“Don’t make me laugh, Coco, I’ll wet myself,” she giggled.
I tried the door, but it was locked.
“We need to go round to my classroom,” I said.
We crouched down and ran along the back of the building, past the science labs and the school canteen where the bins were giving off a foul odour, even in the cold. We rounded the building and reached my classroom. I peered in the window. The room was dark and silent. I gripped the door handle and gently turned: the door opened a crack. Marika made to go in.
“You should stay outside,” I said. “What if we get caught?”
“Who is going to catch you? The place is empty. There aren’t burglar alarms, are there?”
“No,” I whispered. “The Ripper never turns them on after they went off accidentally a few times one weekend.”
The door creaked as I opened it and we slipped inside. I closed it softly behind us, and we tiptoed between chairs stacked on rows of desks. Halfway along my handbag became tangled on a leg of one of the chairs and it fell off the table, hitting the floor with a crash. The door to my classroom was open and it echoed along the hall. We froze as the echo subsided. I was shaking and so was Marika.
“It’s okay,” she whispered. “We’re the only ones here.”
Carefully I picked up the chair, turned it over and placed it gently back on the desk.
We crept out of my classroom and along the dark corridors. When we reached the doors to the assembly hall we stopped to catch our breath. I grimaced as the handle squealed, and the door creaked open. Long windows stretched all the way along one wall from floor to ceiling. The full moon lit the vast room.
“Let’s be quick,” I whispered. “It’s so bright. People might see us!”
Halfway across the vast parquet floor of the hall, a huge cloud sailed in front of the moon, plunging us into darkness.
“I can’t see anything!” whispered Marika.
I slowed and reached back, grabbing her hand. We fumbled our way to the other side of the hall, squealing when we made contact with the branches of the giant Christmas tree. We jumped back as it swayed and a lone bauble fell off, bouncing away on the dark floor like a ping-pong ball.
We finally made it out of the hall and along to Mr Wednesday’s classroom in the art department. The moon came back out and we approached Mr Wednesday’s desk. There was nothing on it. The moonlight reflected off the polished wood. We stood for a moment looking at the driftwood of the abandoned still life.
“He probably put it in your pigeon hole then?” whispered Marika.
I gulped: the pigeonholes would mean another trip across the school to the front entrance. We slipped quietly out of the Art department, back through dark corridors. The school was starting to give me the creeps. All this empty space. Marika must have felt the same because she grabbed hold of my hand.
We arrived at the school canteen, passing rows of tables, and then we were through to the reception area. The wall of staff pigeonholes was opposite Miss Marks’s desk. We were about to start poking around in the pigeonholes when we heard the main entrance door open and someone hit the lights. They blared on and we squinted against the brightness. Voices were coming towards us, fast, and we rushed down the corridor toward The Ripper’s office. The door was closed but the little kitchenette opposite was open. We dived in and ducked down under a work surface to one side, between two big boxes of Styrofoam cups. We got there just in time as The Ripper walked past with Miss Marks!
Marika grabbed my hand again and dug her nails in. I bit my lip; we were both trembling. We heard the clinking of a big bunch of keys and The Ripper unlocked his office. They went inside, and the door closed. I leaned round the box, but the door opened again. I pressed my back against the wall. They stopped outside the kitchenette.
“How long have we got?” asked Miss Marks breathlessly. “Will I get to see you over Christmas?”
Marika and I looked at each other outraged. Miss Marks was a home wrecker!
“You can come to my flat,” she went on. “I put Mother down for a nap in the afternoons, so we’ll have privacy.”
She sounded quite desperate.
“I want you. Now,” he growled.
“Where do you want to do it? The vaulting block in the gymnasium?” she suggested.
There was a slurping sound. Ugh. Miss Marks was kissing The Ripper!
“How about the biology lab? You want me to be your naughty gynaecologist?” growled The Ripper.
“That’s my classroom,” mouthed Marika with a disgusted look on her face.
