World's Greatest Liar

by Hutchinson Barry

  A spinning roundhouse kick to the head?

  She’d done them all before. Although that last one might have been a dream, now I think about it.

  In the end, she just shook her head and stormed off along the road. “Whatever.”

  I caught her up. “You believe me?”

  “Of course I don’t believe you!” she said, but then she stopped and looked over my shoulder. “Hey, what’s that?”

  I wasn’t about to fall for that one. She’d snag me with a wedgie the second I turned round. This was amateur-level stuff and, frankly, I expected more of her.

  I was halfway through telling her that when she pushed me aside and barged past.

  We were standing outside a strange little shop that I was sure we hadn’t passed before. It looked like the type of place you’d find decorating a biscuit tin at the back of your gran’s cupboard – all twiddly writing and tiny windowpanes that had the appearance of rippling water.

  “Madame Shirley’s Marvellous Emporium of Peculiarities,” said Jodie, reading the hand-painted sign.

  The stuff in the window didn’t look all that “peculiar” – more like a load of old junk. There was a tatty ragdoll in a rocking chair, a model of a frog playing a banjo and a saggy old stuffed toy cat with half its fur missing.

  Beside those was a whole rack filled with nothing but pickled onion crisps. That was pretty peculiar, I suppose.

  And beside that was a handwritten sign.

  “Try the world’s only truth-telling machine,” Jodie read. “That’s a bit weird.”

  I nodded. “A truth-telling machine. How ridiculous.”

  “No, I mean … we were just talking about how you’re such a liar…”

  “No, we weren’t,” I lied.

  “…and now here’s a shop advertising the world’s only truth-telling machine.”

  “You don’t really believe there’s such a thing as a machine that makes people tell the truth, do you?” I asked. I sounded confident, but there was a tiny doubt niggling away at the back of my mind. Could there be such a machine? I snorted. Nah.

  “Can’t hurt to try, can it?” said Jodie. Her eyes lit up. She caught my arm. And before I could stop her, she dragged me through the door and into the strange little shop.

  The inside of the shop smelled of one part mould, one part cabbage, and eight parts pickled onion crisps. A little bell chimed above the door as we entered, and something that looked like a startled scarecrow popped up from behind the counter.

  “Madame Shirley at your service!” roared the scarecrow. “A joy to meet you, an absolute joy!”

  “Well, this is … nice,” I said, looking around at the clutter of dusty books, broken ornaments, tins of cat food and yet more bags of pickled onion crisps. It wasn’t so much an Emporium of Peculiarities as it was a cramped, dimly-lit shop filled with mad old junk.

  Madame Shirley was as much of a jumble as the shop was. Her greying hair stood on end like she’d spent the morning rubbing balloons on it, and her skinny frame was tucked inside either a very long dress or a very small tent. She wore purple fingerless gloves and had three pairs of glasses on strings round her neck.

  As she made her way round the shop counter, she knocked a stack of old magazines, a small wooden clock and a tub of margarine on to the floor. She stepped over the pile and rushed to meet us.

  “Come in, come in,” she cackled, apparently oblivious to the fact that we already were in. “Come for a browse, have you? Come for a nosey?”

  “Actually, we’ve come for the truth-telling machine,” Jodie said, indicating the sign in the window.

  “Don’t listen to her,” I said. “We’re here for crisps. I don’t suppose you have any…?”

  Madame Shirley squinted and looked me up and down. “Yes. Oh my, yes, I see why you’re here. And just in time, too,” she muttered. She held her hand out to Jodie, still staring at me with her beady little eyes. “Pound.”

  Jodie hesitated, then fished in her pocket and handed over a pound coin. Madame Shirley bit it, nodded once, then caught my arm and guided me through a maze of teetering boxes towards the back of the shop.

  “What’s with all the pickled onion crisps?” I asked.

  Madame Shirley rolled her eyes. “There was a mistake with the order. It’s absolutely ridiculous, isn’t it? I mean, why on earth would anyone need so many packets of pickled onion crisps?” she said, shaking her head. “They were supposed to be salt and vinegar.”

