Now

by Morris Gleitzman

  ‘Thanks,’ I whisper to Jumble. ‘Don’t say anything to Felix.’

  I know he won’t.

  ‘Come on,’ I say as I put him down. ‘Let’s give Felix his surprise.’

  I pause at the back door and glance down the hill because I’m having the scary thought that maybe the bully girls have followed me home.

  No sign of them.

  I don’t think they have.

  Felix opens the door. For a sec I’m not sure what’s wrong. He’s grinning, but his face looks sort of wobbly. Both his pairs of glasses are on the top of his head as usual, and they look like they’re going to wobble off.

  Then I realise nothing’s wrong. It’s just the air that’s wobbling because Felix is holding a cake covered with burning candles.

  I grin too.

  Felix couldn’t wait for his birthday tomorrow. I hope when I’m old I still want to do things right now this minute.

  I start singing happy birthday and Jumble joins in. He can’t do the words, or the tune, and he hasn’t got much sense of rhythm, but he’s the most enthusiastic barker I’ve ever had the pleasure of singing with.

  ‘Hang on, babushka,’ says Felix, laughing. ‘This cake isn’t for me, it’s for you.’

  I stare at him, confused.

  He knows my birthday’s in August, not January.

  I look closer and see what’s written on the cake in icing letters.

  Congratulations On Finishing Your First Week At Your New School.

  That is such a nice thought. And I can see Felix did the icing himself because the letters are a bit wobbly from when his hands tremble sometimes.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say.

  My voice is a bit wobbly too because I’m feeling so emotional. It’s what happens when you live with the best grandfather in the world as well as the best dog.

  We go inside and I blow out the candles. Felix puts the cake down and I give him a big hug.

  Oops, I forgot about his legs. But it’s OK, he doesn’t fall over. Poor Felix’s legs are even worse than Jumble’s. It was one of the awful things that happened to Felix when he was a kid. He had to hide from the Nazis in a hole in the ground for two years and didn’t get to play any sport at all.

  ‘So,’ says Felix gently. ‘Was it a good first week?’

  His face, which is old and a bit battered like his house, is smiling, but his eyes are watching me carefully.

  I hug him again and keep my face pressed into his jumper while I think of something good to tell him. Felix always wears jumpers made from incredibly soft wool, even in summer. It’s because he was cold a lot when he was young.

  The feel of the wool against my face reminds me of the poor mouse’s fur.

  ‘Ms Canny is nice,’ I say.

  ‘Excellent,’ says Felix. ‘How many out of five, Margaret?’

  I smile at him. Sometimes we call each other Margaret and David, like the film reviewers on TV.

  ‘I’m giving her four out of five, David,’ I say.

  ‘I’m glad,’ says Felix. ‘Anything else you want to tell me about?’

  There is, but I’m not going to. Instead I open my school bag and give Felix his present.

  ‘Happy birthday,’ I say.

  He looks surprised.

  ‘I know it’s not till tomorrow,’ I say. ‘But I can’t wait.’

  Felix grins.

  ‘I can’t either,’ he says, and starts ripping open the post bag.

  I hold my breath. If he’s grinning now, what will he do when he sees what’s inside?

  William’s Happy Days by Richmal Crompton. The book Felix wants most in the whole world.

  Mum and Dad have told me heaps of times how much pleasure Felix got from Richmal Crompton’s William stories when he was a kid. Felix reckons that in a way they helped save his life. He’s been collecting the William books ever since. Richmal Crompton wrote thirty-eight of them and Felix has got thirty-seven.

  Until now.

  I bet when he sees William’s Happy Days he’ll light up like a very happy Christmas tree and dance around the kitchen doing backflips like a very happy ballerina and hurtle through space showering sparks like a very happy space rocket.

  Well, almost.

  The post bag tumbles to the floor. Felix flips his reading glasses down and stares at the book.

  He’s still grinning, but not quite as much as before.

  I think he’s in shock.

  ‘Thank you, babushka,’ he says.

  He kisses my cheek.

