by Jim Smith
Inside my hoodie, Hamburger was barking and scrabbling around. ‘Oh be quiet, you stupid little mutt!’ I growled, pulling him out and plonking him on the pavement.
‘Nice one, Loser!’ burped Darren, cracking open one of his cans. ‘Now we can’t watch Disaster Strikes! All because of your stupid little doggy-woggy.’
‘What are you talking about, Darrenofski?’ I cried. ‘If it wasn’t for your six-pack that bloke never would’ve spotted Hamburger!’
Anton, who looked like a comperleet grandad in his big woolly sweater, opened his mouth. ‘Actually it was Sharonella who originally caught the Manager’s attention,’ he said.
‘Oh right, so you’re saying it’s my fault are you, “Mr Mildew”?’ squawked Sharonella. ‘Dazzy, you gonna let him talk to me like that?’
Darren put his arm round his girlfriend.
‘Shhhh, my Smoochypoos,’ he cooed. ‘Ooh, how I hate to see you this way.’
I turned round to puke all over Bunky and Nancy’s trainers.
‘By the way,’ I said to my ex-best friends. ‘I’m still waiting to hear why you lot were going to the cinema without me and Hamburger.’
I pointed down at my little doggy, sitting on the pavement, and everybody gasped.
Which was weird at first. Until I looked down and realised he’d run away.
Lost dog
‘Hamburger!’ I screamed. ‘My little poochy’s disappeared!’
‘Maybe he heard you calling him a stupid mutt?’ burped Darren.
‘Actually I think he said stupid LITTLE mutt,’ said Anton.
Bunky held his hands up in the air. ‘Guys, you’re not helping the situation,’ he said. ‘We’ve got to find Barry’s sausage dog!’
‘Why should we help him?’ growled Darren. ‘I thought he’d had enough of us all.’
I was dancing around on the spot like I needed a wee, not that I did. I just wanted to get on with finding Hamburger. ‘I was just annoyed, that’s all,’ I warbled. ‘Because you’d all met up without me and everything!’
Nancy put her arm round my shoulders, doing her face she does when she’s feeling sorry for me. ‘We would’ve invited you, Barry,’ she said. ‘But everyone knows dogs aren’t allowed in Mogden Cinema.’
‘It’s not just that,’ I said. ‘You’ve been making me feel like a gooseBarry all week.’
They all did their confused faces.
‘I thought getting a dog’d make me part of the gang again,’ I carried on. ‘But even that didn’t work.’
Bunky sighed. ‘Sorry, Barry,’ he said. ‘We didn’t know you felt like that.’
‘You didn’t?’ I asked, and they nodded, all apart from Darren.
‘Course not, Baz,’ said Sharonella, fluttering her eyelashes at me. ‘We love you, ya little Loser!’
‘Right, enough of this slushy stuff,’ said Nancy, grabbing Anton and me. ‘We’ll go this way.’ She pointed up Mogden High Street towards Bruce the butcher’s. ‘You lot look down there.’
Bunky & Fay and Shazza & Dazza twizzled round on the spot and zoomed off.
‘We’ll call you if we find him,’ cried Sharonella over her shoulder.
But to cut a long story short, they didn’t.
‘Any luck?’ I asked half an hour later, panting from running around Mogden like an old granny with her knickers on fire.
Darren shook his head. ‘Nope,’ he burped.
Anton scratched his bum. ‘Looks like it’s time for plan B,’ he said, and I turned to face him.
‘What’s that?’ I said, my ears pricking up like a sausage dog’s.
‘Lost Dog posters!’ smiled Anton.
‘Lost Dog posters?’ I cried. ‘Anyone could’ve come up with that!’
Nancy pushed her glasses up her nose. ‘Mr Mildew’s just trying to help, Barry,’ she said.
‘You’re right,’ I sighed, feeling like a bit of a cranberry, or whatever fruit it is people call people who aren’t being very grateful.
‘Come on, let’s do this,’ I said, heading back to my house to make some Lost Dog posters.
Lost Dog posters
It was weird, sticking Lost Dog posters on lamp posts all over Mogden.
It felt like only days ago I’d spotted the one saying ‘Sausage dog for sale’.
Everywhere I looked, things reminded me of Hamburger.
Like when I was sticking a Lost Dog poster to the boring old lamp post outside Bruce the butcher’s and I spotted a stack of plastic hamburgers piled up in his window.
Or when I was sticking another Lost Dog poster to another lamp post three billiseconds later while a dog was doing a real-life wee up against it and all over my trainers a bit too.
‘I’m sorry, Hamburger,’ I whispered inside my head, and I hoped wherever he was, he could hear what I was thinking.
‘That’s us all out of posters,’ said Bunky, him and Fay walking up to me twelve trillion hours later.
Snoggles put her arm round my shoulders, even though I hadn’t said she could. ‘Don’t worry Barry, we’ll find him,’ she said, and I gave her a fake smile, thinking maybe she wasn’t all that bad after all.