  “Riiiight,” I said slowly. “That would make much more sense.”

  We stopped in a shadowy corner of the shop.

  “Now,” breathed Madame Shirley. “Here we are.”

  I don’t know what I expected to see. A small but exciting fairground ride, maybe. A colourful doorway with some glitter on it, perhaps. Even just a shower cubicle with some Christmas lights dangling off it would have done.

  Madame Shirley’s machine, though, was none of these things.

  A large dented metal box stood in the corner of the shop. It reminded me of the portaloos we had to use at school when the pipes all froze a few years ago. On the door, someone had scribbled “truth-telling machine” in blue felt-tip pen.

  I turned to Jodie and grinned. “Well, this all seems completely genuine.”

  “OK, yes. Daft idea,” she admitted.

  “Nonsense! We haven’t come from all the way just out there on the street to turn back now,” I gloated. “I’m sure this rusty box will teach me a very valuable lesson indeed.”

  Madame Shirley muttered below her breath as she tugged and heaved on the door. “Come on, you ruddy thing.” She gave it a kick, before eventually managing to open it with a squeal of rusty metal.

  “Now that’s proper craftsmanship, that is,” I said admiringly.

  Jodie scowled and crossed her arms. She was clearly feeling stupid for believing the sign in the window. I knew the decent thing to do would be to leave the shop, pretend none of it had happened and let her off the hook.

  No chance! I was going to milk this for all it was worth.

  I stepped into the box and a lightbulb flickered on above my head. The metal walls were bare and featureless. Other than me and the bulb, the box was completely empty.

  The door squeaked shut.

  “They don’t make ’em like this any more,” I said, my voice bouncing around inside the narrow chamber.

  I whistled quietly, listening to the echo and waiting for the door to open. I imagined how much Jodie would be cringing with embarrassment right now. I’d never let her live this down. I couldn’t wait to tell all her friends that she’d fallen for—

  The floor began to vibrate gently.

  I looked down.

  “Huh,” I said.

  A second later, the world turned inside out.

  Imagine being inside a washing machine on high spin. Now imagine that washing machine is tumbling down a hill. During an earthquake. On the moon. That’s not even close to what it was like inside the truth-telling machine. Part of me knew I wasn’t actually moving, but the rest of me felt like I was being flipped and twirled and shaken and spun in every direction at once.

  I could see my feet were still standing on the floor, but the floor became the ceiling and the walls became the door and the whole thing kept flipping end over end. I looked at my hands, which suddenly seemed a very long way away, and somehow got the impression they were looking back at me.

  My head spun. My stomach heaved. My eyes rolled like the barrels of a fruit machine. I tried to speak, but my throat was dry, my lungs had cramped up, and the sound was point-blank refusing to come out.

  And then, without any warning, the whole thing shuddered to a stop.

  I leaned my hand against the door to steady myself, then almost fell flat on my face when Madame Shirley pulled it open.

  I stumbled out, trying hard to A) stay upright, and B) not vomit. Jodie and Madame Shirley looked at me with very different expressions.

  “Well?” asked
Madame Shirley, beaming from ear to ear. “How was it?”

  “What do you mean, ‘how was it’?” said Jodie. “Nothing happened! He just went in the box, hung about for five seconds and came back out again.”

  Five seconds? Was that all I’d been in there for? It felt like much longer.

  The machine may have stopped spinning, flipping and shaking, but my brain hadn’t. I had no idea what had gone on in there, but if Jodie saw what a dizzy mess I was, it would be her who would never let me live it down. I swallowed and tried to pull myself together.

  Play it cool, Beaky. Play it cool. Don’t let them see how shaken up you are.

  I shrugged. I smiled. “I did a little wee,” I announced.

  Wait.

  Back up.

  What?

  Jodie snorted. “Sorry?”

  My head was obviously more scrambled than I thought. I took a breath and tried again.

