, it was your idea, Sam … I think it was cake suggestion number four – you made it last Monday …”
“And the film-theme fancy dress really worked, didn’t it, Dad? Everyone’s costume was great! Barry Bennett looked brilliant as Gru from Despicable Me! And Ellie and Fred Stone as Minions! And Malcolm Bailey as the sloth from Zootropolis! And Morris Fawcett as Homer Simpson!”
“Well,” said Charlie, “that was your idea too. Party suggestion number seven …”
“And you looked great!” said Vicky, grimacing as she pulled off Sam’s Wall-E head and feet.
“Well, that’s why I won the Best Costume Prize …”
“No, actually, that’s because it was your party,” said Ruby, wandering into the room. She’d been allowed to stay up a little bit later as it was Sam’s birthday. Ruby had a tendency to be very direct about everything, in a seven-year-old way. But she was a very clever seven-year-old. “So everyone thought you had to win. In fact, Mum and Dad basically bribed all your friends to vote for you by giving them extra cake and—”
“Yes, all right, Ruby. Time to clean your teeth,” said Charlie, taking her hand, and leading her – a little forcefully – towards the door.
“Dad? Mum? For my birthday, can I have a kitten?” said Ruby as she was leaving the room, books tucked under her arm, to do extra homework as usual. This was another thing Ruby said a lot, as well as “actually”. Sometimes she combined them and said, “Actually, Mum and Dad, can I have a kitten?” Even when no one had asked her what she wanted.
“Well …” said Vicky.
“Um …” said Charlie.
Ruby didn’t look surprised. She was used to her mum and dad saying “um …” in answer to the kitten question. But that didn’t mean she was going to let it go, either.
“Sam got a guinea pig,” she said, pointedly. “Spock!” Which, indeed, was something else on Sam’s birthday list that his parents had managed to get him. They looked over to said guinea pig, in its cage on the floor. It was a brown-and-white one, with a little tuft on its head. Sam had decided to call the guinea pig Spock after the extremely logical, cold character in Star Trek. Spock looked back at them with quite a strong sense of, “I think that name is very unfair.”
“Ruby,” said Charlie, “you know what a kitten will become?”
“Yes, actually, I do, Dad. I’m seven, not an idiot. A cat.”
“OK, so a grown cat, unlike Spock, will need some outside space. We haven’t got any.”
“Yes, we have,” said Ruby, pointing to the window. “What’s all that stuff out there?”
“Oh right. I see. Is the cat going to go down by itself from the seventeenth floor? In the lift that smells of wee?”
Ruby sighed, as if that question was ridiculous. Which it kind of was.
“We’ll think about it,” said Mum.
“Um …” said Dad.
Ruby nodded, feeling her point had been made, and turned to go out of the room. “Night, Sam! Hope you had a great birthday!”
“I did!” he replied.
CHAPTER 3
THE STAR-WATCHER EXPLORER
Sam looked up at his mum. She was buttoning his new pyjamas, which were covered in little UFOs. Sam, of course, being eleven, could do up his own pyjama buttons. But he knew it was something his mum still liked to do. “And I loved all my presents! The skateboard and the computer games and the new trainers and the DIY tool kit and the books …”
“Everything on your list,” said Vicky. “Well, apart from the iPod. Sorry about that, Sam. Maybe next year …”
“It doesn’t matter, Mum. You got me the telescope. That was my big present. I love it!”
They looked over to the window. There it was: the Star-Watcher Explorer. Sam’s dad had already set it up on a tripod, and angled it against the window, pointing at the moon. It was black and sleek and long, with a computerised tracker to allow Sam to find particular constellations.
Sam and his family lived in a tower block – Noam Chomsky House – on the seventeenth floor. So it was the best present ever! They were so high up that Sam had an uninterrupted view of the night sky, and all its stars.
“You should be able to see any aliens out there with that, eh, Sam?” said Charlie.
“I don’t think so!” shouted a voice from outside the room. It was Ruby’s. “Actually, the nearest planet capable of sustaining life is four light years away!”
“How far is that?” said Sam. “In miles?”
