Thimble and I were checking through Dad’s emails next day when we came across one from his publishers. It said the final deadline for Pixie Pony Ballerina had already passed, and unless they got the story in the next week they were cancelling the contract.
Dad didn’t seem too pleased when I told him, especially as Mum was listening. ‘I’ve told you a hundred times,’ he said. ‘Stay out of my business.’
‘And I’ve told you a thousand times,’ I replied. ‘Don’t exaggerate.’
‘That’s a very old joke, Jams.’
‘I’ve got lots of better ones,’ I replied. ‘We could use them in Pixie Pony Ballerina.’
‘For the millionth time,’ rasped Dad, ‘I do not need any help.’
Mum’s head rose from her muesli. ‘How many words do you have to write?’
‘Ten thousand,’ grunted Dad.
‘And how many have you written so far?’
‘About seven.’
‘Seven thousand?’ asked Mum.
‘Hmm…’ said Dad.
‘You’ve written seven?’ said Mum. ‘Seven?’
‘How can I write with that blasted monkey around?’
‘Stop using Thimble as an excuse.’
‘Have you seen my antique captain’s chair?’ snapped Dad. ‘I haven’t even got anything to sit on, for goodness sake!’
Mum laid down her spoon and viewed Dad in a kind of doctorly way. ‘You need to get away for a few days.’
‘Chance would be a fine thing,’ replied Dad.
‘You’ve got a tent,’ said Mum.
‘Woh, camping!’ I cried. ‘Can I come?’
‘Hang on, hang on,’ said Dad.
‘It’d be brilliant, Dad!’ I said. ‘We could light a fire and eat pizza and tell stories and stuff.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Mum. ‘It might just give you inspiration.’
‘Or constipation,’ grumbled Dad.
‘I’ll pay for it,’ said Mum.
Dad’s eyes narrowed. ‘How much?’ he asked.
‘A couple of hundred should cover it,’ said Mum. She took a pile of notes from her purse and laid them on the table. Dad viewed them hungrily.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘I’m going to say yes. But I’m not going to say it because you’ve offered me money. I just need to show Jams what it takes to be a real man.’
‘Yay!’ I cried. ‘Do you hear that, Thimble! We’re going camping!’
‘Hang on, hang on,’ said Dad.
‘Obviously you’ll have to take Thimble,’ said Mum. ‘We can’t leave him here unsupervised.’
‘I am not sleeping in a tent with that monkey!’ cried Dad.
‘Nonsense’, replied Mum. ‘Going camping with Thimble is exactly what you need to do. It’ll be like one of those male bonding weekends.’
‘I do not want to be bonded to anything, thank you,’ snapped Dad. ‘Least of all a monkey!’
‘Ok, I’ll keep the money,’ said Mum. She reached for the pile of notes, only to find that Dad’s hand had moved faster than a frog’s tongue to cover them.
Dad doesn’t believe in campsites.
Campsites have horrible discos, and games rooms, and TV lounges, and worst of all, other people. Dad says proper camping is camping in the woods, or on a mountain, where you have to make your own toilet, and fire, and entertainment. The very thought of this made me want to make a toilet in my pants, but I had to put on a brave face for Mum. Mum was quite anxious about Dad’s rough camping plans.
‘Don’t forget your phone,’ she said.
‘It’s not working today,’ replied Dad.
‘Douglas,’ said Mum, ‘you need a phone that works every day, not just some days.’
‘It’s a nice colour,’ replied Dad.
‘You’d better borrow my spare.’
‘That’s thoughtful of you.’
‘I don’t want Jams and Thimble to get lost,’ said Mum.
‘Right,’ replied Dad, sourly.
‘You’ll need the passcode,’ noted Mum.
‘What’s a passcode?’ asked Dad.
‘My birthday,’ replied Mum.
This was all getting a bit much for Dad. He was only just getting used to phones that weren’t connected to the wall, and Mum’s phone was horribly complicated. She could even take photos with it, and – get this – connect to the internet! Crazy!
A few spots of rain were falling as we reached Tuffety Great Wood, but that didn’t bother Thimble. He went straight up the nearest tree, swinging from branch to branch, much to Dad’s annoyance. ‘He should be down here carrying a knapsack,’ he said.
‘Carrying a what?’ I asked.
‘Knapsack.’
‘Dad, no one says “knapsack” these days.’
‘I do,’ replied Dad.
‘This is why you need my help,’ I said.
Dad did not reply. We moved deeper into the wood. ‘Dad,’ I began, ‘do you think we should leave a trail of beans, like Hansel and Gretel?’
