Archie's Unbelievably Freaky Week

by Andrew Norriss

  ‘Here,’ he said, and he spun round and pointed to the glass bowl of sweets on his desk. ‘Have a lolly.’

  And then, to Archie’s astonishment, he added. ‘In fact . . . have two!’

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ said Cyd, as she and Archie walked home at the end of the day. ‘He gave you two lollies?’

  You had to have done something very special to be given a lolly from the bowl on Mr Gunn’s desk. It was a bit like a soldier being awarded the Victoria Cross, and nobody had ever been told to take two.

  ‘I thought he was going to be really cross with me,’ said Archie, passing one of the lollies to his friend, ‘but he wasn’t. He told me not to worry about it.’

  ‘We missed everything, up in the classroom,’ said Cyd, sadly. ‘We didn’t see the accident. We didn’t even see the ambulance.’ She sighed. ‘A man with a toilet on his head running round the car park, and we missed it all.’

  ‘You might get to see it on Monday,’ Archie told her. ‘Mrs Clay filmed the whole thing from her classroom, and Mr Gunn said he was going to show it in assembly.’

  ‘Really?’ Cyd’s face brightened, and maybe it was the thought of the film, or maybe it was the lolly from Mr Gunn’s sweet jar, but she seemed to be in a much better mood after that.

  Archie’s mother, however, was definitely not in a good mood when she saw the splashes of blood down the front of his shirt.

  ‘Is it really too much to ask,’ she said, ‘that you come home one day – one day – without your clothes needing to be boiled clean?’

  ‘Honestly,’ she muttered, as she sent him upstairs to get changed. ‘I don’t believe it, Archie!’

  ON SATURDAY, CYD suggested that she and Archie visit Miss Jensen, their class teacher, in hospital.

  ‘I think she needs to know,’ said Cyd, ‘how important it is that she comes back to school as soon as possible.’

  ‘Is it important?’ asked Archie.

  ‘Of course it is!’ said Cyd. ‘You don’t want to be stuck in Mr Gunn’s office all next week, do you? I’ll ask Mum to take us. You go and pick some flowers.’

  Cyd’s mother was a nurse, and she drove them to the hospital and told them how to get to Miss Jensen’s ward. They found their teacher sitting in a chair by her bed, looking very well.

  ‘I am very well,’ she said, when Archie asked. ‘I’ve never felt better.’

  ‘Does that mean you’ll be back in school on Monday?’ asked Cyd, eagerly.

  ‘Unfortunately not,’ said Miss Jensen. ‘They’re waiting for the results of some tests they’ve done. Then someone has to decide what medicine I need. I could be here for days yet.’ She looked at the flowers the children had brought. ‘These are lovely. Could one of you get some water for them?’

  Archie said he would and, leaving Cyd with Miss Jensen, he went out into the corridor to find somewhere he could fill the jam jar he had brought, with water.

  The accident happened on his way back.

  Walking down the corridor, some of the water splashed out of the jar and, rather than leave a wet patch on the floor that someone might slip on, Archie bent down to mop it up with his sleeve.

  The porter, coming out of the lift with a hospital trolley, didn’t see him until it was too late. He pushed his trolley out into the corridor and the end of it banged straight into Archie’s head.

  Archie gave a little cry and sprawled on the floor, his jam jar of water rolling away beside him.

  The porter came running round and knelt down beside Archie. ‘I’m sorry, I never saw you! Are you all right?’

  Archie sat up, slowly. ‘My head hurts,’ he said.

  ‘I’m not surprised.’ The porter peered at the back of Archie’s head. ‘You took quite a knock. We’d better get someone to look at that.’

  He sat Archie on his trolley and wheeled him off down the corridor. ‘I’ve got a friend in the children’s ward,’ he said. ‘She’ll look after you!’

  The porter’s friend was a nurse with short, dark hair and a friendly smile. She took Archie into a room with a bed and an armchair and examined the lump on the back of his head.

  ‘He gave you quite a thump, didn’t he?’ she said cheerfully. ‘Wait here. I’ll get you a glass of water and an aspirin.’

  Archie sat in the armchair and waited.