  ‘You’re amazing,’ he says. ‘Where did you … ?’

  ‘I got it on the internet,’ I say. ‘I had to search for ages.’

  I don’t tell him it cost all my savings.

  ‘Incredible,’ says Felix.

  We go over to the Richmal Crompton bookcase. Felix has loads of bookshelves all over the house. He lived in a bookshop when he was very little and he reckons he caught books instead of measles.

  The Richmal Crompton bookcase is his favourite one, which is why it’s in the best position of all, next to the TV. We make a gap in a row of books and slide William’s Happy Days in between number eleven in the series, William The Bad, and number thirteen, William’s Crowded Hours.

  Felix gazes at them. His eyes are slightly moist, which is what you’d expect when a person has finally got a full set of Richmal Cromptons after waiting eighty years.

  He flips his glasses onto his head and gives me a big hug.

  ‘This deserves a dance,’ he says.

  We like dancing, me and Felix. It hurts him a bit, but he reckons he doesn’t care because it makes him so happy.

  I think it’s probably the same when he thinks about the real Zelda.

  Felix spins me away from the bookcase and around the room while he hums a traditional folk song from Poland, the sort of thing that was in the top forty when he was a kid.

  After a while I do the special fast twirl he taught me last year. Except when he taught me, I didn’t have anything in my pocket. So no locket went flying out of it and skidding across the floor.

  Not like now.

  We stop dancing and look at the small gleaming thing lying on the floorboards in the corner.

  I feel sick and my cardiovascular system hurts.

  Felix goes over and picks up the locket. He stares at it, frowning.

  ‘Where did you get this?’ he says.

  ‘The bottom drawer in the bathroom,’ I say in a small voice. ‘In that old matchbox where you hid it so burglars wouldn’t find it.’

  Felix doesn’t say anything, but he’s frowning even more.

  ‘I didn’t know it was there,’ I say. ‘I was hunting for the nail clippers and I found it by accident.’

  I can’t look at Felix, so I look at the floor.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I thought it would make me brave.’

  After a while I hear Felix sigh. Then he puts his hand on my shoulder.

  ‘Let’s have some cake,’ he says.

  He leads me to the table and we sit down. I’ve never felt so not hungry for eating cake in my whole life.

  Felix looks at me. He has such kind soft eyes, even when he’s cross.

  ‘You should have asked,’ he says. ‘But I forgive you, babushka. I know how scary it feels the first time your mum and dad go away.’

  I nod, because I can’t speak, not just at the moment.

  Calm down, Zelda, you’re not a lawn sprinkler.

  ‘It does get less scary,’ says Felix. ‘And they will be back.’

  He holds my hand while I cry. He’s amazing. His mum and dad were murdered by the Nazis and mine have only gone for three months, but he still knows how much I miss them.

  ‘When my parents went,’ says Felix, ‘I wished I had something to make me braver too.’

  He puts the locket round my neck.

  ‘Zelda would want you to have this,’ he says.

  I still can’t speak. I give him a grateful hug.

  While Felix makes a
pot of tea, I struggle with whether or not I should accept the locket. I would love to, but it’s Felix’s most precious thing.

  I struggle some more while we have the cake. It’s a carrot and zucchini and pumpkin and apple and sultana and breadcrumb cake with icing made from yoghurt and marmalade.

  Felix hates wasting leftovers. He hates wasting food of any description. He says that’s how it is when there wasn’t enough in your childhood.

  The cake is delicious.

  I have two pieces and Jumble has three.

  He eats much too quickly and as usual I have to whack him on the back when a mouthful goes down the wrong way.

  Then I take the locket off and give it to Felix.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘It’s a really kind thought, but I’ve decided I don’t need it any more.’

  Felix looks at me, gives a little nod, and carries on chewing.

  He understands.

  He knows that lockets on their own can’t make everything OK. No jewellery can.

  It takes more than that.

  Felix knows the secret.

  So many sad things happened to him when he was a kid. Losing his best friend and his parents and the strength in his legs. And yet he’s the happiest person I know. Because he’s really good at doing happy things.