  “I did a little wee,” I said, pointing to the front of my trousers. “In my pants.”

  With a gasp, I clamped my hand over my mouth. Why had I said that? I mean, it was true, but why had I said it?

  I looked at Madame Shirley. She winked one of her beady little eyes and gave me a fingerless-glove thumbs up. “Another satisfied customer,” she laughed.

  “What…? But … I mean… What have you done to me?” I demanded.

  The old lady looked at the truth-telling machine then waggled her bushy eyebrows. I shook my head, refusing to believe it. It couldn’t be true. The stupid machine was just a rusty old box. It couldn’t actually have worked.

  Could it?

  Frantically, I tried a lie. Something simple would be enough. I’d say how much I’d enjoyed being in the machine. Nice and easy.

  “That was horrible,” I said, letting out a loud sob. “It was all spinning and flipping and I thought I was going to die.”

  OK. So maybe not that easy.

  I tried again.

  “Your shoes are white,” I said to Jodie. Then I smacked myself on the forehead and jumped up and down in frustration. “Aaargh! No!”

  Jodie raised an eyebrow and looked down at her trainers. “Yeah. So?”

  “I was trying to say they were orange,” I cried. “But somewhere between here–” I tapped myself on the side of the head – “and here–” I pointed to my mouth – “orange became white. And I don’t know why!”

  I grabbed Madame Shirley by the shoulders. “What’s happening? Make it stop!”

  Madame Shirley smiled. “Oh, no, I can’t do that. It’s a one-way street, you see. I couldn’t very well have a machine that made people lie all the time, could I? That’d be skating on some very thin ice, that would. Moral-wise.”

  She smiled, then held out a small green bag. “Crisp?”

  “Wait, so … what’s happening, exactly?” Jodie frowned.

  “It’s her,” I said, stepping back and pointing at Madame Shirley. She smirked and continued munching on her crisps. “She’s a woman!”

  Jodie blinked. “Er, yes. And?”

  “No, not a woman! I don’t mean she’s a woman,” I said. “I mean she’s a woman!”

  “OK, then,” said Jodie brightly. “That makes things much clearer.”

  “I suspect what he’s trying to say is that I’m a witch,” said Madame Shirley, licking the pickled-onion flavouring from the tips of her fingers. “But deep down he knows I’m not, so he can’t get the words out.”

  Jodie looked at me. She looked at Madame Shirley. After a few seconds, she gave a nod. “Right. OK. I get it,” she said, shooting me a scowl. “You’re winding me up. Very funny. You want me to believe the machine worked.”

  “It did work,” I protested.

  “You should listen to him,” said Madame Shirley. “He’s telling the truth. No choice in the matter now, have you, lad?”

  Jodie tutted and made for the door. “Fine. Whatever. Ha ha, the joke’s on me.”

  “Jodie, wait,” I said, hurrying after her. She stormed past the shelves of junk and racks of crisps and out on to the street.

  “Cheerio!” called Madame Shirley. “Pleasure doing business with you. Please come again!”

  I spun on the spot. “I’ll be right back,” I said to her. “Then we’re going to fix me.”

  The old lady just smiled.

  I darted out of the shop. “Jodie, wait. Come back,” I said.

  With a sigh, Jodie stopped and turned round. “What?” she demanded.

  “OK, OK, listen,” I began. “I know this sounds crazy, but that machine…”

  “Metal box,” Jodie corrected.

  “Whatever it was … it worked,” I said. “I can’t lie.”

  “Well, you’re lying now, obviously,” Jodie said, turning to go.

  I caught her by the arm. “Wait, no, don’t go,” I pleaded. “We have to go back in the shop and…”

  I looked at the door just in time to see Madame Shirley turn the lock on the inside and pull down a blind.

  “No, no, no!” I groaned, racing back and rapping my knuckles on the glass. “What are you doing? Open the door.”

  The blind came back up and I breathed a sigh of relief. Madame Shirley gave me a friendly wave, then turned her little “Open” sign so it read “Closed”. With a swish she pulled the blind back down again.