‘I know where I’m going.’
I wasn’t very confident about this. We’d just passed a fallen-down tree which looked exactly like a fallen-down tree we’d passed ten minutes before. Dad insisted that he’d known these woods since he was a child, but it was a long time since Dad had been a child, and most of the trees he’d known then had probably died.
I was beginning to wish I hadn’t brought my walker. My walker was fine on hard dirt paths, but as the rain got heavier so the paths got soggier and boggier. Then Dad abandoned the proper paths altogether. He said he was following the sound of running water, because he was looking for the river, but there was running water everywhere. If only I could have gone up in the trees like Thimble. Thimble was still having a whale of a time, and looked quite disappointed when Dad finally said it was time to stop and make camp.
To give Dad credit, we had found a river. It was quite a scary river, running helter-skelter like it was in a desperate hurry to get somewhere. Thimble was not keen on it at all, and kept making little threatening runs towards it as if he could frighten it away. But Dad was adamant that it gave us all we needed as campers: water for drinking and washing, maybe some fish, and protection from wild animals.
We started putting up the tent on a u-bend, so that the river was on three sides of us. With a fire on the fourth side, we would be completely safe from bears, wolves, and all the other dangerous beasts which only existed in Dad’s imagination.
The chances of lighting a fire, however, were looking increasingly remote. The rain was hammering down by the time we got the tent up.
‘I want to go home,’ I complained.
‘Don’t snivel,’ said Dad.
‘But we’re just going to get soaked!’
‘Now listen here,’ said Dad. ‘The difference between a man and a monkey is that we have the fortitude to look adversity in the eye.’
‘We have four whats?’ I said. It was difficult to hear anything with the rain thundering on the roof of the tent.
‘You’ll feel better with some food inside you,’ Dad assured me.
‘How are we going to cook food?’
‘I’ll see about lighting this fire,’ said Dad.
I didn’t bother to argue. Dad would realise soon enough that it was impossible to light a fire where he’d planned. After a brief scout round, sure enough, he was back.
‘Jams,’ he said, ‘when we put up the tent, wasn’t the river on three sides of us?’
‘That’s right.’
‘That’s funny,’ said Dad. ‘Now it seems to be on four.’
‘What?’ I gasped.
‘We seem to be on a kind of … island,’ said Dad.
‘Dad, I think you’d better ring for help.’
‘Hah!’ said Dad. ‘Your mum would love that!’
‘Please, Dad,’ I pleaded. ‘I’m scared.’
‘The rain will probably stop soon,’ said Dad.
But the rain did not stop. If anything it got heavier. I was starting to imagine my name in the papers, but not in the way I’d always dreamed of.
‘Dad,’ I said, ‘I really think you should ring for help.’
Dad huffed and took out the phone. ‘How does this thing work?’ He pressed the on-switch, and up came the words:
Dad did as requested.
ENTER PASSCODE
‘Passcode?’ said Dad.
‘Mum’s birthday,’ I reminded him.
‘Right,’ said Dad. His finger hovered. ‘Er…’ said Dad.
‘Dad,’ I said. ‘You do know Mum’s birthday?’
‘Don’t you know it?’
‘You’re her partner!’ I said.
‘You’re her son!’
‘You must know it, Dad!’ I said.
‘Hang on,’ said Dad. ‘I’ve just remembered. It’s exactly six months after the day your mum and I first met.’
‘What day was that?’ I asked.
‘Er…’ said Dad.
‘Think, Dad!’
‘Her birthday’s in September,’ said Dad. ‘I’m sure of that.’
‘Just go through all the days in September,’ I suggested.
‘Okay,’ said Dad. ‘I’ll start with the first.’
0109.
WRONG PASSCODE. TRY AGAIN
0209
WRONG PASSCODE. TRY AGAIN
0309
WRONG PASSCODE. TRY AGAIN
0409
PHONE IS DISABLED
‘What?’ cried Dad. ‘Stupid phone!’
‘It’s you that’s stupid, Dad!’
‘The phone should know her stupid birthday!’ cried Dad. ‘It’s supposed to be a smartphone!’
‘Yes, Dad!’ I replied. ‘That’s why it’s not letting you use it, cos it thinks you stole it!’
‘How ridiculous!’ Dad flung the phone, not caring where, but it went straight at Thimble. Thimble sprang into the air, gibbering madly, as it whacked into his shoulder.
‘It was an accident, Thimble!’ I cried, but he was well beyond reason. He grabbed the phone, and for a moment I feared he would fling it back at Dad. Instead he stuffed it in his pocket and shot up the only tree on our little island. Before my flabbergasted eyes, he then swung through the branches, across the teeming river, and away out of sight.