  Reading books and making cakes and having hot baths and dancing.

  Felix knows that as soon as bad things have happened, they’re in the past. Which is the place to leave them.

  From now on I’m going to do what Felix does.

  Leave the bad stuff in the past and concentrate on being happy now.

  If I can.

  Now. I want to wake up now.

  I force my eyes open. I reach out and click the bedside lamp on. I’m hot and tangled and thumping and sweaty. My cheeks are wet and not just because Jumble is licking my face.

  What a horrible dream.

  It was dark and I couldn’t move and they were coming. Thousands of them, marching in crumpled uniforms with pest-removal badges on their school bags.

  I sit up and look at the bedside clock.

  2.16 a.m.

  ‘Are you all right?’ says Felix, hurrying in.

  He’s wearing a jumper over his pyjamas and his reading glasses are on his head and his hair is sticking up at the back. He sits on the edge of my bed and holds my hand.

  ‘You were moaning,’ he says. ‘You sounded terrified.’

  ‘It was just a bad dream,’ I mumble. ‘I’m sorry I woke you up.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, babushka,’ says Felix. ‘Anyway, I wasn’t asleep, I was reading.’

  I stare at him. I wish I was allowed to read till 2.16 a.m.

  ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ says Felix.

  I nod. Felix lets go of my hand.

  ‘I’ll be back,’ he says.

  He hurries out.

  Jumble sits next to me, panting hopefully. I can see he’s thinking the same as me. Maybe Felix is getting us some hot chocolate. I’m pretty sure hot chocolate was invented to help people stop thinking about bad stuff.

  Felix comes back. But not with hot chocolate. Instead he hangs something on the corner of the picture frame over my bed.

  The locket.

  ‘I thought you might like to have it just at night,’ he says.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say.

  It’s a kind thought, and maybe he’s right. Maybe it will help. I try not to show I’m feeling a bit disappointed about the hot chocolate.

  Jumble doesn’t even try. He whimpers mournfully.

  Felix flips his glasses down and peers closely at the locket, which is gleaming in the light from the bedside lamp, but not very much.

  ‘I’ll have to give this a clean,’ he says. ‘Look how dull and tarnished it is from being in the bathroom drawer.’

  I feel a stab of guilt. I can’t let Felix buy special metal polish for the wrong type of dullness and tarnishing.

  ‘It might not have been from the bathroom drawer,’ I say nervously. ‘It might have been from the locket being inside an animal.’

  Felix blinks.

  ‘An animal?’ he says.

  ‘A bush mouse,’ I say. ‘A dead one.’

  Felix frowns.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ I say. ‘I tried to protect Zelda’s locket, but I wasn’t big and strong enough.’

  Felix looks at me for what feels like ages. Then he sits on my bed again.

  ‘Babushka,’ he says gently. ‘Are you being bullied?’

  I feel like booting myself in the bum. I wasn’t going to say anything about it till after his birthday. This is all my fault. I shouldn’t try and have important conversations when I’m half asleep.

  Felix sighs.

  ‘I’m getting slow in my old age,’ he says. ‘I had an idea something was up yesterday afternoon, when I saw the way you were looking over your shoulder at the back door. I know that look. When I was your age I looked over my shoulder a lot.’

  I sigh too.

  Zelda, you’re such a dope. How could you forget you’re living with an expert?

  OK, Felix doesn’t talk much about his childhood experiences of being bullied, but Mum and Dad have told me how often the Nazis did it.

  ‘I am being bullied a bit,’ I say quietly to Felix. ‘I think it’s because I’m new.’

  Felix nods.

  ‘Do you think it’ll stop?’ he says.

  ‘I hope so,’ I say.

  I can hear in my voice I’m not sure.

  Felix is still watching me, his soft eyes sad and concerned. And suddenly I need to tell him about it. So I do. All of it.

  He listens to every word.

  ‘Felix,’ I say at the end. ‘If they don’t stop, what should I do?’