  I thumped my fist against the door. “Open up! Open up! You can’t leave me like this!”

  “Beaky, what are you doing?” Jodie asked. She sounded annoyed, but I could pretty much guarantee she wasn’t as annoyed as I was.

  I bent down and flipped open the shop’s letterbox. “Open up or I’ll try to kick the door down, but probably fail miserably because of my poor lower body strength,” I shouted through the gap. “Pretend you didn’t hear that last bit,” I added, after a pause.

  “The joke’s over,” said Jodie. “Come on, we need to get those fish and chips.”

  “You don’t believe me,” I muttered, my mind racing. “Of course you don’t believe me, because I lie all the time, like the time I said I didn’t know what happened to your goldfish. Or all those times I used your toothbrush to clean my bike and told you I hadn’t.”

  “I knew it,” Jodie cried. She crossed her arms. “But I still don’t believe you on the ‘not being able to lie’ thing.”

  “Fine,” I said, squaring my shoulders. “Well, if you don’t believe me, then I guess there’s nothing else for it. I’m just going to have to prove it.”

  Jodie power-walked along the street, keeping a look-out for anything resembling a chip shop. I hurried to keep up, glancing back to see if Madame Shirley had come out of her shop, just before we rounded a corner and I lost sight of the place.

  “Go on, then,” I urged. “Ask me anything.”

  Jodie shook her head. “You’re just not going to give up, are you? Fine. What happened to my goldfish?”

  “Destructo knocked the bowl over. I tried to catch it. The fish went out the window,” I said.“I didn’t see what happened to it after that, but as it fell five metres on to solid concrete, I’m assuming it was nothing good.”

  “I knew it was you!” Jodie gasped. She shook her head. “Poor Sharky. I loved that fish.”

  “Don’t worry, it was probably a slow, painful death,” I said cheerfully.

  Jodie’s jaw dropped. “Oh, well, that’s made me feel much better.”

  I clenched my fists and beat them against the sides of my head. “Argh! That’s not what I meant to say.”

  Jodie stopped and eyed me suspiciously. “How often do you change your pants?”

  “Three times a week at most,” I said.

  “Socks?”

  “Twice a week. But sometimes I just turn them inside out.”

  She tapped her foot. Her eyes narrowed. She held out a hand. “Give me your phone.”

  “What? Why?”

  Jodie scowled. “Do you want me to believe you or not?”

  Reluctantly, I handed her my mobile. I knew she couldn’t do to
o much harm with the screen locked.

  “What’s your security code?” Jodie asked.

  “I’m not telling you that!” I said.

  She held out the phone to me. “See? I knew you were lying.”

  I stared at the handset, then at my sister’s smug expression. I didn’t want to tell her, but if it proved I was telling the truth, it might be worth it. Besides, I could feel the numbers rising up in my throat, like they were determined to come out all on their own.

  “Four-nine-two-one,” I said through gritted teeth.

  Jodie punched in the PIN and the screen unlocked. I made a grab for the phone, but she held me at arm’s length with one hand.

  “OK, give it back, I proved it,” I said.

  Jodie tapped the screen a few times with her thumb. “Do you have any embarrassing selfies on here?”

  I bit my lip. “Yes, loads.”

  “Good to know!” Jodie grinned.

  I tried another grab for the mobile, but she ducked out of the way. “Oooh yes, here’s one.”

  “Give it back!” I demanded.

  Jodie’s thumb flew across the screen. “Just emailing this to myself, and … done.”

  She held the phone out and I snatched it back straight away. I groaned when I saw the picture on screen. It was taken from a low angle and you could see right up my nostrils. To be fair, from that view my nose did look pretty massive.

  “What are you going to do with that photo?” I asked.

  Jodie shrugged. “Anything I want. Facebook. Instagram. I’ll put it everywhere,” she said, smiling wickedly. “Unless you admit you’re lying about the truth-telling thing.”