by Anne Fine
I couldn’t have felt more sorry for her. After all, I read more than my fair share of books that make me keep the light on all night long. And lots of books that make me sad, or anxious, till things work out right. But I don’t end up in a state like her, halfway to fainting because of three or four grisly pages, and not even able to look at the cover of that book again without wanting to shudder.
‘A gift’, her mother called it. But, the more Imogen told me about it, the more I thought that that was totally the wrong word.
‘Curse’ was more like it.
Yes. Not ‘gift’, but ‘curse’. . .
www.kidsatrandomhouse.co.uk
Contents
Cover
Also by Anne Fine
Bad Dreams
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
A Note from the Author
By Anne Fine, published by Corgi Yearling Books:
BAD DREAMS
CHARM SCHOOL
FROZEN BILLY
THE MORE THE MERRIER
Published in hardback by Doubleday:
THE ROAD OF BONES
Published by Corgi Books:
THE BOOK OF THE BANSHEE
THE GRANNY PROJECT
ON THE SUMMERHOUSE STEPS
ROUND BEHIND THE ICE HOUSE
UP ON CLOUD NINE
A SHAME TO MISS . . .
Three collections of poetry
Perfect poems for young readers
Ideal poems for middle readers
Irresistible poetry for young adults
Other books by Anne Fine:
For junior readers:
THE ANGEL OF NITSHILL ROAD
ANNELI THE ART-HATER
BILL’S NEW FROCK
THE CHICKEN GAVE IT TO ME
THE COUNTRY PANCAKE
CRUMMY MUMMY AND ME
GENIE, GENIE, GENIE
HOW TO WRITE REALLY BADLY
LOUDMOUTH LOUIS
A PACK OF LIARS
For young people:
FLOUR BABIES
GOGGLE-EYES
MADAME DOUBTFIRE
STEP BY WICKED STEP
THE STONE MENAGERIE
THE TULIP TOUCH
VERY DIFFERENT
For adult readers:
ALL BONES AND LIES
THE KILLJOY
RAKING THE ASHES
TAKING THE DEVIL’S ADVICE
TELLING LIDDY
www.annefine.co.uk
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Epub ISBN: 9781409012924
Version 1.0
www.randomhouse.co.uk
BAD DREAMS
A CORGI YEARLING BOOK : 978 0 440 86732 6
First published in Great Britain by Doubleday,
an imprint of Random House Children’s Books
Doubleday edition published 2000
Corgi Yearling edition published 2001
This edition published 2006
5 7 9 10 8 6 4
Copyright © Anne Fine, 2000, 2006
Illustrations copyright © Susan Winter, 2000
The right of Anne Fine to be identified as the author of this work has
been asserted in accordance with the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
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www.kidsatrandomhouse.co.uk
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library.
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
CPI Cox & Wyman, Reading, RG1 8EX
For Jon Appleton,
without whom . . .
CHAPTER ONE
It’s only been bothering me a tiny bit. But still, Mr Hooper saw my uneasy look.
‘What ho, Mel!’ he offered. ‘A trouble shared is a trouble halved?’
I shook my head. ‘No, thanks. It’s too private.’ ‘Write it down, then,’ he told me. ‘If something’s gnawing at you, shove it on paper.’
I waved at the books round us, shelf upon shelf of them, up to the ceiling.
‘Is that what the writers of some of these were doing?’
‘Quite a few, I should think,’ he said. ‘False names, true stories, and they make a mint. You try it. I’ll buy a copy.’
He went off chuckling and I sat down to think. Why not? I’m good at stories. I could call it Bad Dreams. Or even, Imogen Imagines, since it would be about her, and how she came to our school and spooked all of us – especially me – with her weirdness, and all of her horrible imaginings.
This is how it started. She turned up halfway through one morning in summer term. She came through the doorway behind Mrs Trent, who simply handed her over and left in a hurry.
Mr Hooper had only the briefest of chats with her at the desk before turning to the rest of us. ‘Class, this is Imogen Tate, who’s joining us from another school.’
She looked embarrassed, and we stared. She was already dressed in our boring old school uniform, with her hair in plain bunches. There was absolutely nothing special about her, but in spite of that everyone wanted to be her first-week minder. Almost all of them put their hands up.
But Mr Hooper said, ‘And I pick – Melanie!’
I was astonished. ‘Me?’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘why not?’
‘I didn’t put my hand up.’
‘That doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘It’ll be nice for you to have someone in that empty seat.’
