Now

by Morris Gleitzman

  For a sec he looks startled. Then he grins.

  ‘Eighty years old,’ he says. ‘Who’d have thought it. Do you realise I may only have another thirty years left?’

  I try to do the maths but it’s too early in the morning.

  The important thing is, Felix is grinning.

  ‘Did you sleep better, babushka?’ he says.

  ‘Yes thanks,’ I say. ‘Happy birthday.’

  I give him Mum and Dad’s present. He starts to unwrap it, then remembers something.

  ‘I got a text message from your mum and dad earlier,’ says Felix. ‘They send their love.’

  ‘Are they OK?’ I say.

  ‘Just a touch of non-specific gastric mycosis,’ says Felix. ‘Apart from that, fit as fiddlers.’

  It’s amazing their text got through. The phones in Darfur are very unreliable. And the internet. Sometimes Africa even gets power cuts in their operating theatres. That’s why Mum and Dad took torches.

  Felix unwraps the present and holds it up and looks really pleased.

  It’s a jumper.

  Mum and Dad give him one every year.

  ‘Jumble’s giving me the same as last year too,’ says Felix. ‘A swimming pool.’

  Jumble is in his hole, scrabbling at the dirt with his paws.

  It’s not really a swimming pool. It’s Jumble trying to dig his way into the chook pen. The hole’s pretty deep for a little dog and getting wider. Sometimes Jumble needs help climbing out. Felix doesn’t mind because the chook wire goes a long way into the ground, and as Felix says, everyone needs a hobby.

  ‘I’ll make breakfast,’ I say. ‘Pancakes.’

  ‘Yippee,’ says Felix.

  Jumble agrees.

  ‘The taxi’s coming to take us into the city at midday,’ says Felix. ‘So after breakfast we’ve got time to go into town and get some birthday treats.’

  ‘Yippee,’ I say.

  I was totally wrong about Felix having a miserable birthday. He must just have been feeling the heat. The temperature is pretty savage this morning and it’s not even eight o’clock.

  In town we split up so we can surprise each other with birthday treats.

  I take Jumble into the hardware shop to get something to clean Zelda’s locket.

  The hardware lady holds the locket up and squints at it.

  ‘It’s not real gold,’ she says.

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘But it’s very precious, so we’d like your best polish, please.’

  The lady gives the locket another professional stare.

  ‘You say it’s been inside a mouse?’ she says.

  I nod.

  ‘Only briefly,’ I say.

  While the lady gets the polish, Jumble tugs on his lead. He wants to show me something. It’s a mechanical digger. I think he’s dropping hints for when his birthday comes around.

  We wait for Felix outside the shop.

  My phone beeps with a text.

  For an excited moment I think Mum and Dad have got through twice in one day.

  But they haven’t.

  zelda zelda worse than snot u think ur special but ur not

  I can feel my face burning. I erase the message and try to think about something else.

  Maybe the friendly boy from my class is in town this morning. I hope so. Felix and Jumble could meet him. We could have iced chocolate together.

  I peer up and down the main street.

  No sign of him.

  A little pang of loneliness stabs me in the respiratory system. For a sec I wish Mum and Dad weren’t quite so kind and compassionate and caring. If they’d just sent some money to Darfur, or some syringes, we’d still be living in South Melbourne and I’d be with my old friends.

  Calm down, Zelda, no need to carry on like a social reject. Your old friends haven’t forgotten you. Two of them called last week.

  I look up and down the street again.

  Still no sign of the boy.

  Just Felix, waving as he walks towards us with a bulging shopping bag.

  That’s weird, he’s coming from the opposite direction to the cake shop.

  I take the bag from him and peek inside.

  This is even weirder. There are no cakes. Just some battered-looking carrots and some bits of cabbage and a lumpy vegetable I don’t recognise. I take it out of the bag.

  ‘It’s a turnip,’ says Felix. ‘For my birthday soup.’

