Radio Boy and the Revenge of Grandad

by Christian O'Connell

  I headed to school, with my head and heart full of dread. Sensei Terry was on his post round, with his postbag bursting with letters and parcels. ‘Morning, Spike. I see a young man heavy in thought,’ he said in his wise karate-warrior way.

  ‘Really? How do you know?’ I asked.

  ‘Samurai training. I can read a man easier than a book. If I see someone wiggling their fingers, they could be about to attack with that hand. I’ve already thought through my options to neutralise the attack. It’s over before it’s begun,’ he said casually.

  ‘Wow! Have you ever had to use this knowledge in practice?’

  ‘Oh yes. A man was once loitering near my car, Spike, looking very shifty indeed. I crept up on him. He spun round and went to withdraw something from his pocket. This could’ve been a knife or gun so I was compelled to react FAST. The best form of defence is attack. I grabbed him at lightning speed and threw him over my hip, classic hip throw, Spike. Correctly known as O-Goshi. KABLAM! On the pavement.’

  ‘WOW! A knife-wielding maniac?’

  ‘Not exactly, as it turns out. A traffic warden who was trying to get my parking ticket out of his pocket. Still, we had a laugh about it, once he got out of Casualty a few days later. I never did get that ticket …’

  At that precise moment Grandad Ray came strutting past us. ‘Have a good day at school, Spike. This weirdo bothering you?’ He gestured at Sensei Terry.

  ‘Oh no. This is Sensei Terry. He’s not just a postman, Grandad, he’s also the local karate instructor,’ I explained.

  Sensei Terry, upon hearing his introduction, gave a half-bow to Grandad Ray.

  ‘Karate, eh? Yeah, been in a fair few scraps myself …’

  Here we go, I thought. The Big Topper at the ready. You might want to pull up a chair, Sensei, we could be here a while as it’s Grandad storytime.

  ‘Well, I’m afraid you can’t beat the skills learned in the bars and back streets of the Philippines, when eight pirates are trying to attack you. Black belt in karate ain’t no good then, other than to hold your pants up, Postman Pat.’ Grandad Ray looked at me, chuckling. I didn’t laugh back. Nor did Sensei Terry.

  ‘I mean, what would you do if I suddenly went … KACHANG!’ – and with that Grandad Ray did something incredibly stupid. He tried to grab our postman Sensei Terry round the neck from behind.

  Before I could even get out the words ‘NOOOOOOOO, GRANDAD, DON’T’, like you would do if your own grandad had just poked a grizzly bear for ‘a bit of a laugh’, Sensei Terry had ‘neutralised’ Grandad Ray. He effortlessly threw him and his huge hair over his hip and deposited him into the hedge of Number 73 Crow Crescent.

  O-Goshi and O-splatti.

  ‘Argghhhhh – my back! I’ll sue you for beating up an old man. If I was ten years younger, I’d have smashed your—’

  ‘Grandad, you attacked him without warning.’

  ‘I was just mucking around!’

  Sensei Terry apologised profusely and gently helped Grandad up, brushing him down and then pressing his palm firmly into Grandad’s back. Something clicked loudly.

  ‘There you go, sir, you should be fine now,’ Sensei Terry said. ‘Just your third and fourth lower vertebrae were tight.’ This man could break people and then mend them again. Awesome.

  ‘Stay away from me, you ninja postman!’ muttered Grandad Ray, now back to his normal self. Maybe Sensei Terry could un-mend him, come to think of it.

  ‘Come with me, Spike,’ Grandad Ray urged. I stayed put.

  ‘No, I’m OK, actually, Grandad,’ I said calmly.

  ‘Suit yourself, then. I’ve got my eye on you, postie, Sensei Tom or whatever you are,’ said Grandad bravely, from well out of Sensei Terry’s reach.

  We watched Grandad walk away with far less confidence than when he had arrived. He was still muttering to himself as he got his comb out to redo his hair.

  ‘He’s the problem on your mind, isn’t he, Spike?’ said Sensei Terry, watching Grandad walk away.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I heard your show. He has … taken over a bit,’ said Sensei Terry.

  I sighed. ‘Yes. I need to sort of … sack him and I have no idea how,’ I replied.

