All the Things That Could Go Wrong

by Stewart Foster

I read what I’ve written, then fold the piece of paper in half. I’ll get an envelope from Mum and post it on the way to the cave in the morning. I smile because this is the happiest I’ve felt in ages.

  I’m going to see him.

  I’m going to see my brother.

  Alex: I had a dream

  Last night I dreamt again that Shooting Star was mine. I had no worries and the sun was shining brightly so I took her out on the sea and paddled towards the old pier. Lizzie was with me too. When we reached the old pier, we dropped anchor, then leant over the side of Shooting Star and dropped our crab lines into the water. The water was calm, with nothing moving beneath the surface. Me and Lizzie left our lines in the water, waiting for a crab to bite, but they never did. All we caught was an old tyre and a can of creosote.

  Then it started to get dark and we started to get cold so we wrapped ourselves up warm with the tarpaulin. There was no one else near us, there were no cars or buses on the seafront and the pier was closed. The only noise we could hear was the water lapping against the wood and the only lights we could see were the stars.

  Lizzie fell asleep and I started to feel tired too, but just as my eyelids began to droop I felt a tug on the line. I knelt up on Shooting Star and started to pull the line in. But the line went on for ages and it started to cut through my gloves. I kept pulling but it was like the line had no end. Lizzie woke up just as I heard something thrashing in the water. My arms were aching and I was running out of breath. Lizzie leant over the side.

  ‘What have we caught? A mermaid?’ she shouted.

  I peered down into the water. A dark shadow moved towards me then turned towards the pier. My line went taught and t he shadow tugged Shooting Star through the water like a speedboat.

  ‘Let go, Alex,’ shouted Lizzie. ‘Let go!’

  I tried to drop the line but it was glued to my fingers. The shadow kept tugging us. I could hardly breathe as we bumped over the waves with water spraying in our faces.

  ‘Alex!’ Lizzie screamed. ‘We’re going to drown!’

  Shooting Star dipped down under a wave. The water went over my feet then up to my waist. Lizzie grabbed my arm.

  I’m not ready to die, I thought. I’m not ready to die.

  I yanked on the line and suddenly—

  Snap!

  I looked at my hands. The line was slack with a broken end, dragging in the water.

  I put my arm around Lizzie.

  ‘We’re okay,’ I said. ‘We’re going to be alright.’

  Lizzie mumbled something but all I heard was her shivering.

  I peered into the water again. Everything was still and quiet, but then the lights flickered on the pier, and the rollercoaster climbed the track, but there was nobody on it. Lizzie started to cry.

  ‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘We’ll be all right.’

  And we sat on Shooting Star all night while a dark shadow circled underneath us like a whale …

  ‘That’s great,’ says Mum.

  I just told her about the dream as she drops me off at the seafront.

  ‘Why’s it great?’ I ask. ‘It was scary.’

  ‘Because it’s a good thing you’re dreaming about being outside, for once.’

  Mum’s right. I hardly ever dream about being outside. Even if it was scary at least something exciting happened outside of my room. That never happened before I started working on Shooting Star. It’s like—

  ‘Alex … Alex!’ Mum nudges me.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you get out now, love, I need to get to work.’

  ‘Oh sorry.’ I climb out of the car.

  ‘Drive safe.’

  ‘Drive safe.’

  I close the door and Mum pulls away.

  When I reach the cave, I can’t see Dan. All I can see is Shooting Star. Her base planks are now painted dark like a proper fishing boat.

  ‘All right, Shark Face?’

  Dan stands up at the back of the cave with a bin liner full of bottles in each hand.

  ‘Just thought I’d move these out here so we can see what we’re doing,’ he says cheerfully as he walks towards me.

  That’s weird. For a moment, I thought that he smiled at me, but he can’t have. It must have been the sun in his eyes.

  I walk into the cave and hang my bag on the hook. The light flickers as a truck rumbles overhead. I glance quickly around the cave, checking for any new cracks that might have appeared during the night.

  ‘They won’t come through,’ says Dan. ‘These caves have been here for yonks.’ He goes back for more bottles.

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘But the cement trucks haven’t.’ I look up as another rumbles above. The Observation Tower must be nearly finished because it’s like all the trucks are moving out at once.

