by Simon Mason
The other Quigleys ran out from their hiding place. Dad was struggling in the netting. Quite a lot of him was covered in fruit. The hoolah hoop was bent in half and the toasting fork was sticking out of the buddleia.
‘Did I get him?' Dad panted, rubbing mango from his face.
They looked in the netting, which was empty except for Dad. They looked round the garden. Deathwing, Lord of the Skies was nowhere to be seen.
In the moment of silence that followed, Will said, ‘Listen.’
Tuckle, tuckle, natter, natter, natter. They all looked up, even Dad, who had got the mango out of his eyes, and they saw Deathwing, Lord of the Skies sitting in the lowest branches of the chestnut tree.
Then an absolutely astonishing thing happened. Will left the others and walked towards the budgie very slowly, holding his finger out, and talking in a quiet conversational voice.
‘Come on, Deathwing. Come on, boy. Come on, Deathboy.' He whistled softly, and talked. ‘It's all right. Come on now.' Almost immediately, Deathwing, Lord of the Skies flew down with a small screech and landed on his finger, and Will gently took hold of him.
From his position on the lawn, Dad gagged.
‘But,’ he said, choking. ‘But. But that's exactly what I was trying to do.’
On Sunday morning, the Quigleys sat in the back room eating their breakfast in their pyjamas and dressing gowns. In their cage on top of the toy cupboard the budgies were having their breakfast too. They went tuckle, tuckle, natter, natter, natter.
Dad sat with his swollen ankle up on a stool. He felt very tired.
‘When I've finished breakfast,’ Will said, ‘I'm going to train the budgies to talk.' Behind his paper, Dad moaned to himself.
Will ignored him. ‘They know me now. We understand each other. I'm going to talk to them about things.' He thought for a moment. ‘I might ask them what they think of you leaving that window open.’
Dad limped with the paper into the front room. He had nearly fallen asleep when Will came in.
‘Well,’ Will said. ‘That didn't take long.' Dad looked at him suspiciously. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Told you I was going to teach them to talk. Well, it didn't take me long.’
Disbelieving, Dad followed him into the back room, where Mum and Lucy were standing looking at the cage. Will got Deathwing, Lord of the Skies out and held him on his finger. Deathwing, Lord of the Skies was strangely calm, quite unlike normal.
‘Hello,’ Will said. The bird cocked his head on one side.
‘Hello,’ Will said in a deeper voice. Deathwing, Lord of the Skies shook his head feathers and looked interested.
‘Hello,’ Will said in an even deeper, more tragic voice. ‘Hello. Hel-lowww.’
‘Hello, Ralphie,’ the budgie said brightly. Dad staggered sideways, broke the family rules, and Mum told him off.
‘You see,’ Will said, beaming. ‘He knows my name.’
Dad frowned. ‘But he didn't say your name,’ he said. ‘He said, “Hello, Ralphie.”' ‘No, he didn't, he said “Hello, Willie.”’
‘Sounded like Ralphie to me.’
Will scowled so hard his forehead seemed to cover his eyes. ‘Typical,’ he said. ‘I spend all morning teaching him to talk, and all you can do is criticize.’
Dad apologized. He said he was going to go for a walk in the park and, out of pure kindness, Lucy said she'd go with him.
It was a clear blue cool day. Lucy and Dad walked down the street holding hands. Sometimes Lucy didn't like holding hands, but today she thought Dad wanted to.
‘Amazing,’ Dad kept saying, shaking his head. ‘Just amazing.’
They went down Parkside Road, and turned into the path that led to the park.
‘Look,’ Lucy said. ‘Someone's done a picture of Deathwing, Lord of the Skies.’
They stopped and looked at the picture fastened to a lamppost.
‘Why have they done a picture of Deathwing, Lord of the Skies?' Lucy said.
‘It's a good picture, isn't it? It looks just like him.’
Dad stared at the picture. ‘Listen to this, Poodle,’ he said in a strange voice. ‘It says: “Have you seen this bird? Green budgerigar, very tame and friendly. Lost on Friday. Will come to your hand, and answers to the name of Ralphie.” And then there's a phone number.’
