Rare Pets and Other Oddities

by Dave Leys

toilet roll for a neck and stuck it into the top of the jumper. Then they put the hat on top and sat him on a chair looking out the window. Just to make him a little more lifelike they left one of his hands resting on Natasha’s computer keyboard.

  Then they stepped back to view their creation. Alicia and Natasha breathed out slowly, completely satisfied.

  ‘His name,’ said Alicia firmly, ‘is Owen.’

  Now all that remained was to make Imogen fall in love with him. They bustled towards the door, turning back to look once more at Owen. His bald white teeth stood out from his shrunken bones and grinned weirdly at them as they left.

  Two minutes later, having run across the road giggling, they were knocking on Imogen’s door. Imogen was once more lying on her bed, staring at the wall. ‘What do you two want?’ she said tiredly.

  Alicia tugged at Natasha’s arm.

  ‘Nothing,’ replied Natasha. ‘Only, a boarder has moved into my house. He’s taken my room.’

  Imogen shrugged. What did she care?

  Alicia continued. ‘His name is Owen. He’s your age, actually. He’s a bit lonely.’

  They had pricked Imogen’s curiosity now. She levered herself up and looked at them, pursing her lips. ‘And?’ she said.

  ‘He’s really nice,’ said Natasha. ‘And lonely. We told him about you.’

  ‘What?’ There was colour rising in Imogen’s cheeks now. She frowned for a moment, and then said, ‘Well, if he’s so lonely, tell him to come and visit.’

  Alicia thought for a moment. ‘The thing is, he’s not able to leave the house. He’s a bit sick, you see.’ She reached over and pulled at her sister’s arm. ‘Look, you can see him through the window.’

  Imogen looked confused now, but she followed her sister and walked to the window. Right across the street sat Owen. His teeth gleamed as he tapped on the keyboard.

  Imogen narrowed her eyes to focus and gasped. ‘What’s wrong with his face?’

  Natasha stepped forward. ‘It’s the sickness he has. It made his skin shrink.’

  ‘He saw you this morning,’ Alicia added. ‘He thinks you’re beautiful.’

  Imogen put her hand to her heart. ‘He said that?’

  The two girls nodded solemnly.

  Imogen took another look through the window. ‘Poor boy,’ she whispered softly.

  Alicia turned to Natasha, her eyes gleaming. The fish had just taken the bait. They began to back out of the room and then Alicia, as if she had just thought of it, said, ‘He was wondering if he could email you. He’s always on the computer.’

  Imogen considered it. ‘Couldn’t he call me?’ she asked.

  ‘His throat,’ said Alicia, ‘from the sickness, it’s really sore. In fact he might not have long to live. He said to us he just wanted to get to know a beautiful girl before he …’ She made a faint gurgling sound. They all knew what it meant.

  Imogen only nodded, her face radiant.

  Alicia and Natasha walked back across the road, trying to be calm. It was going very, very nicely so far. They crawled into Natasha’s room, careful not to be seen from the window, and plugged a laptop into the internet. Then they created an email account under the name owen.still.lives@gmail.com and started the correspondence.

  Dear Imogen, yr sister told me all about you. You sound cool. I saw you this morning. Yr really HOT. Please reply to me, please please.

  Owen x

  It was less than five minutes before a reply came in.

  Dear Owen, thanx.  Tell me all about yourself. I am 13, I have long blonde hair, I like dancing and netball. What about you? Tell me everything about yourself, okay?. Xx

  Imogen

  The rest of the afternoon the internet ran hot with messages between Owen and Imogen. By the end of the day they were declaring undying love for each other. Owen, sitting up next to the computer in his lumpy way, looked strangely satisfied with the effort. The last of the afternoon sun shone brightly off his cheekbones as they logged off and closed the curtains.

  Alicia waved goodbye to Natasha and walked back home. She felt exhausted –this love business sure took a lot of work. She went straight to her room and collapsed on her bed. Soon there was a knock and Imogen appeared at the door holding a plate of fruit and chocolates.

  ‘Could you take these to Owen tomorrow?’ asked Imogen. It was as if a glow was coming off her whole body. She was a nurse, an angel, a shining being.

  For a moment a tremor of guilt went through Alicia’s frame and she almost confessed to the whole thing, but something about her sister’s happiness stopped her. She only nodded and took the plate.