  I look at Felix to see if he’s joking. A birthday soup should have special things in it, like mini sweetcorn and fresh herbs and party frankfurters. This stuff looks more like chook food. I know Felix likes to use up leftovers, but he doesn’t normally use up other people’s leftovers.

  ‘It’s a special soup I make on my birthday,’ says Felix. ‘To help me remember some special people.’

  Suddenly I understand.

  It’s a birthday soup from a long time ago.

  Felix grins.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘I have cakes on my birthday too. We’ll get them in a moment. First there’s something special I want to get you.’

  Felix is amazing.

  I bet there aren’t many people with a scary wartime childhood who can happily shop in an army disposal store. Surrounded by ammo belts and military knives and camping stoves that could be Nazi ones for all we know.

  It goes to show how good Felix is at leaving the bad things in the past and concentrating on happy things now.

  Happy things like these boots he’s buying me.

  ‘Comfy?’ says Felix.

  ‘Brilliant,’ I say.

  I stand up and walk around. They fit perfectly. The leather is really strong, but soft. The soles are really chunky, but light. They’ve got more lace holes than any shoes I’ve ever had.

  Any bully would think twice about tormenting a kid who was wearing boots like these.

  The only thing I’m not sure about is why Felix is buying them for me. Today is his special day, not mine.

  ‘Is this an early birthday present?’ I say.

  Felix shakes his head.

  ‘I’m buying them because you need tough footwear here in the hills,’ he says. ‘And because a long time ago somebody gave me boots when I really needed them.’

  I give Felix a hug.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘And thank you to that person.’

  ‘His name was Barney,’ says Felix softly.

  I’ve heard that name. Mum and Dad have mentioned Barney.

  I can hear from Felix’s voice that remembering Barney is making him feel a bit emotional. I look away towards the front of the shop to give Felix a private moment.

  I’m glad I do.

  I can see out through the shop window and across the street. To where three people are lounging against the front of the newsagents.

  Tonya and her bully mates.

  I duck down onto the floor behind a pile of blankets.

  Felix is giving me a strange look. So is Jumble, who’s been snoozing in a military helmet.

  ‘These boots are very comfy for walking,’ I say to Felix. ‘I just want to see how they are for sitting.’

  I’m desperately trying to think of a way to keep us in the shop until Tonya and her mates move on. So Felix’s birthday isn’t ruined. If Tonya and Felix bump into each other, I wouldn’t put it past Tonya to laugh at Felix’s accent.

  ‘Come and sit down,’ I say to Felix. ‘Tell me some stuff about Barney.’

  I know I shouldn’t be encouraging Felix to dwell in the past, but I can’t think of anything else. We haven’t got a book to read together, and Felix doesn’t like making up stories.

  Felix sits on the floor next to me, groaning as he bends his knees.

  He gets comfortable against the blankets, and tells me about Barney, who was a dentist and who saved Felix’s life and kept a lot of other children safe from the Nazis. Then he tells me about Genia, a Polish pig farmer who risked her life and her pig to hide Felix. And about Gabriek, Genia’s husband, who looked after Felix
for two years after Genia was killed.

  These real-life stories are so gripping and amazing I’m not surprised Felix can’t be bothered making up stories. I’ll never think real-life stories are boring ever again. Or dentists, or pig farmers.

  ‘OK, babushka,’ says Felix. ‘Time to go.’

  I don’t want to go yet. There’s another special person I want Felix to tell me about. I’ve never heard him talk about her. Everything I know about her I’ve heard from Mum and Dad.

  ‘Tell me some things about Zelda,’ I say.

  ‘If we don’t get home soon,’ says Felix, standing up slowly, ‘we’ll miss our taxi to the city.’

  I’ve been so involved in the stories, I’ve forgotten to check if Tonya and her mates are still across the street.

  I peer round the blankets.

  ‘They’ve gone now,’ says Felix quietly. ‘The people you didn’t want to see.’

  I stare at him in surprise.

  He grins and helps me up. Which I need, because my legs have suddenly gone a bit weak.

  ‘Are the boots comfy for sitting?’ says Felix.