I didn’t think so, but I couldn’t say. Maybe I should explain. I’m the class bookworm. I don’t mix much with the others because I like reading better. All the way up the school it’s bothered my teachers. One after another, they’ve tried to prise the books out of my hands, and get me to join in more.
Yet I still prefer reading.
But yo
u can’t be rude to someone who’s new, and standing there trembling. So I just patted the spare chair at my side, and she came over. And as she was busy unpacking her pens and pencils into the desk, I finally thought of something friendly to say.
‘I like that necklace you’re wearing. Is it gold?’
She nodded shyly.
‘Real gold?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘My granny gave it to my mother, and now it’s been passed down to me.’
I peered at it more closely. It had strange little scratchy markings, and looked fine and slinky enough to be spilled into a teaspoon.
‘You’re so lucky,’ I told her, still trying to be nice. ‘I’m sure no-one will ever pass anything special down to me.’
As if I’d suddenly reminded her of something, she stopped in the middle of her unpacking and gave me a look. ‘Then maybe you’re the lucky one,’ she told me.
I stared at her. ‘What do you mean?’
She wouldn’t say. In fact, she hardly said anything at all after that, except things like, ‘Should I write this in the red book?’ and, ‘Do I use pen or pencil to do this?’ and, ‘Can I borrow your ruler?’
I bet she didn’t even realize that what she’d said stuck in my mind. But it was like the first clue in a book. It just stuck out. And it was strange.
CHAPTER TWO
She was no good at schoolwork. You could tell Mr Hooper was amazed how badly she did in all the tests he set her. But he still made her book monitor, along with me.
‘Since Melly’s looking after you,’ he explained.
‘Must I?’ she asked him. ‘I hate books.’
I was astonished. ‘Hate them? Actually hate them?’
She blushed. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I just don’t get on with them very well.’
What can you say? I love books more than anything. Left to myself, I wouldn’t come to school at all. I’d spend my whole life reading. ‘Go out,’ my mother tells me. ‘It’s lovely today. Go and play in the fresh air.’ But I’d rather stay in my bedroom, and read about other children going out to play.
‘You’re not a bit like me, then,’ I told Imogen. ‘You know those battered old Christmas albums you see in jumble sales that have a picture on the front of a girl reading another album just the same, with a picture of herself on the cover? You know how they go on, down and down, smaller and smaller, like boxes inside boxes, until the girl’s too small to be seen?’
‘Yes, I’ve seen those.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘that’s who I want to be. That girl who’s reading all the other lives in from the outside.’
Now it was her turn to look at me as if I were loopy. ‘Really?’
‘Yes,’ I admitted. ‘That’s who I’d like to be more than anyone in the world.’
And then I showed her how to use the card index in the book corner. And how to stamp the books out, and how to tell from the coloured sticker on the spine whether it should go back in Older Readers, or Poetry, or Project Work.
She had a funny way of picking up the books – gingerly, as if they might scorch her. After a few minutes, I asked her, as a joke:
‘Didn’t you have any of these in your old school?’
She made a face. ‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘We had them. It’s just that I hardly ever had to go near them.’
Strange thing to say. And I was just thinking, ‘No wonder her work’s so bad’, when, suddenly, I saw her jump.
‘Oh!’ she said, startled.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing.’
But I couldn’t help noicing she hadn’t touched that book again. She was staring at it nervously.
‘It’s that book, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘Something about it has upset you.’
‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. But she had definitely gone red again.
I’m not an idiot. I kept a watch. And only a few minutes later, I saw it happen a second time. Imogen picked up a different book, and dropped it as if it had stung her.
As if it were red hot.
‘What up?’ I asked again.
‘Nothing.’
I think, when people try to fool you, they can practically expect you to start spying on them. And that’s why I was watching so closely when, later that morning, Mr Hooper hurried past her without a single word, then, noticing her anxious little ‘new-girl’ face, stopped guiltily and thrust the book he happened to be carrying into her hand.
‘Here, Imogen,’ he said. ‘You say you don’t like books. Try this one – Violet’s Game. Melly says it’s brilliant. It’s about a girl called Violet. That’s her you can see on the cover, cuddling that kitten. And she—’
He broke off because Imogen was already backing away. ‘Oh, no! I couldn’t bear it! I can’t stand stories about animals that have been hurt.’
Mr Hooper looked a bit surprised. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I hadn’t realized you’d already read it.’