  Felix thinks for a moment.

  ‘You need two things, babushka,’ he says. ‘A grown-up to tell, and a friend to watch your back.’

  He takes his glasses off and cleans them.

  ‘You’ve got the grown-up,’ he says. ‘If these girls don’t stop, I’ll have a word with them. Tell them what happened to some bullies I knew once who were arrested for war crimes and executed.’

  I look at Felix. I’m not sure if he realises how big and tough Tonya is. I’ll have to make sure if he has a word to her, he does it by phone.

  ‘What about a friend?’ says Felix. ‘Do you have one of those?’

  I remember the boy from my class, crouching at the tap yesterday afternoon washing my scissors.

  ‘I think I might have,’ I say.

  ‘Good,’ says Felix.

  I put my arms round him.

  ‘Thank you,’ I whisper.

  One day I want to be able to do what Felix does. Spot when somebody I love is having a problem and help them solve it.

  I should be able to do that because I am pretty observant.

  ‘Hey,’ I say, pointing to the bedside clock. ‘It’s after midnight. Happy birthday.’

  Felix grins.

  ‘Thanks,’ he says. ‘Seeing as we’re all awake, let’s have hot chocolate.’

  I give a whoop.

  That’s the good thing about living on the top of a hill in the bush with no other houses around. You can whoop loudly in the middle of the night, or even bark if you want to, and you don’t wake any neighbours.

  Felix stands up and rubs his legs and heads for the kitchen.

  Jumble follows him.

  I do too, but on the way I stop outside Felix’s room. His door is open and I can see a book lying open on the bed. A book with a cover I recognise.

  I go in and pick it up.

  The book is old and battered. The edges of some of the pages are burnt. The words on the cover are in a foreign language. Felix had some jam from Poland once, and the words on the label looked a bit like this.

  But this book isn’t about jam.

  I know this book. The picture on the cover is exactly the same as the English version.

  William’s Happy Days.

  In
side the cover is a name written in pencil.

  Wilhelm.

  Where have I heard that name before?

  I remember. Dad told me. It’s the pretend name Felix called himself when he was hiding from the Nazis.

  Felix must have had this book all these years. But instead of putting it on the bookshelf with all the others, he’s kept it hidden away.

  Why would he do that?

  ‘Babushka,’ calls Felix from the kitchen. ‘Do you want cake with your hot chocolate?’

  I put the book down.

  I haven’t got time to solve the puzzle now.

  But I will later. After we’ve had our snack, Felix will need to get some sleep because he’s got a big day tomorrow.

  That’ll give me the chance to get the English version of William’s Happy Days off the bookshelf and have a read of it in bed.

  Then maybe I can be like Felix and spot something that’s bothering a person I love.

  Now it’s morning and something doesn’t feel right.

  I’ve got a book in my ear instead of a dog.

  I sit up and I switch off the bedside lamp and put William’s Happy Days under my pillow.

  I’m the only one in the bed. Jumble must have got up early.

  Hang on, I remember. Jumble went and slept in Felix’s room because he was sick of me reading with the lamp on.

  Not that I read very much. I conked out after the first story. It was good, but I couldn’t spot anything in it that solved the puzzle about why Felix didn’t want William’s Happy Days on his bookshelf.

  I’ll read some more tonight. Today I’ve got too much to do. Starting with making a birthday breakfast.

  I jump out of bed and grab the present Mum and Dad left with me for Felix, and creep out of my room. With a bit of luck Felix is still asleep and I can get the sweetcorn and oven-chip pancakes made and then surprise him with them.

  But Felix’s door is open and his bed is empty.

  He and Jumble are already up. And I bet I know where they are.

  I head out into the backyard.

  I’m right. Felix is feeding the chooks. Well, not so much feeding them as standing there staring at them.

  His shoulders are slumped and his head is bowed and he doesn’t look like somebody who’s having a happy birthday at all. He looks like somebody who’s having a miserable birthday.

  ‘Felix,’ I say, hurrying over. ‘Are you OK?’