  I nod.

  ‘Good,’ he says, still grinning.

  ‘Thanks, Felix,’ I say.

  We look at each other.

  He knows I’m not just talking about the boots.

  Now I glance across at Felix in the taxi to see if he’s OK.

  He’s been a bit quiet on the trip into the city and I think he might be feeling stressed.

  The taxi pulls up.

  Felix definitely looks stressed.

  I don’t get it. When you’ve spent all your career being a really good surgeon and saving heaps of people’s lives and about two hundred of them invite you to a gala birthday lunch at a big hotel so they can pay tribute to you and say thank you and show you how well their stitches have healed, you think you’d be happy, right?

  Poor Felix isn’t.

  He’s frowning like we’re about to have a crash. And we’re not. We’re parked outside the hotel.

  ‘This is the address, sir,’ says the taxi driver.

  ‘Thank you,’ says Felix.

  I can see he doesn’t want to go inside.

  ‘Are your legs hurting?’ I whisper to him.

  This is why we’ve come in a taxi. It’s hard for Felix to drive all the way into the city these days because of his legs.

  ‘Not too bad, thanks, Margaret,’ says Felix. ‘Three and a half.’

  If it’s not his legs, what is it?

  Perhaps it’s the heat. The taxi driver said it’s thirty-five degrees here in the city. But this taxi’s airconditioned and the hotel will be too.

  Whatever it is, it’s not fair. A person should be allowed to do what he wants on his birthday.

  ‘We could just go home,’ I say. ‘I’ll make you a toasted sandwich with birthday sprinkles.’

  Felix looks tempted. But only for a moment.

  ‘It’s a very kind offer, babushka,’ he says. ‘But I agreed to this and we must face our destiny with humility and resignation.’

  Sometimes Felix forgets that not everybody went to university for eleven years.

  ‘Plus,’ he says, ‘there might be cakes.’

  The driver opens the door for us.

  ‘Have a nice lunch, sir,’ he says.

  ‘Thank you,’ says Felix.

  The driver gives me a little bow.

  ‘And you, Margaret,’ he says.

  As soon as we walk into the hotel ballroom, I understand why Felix is feeling stressed.

  The crowd is huge.

  Everyone recognises Felix and they jostle around us, talking excitedly and trying to get close to him.

  Felix has spent most of his life away from crowds. There weren’t any in his hiding hole, and after he left university he spent nearly forty years in quiet operating theatres with only a few other people around, some of them unconscious.

  No wonder big groups like this make him feel stressed. All these excited people hugging him and thanking him and showing him their children.

  I hold Felix’s hand so he knows I understand.

  On the wall above us is a big banner that says Happy 80th Birthday Dr Salinger.

  A man with a bow tie and a loud voice grabs Felix’s arm and tells us all the details about the new digestive system he got from Felix twenty-seven years ago.

  ‘Still going strong,’ he says.

  That’s a relief. For a sec I thought he was going to ask for another one.

  A lady cries as she reminds Felix how he took a lump of cancer out of her head when she was three. Poor thing. It must really hurt when you’re that young.

  ‘You’re a saint,’ she says to Felix.

  About fifty people say that.

  He deserves it. I feel so proud of him. And I can see he’s starting to relax as he asks everyone how they are and holds their hands gently in both of his.

  It must feel so good to save sick kids and then meet them years later when they’re grown-up with families and jobs and good health apart from a few back twinges and a bit of tooth decay.

  I wish I could do that.

  Felix introduces me to the last person he operated on before he retired. She’s twenty-two now, and you can’t tell she’s got a false eye unless she taps it for you with her fingernail.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say after she does it for me. ‘That’s amazing.’

  ‘Your grandfather’s amazing,’ she says.

  I agree.

  A man about as elderly as Felix gives him a hug.

  ‘Congratulations, old friend,’ says the man.

  ‘Thank you, Miklos,’ says Felix.

  I recognise the man and say hello. I met him once when Felix took me and Dad to a special survivors day at the Holocaust museum. I think he goes to the same Holocaust survivors group that Felix goes to.