I was now terrified. What if they caught us? There were more slobbering, snogging noises and growling sounds. Then there was silence. We sat sweating for a few minutes, then a few minutes more. “I’m going to look,” I mouthed.
I peered round the boxes a fraction: they weren’t in the doorway. I got up and slowly moved to the door, peeped round, but they had gone. I beckoned for Marika. We crept out and over to the pigeonholes. I found mine and, sure enough, tucked inside were the plans for Tracy Island.
“Let’s get out of here,” said Marika, still terrified.
We made to leave, and then I noticed my Tracy Island on Miss Marks’s desk! I went over to it and ran my finger along the cellophane. The box was so colourful, the picture of the toy island was so glossy and striking.
“This is what he must have come back for,” I said. “He’d forgotten it.”
“Or he used it as an excuse to get out of the house,” said Marika.
“I went through so much to get this,” I said wistfully.
Making one out of old junk was going to be such a let-down for Rosencrantz. I looked over my shoulder and back at the box. I lifted it off the desk.
“You’re going to take it?” gasped Marika.
“Why not? What can he prove?”
“Coco, you’d be crazy!”
“No, it’s perfect, he hasn’t seen us. He couldn’t prove which member of staff it was.”
“But he knows you gave it to him and—”
“And what?” I interrupted.
I was going to do this. I was going to take it back from the cheating bastard. It was pleasingly heavy in my hand.
“They’re coming back!” warned Marika.
Through the glass of the canteen doors The Ripper and Miss Marks came round the corner of the tables, walking hand in hand.
“Put it down Coco, and run!” hissed Marika.
Devastated, I put Tracy Island back and we ran, down the corridor and out of the front entrance, which thankfully was open. We dived through the hedges and ran across the playing fields to the gap in the fence, and then we were out and in the dark alley. We stopped to catch our breath. I was in tears.
“We got the plans, Coco,” said Marika, giving me a hug. But it didn’t make me feel better.
We trudged past the terrace houses and towards the front of the school. Suddenly The Ripper’s car was coming down the drive and approaching the school gates. We looked around for somewhere to hide. Then a hearse came purring out of the darkness and pulled up beside the kerb. The tinted window slid down.
“I thought you might need a getaway vehicle,” said Meryl, leaning over to peer through the window, still wearing her curlers. “Daniel and Tony came home and told me what you were up to.”
I yanked open the passenger door, but Marika hesitated. The Ripper’s car was now almost at the gates.
‘It’s all right, dear, there’s no dead body in the back. There was this morning, but she’s now safely tucked away, six feet under,” trilled Meryl.
“Get in, Marika!” I hissed. We piled in and shut the door, just as The Ripper’s car headlights reached us, illuminating the hearse.
“Where to?” asked Meryl, as if we’d just completed a bank heist.
“The pub,” I said, clutching the Tracy Island plans to my chest.
“Yes, I could do with a swift one. I am spitting feathers,” said Marika. We sank back against the leather s
eat in relief and laughed.
Wednesday 23rd December
It turned into quite a fun evening. We had some drinks and a bite to eat. Afterwards, I walked Marika over to Baker Street tube station and thanked her again for joining in the St Duke’s heist.
“Think about coming for Christmas Day,” I said. “I’d love you to be there.”
“No, Christmas is a time for family,” she said.
“Christmas is a time for wanting to kill my family,” I corrected her, but she wasn’t having any of it. I watched as she went down the escalator and wished she wasn’t so bloody proud.
When I got home, everyone was asleep. I kissed Rosencrantz good night and then found Daniel had returned to the marital bed, his plaster cast hanging off the end, and he was snoring loudly. I undressed, climbed in beside him and was asleep in seconds.
* * *
There was a knock on the bedroom door at six this morning. I thought it was Rosencrantz, but then I heard Meryl whispering, asking if I was ‘decent’.
I left Daniel sleeping and came to the door. She was in her long button-up nightie and holding the plans for Tracy Island with her reading glasses perched on her nose.
“Coco, we need to talk,” she whispered.
“Now? It’s early—”
“Now!,” insisted Meryl.