  ‘How’s the head?’ asked a voice, and he looked up to see another nurse, this one tall and wearing glasses, looking down at him.

  ‘Well, it still hurts a bit,’ Archie told her.

  ‘This should help,’ said the nurse, holding out a little plastic cup of medicine. ‘You get that down you.’

  Archie did as he was told and drank the medicine, which tasted rather nice.

  ‘Now,’ said the nurse. ‘You know what’s going to happen next?’

  Archie shook his head.

  ‘Well, it’s nothing to worry about. We’ve got one of the doctors coming down shortly, and he’ll explain it to you.’

  The nurse with short, dark hair appeared in the doorway with a glass of water and an aspirin, but the tall nurse waved her away.

  ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘I’m looking after Archie!’

  ‘Oh. OK!’ The dark-haired nurse smiled at Archie and left.

  ‘As I was saying,’ said the tall nurse, ‘the doctor will explain about the operation, so if there’s anything you want to know, you ask him.’

  The operation?

  Archie hadn’t thought the bang on his head had been that serious but, curiously, he wasn’t really worried. There was a wonderfully relaxed and floaty feeling running through the muscles of his arms and legs and for some reason it was impossible to worry about anything.

  ‘How’s the head now?’ asked the nurse.

  ‘Issfine,’ said Archie. And it was true. His head did not hurt any more and he was feeling calm, relaxed and without a care in the world.

  ‘I told you the medicine would help,’ said the nurse. ‘Now, let’s get you undressed and into bed!’

  Cyd, meanwhile, had been telling Miss Jensen about all the things that had happened earlier in the week. She told her about Miss Hurrell, the teacher who thought Archie wanted to murder her, and about Miss Humber and the Brazilian Wandering Spider, and about Miss Henley getting trapped in the stockroom. She told her about Mrs Hemp thinking that Archie had turned into a dog, and then about the man from Health and Safety getting a toilet stuck on his head.

  ‘Though I didn’t actually see any of that one,’ Cyd admitted. ‘Archie was taken out of the class, so I missed it.’

  Miss Jensen gave a little sigh. ‘I know how you feel,’ she said. ‘I’ve missed a whole week of Archie’s adventures, stuck in here. And it looks as if I might have to miss another.’ She paused for a moment. ‘I wanted to ask if there was any news of your father coming home, but before I do . . . Archie’s taking rather a long time getting that jar of water, isn’t he? Do you think something’s happened?’

  ‘Hmm . . .’ said Cyd. ‘I’d better go and check.’

  *

  ‘Well, now!’ The doctor stood at the foot of the bed and smiled down at Archie, who was dressed in a pair of hospital pyjamas. ‘I’m the doctor who’s going to put you to sleep for your operation and I came to see if you had any questions.’

  Archie had to think quite hard before he remembered that he did have one question.

  ‘This operation,’ he said. ‘What’s it for?’

  ‘Ah,’ said the doctor. ‘Well, the X-rays have shown us that there’s a blood clot in your skull – that’s what’s been causing all the pain you’ve been getting – and what we’re going to do is—’

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ said a voice.

  ‘Hi, Cyd!’ Archie gave his friend a little wave.

  ‘What are you doing in bed?’ demanded Cyd.

  ‘I’m going to have an operation!’ said Archie. ‘On my head!

  Cyd stared coldly at the doctor. ‘What’ve you done to him?’ she demanded.

  �
�We haven’t done anything yet,’ said the doctor, ‘but, as I was just explaining, the pains Archie’s been getting are caused by a blood clot in his skull. So we’re going to put him to sleep, drill a little hole in the back of his head and—’

  ‘No,’ said Cyd, firmly. ‘No, you’re not.’

  ‘It’s all right.’ The tall nurse put a hand on Cyd’s shoulder. ‘He won’t feel a thing, I promise.’

  ‘He won’t feel anything,’ said Cyd, ‘because you’re not going to operate on him. There’s obviously been a mistake.’

  ‘We don’t make mistakes at St James’s,’ said the doctor, stiffly. ‘Your friend was brought in last night and—’

  ‘My friend was not brought in last night,’ said Cyd. ‘He came in this morning with me to visit our teacher, and until half an hour ago he was absolutely fine. I don’t know how he got into this bed, or why you want to drill a hole in his head, but you’re not going to.’

