Controlling himself – quite well, at first – Malcolm looked up from these presents and said: “Thanks. No, really: thanks. I really appreciate it. Um … anything … not to do with chinchillas?”
Jackie and Stewart exchanged glances.
“Um … of course!” said Stewart, handing over another present. Malcolm unwrapped it, suspiciously. Then held up what was inside and looked at his parents.
“It’s a chinchilla,” he said. “A cuddly toy chinchilla.”
“No …” said Jackie. “I’d say it’s a … rabbit. Wouldn’t you, Dad?”
“Yes! Or maybe … a … a … big-eared hamster!”
“Right, yes. A big-eared hamster. Maybe we should call it … um …”
“Hammy Big-Ears!” said Stewart.
“LOLTT …”7 said Libby.
“Exactly!” said Jackie. “Hello, Hammy Big-Ears! Look at your cute … big … hamster ears!”
“Right,” said Malcolm. “So when you bought this cuddly toy, you weren’t sure what kind of animal it was meant to be? It had no label of any kind? It wasn’t in any particular section of the cuddly toy shop? Perhaps the CH section? Just after Cheetahs and Chimpanzees?”
“Can I eat it?” said Bert.
“I think that clinches it,” said Malcolm, tossing the toy to Bert. “It’s a chinchilla.”
And, with that, he lay back on his bed, with his arms crossed, looking up at the ceiling. “Mum, Dad,” whispered Libby. “You know why Malcolm’s like this, DC?”8 She lowered her voice to an even lower whisper, made lower still because of her bored voice, which was like someone speaking through a yawn. “It’s cos of the Monkey Moment. IKEA …”9
“No, it’s not,” said Malcolm. The whisper had clearly not been whispery enough.
Jackie and Stewart exchanged glances. “It probably is, isn’t it, Stewart?” Jackie whispered.
“Yes, darling, I think we all know it is …” Stewart whispered back. “I think because of the …”
“… Monkey Moment,” said Jackie.
“Yes, the Monkey Moment … Perhaps Malcolm still feels a bit traumatised around furry creatures …”
“The whispers aren’t working!” said Malcolm. “I can hear you! It’s a small room! And: it’s got nothing to do with the Monkey Moment! Stop saying the words ‘Monkey Moment’!”
“What ‘Monkey Moment’?” said Grandpa.
“Oh, Dad! We’ve told you a hundred times!” said Jackie.
“Tell me again,” said Grandpa. “You know how I forget things.”
Malcolm sighed, and looked out of the window at a pigeon flying away from a car bumper at the last second.
So the family told Grandpa again. Thoughtfully, they went back into the living room and left Malcolm in his bedroom, as they didn’t want him to have to relive the trauma of the Monkey Moment, even if he said he wasn’t traumatised by it.
“Well, Dad,” said Jackie, “when Malcolm was six, we went on one of our regular Sunday trips to the zoo. And he loved seeing the animals then, didn’t he, Stewart?”
“Yes,” said Stewart. “I remember him running up and down by all the cages, smiling his biggest smile.”
“So the animals he really wanted to see were the monkeys …”
“Fair dos,” said Grandpa. “They are the top animal in a zoo.”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
“And when we got there – to the monkey house …”
“Monkey house, yes,” said Grandpa.
“He was really excited!”
“CGI …” said Libby, nodding in agreement, but in a way that suggested that she could barely be bothered to nod.
“What does that one mean?” said Grandpa.
“Crazy Gagging for It …”
“Right you are.”
“And so he ran right up to the cage. The one with all the chimpanzees in it. And the chimpanzees were all rolling about and swinging from ropes and jumping through tyres and chasing each other along the tree trunks …”
“Sounds great!” said Grandpa.
“Can I eat them?” said Bert.
“And Malcolm loved it all. He was so happy. He loved it so much, in fact, that he started clapping.”
At this point, Jackie paused, and looked a bit troubled.