  The next day, munching on the fruit and chocolates, Alicia and Natasha continued the charade. The emails flew back and forth like cooing doves from house to house. It was around midday they noticed that something was wrong with Owen. The stuffing had come out of his right arm and it was hanging loosely by his side swinging a little in the breeze from the open window. Imogen must have noticed as well, because in her next email she asked Owen what was wrong with his arm.

  Alicia sucked her tongue and emailed:

  Its nothing much babe. Thats the sickness. I lost the feeling in my arm. Be brave for me.

  Owen 

  But poor Owen was suffering from the elements. The elastic band holding the mask in place, heated by the sun and already several years old, snapped. His skull slithered down onto his chest and was only stopped from falling right off by the strands of the mop curled around it.

  An email from Imogen appeared, hysterical in tone, Natasha squealed and Alicia rushed to the laptop. There was no time left. In a panic she emailed:

  I think this is it babe. My spine is giving out. Its all over. Remember me, my love, but move on. It was great while it lasted.

  Owen xoxoxo

  The next email from Imogen was just a long line of  and then … nothing. At that moment Owen’s chest caved in, the bunched up newspaper slithering out in a whoosh, and Natasha drew the curtain. They logged off and looked at Owen. He was a pathetic sight now, limbs and head crooked and strewn on the floor.

  Alicia sighed, her heart beating. She felt overwhelmed with sadness. Poor Owen, poor Imogen, their love affair was over and it had only just begun. She placed her hand on Natasha, who was staring sadly at the floor, and walked back home.

  It wasn’t until she was inside that she suddenly remembered what it was all about. Hang on, she thought, this was all part of the plan, wasn’t it? She sat on her bed, gathering her thoughts. She had to reveal the trick to her sister.

  She knocked at Imogen’s door and gingerly stepped in. Imogen was once again lying on the bed. Was that a tear mark on her face? Alicia gulped. It was time to confess and do what she had to do – shatter the illusion of love.

  ‘Im,’ she began.

  ‘He still lives,’ Imogen said in a shaky voice, ‘and he always will, in my heart.’

  Alicia grimaced. This did not feel as easy as she had imagined it would be, and certainly wasn’t fun. She looked at her sister, crumpled up sadly on her bed, and she suddenly felt, what? She didn’t feel frustrated with Imogen any more, she didn’t feel superior. She only felt … love. She realised she would do anything for her sister, anything at all.

  She crept up to the bed and lay next to Imogen, snuggling into her back, not saying a word.

  Selling the News

  ‘Pheooooowipp!’ Brad let the whistle drop. ‘Get your Herald, get your Tele!’

  Brad, at the age of eleven, finally had a real job. Not a pretend job like washing your dad’s car for pocket money or getting the leaves out of the pool. A real job, where you actually turn up at the same time each week, where you get a pay slip and everything. Brad was a paper boy.

  He had been doing the paper run around the suburb of Shetland Heights for three weeks now. It was great – he would get up at five-thirty on a Sunday morni
ng, pad quietly down the hallway to have his breakfast, and then walk up to the local newsagent. It was still dark when he left the house, the stars twinkling in the sky, the houses on the streets all shut up and sleepy. At the newsagent he would mumble hello to the owner, Mr Kominos, sort the Sun Heralds and the Sunday Telegraphs into his cart and grab his favourite thing about the paper run – the whistle.

  Only those who have done a paper run understand what joy it is to walk along the street blowing a whistle without anyone coming out to tell you to stop making that noise. Not only are you allowed to do it, you’re required to do it. Blowing a whistle is a central part of the job. And you can’t just blow it any old way, there’s a special paper-boy method. It goes pheooooowipp! The wipp! at the end, by the way, is crucial.

  Brad strode down Wilson Street pulling the cart behind him. The sun was starting to come up over the tree line, the wheels of the cart were rolling smoothly and he was starting to know his regular customers. There was Mr Lin, the old Chinese man who always gave him a fifty-cent tip, there was Mrs Mack who wore sunglasses and a maroon and green dressing gown at six in the morning and there was Bob (‘just call me Bob, son’) who always talked to him about football.

  Brad was just about to turn into McIntyre Avenue when he heard a voice on the corner calling him. He turned around and saw a girl on the front porch of a stone white house waving and jumping up and down. He smiled and turned the cart round, pulled it up and asked her what she wanted.

  ‘A Sun Herald. It’s for my dad,’ she said.