Nancy and Anton strolled over. ‘I calculate we’ve flyered ninety-seven percent of lamp posts in the Greater Mogden Borough,’ said Mr Mildew.
‘Thanks, gang,’ I said, even though they weren’t all there. ‘Anyone know where the Shazzonofskis are?’
Just then I heard a wheezing noise from behind me.
I swivelled round and spotted Sharonella running towards me with Darren behind her, his face as red as a Diet Cherry Fronkle.
‘Bazzy!’ she cried. ‘I’ve just seen my gran - I think I know where Hamburger is!’
Weirdo question
‘WHERE IS HE?’ I cried in all capitals.
Sharonella was folded over in half, trying to catch her breath.
‘Tell me, Shazza!’ I boomed. ‘I’ve got to know where my smoochy little poochy-poos is!’
Darren, who was lying on the pavement, his chest going up and down like a bouncy castle, raised a hand. ‘He’s . . . in . . . an . . .’ he gasped.
‘In a what?’ I wailed. A cloud bubbled up above my head, a video playing inside it of Hamburger inside a rubbish truck, the jaws closing down on him like a giant robot eating a hot dog.
Sharonella straightened back up, her hair sticking out like an exploding party popper. ‘He’s in an old people’s home,’ she said.
‘An old people’s home?’ gasped Bunky. ‘But he’s a dog, not an old person!’
Darren, who was still lying on his back, opened his mouth. ‘Some old lady found a sausage dog wandering around Mogden,’ he said. ‘She took him back there - and she’s not giving him back!’
I sat down on a nearby bench, blowing off into the planks. ‘How does your gran know all this?’ I warbled.
Sharonella plonked her bum down next to mine. ‘She was visiting her friend who lives at the old people’s home,’ she started to explain. ‘I say friend - she’s got millions of them there. Practically her whole gang’s living in the place these days.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘Go on . . .’ I said.
‘I’d popped home for a wee,’ said Sharonella. ‘And was telling her about Hamburger, how you’d lost him and everything. And Gran - well, she asks me this weirdo question.’
‘What was the weirdo question, Shaz?’ asked Nancy, and we all went quiet, waiting for Sharonella to tell us.
‘She asked me if he could speak English,’ she said.
Mogden Home for Old Grannies and Grandads
Bunky did his confused face. ‘But dogs can’t speak English,’ he said. ‘Only people can.’
‘Ah ha!’ I said. ‘But Hamburger can say SOZZAGIS!’
Sharonella clicked her fingers and pointed at me. ‘Exactamondo,’ she smiled. ‘My gran says this old lady’s new dog can say SAUSAGES!’
‘That’s Hamburger!’ I cried. ‘Where’s the old people’s home?’
Shaz got off t
he bench and started jogging. ‘About twenty minutes this way!’
‘Blooming Nora, not again!’ panted Darren as the gang started to follow.
We ran for ten minutes, which is how long you have to run to get somewhere twenty minutes away.
‘This is the place,’ said Sharonella, and I spotted a sign that read ‘Mogden Home for Old Grannies and Grandads’.
‘How’re we gonna get in there?’ burp-gasped Darren, opening can number two of his six-pack. ‘We’re nowhere near wrinkly enough!’
Sharonella strolled through the gates like she owned the place. ‘No problemo,’ she smiled. ‘I’ve been here a trillion times with my gran, I’ll just tell them we’re visiting one of her pals.’
‘Ooh hello, Shazza,’ smiled the lady behind the counter as we burst through the main entrance.
‘Mornkeels, Jackie,’ said Sharonella, all casual. ‘Just popping in to see Ernie.’
Jackie checked her computer. ‘Ernie’s out I’m afraid,’ she said. ‘He’s at the cinema watching Disaster Strikes!’
Sharonella blinked. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘In that case we’ll see Vera.’
‘Okeydokes,’ said Jackie, and we walked up to two glass doors that slid open automatically. ‘But just so you know,’ she called after us, ‘it’s the OAP disco in twenty minutes!’
The OAP disco
You know how it only took us ten minutes to run to the old people’s home?
Well it took about twenty five to find the old lady who’d stolen Hamburger - that’s how much of a maze Mogden Home for Old Grannies and Grandads was.
‘There he is!’ cried Anton as we turned a corner into a little hall.
Music was playing and the lights were turned down. There were chairs all the way round the edge, and at one end of the room somebody had stacked a pyramid of teacups on top of a snack table.
Grannies and grandads were gliding round arm-in-arm on the dance floor, their walking sticks propped up against the walls.
And there in a corner, sitting all on her own, was a familikeels old lady with a grumpy face and a sausage dog in her lap.
‘It’s Margot Cranky!’ I gasped, rewinding my brain to the other day when she’d said she wanted a dog to cuddle. ‘She’s the one who stole my Hamburger!’
Bunky grabbed me and ran across the dance floor, the gang following behind. ‘Hide!’ he cried, ducking behind the pyramid of teacups. ‘If she spots us she’ll scarper.’
‘What we gonna do now then?’ burped Darren, eyeing up a plate of Feeko’s Chocolate Digestives. ‘That old lady ain’t budging from her seat.’