  ‘Ah. You need to take the fox from the henhouse?’ asked Sensei Terry.

  ‘What henhouse? It’s a shed. No, like I just said, I need to sack him from the Secret Shed Show.’

  ‘Exactly, take the snake from the kittens.’

  ‘No, sack Grandad from the radio show.’

  ‘Show the monkey the ape.’

  ‘No, sack Grandad.’

  ‘Remove the frog from the pond?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘The cat from the mice.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Keep the wolf from the door, Spike.’

  ‘What are you going on about?’

  ‘Your problem is one as old as the mountains, Spike. You have to remove the snake.’ He pointed at Grandad Ray, who was now disappearing from our view. Not so much a snake as a slippery eel.

  I thought it best that I too spoke in animals with Sensei Terry or this conversation wasn’t going to go anywhere.

  ‘Yes! You’re right, I do have to remove the snake. But I don’t want to hurt the snake’s feelings too much. The old, annoying, singing snake has been thrown out by his nice, kind snake wife,’ I explained. Then I paused. ‘Plus, the snake has a nasty bite and might take my head off.’

  ‘This old snake has no feelings, Spike. Tough, leathery skin. You must be quick before he wraps himself further round you.’ He paused and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘Can I give you some advice, Spike?’

  ‘Not if it involves me throwing him over my hip.’

  ‘No, far better than that. You’ve heard of the phrase, the pen is mightier than the sword?’

  ‘Are we still talking about the snake?’

  ‘No. The pen is mightier than the sword means that words are far more effective than violence. Words can start or end wars. Words can help you fall in love. What makes you good at radio, Spike? Words.’

  ‘So … write him a letter?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Great idea, that’s what I would do. Write Grandad Ray a letter. Firing him.

  Can snakes read?

  You know in exams when you have to show all your workings? I’m going to do that here. It’s not easy telling your grandad that he is fired from your radio show. I had been taught to respect my elders, but I had to protect the show/henhouse from Grandad Ray/the snake. He was going to ruin my chances of winning Radio Star, and cause Holly to leave.

  I knew I had to. He was destroying the show. But I was still worried. Would he get angry with me or, even worse, get upset and cry? Or, much, much worse – sing? Maybe he would understand and say sorry for being rude to Holly and all of our listeners.

  Ha. Fat chance.

  Here is the letter with all the attempts to get it right:

  This was just so hard.

  I stopped and thought about how unkind Grandad had been to Holly. He hasn’t been thinking about her feelings, or mine for that matter, when he said my show was basically pants.

  I suddenly remembered just how much he loved playing games … and winning them. I started to write again.

  The Richter scale was developed in the 1930s to measure the magnitude of earthquakes.

  It goes from:

  Richter 1.0 – a Microquake which is not really felt by anyone but particularly sensitive ants,

  to:

  Richter 9.0 – total destruction to all nearby houses, cars, people and animals – any living thing within a 1,000-mile radius of the epicentre.

  Well, I can confirm that the Richter people need to add a whole new level.

  Richter 10 – Grandad Ray’s explosion upon receiving my letter.

  We were live on air when it happened. The Grandad Ray earthquake.

  It was just the three of us in the shed doing the radio show. Me, Artie and Holly. The way it all started and the way it
should be.

  At first, we were aware of someone shouting – more like howling, actually. It was similar to the sound you hear from that strange man you often see outside a bus station, yelling at the moon. The howling was coming from outside the shed and, worryingly, it was getting closer. Then the door handle rattled violently! Thank goodness it was locked, as always, to keep my mum out, but I nodded solemnly to Holly to unlock it. I already knew who it was for two reasons:

  The overwhelming and familiar scent of aftershave, Eau de Pong.

  Sherlock was growling through gritted teeth by the shed door.

  The rotting shed door almost fell off its hinges, as Grandad Ray came flying in. He wasn’t dressed quite as smartly as usual. He was wearing only jogging bottoms and a white string vest, revealing his faded tattoos that I could now make out even more clearly, including one I hadn’t seen before of a very ill-looking Hawaiian hula girl stretched over his belly.

  ‘Th-th-th-th-thanks for this, GRANDSON,’ he spat out as he waved my letter like a fan in front of my now-reddening face.