“Yes,” said Grandpa. “Then what happened? Don’t stop there: INTK!”10
“Well …” said Jackie, “when Malcolm clapped, all the chimpanzees stopped what they were doing. And then one of the biggest ones … the dominant male, I think …”
“Louie,” said Stewart, helpfully. “That was his name. I remember reading it on the little placard outside the cage. They’d got him from a zoo in Frankfurt.”
“Yes, all right, Louie … He …” For a moment, it looked like Jackie was going to cry. Stewart came over and put his arm round her; Libby yawned; Bert found a piece of fluff on the floor and put it in his mouth.
“You don’t have to continue if you don’t want to, darling,” said Stewart.
“No, it’s fine. I’ll be fine.” She took a deep breath. “Louie picked up some of his … poo. From the floor. And threw it in Malcolm’s face.”
Grandpa nodded, with a very serious expression.
Then he nodded some more, making his face even more serious.
Then … he started laughing.
“Grandpa!” said Stewart.
“Sorry, but …” He couldn’t carry on the sentence. He started gulping for breath in between the laughs.
“The monkey plop splattered on the bars of the cage,” said Jackie. “But that didn’t stop him getting it all over his face. It’s not funny! It was awful!”
Grandpa carried on laughing. Then Stewart started. Then Bert joined in, while also repeatedly pressing the monkey icon on AnimalSFX on Stewart’s phone to create the sound of a chattering monkey. Even Libby stopped looking bored and started smiling.
“Stop it! Why are you all laughing?!” said Jackie. “And then – and then – all the other chimps joined in!”
“AHHAHAHAHA!!”
That was everybody else, laughing.
“LOLT27!!”
“Stop it!” said Jackie. “They all looked round – twenty chimps – and they all picked up bits of poo – and all threw it at the same time at Malcolm! It was like a huge battalion of medieval soldiers catapulting cannonballs at a castle! Except it wasn’t medieval soldiers, it was monkeys! And it wasn’t a castle, it was Malcolm’s face! And it wasn’t cannonballs, it was … AHHHHHAHAHAHA …!!!”
That, unfortunately, was Jackie. Joining in with the laughter.
“… poo …!!” she finally finished.
“AHHHHHAHAHAHA!!!”
“It was poo!” she said again, irrelevantly, to be honest. “Monkey droppings! Chimp plop! Planet of the Apes poo-poo! AHHHHHAHAHAHA!!”
“AHHHAHAHAHA!!”
That was everyone else.
“So … having a nice time?” That was Malcolm.
Everyone looked round.
Malcolm was standing at the door to the living room, with his arms crossed.
The rest of the family fell silent.
For almost twelve seconds.
Then they all started laughing again. In that way that people do when they’re trying not to, laughter bursting out of them like jets of air from an overfull balloon that someone is releasing, then pinching closed, and then releasing again. It’s made worse, that type of laughter, if you’re the object of it, because it sounds like the people laughing are not just laughing at you, but blowing raspberries as well.
“BRRRR! HAHAHA!! HAHAHA! BRRRR! AHHAHAHAHA!!!” went Malcolm’s family.
Chatter chatter chatter scream scream scream! went AnimalSFX in Bert’s hand.
Malcolm shook his head, raised his eyes to heaven and turned to go back to his bedroom.
“Hang on, Malcolm,” said Stewart. “Sorry sorry sorry! We’re all really sorry! Aren’t we?”
“Yes!” said Jackie.
“Yes!” sa
id Grandpa.
“STTM …”11 said Libby.
“Can I eat sorry?” said Bert.
“But look …” said Stewart. “If it helps … we do have one more present.”
“Is it a chinchilla hat?” said Malcolm, not turning round. “A chinchilla key-ring? Tickets to Chin-Chinenney Chin-Chinenney Chin-Chin Chilla!: The Musical?”
“No!”
“It’s got nothing to do with chinchillas at all …?”
“Nothing.”
Slowly, Malcolm turned round. He looked at his father suspiciously.
“All right then,” he said.
Stewart walked over to Malcolm, then took something out of his pocket and handed it over.
The last present.
It was slim: perhaps some kind of card, wrapped up in the candles paper.