I scratched my nose, trying to come up with one of my brilliant and amazing plans, but the thought bubble above my head was empty.
‘Bingo!’ whispered Anton, and what with his woolly sweater and everything, he looked just like a real-life grandad. ‘I think I’ve had an idea.’
Darren reached across and grabbed a biscuit, stuffing it in his mouth.
‘Go on then, Mr Mildew,’ he snuffled, a chocolate goatee zig-zagged round his mouth. ‘Tell us what it is.’
Anton smiled to himself and started to explain.
Mr Mildew’s terrible idea
‘You have got to be kidding me!’ I cried, once Anton had told us his plan, which was this:
1. I put a disguise on
2. Go up to Margot Cranky
3. Ask her for a dance
4. She leaves Hamburger on the chair
5. Bunky steals him back
Bunky sniggled. ‘I think it’s pretty keel,’ he said.
‘But what about Hamburger?’ I said. ‘He’ll spot me straight away and start weeing himself with excitement. Old Cranky’ll know something’s up, for sure.’
Anton grinned. ‘She’ll just think her brand new sausage dog likes you,’ he said. ‘Which can only be a good thing.’
‘Ugh, I cannot believe this happening to me,’ I groaned. ‘It’s bad enough dancing with girls. But boogying with a granny?’
The song that was playing stopped and a familikeels-sounding fingernail tapped the microphone.
‘This is DJ Dongles coming at ya on the ones and twos,’ boomed a voice through the speakers. ‘And here’s a little something for all you lovers out there!’
‘Oh my unkeelness,’ cried Nancy. ‘It’s Mrs Dongle!’
‘Ooh-ooh, kids!’ she mouthed, spotting us behind the teacups. ‘What are you lot doing here?’
‘I could ask you the same thing,’ I mouthed back, as she pressed a button and Banana Moon started to warble out of the speakers.
Bunky grabbed a biscuit and licked the chocolate bit, then he reached across and drew a moustache along my lip. ‘Eww, gross!’ I cried, sounding like Fay Snoggles.
Anton grabbed a flat cap some grandad had left on a chair while he’d gone for a boogie and plonked it on my head. ‘Just needs one more thing,’ he said, pulling off his woolly sweater and passing it to me.
‘Have a go on this for good luck, Loser,’ smiled Darren as I put Anton’s grandad sweater on, and he handed me his can of Jinx.
‘Thanks, Daz,’ I said, spraying the armpit bits of Anton’s jumper.
Then Bunky gave me a shove and I stumbled on to the dance floor.
Chatting up a granny
I zig-zagged across the dance floor, trying not to bump into any granny or grandad bums. Then I popped out the other side, face to face with Hamburger.
‘SOZZAGIS!’ he barked, his whole body starting to wag.
‘Ho ho, your dog seems to like me!’ I boomed in my best grandad voice.
I glanced to my right and spotted Bunky, creeping round to snatch the little pooch as soon as Margot plonked him down.
The grumpy old lady stared through her angry glasses at me. ‘Do I know you?’ she said, crunching on a chocolate digestive.
I peered into her hairdo, trying to work out what was going on inside it. ‘I’m here with Ernie,’ I smiled.
‘Ernie’s gone to the pictures,’ said Margot, looking all suspicious.
‘I mean Vera,’ I said, still staring at her hair. It reminded me of something, but I couldn’t work out what.
Margot screwed her face up. ‘I hate Vera,’ she said, stroking Hamburger, who was wriggling in her arms, trying to get back to his owner.
‘Why do you hate her?’ I asked, not that I really cared. I was just putting off asking her for a dance.
‘I hate ’em all,’ said Margot, nodding at the dance floor. ‘Look at the blooming show-offs, all paired off and lovey-dovey. Makes you sick, dunnit.’
And that’s when I realised what her hairdo looked like: a gooseberry bush!
‘Well blow me down with a pair of knickers!’ I muttered to myself all grandadishly. ‘Margot Cranky’s a blooming gooseberry just like me!’
‘What’re you looking so pleased about?’ she asked, as I reached my hand out, spotting Bunky twenty centimetres away.
‘Would you like to dance?’ I asked, and her angry glasses turned all happy.
Dancing with a granny
The weird thing about boogying with a granny while my best friend stole my sausage dog back is, I actukeely quite enjoyed it.
‘What’s your name, old man?’ she asked as we swung round the dance floor. Hamburger smiled at us from Margot’s chair, licking up biscuit crumbs.
‘Barry,’ I said without thinking, and her eyebrows shot a centimetre up her wrinkly forehead.
‘That’s funny,’ she said. ‘I met a Barry yesterday. He was about your height, too.’
‘Strange how these things happen, isn’t it,’ I chuckled, actukeely sounding like a real-life grandad.
Margot leaned back a millimetre and looked me up and down. ‘You’re very short for a grown-up,’ she said. ‘What’s your second name?’
Behind her, Bunky had reached her chair. He scooped Hamburger into his arms and gave me a thumbs-up.