  I didn’t need Sensei Terry’s psychic powers to know he was a little bit upset.

  ‘We are live right now on the Secret Shed Show, let’s play a song—’ I managed to rush out in 0.000007 seconds.

  Grandad Ray shoved Artie’s chair aside and grabbed his microphone with his big grandad hands. Why is it grandad hands and ears seem to get bigger as they get older? The secret service should use them as human listening devices to spy on potential suspects.

  The MIC LIVE! sign flashed on as Grandad Ray rammed the microphone button down. He had put himself on air to all my listeners. His eyes were wild and I think he was foaming at the mouth.

  ‘Now, listeners, let’s have a little CHAT with my grandson. So, Spike, why don’t I tell all your Oompa-Loompa-sized listeners, all those sad little Munchkins,1 about this letter you’ve written me, SACKING your poor old grandad from this tinpot Kiddie FM show.’

  ‘It’s not tinpot,’ I protested.

  ‘It is! Boring kids with boring stories. You can’t fire me, sonny Jim – I quit!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Grandad, it just wasn’t working out and—’ Before I could even finish my sentence he cut me off.

  ‘I’ll show you, and you, and you,’ he said as he pointed at each of us in turn. ‘You’ll pay for this, I promise you.’

  Then he stormed out. His comb fell out of his back pocket as he slammed the shed door behind him. It really couldn’t take much more rattling and certainly wasn’t designed to withstand Earthquake Toni Fandango. We all sat in stunned silence. We felt like earthquake survivors surveying the aftermath damage. Which in this case was the shed door barely hanging on by one hinge.

  Suddenly there was more wailing outside the shed studio window. Silhouetted by the moon was Grandad Ray. It was song time again.

  ‘THE WIN-NAH TAKES IT ALL …’

  ‘ABBA. What a song,’ muttered Artie, with grudging respect.

  Grandad had his back to us and his tattooed arms were wide open as he finished his song. From where I was sitting, it looked like he was performing to the moon.

  Hell hath no fury like a spurned grandad.

  Every Friday that Grandad Ray had been staying with us, he would have an ice cream ready for me and him to enjoy together the moment I finished school for the week.

  It was our thing.

  Two days had passed since he burst through the shed door. He’d been very quiet, which was a very good reason to be suspicious. I’d been doing my best to avoid him at all costs. It’s not easy in a tiny house like ours … and what with the fact we were room-mates. More like cell-mates. I’m pretty sure he was snoring even louder on purpose.

  Each day since he’d started staying with us, Mum had been trying to get him to join a club in the evening. This was something she’d always done with me, too, until I split my pants at Sensei Terry’s karate class.

  ‘It’d be good to get out there, Ray, and meet people your own age,’ said Mum.

  Always trying to fix people. Every day, various leaflets would be thrust in Grandad’s face by Mum. Every day this was met with a swift reply.

  ‘I’m not joining a dominoes club with the living dead, Carol.’

  ‘I’m not joining a bingo club, Carol, with losers.’

  ‘I’m not joining a nude life-drawing class, Carol. Not even as the model.’

  Then finally, the day after the sacking earthquake, one did take Grandad’s eye.

  ‘Ballroom dancing, you say, Carol? Well, well, well. I’ve always fancied that. I can already move like a pro from my cruise-ship days. I reckon I could have been a world champion disco dancer.’ And the Big Topper was off.

  When he returned home from his first ballroom lesson, I could hear his booming voice in the lounge boasting to Mum.

  ‘Loads of lovely ladies there, Carol. I’ve got a date this weekend with one of them. They all loved me when I started to sing.’

  Mum’s favourite TV show is Strictly Come Dancing. Which is, without doubt, in my opinion, the dullest TV show in the whole wide world. Newsreaders and very tanned soap stars in sequins and fake grins looking like wooden puppets.

  While I think of it, humans are odd. Why do we dance? I hope at no point in my life am I expected to dance. We must be the only animals that do it. You ever been to the zoo and seen a couple of chimps doing the foxtrot? If they did, of course, it would be awesome. Ballroom Chimps is also a good name for a band. Strictly Come Chimping. Now that’s a TV show I’d watch.