‘Ralphie,’ Lucy said. ‘That's funny. That's what Deathwing, Lord of the Skies said.’
Dad looked at her. ‘Oh dear,’ he said. ‘Isn't it Deathwing, Lord of the Skies?' Lucy said. ‘Is it Ralphie?’
They turned together and walked back up Parkside Road. ‘Oh dear,’ Dad kept saying.
As they went in, Will was standing in the back room with the green budgerigar on his finger. He said, ‘It's very odd, Dad. I've taught him to talk all right, but he seems to have this speech problem.’
After they had taken Ralphie back to his owners, the Quigleys sat in the front room and comforted Will. Lucy did him a picture of Deathwing, Lord of the Skies which she said he could put up on the lampposts now that the pictures of Ralphie had been taken down.
Will shook his head. ‘No point,’ he said. ‘He'll be halfway to Singapore by now.’
Dad blushed. ‘It's all right,’ Will said heavily. ‘I knew it was too good to be true when he flew onto my finger. He was always too stupid to do that.’
They sat quietly for a while, and then it was time for Will to practise the piano.
‘At least the piano got fixed,’ he said. ‘So something good happened yesterday.’
He sat at the piano, looking at his hands and sighing, and then he began to practise. After a while he stopped.
‘I don't think much of that piano tuner,’ he said. ‘It doesn't sound right.’
He played on for a bit, making quite a lot of mistakes.
‘This piano sounds awful,’ he said. ‘Come on now,’ Mum said. ‘Don't take it out on the piano, just because you're upset.' She went to sit next to him.
Will made a mistake, and then another. ‘You see,’ he said. ‘The notes keep missing and they don't sound right.’
‘Try it again,’ Mum said. ‘Hit the keys firmly.’
Will hit the keys firmly and the piano squawked. Mum and Will looked at each other, amazed. Will flung open the piano lid, and Deathwing, Lord of the Skies burst madly and loudly into the room.
The Quigleys found themselves standing up and speaking together.
‘The piano tuner left the lid up,’ Dad said.
‘And he flew into the piano,’ Mum said. ‘And I put the lid down again without realizing,’ Dad said.
‘So he didn't fly out of the window at all,’ Will said.
‘And I am stupid,’ Dad said. There was a slight silence after this. ‘I think I should play “Sing, Bird, Sing”,’ Lucy said kindly, and she did.
‘And Deathwing, Lord of the Skies isn't stupid after all,’ Will added.
They looked up at him flying in mad circles round the ceiling.
‘Well,’ Will said. ‘Not totally stupid.’
Will in a Dream
Mum and Dad said Will was too dreamy. They said he forgot things, and didn't pay attention, and left things behind, and didn't think. They were sitting in the back room one Sunday, talking about it. Or rather, Mum and Dad were talking about it, and Will was reading The Beano.
‘I hope you haven't lost your new coat,’ Mum said. ‘It's not on the pegs.’
Will carried on reading The Beano, grinning to himself.
‘Will!’
‘What?’
‘Where is it?’
‘Where's what?’
‘Where's your new coat?' Will looked at the coat pegs and back at Mum. ‘Well, it's not on the pegs,’ he said. He saw the look on her face. ‘But I know where it is,’ he went on in a different, more helpful voice. ‘I know exactly where it is.’
Mum waited for him to say something else, but he didn't. He went back to The Beano.
‘Well, where?' she asked at last.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘You're absolutely sure?' ‘Yes, I told you.' He resumed reading The Beano. ‘Unless it's at Tim's,’ he said after a moment.
Mum opened her mouth with a bit of a hiss, and Will looked up. ‘Or Dani's,’ he added. ‘There's a sort of very small chance it might be at Dani's. But basically I do know where it is, so that's all right. Oh, and shall I clear away the breakfast things?’
