The problem for Sam’s mum and dad was not getting hold of these things – they shopped for them the next day, and, by the standards of Sam’s usual present-wishes, all of them were fairly cheap and available from HomeFront, where Charlie worked.
The problem wasn’t getting all this stuff into Sam’s room either, as he had cleared up in there, putting all his other presents into four piles (well, towers, really: there were so many presents he’d had to stack them right up to the ceiling), one in each corner.
The problem was the hammering. It went on all of the next day, and into the night. That was bad in itself, as it was very loud, but particularly bad because the next day was, of course, still Sam’s birthday. Which meant that when his parents and Ruby knocked on Sam’s door, holding his birthday cake, he didn’t let them in – not, this time, because he was being moody and grand and didn’t want to come out, but because he couldn’t hear them and was concentrating on his mission to get to the falling star and un-wish his wish.
After all, Grandpa Sam was still missing and no one seemed to be doing anything about it. The police were going to speak to them all at Abbey Court to get more information for their enquiry, but not till the following day, they’d told Grandma Poppy, because they were working on something urgent.
Eventually, not sure what to do, Sam’s family lit the candles and sang “Happy Birthday” as loudly as they could outside the door to try to make Sam hear them over his own hammering.
It worked: when they got to the words “DEAR SA-AM!!” – all of them red and raw-throated with the effort of keeping the volume up – the hammering stopped for a second, and he opened the door.
“Oh! Thank you so much!” said Sam.
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!”
“All right, no need to shout …” And he blew the candles out.
“Sam …?” said his dad, peering into the room. He could see the edge of one of the planks, which seemed to have been nailed to one of the others, and secured with a piece of rope. The floor, he noticed, was scattered with drawings, like the ones you have to do in DT, with lots of numbers and measurements on them. “What are you making in there?”
“Oh nothing,” said Sam, coming out and closing the door. “Shall we go downstairs and cut the cake? Oh, and, Mum and Dad, here’s my birthday list for tomorrow …”
He handed over another piece of paper. They looked at it.
“Three more skateboards?” said Vicky.
“Yes. They can all be the same model as my other one if you like.”
His parents exchanged glances.
“Sam,” said his dad. “That will cost quite a … lot of money …”
“Oh! Right.” Sam thought for a bit. “I see …” he said, opening his door and going back into the room and shutting it behind him.
His family stood outside it, confused: had he reacted badly again? Would he stay in there for the rest of the day? Then, from inside the room, they heard Sam say:
“Can you open the door, please?”
Ruby looked at her parents, shrugged and turned the handle.
“Slowly!” said Sam.
Ruby frowned. But did as he asked, opening the door more slowly.
To reveal: what appeared to be a shaking tower of presents. A model of the Star Wars Millennium Falcon was balanced on a helicopter, which was balanced on a walkie-talkie, which was balanced on a kite, which was balanced on a toy crossbow, which was balanced on a tambourine, which was balanced on a pirate ship, which was balanced on a digital alarm clock, which was balanced on an action figure of Spider-Man, which was balanced on a painting set, which was balanced on three juggling sticks, which were balanced, themselves, on two small hands.
Then, Sam’s face appeared round the side of the middle of the tower (at about the level of the pirate ship).
“Hello. I thought, Mum – I don’t mean to be ungrateful and thanks to you and everyone else who bought these presents but – I thought maybe you could return these. If you needed to.”
“To buy the skateboards?” said Vicky, uncertainly.
“Yes … oh … oh … oh no!”
He was saying this because – perhaps you’ve guessed – the tower of presents was beginning to topple.
Luckily his family sprang into action. His dad caught the Millennium Falcon and the helicopter and the walkie-talkie, his mum caught the crossbow and the tambourine, Ruby caught the pirate ship and digital alarm clock, the kite rose into the air anyway, Sam managed to hold on to the three juggling sticks, and the action figure of Spider-Man fell through the bars of Spock’s cage and ended up upside down right next to the guinea pig. Who looked at it with quite a strong sense of, “Considering what you’ve just landed in, Spidey, I think you should change your catchphrase to, ‘With great poo-wer, comes great res-poo-sibility.’”
Although that may be reading quite a lot into a guinea pig’s face.