‘Oh, no.’ Imogen started to shake her head, then stopped, embarrassed. And Mr Hooper looked a little embarrassed, too. After all, just because Violet’s Game has only just come into our class book corner, it didn’t mean Imogen couldn’t have come across it back in her old school.
‘Well, at least it ends happily,’ Mr Hooper reminded her. Then the bell rang, and he rushed off to get his coffee.
So I was the only one left to see Imogen running her finger gently over the kitten in the picture on the cover, and muttering, ‘Good!’
As if she were glad to hear it.
And as if it were news.
CHAPTER THREE
Was she more careful after that? I couldn’t say. If you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, you’re often not sure what you’ve seen. She acted normally enough from then on. I heard her draw her breath in sharply once or twice. But the top shelf is pretty high, and it can be tiring, reaching up over and over to put things back after wet break.
But I was still curious about her and books. So whenever I came across one I really loved, I held it up.
‘Have you read this?’
Sometimes she nodded. Sometimes she shook her head. But she never burst out with the sort of thing everyone else says.
‘Oh yes! Didn’t you just love the bit where his head flipped off, and it turned out he was an alien?’
Or, ‘I hated the creepy old lady. I knew she was out to get them from the veryp first page.’
Or even things like, ‘Did you cry when the dog died? I cried buckets. My dad had to make me a cup of tea!’
No, she’d just put on that closed look people get when they’re trying to get past charity collectors in the street. She’d try to fob me off.
‘I think I read it, yes.’
‘You must remember.’
She’d try and distract me. Even though hardly anyone had come near the book corner for days, she’d pretend we were so busy she had to interrupt to ask, ‘Should this book here be put away? Or do I leave it out for the next project group?’
And I’d give up.
But, next day, when I held one of my favourites up to her face, I did quite definitely see her shudder.
‘You have read this one, then? You know what it’s about.’
‘Well, sort of . . .’
‘Didn’t you get to finish it?’
She tossed her head vaguely. You couldn’t tell if she meant yes, or no.
‘Well, did you?’
She wouldn’t answer. She just asked a question of her own. ‘What did you want to say about it, anyway?’
‘Nothing,’ I muttered grumpily, and went back to my sorting. I had decided there was no point in trying to talk to Imogen about the books. I think, if two of you have read the same things, you should be able to have a good long chat about them, not have to put up with the other person ending each conversation by staring uncomfortably at her feet, and mumbling things like, ‘Yes, I suppose so,’ or, ‘I’m not sure I remember that bit very well,’ or, ‘Maybe that wasn’t actually the book I read.’ I fel
t so cross about it, I even complained about her to Mr Hooper.
‘Why have you dumped her on me? She’s not much of a reader.’
He burst out laughing. ‘Melly, compared with you, no-one in this class is a reader.’
I shook my head. ‘No,’ I said stubbornly. ‘There’s more to it than that. She says she’s read things when she really hasn’t.’
‘Maybe you intimidate her,’ he said. And then he added firmly, ‘Just make an effort to be friendly, Mel. A week’s not long. It won’t hurt you.’
Seeing my face, he reached behind him to the shelf, and tipped a big fat book out of a jiffy bag into my hands.
‘There you are, Mel,’ he said. ‘Here’s a reward for all your sufferings. And don’t expect to be able to talk to Imogen about this one, because practically nobody else in the world has read it.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because it’s hot off the press,’ he said proudly. ‘A free gift from the publishers for ordering all those other books at the end of last term.’
I turned it over. Red Rock, by Alston Byers. The cover was a bit soppy. A little girl in a blue frock was picking up stones. But some of the best books in the world have the worst covers, so I started it anyway, under the desk at the end of Maths Workbook.
It was amazing. I thought at first it was going to be one of those stories too stuffed with descriptions. It seemed to start with an awful lot of heat hazes lying over scrubland, and people leaning against the doors of sun-blistered shacks.
But suddenly it turned into a real nail-biter about a tribe of Indians who got fed up with tourists chipping off bits of their famous sacred red rock, to take home as souvenirs. So they put a curse on all the bits missing. Instantly, all over the world, reports started coming in of horrible deaths, and gruesome accidents, and weird diseases, as if some ghastly jump-in-your-seat horror video was playing everywhere, but, this time, for real.
I couldn’t put the book down. Mr Hooper went through all his usual routines.
‘Am I going to have to take that book off you till going home time, Melly?’
‘I hope you’re not rushing that written work to get back to your reading.’