There was a silence. But only for a few seconds. “Two hundred and thirty-five billion billion. Give or take the odd mile.”
“Um … OK …” said Charlie. “But we don’t know how fast their spacecrafts travel, do we?”
“Well, anyway,” said Vicky, looking out of the window at the night sky above the city, “I just have a feeling that there is life out there somewhere.”
Charlie smiled: he knew that his wife had a lot of faith in her feelings. He loved that about her, even if he didn’t have so much faith in her feelings.
“Is that like the feeling,” he said, putting his arm round her, “you had yesterday, about how I shouldn’t walk under that ladder – and so I didn’t, and fell in that huge puddle instead?”
She pushed him away, but smiled as she did it.
“It didn’t cost too much, did it?” asked Sam, going over to the telescope.
Sam’s dad was a manager at HomeFront, a big building supplies store, and his mum worked at home, buying and selling stuff on the internet, so they weren’t exactly rich – though it did also mean that Dad had been able to get a staff discount on the tool kit, something Sam had really wanted, as he loved making and fixing things.
“Don’t worry about that!” said Vicky. “It’s your birthday!” She looked over at the telescope. “Are the stars out? If you see a shooting one, you can wish on it! You should wish on it!”
“Really?” said Sam. “Does that actually, y’know … work?”
“Yes!” said Vicky confidently.
Charlie looked at her, and raised an eyebrow.
“Well. No one really knows. Do they?” she said defiantly.
“Um …” said Charlie, bending down and checking the telescope lens. “Well. What I would say is that tonight is too cloudy to see the stars anyway.”
“Never mind,” said Sam. “We’ll look through it tomorrow!”
He climbed up the little ladder and got into bed. It was a bunk bed, and sometimes Sam would show how good he was at balancing on that ladder by walking up without using his hands, although tonight he was too tired for that.
“Oh! And I liked it when the grans and grandpas came round for lunch,” he said. “They didn’t even fight!”
“I know,” said Vicky, clearly surprised herself. “They were on their best behaviour.”
“Yes …” said Sam, settling his head on the pillow. “Grandpa Sam didn’t even swear at Grandpa Mike. And Grandpa Mike didn’t even punch him or threaten to get his boys on him or anything. And Grandma Glenda and Grandma Poppy even smiled at each other.”
“I think that might have been a snarl …” said his dad.
“Shush, Charlie. Anyway … you should go to sleep now, Sammy,” said Sam’s mum. “I imagine you’re exhausted …”
“Specially,” said his dad, “having got up at the dot of six in the morning!”
“Was that the time?” said Sam.
“Well. It was one minute past six when you were knocking on our bedroom door, demanding presents. I’m sure of that …”
“But that was my favourite bit!” said Sam.
“Of what?”
“Of my birthday! I love how exciting it is to wake up on your birthday! And realise that it is your birthday! This day you’ve been waiting for, for so long, it’s finally here!”
“Yes,” said Vicky. “That is very exciting.”
“Not quite as exciting when you get to forty-three, though,” said Charlie, and Vicky laughed at his joke in a grown-ups-laughing-at-grown-ups’-stuff kind of way.
“Isn’t it?” said Sam.
“Pardon?” said Charlie.
“Exciting. Isn’t it exciting any more, your birthday?”
His mum and dad looked at each other.
“Well,” said Vicky, looking back at Sam kindly, and pulling his duvet back across him. “It’s always nice, yes. But maybe not quite as nice as it was when you’re ten … or when that of course turns into eleven.”
Sam nodded, but then shook his head.
“I’d like it to be my birthday every day!” he said.
His parents smiled, and then both of them got on the bed with him – climbed up the ladder and everything – and put their arms round him, something that in this family was referred to as a bundle-hug.
“Wait for me!” said Ruby as she hurried back into the room. She climbed up and joined the bundle-hug. She was holding a big science textbook, which made it a bit uncomfortable.
Then, after that, Vicky said:
“I’m glad the day went so well. Ruby, back to your room. Sam, time to go to sleep …”
And Sam smiled at her, and shut his eyes.
CHAPTER 4
11.59PM
Normally, Sam had no problem sleeping. Normally, he was out as soon as his head hit the pillow. And his parents were right: he should have been more ready for sleep than ever, given how early he’d been up that morning.