  ‘Come on,’ says Dan. ‘The creosote has dried so we can fix the bottles on now.’

  He sounds like he’s in a hurry to get it done. Or maybe he’s just in a hurry to get rid of me. Once we’ve fitted the bottles and buoys, he won’t need me any more.

  He puts the bottles on the ground, then walks over to the diagram of Shooting Star. I stand next to him.

  ‘We’ve got to put the bottles into groups of ten and then tie string round them, like that.’ He points at a drawing of bottles grouped together. They look like the cells you see under a microscope. ‘Then we have to tie the bundles under the base planks.’

  I look at the diagram. It all makes sense, apart from only fixing the buoys underneath and not at the sides, but he’ll get angry if I mention that.

  We go to the front of the cave and sit down on our buckets. I sit a bit behind Dan so the seagulls can’t swoop down and get me.

  ‘I know why you did that.’

  ‘Why I did what?’

  ‘Sat there. It’s so the seagulls can’t get you. I’ve seen you running away from them.’

  I shrug. I can’t tell him he’s right. If he knows, then that’s one more thing he can bully me about.

  Dan picks up a bin liner and empties the bottles onto the ground. Then he reaches down and starts to stand them up.

  ‘You hold them,’ he says, ‘and I’ll tie the string round them.’

  I lean forward. The bottles have been at the back of the cave, with all the damp and clumps of moss and other bits of dirt on the floor. All sorts of germs could be on them. I lift up my hand. I don’t want to touch them, but if I don’t we’ll never finish Shooting Star.

  ‘Come on, Shark Face, we haven’t got all day.’

  I grit my teeth and hold my hand over the bottles like the claw that grabs the Minions on the machine on the pier.

  You can do it. You can do it.

  They’re filthy.

  You can. Last week you picked up planks and nets – you can do this.

  I drop my hand down on to the bottles. It didn’t hurt. I’m still alive.

  I trap a group of bottles between my feet and hands. Dan wraps the string round them and ties a knot. Then he groups more bottles and we do the same. In half an hour, we do four, but that’s only forty bottles and we’ve got to do another 260 before Shooting Star will be able to float. Dan empties another bag, then another. There’s so many of them that they start to blur. I block out the germs and start grouping them again. After we’ve tied twenty bundles, we pick them up and tie them under the base planks.

  ‘She’s looking great, Shark Face.’ Dan smiles and looks at what we’ve done. For a moment, I think he’s going to pat me on the back, so I step away, but he’s just putting his hands on his head.

  Why is he so happy? He can be like this at school, making the class laugh, but the next minute he snaps like an elastic band, so I don’t trust him. Shooting Star does look great, but we’ve only got one side fixed with bottles. We need loads more. If she went on the water like this, one half of her would be underwater and the other would be sticking up in the air.

  Dan walks over to the diagram on the blackboard. ‘It must say five hundred.’ He scratches his he
ad.

  ‘What must be five hundred?’

  ‘That.’

  I stand next to Dan as he points at a blurry number on the diagram.

  ‘I asked him what it said when I wrote to him last week. But he hasn’t replied.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Ben.’

  ‘Why do you write him letters? Can’t you just talk to him?’ The words jump out of my mouth. I wish they hadn’t. It’s like lighting the fuse on a bomb. I should crouch down with my hands over my ears. But Dan doesn’t explode. He’s smiling.

  ‘I can now,’ he says. ‘I’m going to see him this week.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  Dan doesn’t answer. I look at the diagram and pretend I’m reading the instructions by the side.

  ‘He’s in an STC,’ Dan says suddenly.

  I turn and look at him.

  ‘Ben … he’s in an STC.’

  I don’t know what an STC is, but I decide to look it up tonight on the laptop.

  ‘It’s a secure training centre,’ says Dan. ‘It’s where teenagers get sent instead of prison when they’ve done something wrong.’

  He sees the surprised look on my face.

  ‘But it wasn’t his fault, he was just unlucky.’

  ‘How … how long has he been in there?’ I say cautiously. I shouldn’t ask, but this is the most Dan’s even spoken to me about it.

  ‘Three months but it seems like ages.’

