“So… who else lives here?” said Barry as the lift rose to the top floor, marked P. House on the lift button. Barry knew that P stood for Pent, although a small part of him wanted to ask Jonty if it stood for Pee. He suppressed that with a giggle.
“No one,” said Jonty.
“No one?” said Barry. “But it’s an enormous building!”
“Yes,” said Jonty. “Vlassorina wanted to live somewhere very high. But obviously not somewhere where they’d have to bump into ordinary people. So that’s why they built Vlassopolis.” He took out a tissue and wiped Barry’s cheek. “Sorry, Barry. It’s very hard not to spit when you say Vlassopolis. Oh dear, I’ve done it again.”
“Really, it’s no problem…”
“Why couldn’t they just have called it Vlassorina Towers?” said Jonty with a sigh.
“But who lives on all these other floors?” asked Barry.
“No one,” said Jonty. “They sometimes give the apartments to some of their famous friends to stay in, when they’re in town. You know. Finula Postalnarg. She’s stayed here. Jatt Blatt. Monty out of Monty and the Nose Hairs (obviously only Monty – none of the Nose Hairs). Imogen Le Bam-Bam, who, as I’m sure you know, designed the first ever edible smartphone. Dickie Henderson-Bear, who dances on a carousel in—”
Ting! went the lift, much to Barry’s relief. He’d had just about enough of Jonty’s name-dropping, especially when the names were all people he hadn’t heard of.
The lift doors opened, not into a corridor as Barry expected, but straight into the penthouse flat. It was an enormous room, bigger than any Barry had ever seen, with windows on all sides, showing an amazing view of the city.
The room itself was really white: white walls, thick white rugs, paintings on the wall that seemed to be just blank white canvases and, on the very long white sofa, a white poodle, a white fluffy cat and a long-haired white rabbit, looking at him curiously. Music was playing, piped in from all sides. Barry had just caught the lyrics – “He sleeps by the fire/While we watch the news!” – when, from the ceiling, two white cages descended containing two figures, apparently asleep.
The cages reached the floor and their doors opened. The man looked up with a surprised face and sang: “And when one pops out!”
The woman looked up, danced into his arms, ballroom style, and leant back, singing, “He looks confuuuuuused!!” Then they opened their mouths and pretended to bark. Eventually, the music stopped and, from their dance position, the man and the woman – clearly Vlad Mitt and Morrissina Padada or, if not, some lunatics who had broken in – said, together: “Barry – welcome to Vlassopolis!”
Jonty took out his tissue and wiped their combined spit off Barry’s face.