Will had noticed that when he offered to do something helpful, it often made Mum and Dad forget what they were talking about. Today it didn't work. Mum had that squeezed look. It was not her worst look, but it was one of her worst. It came somewhere between the distracted look and the bone-munching look of fury. Mum's squeezed look was difficult to make go away.
‘You don't look after your things,’ Mum said crossly. ‘I bet your friends don't treat their things like this, do they?’
Will thought it best to agree, and he shook his head sadly.
Dad weighed in. ‘I bet your friends aren't always leaving things at school, are they?' he said.
Will shook his head again, looking mournful.
‘I really don't know what we're doing wrong,’ Dad sighed, and Will was just wondering how to answer this when Mum suddenly asked him if he'd given out all the invitations to his birthday party at school. That took him by surprise.
‘What invitations?' he said, before he could stop himself.
They discovered them all still in his school bag, and it seemed as if Mum's squeezed look was about to be replaced by her bone-munching one.
Will thought quickly. ‘I'll take them now,’ he said. ‘I don't mind. I'll enjoy it.' Mum still looked quite fierce. ‘It'll be good for me,’ he added. ‘I can put Tim's through his letterbox, and Matt's, and Sandy's, and I can cycle over to Dani's with his. That's almost half of them.’
Mum and Dad calmed down. ‘OK,’ Mum said. ‘But be back by lunchtime.’
Will put the invitations in his pocket and went to the door.
‘Oh. And can I stay at Dani's for a bit, to play? If I promise to come back on time?' He smiled sweetly. It was a smile he had practised in the mirror. He wasn't sure if Mum and Dad could see the sweet smile all the way from the back room, but he thought it was worth it anyway.
‘All right,’ Mum said. ‘But make sure you're back by one o'clock.' She used a firm voice. ‘Don't get in a dream and forget.’
Will turned to go.
‘Don't forget!' Dad called. He used an even firmer voice. ‘Don't get in a dream!’
‘Course I won't,’ Will called back. His voice was not at all firm.
He went up and down the street delivering invitations. It was a fine warm spring morning, blue and gold. The front gardens were full of lilacs and azaleas and Yellow Betty. The Quigleys' rose bush, heavy with buds, hung over their front wall. Soon the blind lady who lived at number thirty-six would be asking them to cut it back so she didn't walk into it. Will liked the blind lady. He liked her guide dog too. The dog was spectacularly badly behaved. Sometimes, if the Quigleys had left their front door open, it would come bounding curiously into their house and romp around the kitchen, while the blind lady cursed it loudly from the pavement. Will hoped he might bump into the blind lady and her dog on his way to Dani's.
The gutters of the back roads were filled with fallen cherry blossom. He went along the cycle track that ran between the lake and the vicarage, and into the park. He didn't see the blind lady or her dog. At the other side of the park he went across the wooden bridge, and turned into the road where school was.
Suddenly he stopped. The school gates were wide open, and the main door was open too. He frowned. School ought to be closed on Sundays. He looked up and down the empty street, then back at the school buildings. Leaning forward on his bike, he listened. He could hear noises. Something was going on inside. He asked himself what it could be. Had burglars broken in to steal the valuable chalk or rare guinea pigs? Could dark forces have taken over the school for their own secret purposes? Or perhaps Miss Strickland had been involved in some sort of accident. He liked that particularly. He imagined Mr Sheringham rushing into the car park, shouting, ‘Quick, four strong men! She's fallen down!’
Then, for no reason at all, he remembered his coat. He really did think he'd left it at school. It would be hanging on the peg outside his classroom. He could nip in and fetch it while school was open. What a surprise Mum and Dad would have when he came home wearing his lost coat. The thought of it was almost as nice as the thought of Miss Strickland's accident.
He got off his bike and chained it to the railings. There was another bike chained up a bit further along, and a woolly hat stuck on top of the gate. It was just like some people to leave their things behind. He went cautiously across the yard to the door, and peeped in. There was no one in sight. After a moment he slipped inside.