Aha! thought Malcolm. A voucher! I can use that to buy the Apache 321!
“Oh, thanks, Dad!” he said, as his fingers took off the Sellotape on the back. “And Mum! Sorry, I didn’t mean to be ungrateful about the chinchilla! Can we go to the shops today with the vouch—”
Malcolm stopped speaking, as the word vouch ended on his lips, never to be added to with an er. He frowned, looking at the piece of card, on which were many, many pictures of animals.
For the second time that day, Malcolm looked up in confusion at his beaming parents.
“It’s a card! That we all made together!” said Libby. “BT!”12
“Oh … that’s nice …”
“Look inside,” said Jackie. “We saved up!”
Malcolm looked inside. There were more pictures of animals, plus the words, “Happy Birthday!”
There was also a piece of paper, folded up. Ah, he thought, the voucher. Right.
Malcolm unfolded the piece of paper.
It wasn’t a voucher.
It was an invoice.13 An invoice from his school: he knew this because the words Bracket Wood Primary School were printed on top of it.14 On the main bit of the paper were the words:
YEAR SIX SCHOOL TRIP
With a stamp across them that said:
PAID
Malcolm looked up.
“Oh. Thanks!”
He meant this, even though it wasn’t a voucher that he could use to buy an FZY Apache 321. Malcolm knew that his mum and dad would have struggled to pay the £300 required for the Year Six School Trip. In fact, as he looked at the invoice, it occurred to him that possibly it was a good thing that Ticky and Tacky had torn down his birthday list – and it had then been spread on the bottom of ’Nana’s cage – as maybe, he realised now, his mum and dad couldn’t actually afford an FZY Apache 321.
And Malcolm did want to go: the Year Six Trip was exciting. It was three days long – the first time he’d be away from his family! – and most other children he knew would be going. So he would’ve sounded more enthusiastic about his thanks were it not for the fact that he didn’t actually know where the school trip was going to this year.
So he said:
“No, really, Mum and Dad, thanks. That’s really nice of you. By the way – I know I should know this, but – where is it to, this year? The trip?”
“Um …” said Jackie and Stewart, both at the same time.
The Bracket Wood Primary School coach was having trouble getting down the hill.
This might seem unusual: you would expect most vehicles as old and creaky as the Bracket Wood Primary School coach to have trouble getting up this particular hill, a hill in the middle of the countryside renowned for its steepness. And of course it had done when it had driven up the other side – the climb had taken an hour and a half, and at one point most of Year Six had started screaming, “It’s going to roll backwards! It’s going to roll backwards!” and cowering under their seats.
But once over the top, even the rustiest rustbucket should be able just to glide all the way down. As it was, though, it seemed less to glide than to … cough. And splutter.
None of this was helped by the weather, which, though it was spring, was rainy and foggy.
Malcolm sighed, closed his eyes and tried to rest his forehead on the shuddering window. Up ahead he could see a flock of sheep running away from them as the coach belched its way forward. The vehicle finally managed to gain some speed and pass the sheep, but Malcolm noticed that they carried on running, even though there was nothing behind them any more. In fact, that they were now basically chasing the bus they were supposed to be running away from.
Some boys at the back – a boy called Barry, and his friends Lukas, Jake and Taj – turned round to point at the sheep, running away from nothing, and laughed. But Malcolm just felt annoyed at the stupid stupidity of the stupid sheep.
Eventually they made it to the bottom of the hill, and their destination.
“We’re here!” said their teacher, Mr Barrington, peering out of the front window. “I think …”
He said “I think” partly because his eyesight was not of the best – he had very, very thick glasses – and partly because the sign he was looking at was obscured by mist.
But as he said “I think”, the mist cleared to reveal the words:
ORWELL FARM
“Yes, this is definitely the place,” he said. “Drive on, driver, quick-smart! Let’s waste no more time getting the children out of this bus, on to the farm, and starting to look after all the animals!”
“Hooray!!” went all the children.
Well, all except one.
“So! Everybody! The last animals on our tour – and the last animals you’ll be helping us to look after while you’re here – are! … the goats!”