  Dan looks back at the drawing. Suddenly he looks upset like when a teacher shouts at him.

  ‘Do you miss—’

  ‘I need to get more bottles!’ he says quickly. He pushes his way between me and Shooting Star.

  The bomb’s gone off.

  ‘Are you coming, Shark Face?’

  I open my mouth, but no words come out. Last week he left me here on my own; now he wants me to go with him. It must be a trick. He’s going to walk out with me, and Sophie and the Georges will be waiting by the pier and they’ll throw me in the sea.

  ‘Are you coming or not?’

  ‘I’ll stay here,’ I say.

  ‘Suit yourself. But it’ll be quicker with two of us.’

  The light flickers. I check the ceiling for cracks again.

  Another truck, more cement. Enough to fill a black hole. Seagulls outside. Go with Dan. Get covered in cement. Go with Dan. Get covered in cement.

  ‘Wait.’

  ‘You just said no.’

  ‘I changed my mind.’

  Dan: Shark Face turns into a robot

  Shark Face walks over to his bag and searches through it. I look along the seafront. The clouds are moving quickly and the wind is so strong it’s blowing the flags straight on the pier. I take a deep breath. Ever since Mum told me I was going to see Ben, I feel like someone has taken their foot off my chest, but it still upsets me when I talk about him. I was so excited that I couldn’t sleep last night. I made a giant list of all the things I need to take and planned the car journey in my head. But all the time I kept fast-forwarding to the moment when I actually get to see Ben and we play Call of Duty and FIFA with Five X.

  Shark Face jams a packet of disinfectant wipes into his pocket, then comes out of the cave. He ducks as a seagull flies towards us, then looks around nervously, like he’s expecting someone else to be here.

  He’s so weird.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing. I was—’

  ‘Here, take one of these.’ I hand him a black bin liner.

  He looks at me like he thinks the bin liner is full of germs or even radioactive.

  ‘Where are we getting the bottles from?’

  ‘Bins, course.’

  ‘What?! No!’

  ‘You’re such a wimp. They’re only full of chip wrappers and stuff. Come on. We’ll see if Mr Kendall’s got any first.’

  Shark Face takes the bin liner and follows me along the seafront. He looks even weirder wearing gloves when everyone else is walking around wearing Tshirts or lying in the sun. I only let him come with me today because there’s no chance the Georges and Sophie will see us because the Georges are at the pavilion and she’s miles away at Thorpe Park.

  I keep walking. Out of the corner of my eye I can see Shark Face taking little strides then big ones like he’s jumping over his shadow. ‘Why do you walk like that?’

  Shark Face shrugs. ‘Just do.’

  ‘But it’s weird.’

  Shark Face doesn’t answer.

  I walk to the front of a queue of people waiting for ice creams at Mr Kendall’s kiosk. Mr Kendall’s leaning over, scooping ice-cream out of a tub.

  ‘Have you come to help?’

  ‘No, just wondered if you had any empty bottles?’

  ‘I have.’ He looks across the counter. ‘But I’m a bit busy. Come back later, with your mate.’ He nods at Shark Face.

  He’s not my mate! I turn round to see if Shark Face heard, but he’s still looking at his bag like it’s full of dog poo.

  I walk towards the bins at the pier. Shark Face is beside me. I walk faster. I want his help, but what if people do think he’s my friend? What if anybody from school saw me with him? It would be more embarrassing than when a teacher from my old school started talking to me in the chip shop.

  I reach the pier and stop by a bin. Shark Face takes another big stride and stops by the side. He doesn’t want to touch the bins, but he nearly landed in it. I shake my head. Shark Face shrugs like he’s used to people looking at him that way. I push open the flap of the bin. It’s full of lolly wrappers and fish-and-chip papers, but I can see the tops of two bottles sticking out. I reach in and pull them out. Shark Face steps back.

  ‘Dan! Dan!’

  I spin round. It’s Sophie! But it can’t be, she’s—

  ‘Dan!’

  Where is she? She can’t see me with Shark Face. I scan the pier, looking for her.

  ‘Over here!’ a boy shouts, over by the doughnut stand, then waves.