We came downstairs to the living room, and she closed the door, putting a chair under the door handle. On the sofa was a notebook full of her scribblings, and a video of Blue Peter’s ‘How to make Tracy Island’ was paused on the television. All of Rosencrantz’s Thunderbirds figures and toys were lined up on the coffee table.
“Where did you get that video from?”
“Mandy from Handy Mandy Crafts in Milton Keynes. Mandy was happy to help. She was very pleased with the job Tony did burying her mother.”
“That’s very generous of her,” I said.
“Now, Coco. We’re dealing with papier mâché,” said Meryl gravely.
“That’s easy, isn’t it? Just glue and old newspaper?” I said.
“Papier mâché may be slap-dash in its execution, but it needs time to dry. We’ve got barely forty-eight hours until Rosencrantz comes running down those stairs to see what Father Christmas has left him.”
I sat down heavily on the side of the sofa. I’d been so excited to get the plans last night that I’d forgotten we still had to make the damn thing.
“So we’re screwed?” I said.
“Coco. No toilet language, please.”
“Sorry, Meryl.”
“I’ve watched the Blue Peter video and I’ve been planning,” said Meryl seriously. “I think we can do it, but we can’t waste any time. We need to make a couple of Tracy Islands, maybe three to cover ourselves.”
“Three?”
Meryl came and sat beside me.
“I’ve just been on the phone with Handy Mandy,” she said. “Handy Mandy divulged to me her top-secret drying method for papier mâché.”
Meryl paused for dramatic effect.
“What is it?” I asked.
Meryl glanced around furtively, as if we were two ladies from the French Resistance hiding in a bunker.
“Bake it in the oven at eighty-five degrees for one hour,” she whispered. “We’ll need to monitor the temperature – any deviation from eighty-five degrees and the game’s up. We can’t take our eyes off it for a second. Are you with me Coco?”
I nodded seriously and tried to keep a straight face. She checked her watch.
“Right. You need to get dressed. We’re going shopping.”
We were first at the supermarket when it opened at half past seven. As we dashed round with the trolley, I felt like an awful mother. Here I was with no present for Rosencrantz and attempting to make a substitute with ordinary household junk – washing-up liquid bottles, tin foil and old cardboard boxes, for God’s sake! I had to thank Meryl for her steely resolve and for guiding the trolley round when the tears in my eyes blurred our route.
Meryl left me to go through the till, whilst she went to a pay phone and rang Ethel. We needed someone to keep Rosencrantz out of the house.
“Mum’s not at home,” said Meryl when I wheeled the trolley out with all our purchases.
I was relieved. I didn’t want to have to explain about Ethel boycotting the Nativity play.
“Chris is away on a cruise and Daniel’s only got one good leg,” I said.
“It’ll have to be Tony then,” shrugged Meryl.
“Tony?”
“Yes, it will do him good to spend some time with Rosencrantz, give him practice for…” Then Meryl was silent. She always dismissed the friendly enquiries she got about her having children, saying things like they’d just bought new carpets and a baby would cause havoc.
“So we’ll get Tony babysitting,” she said, pulling herself together. “Next stop B&Q.”
* * *
We arrived home just after ten dragging bags full of Christmas shopping, Tracy Island shopping and a six-foot Scotch pine in a bucket.
“Christmas tree! Yay!” yelled Rosencrantz.
He was disappointed when he heard he was going out for the day with Uncle Tony.
“Is he my uncle?” asked Rosencrantz.
“Of course he’s your uncle!” said Meryl. “He’s married to me, and you know I’m your aunt.”
Rosencrantz looked surprised that the slightly pervy man who came every Christmas was related to him.
“What should I do with him?” I heard Tony whisper to Meryl.
“Get to know him, take him to the zoo or something,” hissed Meryl. “Just bring him back in one piece.”
I nervously kissed Rosencrantz goodbye, and then Meryl pulled me into the kitchen. She had laid everything out and was mixing up a gloopy paste in a bowl.