But his birthday had been so great, and he was still so excited, that Sam just couldn’t sleep. He found himself tossing and turning in his bed, thinking of how much he just wanted to stay up and play with all his presents.
Also, he thought, looking at the numbers on the clock by his bedside – 10.24 – it’s still my birthday! For another hour and thirty-six minutes! What am I thinking of, going to sleep?
No – he also thought – I should be up, doing birthday stuff!
So Sam got out of bed. And tried on his trainers. And ran on the spot with them for a little while. Then he stood on his skateboard, which was great: his parents had splashed out on it – it was exactly the one he wanted, a flexiboard, customised with cool silver wheels and the right trucks and everything.
It would have been more fun to ride on it outside, obviously, but even in his quite small bedroom Sam was able to do some 360s and some frontside flips. Then he got Spock the guinea pig out of his cage, and did some more 360s, but this time with the guinea pig balanced on his head. The guinea pig didn’t look that keen on this. In fact, he looked down at his new master with quite a strong sense of, “If it’s all going to be like this, I’m going to be escaping to Peru. Which is where guinea pigs come from. In case you don’t know. Which I get the impression you don’t.”
(He had a pretty expressive face for a guinea pig, Spock. Which made him somewhat different, it has to be said, from the original Spock.)
Then, he – Sam, not Spock – ate some of the leftover marshmallow from the cake that his mum had brought up on a plate. Then he read the first few chapters of Demon Dentist, which was very funny.
After thirty pages, Sam looked over at the clock, which said, now, 11.55pm. He still, amazingly, didn’t feel that tired. What he did feel was a bit sad. Mainly, he felt a bit sad that his birthday was ending, officially, now. He sat up, and said to Spock, who was lying on his chest – had, in fact, tumbled down into his lap as a result of him sitting up – “Oh, Spock! I wish it was my birthday every day.”
Spock looked up at him with quite a strong sense of, “I wish I could live in a cage made out of parsley, but we can’t have everything.”
Just at that point, though, a light fell across the room. Sam looked up to see that the source of the light was beyond his bedroom curtains. Moonlight.
Aha! he thought. If I can see moonlight, the clouds must have parted. And, if the clouds have parted, I can use my telescope!
So Sam got out of bed and moved over to the window. He drew the curtains, and looked out.
He was right. It was no longer a cloudy night. Noam Chomsky House stood on a hill, and the road from it ran down, after a few miles, to the river that wound through the city. Sometimes, when – like now – the sky was clear and the moon came out, Sam could see all the way to the river (even without a telescope); he could even see the reflection of the moonlight on the water, lighting up a small tree-filled island that sat between the banks.
But Sam wasn’t interested in looking down at the water. He wanted to look up at the sky. He wanted to look up at the sky through his telescope, and see the stars and the moon. All of which were suddenly out.
He put his eye to the lenspiece at the bottom end of the telescope. It was hard to see anything – all he could make out, in fact, was what appeared to be three or four massive spider legs, which at first, excitedly, he thought must be aliens but then realised were just his eyelashes. Gradually, though, his vision got used to it, and then he could see the moon!
All white and shining and pockmarked, like Grandpa Sam’s face (although that was only the pockmarked bit, as Grandpa Sam’s face was sort of leathery and brown, and, though friendly, very rarely shining).
“I can see the moon, Spock!” he said to Spock, who was now on the floor, by his cage. Spock looked back at him with quite a strong sense of, “When you can see a planet made of parsley, let me know. Meanwhile, open my house, please.”
When Sam turned back to the telescope, though, he couldn’t see the moon through it any more. This was a thing about telescopes: even small eye movements meant that you could end up a long way from what you’d been looking at before. He scanned right, left, up and down, but couldn’t see where the moon had gone – and then—
What was that? A spaceship? It was black, and oblong, and had a series of enormous flickering green numbers on the front of it …
… Oh. It was his clock. Made to look much bigger and more spaceship-ey because he was seeing it through the telescope. He’d turned the thing all the way round, away from the window, and was looking back towards his bed.