My lip quivered.
‘Don’t cry, for goodness sake,’ said Dad.
‘He’s gone!’ I blubbed.
‘Man up, Jams,’ said Dad.
‘I’m a boy!’ I blubbed. ‘And anyway, Mum says that if you could cry, you wouldn’t be so angry all the time!’
‘La la, la la,’ replied Dad, covering his ears.
‘But,’ I continued, ‘she says you will cry when she finally plucks up the courage to leave you!’
Dad uncovered his ears. ‘Did she really say that?’
‘Yes,’ I mumbled.
There was a long silence, apart from the hammering of the rain, the rushing of the river and a munching sound which turned out to be Dad devouring a large bar of chocolate.
‘Isn’t there some for me?’ I asked.
‘I’ve got some more in my knapsack,’ replied Dad.
Dad found me some chocolate, which calmed me down a bit, but not that much, because Thimble was still gone and the river was still rising.
‘I hope Nora doesn’t think she’s keeping the castle,’ said Dad.
‘That will be up to the courts to decide,’ I replied, ‘but it should be fairly straightforward, once she’s had you certified insane.’
‘I see,’ said Dad. ‘And how do you feel about this, Jams?’
‘You are a bit bonkers, Dad,’ I replied.
Dad thought for a while. ‘Out of ten,’ he said, ‘how many marks would you give me as a father?’
I thought for a while. ‘Are you including fractions?’
‘What, like nine and a half?’ asked Dad.
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Without the nine.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Well, you never listen to me!’ I complained. ‘I’ve got loads of ideas for stories, and if you’d just listen, maybe we could write a brilliant book, and then you wouldn’t have to write Pixie Pony Ballerina!’
Dad turned to face me. A raindrop ran down the centre of his face and dripped off the end of his nose. ‘If I let you help me,’ he said, ‘will you tell your mum you think I’m a great dad?’
‘If you promise to be nice to Thimble,’ I replied.
‘Jams,’ said Dad. ‘You’re not facing reality. Thimble’s gone.’
‘What do you know about reality?’ I blubbed and, as if to remind us what reality was, a gush of freezing cold water ran over our feet. ‘Get us out of here!’ I cried.
Something seemed to stir in Dad. He jumped up and went to the tree that Thimble had climbed, checking out the footholds, but there was little chance he could climb it, and no chance I could. Realising this, he began barging it like an elephant, possibly hoping to make it fall across the river. But even though Dad was rather fat, he would have struggled to bring down a clothes-pole, let alone a tree.
‘Maybe we could swim the river,’ I suggested.
‘Can you swim?’ asked Dad.
‘Course I can.’
Dad made no move.
‘Can you?’ I asked.
‘Er…’ said Dad.
‘We’re doomed!’ I cried.
As if to echo my despair, a crack of thunder filled the heavens. As this subsided, a new and strangely familiar noise followed. Not rain, nor thunder, but a strange shuckering, buckering sound. What was that above us? A giant dragonfly? A vulture? Or… or…
A helicopter!
Dad and I went mental, waving and screaming like a pair of crazy apes. As if on elastic, the ’copter came down towards us, till we could feel the breeze of the rotor blades like the breath of heaven. A door opened, a man on a winch came down, and next thing I was being clipped into a harness and hoisted into the sky. It was the most thrilling ride ever, but the best was yet to come. As I entered the helicopter, who should I see but my greatest and hairiest friend – the friend who had obviously saved my life.
‘Thimble!’ I cried, throwing my arms around him. ‘I thought I’d never see you again!’
Thimble hugged me back full force and gave me a quick check-over for nits.
‘But how did you do it, Thimble?’ I asked.
‘He’s a very clever monkey,’ replied the helicopter pilot.
Dad arrived in the cabin. Once he’d got over the shock of seeing Thimble, he looked as pleased as me to be with him, and after smiling and nodding rather stupidly for a while, held out his hand. ‘Well done, old boy,’ he said.
‘Dad,’ I said. ‘I don’t think monkeys shake hands.’
‘Ah,’ said Dad. ‘Well, er…’ He patted Thimble on the shoulder. ‘Good going, Thimbs,’ he said.
‘Thimbs?’ I repeated.
‘It’s my pet name for him.’
‘Since now,’ said Dad.
‘If it’s a pet name,’ I said, ‘he must be our pet!’
‘Of course he’s our pet,’ replied Dad. ‘Have I ever suggested he wasn’t?’