He'd never been in school at the weekend before; it felt empty and quiet, not like proper school at all. There was no one in the school office, so he went down the corridor, his footsteps echoing as he walked. He went into the hall and stood there looking round. Usually the hall was packed and noisy; now it was hushed and still. He noticed things he didn't usually see: the rocking chair in the corner and the orange girders across the ceiling. He sniffed. There was a smell of polish. The wooden floor, usually greyish, was glossy.
Was it the stillness, or the quietness, or the smell of polish that made him go into a dream? In his dream he saw the hall filling up with people for assembly, teachers leading their classes in, and the children filing in behind, and he saw Mr Sheringham come through the door, and with him all his friends, some of them jostling and some of them whispering, and Sandy tripping up Dani, and Tim treading on Matt's toes, and, right at the end, a blond-haired boy with freckles – himself, Will Quigley, gazing round and chewing a fingernail.
He came out of his dream when he heard the noises again. Voices and music. Where were they coming from? Going out of the hall, he went quietly down the deserted corridor, following the sounds and feeling daring. Past the guinea pigs, past the girls' toilets, across the display area covered with pictures of Ancient Greeks being turned to stone by the Gorgon's head, down the corridor to Miss Petz's classroom. Now he could hear what the sounds were: people talking – not children, but adults. The door to the classroom was ajar, so he tiptoed up and peeped in.
Some men were standing round the piano. He recognized Ben, Tim's dad. He didn't know the others. They were shuffling papers and talking. Will guessed it was some sort of choir practice. As he watched, one of the men said, ‘OK, from the top,’ and they all straightened up, held the papers in front of them, and stared at the wall behind the piano, looking very serious. ‘After four,’ the man said.
Will had never seen Ben sing before. It was staggeringly funny. One second he was a perfectly normal man with pale hair and a mild face, and the next he was a popeyed lunatic who'd just stepped on a tack. Will retreated, cramming his hands into his mouth. He knew he shouldn't laugh. Certainly he shouldn't laugh out loud or he would be discovered. For several minutes he rolled on the floor biting his knuckles and jabbing his fingers into his cheeks, and squeezing his nostrils shut so the laugh wouldn't explode out of his nose until, at last, the fit passed and he lolled against the wall, grinning soundlessly. And it was then, with some surprise, that he remembered his coat again.
He set off happily towards Mr Sheringham's classroom.
It was nice being in school with no one else around, just being curious and a bit dreamy. He thought the dreaminess had something to do with the stillness. Or perhaps it was the warmth. The sun was coming in the windows of the new block in fuzzy golden shafts. He waltzed down the corridor humming to himself until his classroom came in sight, and then, for the first time, it crossed his mind that perhaps his coat wouldn't be there after all. At once his heart beat high up in his chest, and he began to think things to make it be there. I
f it's there, he thought, I'll be nice to Lucy tomorrow. At least part of tomorrow, until lunchtime, say. And I'll clean the budgies out. I might even clean them out twice.
He thought that was enough, so he stopped thinking, and went carefully down the corridor until he came to his peg. And on his peg was his coat. He smelled it to make sure it was his, and put it on, and grinned to himself. His thinking had worked. Sometimes it did. Now he'd show Mum and Dad whether he knew where his coat was or not. It was turning out to be a very good Sunday morning indeed.
Before he left, he peeped into his empty classroom through the window in the door. It was filled with sunshine, and dust swam in the yellow light. He looked at his desk, where he sat every day. It seemed different without him, smaller and more like the other desks, and he felt sort of sorry for it. Though it was warm, he zipped up his coat so he could feel it round him, and went down the other corridor. On his way he passed the lost property box. It really was amazing how much stuff people left behind, huge piles of things. There was a red wool coat that had been in the box for ages, and a pair of yellow trousers and about seventeen shoes, all different, and a great purple shirt-thing so big and appalling it must surely have been Miss Strickland's. When he put it on, it came down to his ankles. He put the yellow trousers on too, to have something to tuck the shirt-thing into, and then he thought he might as well put on some of the shoes. There was a fur sleeveless jacket he thought would make a good hat, though in fact it wasn't as good as a silver plastic skirt which fitted very snugly round his ears.