  While Felix talks to his friend, I look around the huge ballroom full of people, and a thought hits me. I remember a World War Two photo I saw at the museum. A railway yard in Poland in 1942, completely empty after a Nazi death train had just left.

  If Felix hadn’t saved all these people’s lives, right now this ballroom would be as empty as that.

  I’ve never had lunch on a stage before.

  Only six of us are sitting up here, Felix and me and four bosses from the children’s hospital where Felix did most of his work.

  The patients and their families and friends are sitting at tables on the dance floor, gazing adoringly up at Felix while they chew their lunch.

  The bosses are nice, and they’re the ones who organised this whole event, so me and Felix don’t say anything when the waiters bring our plates and we see what we’re having.

  Fish.

  Felix doesn’t eat fish. He liked it as a kid, but it gives him stomach cramps now. I know how he feels, I’m the same with bubblegum.

  I give Felix a look to let him know I’ll eat his fish when the others aren’t watching.

  My phone vibrates in my pocket. The short buzz you get with a text. I calculate it’s 4.30 a.m. in Darfur, so it’s probably not from Mum and Dad.

  It’s probably one I won’t want to read.

  Instead I concentrate on the speeches.

  One by one, people come up to the microphone on the stage and talk about how Felix saved their lives.

  Felix is smiling, but I can see a sad look in his eyes, and I don’t think it’s about the fish.

  Maybe he’s thinking about Grandma and how she left him years ago and went to live in New Zealand because he used to spend so much time at the hospital with his patients.

  I squeeze his hand a few times.

  But on second thoughts maybe it’s not Grandma he’s feeling sad about. She always sees him when she visits Melbourne and they usually have a laugh.

  A man wearing jeans and a leather jacket comes to the microphone. He starts his speech by describing how, when he was nine, Felix fixed his throat after his windpipe got crushed by a rope twisted round his neck.r />
  Felix was a brilliant surgeon. I can see the man’s neck from here. It’s completely free of rope marks and he’s breathing normally through it and everything.

  The man keeps on talking even though the organisers have said one minute per person.

  ‘Dr Salinger knew I liked trees,’ says the man. ‘I think the climbing rope round my neck gave him a clue. So after the operation he said to me, Gary, would you like some trees to look at? I said, yes please. So he asked the nurses to move my bed out onto the hospital balcony. But the nurses said they couldn’t because it was against the rules. So Dr Salinger bought cakes for all the nurses, and when they weren’t looking he moved my bed himself.’

  The hospital bosses at our table are frowning. I’m not sure if it’s because they’re worried this man’s never going to stop, or because they didn’t know about the bed on the balcony.

  Felix has got his eyes closed.

  The man comes over and puts his arm round Felix’s shoulders.

  ‘This bloke,’ says the man very loudly, ‘is a hero. Every child in Felix Salinger’s life who needed help got it.’

  Everyone applauds. It’s the loudest clapping of the day, on and on.

  I’m so busy joining in that at first I don’t see what Felix is doing. He’s still got his eyes closed, but under the table he’s clenching his hands so tightly his fingers are white.

  I think I’m the only one who can see it. Even if I’m not, I’m probably the only one who knows why he’s doing it.

  It’s his medical condition. Not his legs, his other one. Shaky hands. Lots of old people get it. You take pills for it, but you can never cure it completely.

  It’s tragic. Felix has spent his whole life helping people with his hands, and now his hands won’t let him do that any more.

  He must feel so sad.

  Hang on, that’s it. Of course. That must be the answer to the William’s Happy Days mystery.

  I should have spotted it in the story I read last night. The story is about William doing things to help people. Rescuing an old man’s penknife from the person who stole it, stuff like that. In one part he has to pretend to be a dummy in a shop window. He has to stand totally still for ages, not moving a muscle, not even his hands.

  Felix must feel so unhappy when he reads that story. It must remind him how his hands won’t stop shaking. No wonder he didn’t want that book on his bookshelf.