“Flour and water for the papier mâché,” she trilled. “The Blue Peter Tracy Island starts with a square of cardboard from one of those big boxes from the supermarket. Then on top you build up layers and layers of papier mâché to make the shape of the island.”
It was slow, messy work, especially as we were making three islands. Daniel was helped down the stairs to reluctantly to lend a hand. Ever the practical one, Meryl made a lunch of cream cheese sandwiches with crisps, then washed the tubs up for the next phase of Tracy Island. The control tower lookout was made from an upside down cream cheese tub with square stickers to form windows.
By mid-afternoon the kitchen was a mess of flour and water paste and scrunched-up newspaper, but we had finished the main work on three Tracy Islands. One went into the oven on a very low heat, whilst the other two went upstairs into the airing cupboard.
* * *
We’d just finished clearing away the glue and paste when Tony came through the front door with Rosencrantz. Tony was soaking wet, and his lips were blue.
“My godfathers! What happened?” cried Meryl, pulling him into the living room.
“He fell in the Emperor penguin pond,” said Rosencrantz matter-of-factly.
“Emperor Penguin pond?” asked Meryl
“L-L-London Z-Z-Zoo,” shivered Tony.
“He got pecked a lot too!” said Rosencrantz gleefully.
I noticed peck marks on Tony’s nose, and on top where his hair was thinning. I grabbed him a blanket off the sofa, and Daniel hobbled over to the fire and attempted to put some more wood on.
“Daniel, sit down,” I snapped. “We can’t have any more accidents!”
“Tony! Come upstairs and get those wet clothes off,” instructed Meryl.
Tony shuddered as she led him out of the room and up the stairs.
“Did you know Uncle Tony buries dead people in the ground?” said Rosencrantz. “And if they don’t want to pay extra for him to dig a hole, he burns them in a big oven!”
“Well, it’s a bit nicer than that,” said Daniel.
“The oven!” I cried, noticing a faint burning smell.
Rosencrantz sniffed the air.
“Oh Mummy, are y
ou cooking again?” he said, sounding dismayed.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, it always goes wrong!”
“Oh no! The Tr—” I stopped myself in time and ran into the kitchen, just as the fire alarm began to beep. The room was filled with smoke and a hideous burning smell. I yanked open the oven, and black smoke poured out, spreading across the ceiling. Without thinking I grabbed the grill pan and pain shot through my hand. I dropped it on the floor and ran to the sink, plunging my hand under the cold water.
“What was that, Mummy? I’m not eating it!” said Rosencrantz, peering at the remains of the Tracy Island that never was, the top blackened and the bottom a saggy, glutinous mess.
“Ow, ow, ow! Shepherd’s pie,” I lied.
Rosencrantz gave me a look. Then we heard a scream from upstairs, and feet thundering down the stairs. Meryl rushed in, her head covered in what looked like grey vomit.
“Quick, move. I need water! Before it sets!” cried Meryl, running over to the sink. She shoved her head under the tap and turned on the water. “I went to the airing cupboard to get towels for Tony,” she hissed at me, pulling what I now realised were gloopy lumps of papier mâché out of her hair. “I forgot what we’d put in there to dry, and they both came tumbling out and landed on my head!”
“Both of them!”
“Yes! They’re both ruined. Oh, it’s setting!” she cried. “If this flour and water paste sets in my hair, I’ll never get it out! I’ll have to shave my head!”
“I can’t believe Uncle Tony buries people in the ground, and gets paid for it!” said Rosencrantz, oblivious to the chaos. “I was going to ask him if he’d ever buried anyone alive by mistake but he fell in the penguin pond…”
* * *
We put Tony, Rosencrantz and Daniel in the living room and got to work on clearing up the mess. It took two hours. The carpet on the landing would have to be replaced, and poor Meryl didn’t get to the sink fast enough. Her hair set into a solid, spivvy quiff. At four-thirty we sat with a stiff whiskey and a cigarette each, even though Meryl doesn’t usually smoke, and we made a plan.
Coco Pinchard's Must-Have Toy Story Page 9