  Anyway, as I walked into the kitchen I saw Grandad Ray sitting with an ice cream in front of him. Oh good, I thought, he’s calmed down now and is back to his sort-of-loving Grandad ways. Me and him enjoying an ice cream. He’s finally realised he overreacted. This is his peace offering. I accept.

  He saw me walk in, and, without looking up, started to carefully unwrap the ice cream from its silver foil packet. Slowly and methodically, he proceeded to eat it. Where was my ice cream? Was it waiting for me in the freezer? No, it wasn’t. There clearly wasn’t an ice cream for me.

  I never knew it was possible to eat a choc ice in a threatening and menacing manner – but Grandad Ray managed it.

  As he was committing this act of family war, I spotted something red and angry on his forearm. It was a fresh tattoo.

  ‘Seen it?’ Grandad growled at me.

  I had. In blood red, the word ‘FAMILY’ was freshly etched into his skin. He turned and stared into my eyes.

  Sherlock must have sensed something was up as he suddenly leaped across the kitchen and jumped at Grandad Ray, knocking his hand and the ice cream straight into his face.

  Grandad Ray spluttered, snorting ice cream from his nose.

  ‘Ha ha! Good boy, Sherlock,’ was all I could get out through my hysterics as I ran from the kitchen followed by a tail-wagging Sherlock. Serves Grandad right, I thought.

  ‘Funny, is it? Manky old dog with a ridiculous name!’ shouted Grandad Ray angrily after us.

  I ran into Dad. He always showed up when there was trouble.

  ‘How are things between you and Grandad, since you asked him to leave the show due to … um … artistic differences?’

  ‘Pretty odd, Dad, actually. He’s changed into some kind of monster.’

  ‘Changed, Spike? He’s always been like that. I told you. Look, I may have my differences with him but he loves you. Just give him some time – his very large ego has taken a bit of a knock over the last few weeks, with your nan kicking him out and now you sacking him …’

  ‘He was ruining the show, though!’ I protested.

  ‘I know, I heard. You did the right thing. You could have come to me and I’d have dealt with it, though.’

  ‘I didn’t want to hear you say “I told you so”,’ I said.

  ‘Which I said just now, didn’t I?’ Dad asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘OK, sorry. He will be OK soon enough. He’s landed on his feet in this new ballroom-dancing cl
ub by the sound of it. He won’t want to be staying here for much longer.’

  How wrong he proved to be.

  As if Grandad going to the dark side wasn’t bad enough, my house was about to be rocked (literally) by a brand-new revelation. Not from Grandad this time. Not from Mum. Or even from my sister, Amber.

  This was, in fact, from the most sane person in my family, which after me was my dad.

  That is what made it even more shocking.

  ‘You’re reuniting your band?!’ said my stunned mum dramatically.

  ‘What’s the big deal, Carol?’ said a poor man caught in the headlights of an oncoming Mum-shaped ten-tonne truck.

  ‘YOU ARE A GROWN MAN! WHAT WILL PEOPLE SAY?’

  Bingo! Classic Mum catchphrase. ‘What will people say?’

  To be honest, I had to agree with my mum. This was a shocker. Dad used to be in a band, The Pirates, and by all accounts (mainly my dad’s) they were pretty good. Good enough to get a record label interested in signing them. Sadly, though, the lead singer, Tom, had got ‘involved’ with my dad’s sister, Aunty Charlotte, and had not behaved, according to Mum, ‘like a gentleman’. Midway through their song ‘Dance Like You’ve Got Scurvy’, Dad punched Tom live on stage. A full-on Pirate bundle commenced! Unsurprisingly, this band of merry Pirates was never quite the same after that on-stage fight, and nor was Tom’s voice. Dad’s punch knocked a tooth out, causing him to lisp a little when he sang.

  However, it would appear that after twenty years of not talking to each other, Facebook had brought the Pirate mateys together again and the band had had a reunion in the Bunch of Grapes pub last week. Dad had apparently ‘forgotten’ to tell Mum he was going. She only found out the next morning that he hadn’t gone out with some of his supermarket colleagues, when she’d received some ‘intel’ from her network of spies. Other mums: always on the lookout for each other.

  My sister and I were united in something for once. Embarrassment. Amber spoke for both of us when she said:

  ‘Er, you won’t be playing in public, will you?’