  ‘I’ll call security,’ said the nurse.

  ‘How about you wait,’ said Cyd, ‘until you’ve checked if what I said is true. It won’t be very difficult. You can ask our teacher, who’s in the ward down the corridor. You can phone Archie’s parents – I’ve got his number here – or you can talk to my mother, who’s down in the nurse’s restroom. You can do any of those things but there is no way I’m letting you do an operation on my friend Archie Coates.’

  There was a moment’s silence as the doctor looked at his clipboard, and then at the nurse.

  ‘Coates?’ he said, eventually. ‘It says on my form that his name is Archie Duffen . . .’

  ‘I cannot believe it!’ A small man with a moustache was pacing up and down behind his desk. ‘I still cannot believe a mistake like this could happen in my hospital!’

  On the other side of the desk, Cyd and Archie were sitting on a large sofa, with a table in front of them laid with plates of sandwiches, packets of crisps and a selection of cans of drink.

  ‘Never mind,’ said Archie. ‘These things happen.’

  He was dressed in his clothes again now – all except for his socks, which no one had been able to find – and the medicine had not entirely worn off.

  ‘What did happen exactly?’ asked Cyd.

  ‘You may well ask,’ said the man with the moustache. ‘It seems that Archie Duffen, who is about the same age as Archie here, was brought in last night complaining of pains in his head. We took some X-rays, found a blood clot and realized he needed an operation. He was supposed to have it this morning.’

  ‘So why wasn’t he in his room?’ asked Cyd.

  ‘He’d been sent down for some more X-rays,’ the man with the moustache explained. ‘And he should have been back, but unfortunately the porter who was sent to get him slipped on a pool of water in the corridor, and had to be taken in for treatment himself. In the meantime, of course, a trainee nurse had put your Archie into his room, and when the nurse came in to give the other Archie his medicine – she’d only just come on duty – she naturally assumed that Archie was, well, Archie . . .’

  ‘Simple mistake,’ said Archie, helping himself to another sandwich. ‘Could have happened to anyone.’

  ‘It’s very nice of you to say so,’ said the man with the moustache, ‘and I do appreciate it. I just wish there was something I could do to make it up to you.’

  Archie was about to say that there was no need, when Cyd spoke for him.

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ she said. ‘There is one thing . . .’

  Later, when Cyd and Archie were walking home, Cyd got a text on her mobile.

  ‘It’s all sorted,’ she told Archie, when she’d read it. ‘Miss Jensen says they’ve looked at her tests and worked out her medicine, so she’s going home this afternoon and she’ll be back in school on Monday!’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Archie.

  ‘And Mum says she’s heard from one of her doctor friends that the other Archie had his operation and it all went very well.’ Cyd thought for a moment. ‘Perhaps we should go and visit him some time.’

  ‘You can go,’ said Archie. ‘I’m going to stay away from hospitals for a bit.’

  Cyd agreed that might be best. ‘Though things don’t seem to have turned out too badly, do they?’ she added. ‘I mean, nobody got hurt and . . . well, everyone’s happy!’

  And Archie had to agree that everyone was happy – except his mother when he got home.

  ‘How is it possible,’ she demanded, ‘to lose both socks, just visiting someone in hospital?’

  She stomped off upstairs to find him a new pair.

  ‘Honestly! I don’t believe it, Archie!’

  ON SUNDAY, ARCHIE decided he would like to do something special for his friend, Cyd.

  He had been thinking about what had happened the day before, and the more he thought, the more he realized that things could have turned out very differently at the hospital if Cyd had not been there.

  Cyd was usually there to help when odd things happened to him, Archie thought. She was the one who had warned him not to pick up the Brazilian Wandering Spider. She had come to the rescue when he was stuck in the staff cloakroom without any clothes. And she was the one who put out the fire in Miss Henley’s handbag, so that they hadn’t burned to death in the stockroom.

  He would like, Archie decided, to do something that showed Cyd how grateful he was for all she had done.

  But what?

  He was still trying to think of something when his mother appeared.

  ‘Are you ready?’ she asked.