Gavin, who ran Orwell Farm and who had been giving Year Six their first trip round it, proudly gestured towards the pen behind him. All the children – except for Malcolm – peered towards the animals.
“Does anyone know what we get from goats?” continued Gavin.
A girl called Ellie put her hand up.
“Yes?” said Gavin.
“Milk?”
“That’s right!”
“I thought cows produced milk?” said her twin brother Fred.
“And burgers!” said Morris Fawcett, who was also in Year Six, although some people thought he should go back to Year One where he would almost certainly be more comfortable.
“They don’t produce burgers, Morris,” said Morris’s sister, Isla.
Morris frowned. “I thought beef comes from cows.”
“It does.”
Morris frowned even more. “Well, how do they make it then?”
Gavin smiled, which made his beard (he had a big bushy beard, and wore a flat cap, even though he was quite young) go up at the sides. “We get milk from goats as well. We make our speciality cheese out of it!”
Maven, who may or may not have been Gavin’s wife but who ran the farm with him, held up a plate on which rested a big triangular piece of what looked like rotting soap.
“Stinky Blinky!”
“Urrgh!” said various children. Even though they were out in the open air, a few of them covered their mouths and noses so as to avoid the terrible scent of cheesy goat wee.
“We sell it at the local artisan market!” said Maven. “Goes like hot cakes! Who wants a bit?”
The children all looked down.
Malcolm, though, was already looking down, at his watch. The time was 5.43pm. He had known that for a while (well, at least since it was 5.42pm). But he wasn’t looking at his watch to find out what the time was. He was looking at his watch because he wasn’t interested in what Gavin or Maven were saying about the goats.
He hadn’t been interested in what Gavin or Maven had said about the chickens either; or the sheep;15 or the cows; or the horses; or the sheepdog, Trotsky; or the farm cat, Zsa-Zsa; or the tortoises, Benny and Bjorn, which they kept not because they were farm animals, but just, in Gavin’s words, “for giggles”.16 He – Malcolm – still couldn’t see the point. The animals just walked or sat around in their pens looking at the huma
ns while the humans looked back at them. It was like a very dull episode of Big Brother. Which was a show he never watched because it was very dull.
No, Malcolm wasn’t looking at his watch to check the time.
He was looking at his watch to check the date.
And thinking: Three days. Three days till I can go home.
Meanwhile, Gavin and Maven had walked over to either side of one of the goats. It was a very old-looking goat, with a very long tufty beard, not entirely unlike Gavin’s. It had a sad face, and bulging amber eyes.
“This old guy, though …”
Gavin said, “he’s our favourite. He might even be our favourite animal on the entire farm.”
“We call him K-Pax,” said Maven. “Do any of you kids know that movie?”
Year Six, collectively, shook their heads.
“Oh, it’s great,” said Gavin. “We love it.”
“Yuh! So we, like, found K-Pax when we were trekking in the Himalayas!” said Maven. “And the village were going to, like, slaughter him. Which would’ve been …”
“Gross!”
“Yeah, gross.”
“I mean, they weren’t even going to sell the meat organically at the local market or anything …”
“So …” said Maven, “we bought him. And shipped him back to live with us here at Orwell Farm!”
Malcolm raised his eyes from his watch. They felt heavy with boredom.
“Anyway,” Gavin continued, “because he’s so old, and he’s seen so much of the world, we think K-Pax is really wise and clever! So if any of you have any questions – any big life issues you’ve been wondering about – ask them now!”
There was a long pause. Year Six, collectively, looked back down at the ground. Not because Maven was still holding up the Stinky Blinky – although she was – but because all the children were a bit embarrassed about the idea of asking a goat a question. Malcolm shook his head and imagined it.
Hello, K-Pax. Can you please tell me what life holds for me? Should I follow my dreams of being a great inventor of computer games or settle for being someone whose apps never get made, like my dad?
Sorry, what’s that you say? Baaa? Baaa-Baaa? Oh, and you’ve done a stinky goat wee. Great. Thanks.
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