by Mark Lowery
Silence
The force of the Spaghetti Grooves had blown me halfway across the stage and I’d smacked my head against the wall. Completely dazed, I was sprawled out in a giant puddle of sauce and millions of tiny pasta Jasons. There was a ringing sound in my ears, and the world was spinning. My skin stung, like when you stand too close to a fire, and I couldn’t move.
Rosie, Vanya and Jason were looking down at me.
‘He’s not dead,’ said Rosie. She seemed quite disappointed about this.
‘Roman. You … saved me,’ said Vanya.
I tried to speak but I’d been winded by the spaghetti bomb and I could barely breathe. Once again, I felt my eyes painfully closing as they swelled up from the hot sauce.
‘Quick!’ cried Trevor from the side of the stage. He was still doubled over in pain. ‘Kiss her! Kiss her!’
‘Do what?’ asked Vanya, looking at Jason. ‘But I said …’
‘It’s for the TV show …’ Jason murmured.
‘But you said we were friends.’ Vanya backed away, but slipped on the sauce and fell on her backside. And now Jason was standing over her, the camerawoman right next to him.
‘Do it!’ cried Trevor, still lying on the ground.
Where was Gamble? Only he could stop this now.
Jason moved forward.
Vanya tried to back away but there was nowhere to go.
And then something amazing happened.
From nowhere, the sheep came barrelling on to the stage. Its eyes were glazed and lifeless like a zombie’s. It ran – no, hurtled – at Jason, just as his lips were about to touch Vanya’s cheek.
The sheep butted him right up the backside and sent him flying off the side of the stage, sprawling into the audience below.
And there was Gamble, behind it, with Trevor’s mobile in his hand and a great big grin on his face. ‘Put the brain controller in its ear, innit.’
Gamble wiggled his finger. I was pretty spaced out at this moment, so I may have imagined this, but I’m pretty sure that the sheep began moonwalking across the stage, drabbing its front hooves.
And now Vanya had me by the shoulders. ‘Quick!’ she yelled. ‘Help! Someone needs to wash this hot sauce off my best friend.’
And that was the last thing I heard before I passed out.
I was completely unconscious for the next five minutes, so everything that happened next was told to me by other people.
Luckily, my mum had read the note about the kiss. Being the most embarrassing person on earth, she’d rushed straight to the school along with my dad and his video camera, hoping to ‘catch the beautiful moment when I laid my lips on a lucky young lady’. YUCK!
They arrived just as I was fainting onstage. Apparently, Gamble tried to give me the kiss of life, so I’m glad I was unconscious. Mum always carries a massive packet of wet wipes around with her (in case I ‘have a little accident’), so she was able to clean the sauce off before it did too much damage.
Rosie was seriously angry with Jason for trying to kiss Vanya. She told him he was dumped. ‘Hashtag: it’s over,’ she apparently said. ‘I’m gonna find me a real celebrity boyfriend.’
Nobody else thought that Jason seemed too bothered. Firstly, I don’t think he knew that they were going out with each other in the first place. Secondly, he was too busy being pinned down by the sheep, which Gamble was controlling to kiss him again and again on the face. Jason was crying for help from Trevor, but he’d already sneaked off, never to be seen again.
When I finally came round, this had all already happened, and the prom was over. Mum took me home and treated me to a full-on double doughnut extravaganza. Vanya and Gamble came along too. They both enjoyed the food but Gamble was made to eat outside after he insisted on bringing Scratchy and the sheep with him.
The TV programme never got shown, and very soon, Jason went back to being plain old Kenneth Shufflebottom. However, Simon Bowel did like some of the shots they’d got of Gamble. Keep your eyes peeled for his one-off special: Britain’s Naughtiest Kid. It’ll be on some Freeview channel next year, showing all of the outrageous stunts he pulled that week.
Which reminds me, of course. Mr Gibbons finally finished his report and Gamble WILL be going to the normal high school with me in September. According to him, Gamble ‘might have a lot of energy’ and a ‘mischievous spirit’. But he is an ‘extremely intelligent boy’ with ‘amazing technical skills’ who will ‘do anything to help anyone’.
Who knew?
MARK LOWERY grew up in Preston but now lives near Cambridge with his young family. Some of the time he is a primary-school teacher. In the olden days he used to do lots of active stuff like running, hiking, snowboarding and swimming, but now he prefers staying in and attempting to entertain his children. He plays the guitar badly and speaks appalling Italian, but he knows a lot about biscuits. In his mind he is one of the great footballers of his generation, although he is yet to demonstrate this on an actual football pitch. He has an MA in Writing for Children and his first two books – Socks Are Not Enough and Pants Are Everything – were both shortlisted for the Roald Dahl Funny Prize. Mark is also the author of the Roman Garstang series (The Jam Doughnut that Ruined My Life; The Chicken Nugget Ambush; The Attack of the Woolly Jumper; The Great Caravan Catastrophe) and Charlie and Me: 421 Miles from Home. He is yet to find a cake that he doesn’t like.
Follow Mark at www.marklowery.co.uk or on Twitter: @hellomarklowery
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First published in Great Britain in 2018 by
PICCADILLY PRESS
80–81 Wimpole St, London W1G 9RE
www.piccadillypress.co.uk
Text copyright © Mark Lowery, 2018
Illustrations copyright © Cherie Zamazing, 2018
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
The right of Mark Lowery and Cherie Zamazing to be identified as Author and Illustrator of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-84812-730-2
Piccadilly Press is an imprint of Bonnier Zaffre Ltd,
a Bonnier Publishing company
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