  ‘Ready?’

  ‘I thought we’d get down to the station a bit early,’ said his mother, ‘in case there’s a rush.’

  And suddenly Archie had the answer.

  Three weeks before, his mother had bought two tickets for a trip on the Tornado, the first steam train to be built in Britain for more than fifty years. Archie had always loved steam trains and his mother had bought the tickets as an early birthday treat.

  Cyd would love a trip on a steam train!

  ‘Would you mind,’ said Archie, ‘if I went on the train with someone else?

  ‘Someone else?’ His mother looked slightly hurt. ‘You want to go with someone else?’

  ‘I’d like to go with Cyd,’ said Archie. ‘If you don’t mind.’

  ‘Mind?’ His mother gave a little sniff. ‘Why should I mind? Why should I care if my only son doesn’t want to share his birthday treat with me. No, no, I don’t mind at all!’

  ‘That’s all right, then!’ said Archie. ‘Thanks, Mum!’

  With the train tickets tucked in his pocket, Archie walked straight round to Cyd’s house. He didn’t tell her where they would be going, he simply said he had a surprise for her.

  ‘Great!’ Cyd grabbed her coat. ‘I love surprises!’

  It should have taken about ten minutes to walk down to the station, but several things happened that meant it took a bit longer than that.

  The first thing was that Cyd’s hat blew off in the wind, only a few minutes after they’d set out, and a sudden gust lifted it up into the back of a large removal van parked by the pavement.

  Cyd climbed into the van to get it back, but her hat had landed on a piece of furniture that was too high for her to reach, so Archie climbed in as well.

  He had just rescued the hat, when another gust of wind blew the door of the van closed and they were plunged into total darkness.

  ‘Here we go again!’ said Cyd, cheerfully. ‘I’ll bet we can’t open the door, and get driven all the way to Scotland or something before they find us!’

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ said Archie, ‘that happened to me once. I got stuck in a laundry basket and the—’

  But Archie never got to say what happened to him in the laundry basket, because at that moment the door at the back of the van opened, to reveal the figure of a woman.

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ said the woman. ‘Archie? Cyd? What are you doing in here?’

  The woman standing in the road was Mi
ss Humber, the teacher who had saved Archie’s life on Tuesday by grabbing the spider from his back.

  Archie explained about Cyd losing her hat and the doors closing behind them in the wind.

  ‘Well, it’s just as well I found you,’ Miss Humber chuckled, ‘or you might have been stuck in there till we got to Scotland!’

  ‘You’re moving to Scotland?’ said Cyd.

  ‘I’ve been offered a job there,’ said Miss Humber, ‘as a teacher in the village where I grew up. It’s what I’ve always wanted, and I still can’t believe how lucky I am!’ She smiled. ‘It’s all thanks to Archie, of course!’

  ‘To me?’ said Archie.

  ‘The headmaster of the school I’m going to, saw in the paper about my getting a medal for what I did with the spider,’ explained Miss Humber, ‘and he wrote and said I was just the sort of person he needed.’ She paused. ‘How about you both come inside for a drink and a biscuit, and I’ll tell you all about it?’

  ‘That’s very kind,’ said Archie, ‘but we don’t really have time.’

  ‘Archie’s taking me somewhere,’ said Cyd. ‘For a surprise.’

  ‘Oh, is he!’ said Miss Humber, smiling again. ‘Well, if Archie’s arranged it, I’m sure it’ll be something very wonderful!’

  Looking at his watch, Archie knew they would have to hurry if they were going to get to the station in time, but when they turned the corner at the end of the road, they found the pavement blocked by a crowd of people gathered outside the church, all trying to take photographs of a couple who had just got married.

  Archie and Cyd crossed the road to try and get past, but were stopped by a loud shout.

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ said a voice. ‘It’s Archie and Cyd!’

  And that was when they realized that the two people getting married were Miss Henley, who had been trapped in the stockroom with them on Wednesday, and Gary, the man who had come to their rescue.

  ‘These are the children I was telling you about!’ said Miss Henley, addressing the crowd. ‘If it weren’t for them, Gary and I would never have found each other again, and we wouldn’t be getting married today!’