  My heart slows down. Phew, it’s not her. Shark Face doesn’t seem to have noticed. I don’t know if it’s just the wind making him grimace, but he doesn’t look so worried as he did in the cave.

  I go back to the bin, grab the two bottles. Shark Face opens his bag and I drop them in. I start to walk to the next bin. He follows me like a dog. I find three more bottles and put them in his bag. After five more bins, Shark Face’s bag is full and mine is nearly halfway there. This is the quickest I’ve ever collected them and we haven’t even been to the big recycling bin outside the Grand Hotel. I smile to myself. We’ll get 200 bottles easy today if we keep going like this. We’ll have them fixed on in no time and I’ll be able to show Ben a picture on my phone.

  I walk to the next bin. It’s different to the rest. It’s like a silver dome with the litter flap on the side.

  ‘It crushes the bottles,’ I say. ‘So it’s no good for us.’

  Shark Face nods.

  ‘But it does look like R2-D2.’

  ‘It does.’

  Shark Face smiles, then looks at the bin.

  ‘You’ll be malfunctioning within a day, you near-sighted scrap pile,’ he says in a voice just like—

  ‘You can do C-3PO!’ I say.

  ‘Yep.’ Shark Face nods like he’s pleased with himself. ‘Don’t blame me. I’m an interpreter. I’m not supposed to know a power socket from a computer terminal.’

  I laugh. ‘That’s brilliant! Who else can you do?’

  I think Shark Face ducks as a seagull swoops overhead, but now he’s bent over like an old lady resting on a walking stick.

  ‘Judge me by my size, do you?’

  I laugh out loud. ‘Yoda! You can do Yoda!’

  ‘Hmph. Adventure. Heh. Excitement. Heh. A Jedi craves not these things.’

  ‘Can you do them all?’

  Shark Face nods.

  ‘Yep, pretty much. Can you do any?’

  ‘No, not really, but Mum says I sound like Chewbacca when I’m grumpy. Do C-3PO again.’


  Shark Face stands up straight.

  ‘Sir, it’s quite possible this asteroid is not entirely stable.’

  I laugh again. ‘How did you learn to do that?’

  ‘Easy,’ he says. ‘I’ve got figures of them at home and when I press a button they make the voices.’

  ‘Bring one in tomorrow,’ I say.

  ‘I can’t, I’m going to my nan’s.’ Then Shark Face makes a whistling noise like R2-D2. He looks really weird when he does it.

  He is weird. What am I doing? Why am I laughing? This is Shark Face. I’m supposed to hate him, not laugh at the things he does. Sophie would go mad if she saw me doing this.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket. Shark Face stops whistling. I look at it. It’s a message from Sophie. It’s like she’s watching me now.

  Hey, Dan. George C. got the tickets.

  ‘Great,’ I say out loud. ‘Sophie’s got me a ticket for the Observation Tower.’

  I text her back straightaway.

  Thanks.

  My phone buzzes again.

  What are you doing?

  I look at Shark Face.

  Just stuff.

  I put my phone in my pocket.

  Shark Face is looking at me like he’s seen a ghost.

  ‘You’re going to the Observation Tower too?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘VIP!’

  ‘Argh! No!’ Shark Face scrunches his face like he’s got a headache.

  I think of asking him what’s wrong, but from the shocked look on his face I think I know what it is. We’re both going to the Observation Tower. If Sophie sees him, she’ll be bound to pick on him, and I’ll have to go along with it. I still think he’s a weirdo, but somehow it doesn’t seem fair to do that any more. Something has changed but I don’t know what or why.

  I press the button on the crossing and try to figure out what to do. We can’t go at different times because everyone wants to be on the first ride. And even if there’s a different queue for VIPs we could still bump into each other on the Observation Deck. There aren’t loads of separate pods like the Brighton Wheel.

  We cross the road and walk round the back of the Grand Hotel. I open up a giant bin and look inside.

  ‘We’re going to have to come back, Shark Face!’ I shout. ‘There’s loads in here.’ I reach in. Shark Face holds the bag and I throw the bottles in until the bag is full. I close the bin lid and we start to walk back to the cave. We pass the bin where Shark Face did C-3PO. I glance at him to see if he’ll do it again. He walks by without looking. It’s like someone has come along and taken his battery out.