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- Herausgeber: Pushkin Children's Books
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Sprache: Englisch
I knew STRAIGHTAWAY that something was WRONG on Monday morning when Mum didn't wake me up for school.With his grandma snoring in the kitchen and his older sister spending hours getting ready for school, it's up to Jake to discover where his missing mum might be.Life at home wasn't perfect, but he can't understand why she would simply run off like this. And why doesn't anyone else seem to care?A heartfelt, funny and unique ode to perfectly imperfect families.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022
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For my mum, who is perfectly imperfect,
And for all mothers who are imperfectly perfect.
jake’s notebookMonday 16th December Days since Mum disappeared: One Days until Christmas: Nine
ten things you should know about my mum:
Her name is ChristineHer favourite colour is purpleShe has curly blonde hairHer star sign is ScorpioShe loves the seaShe is thirty-five years young (or that’s what she tells me)She likes to sing and dance (it can be pretty embarrassing sometimes)She doesn’t go to work as she is too busy looking after me and my sister, RoseSometimes she gets annoyed if I do something wrong, like forgetting to tidy my room, but she doesn’t stay angry for longOther than Lukas she is my best friend in the entire worldCONTENTS
1
THINGS START TO GO WRONG
I knew STRAIGHTAWAY that something was WRONG on Monday morning when Mum didn’t wake me up for school. Instead, I was woken ABRUPTLY by my sister Rose shrieking SO LOUDLY it would have roused everyone else in London at PRECISELY the same time.
‘It’s eight o’clock,’ I heard her scream. ‘Why didn’t anyone wake me?’
Rose is my older sister. She is what scientists call ‘A TEENAGER’. This basically means that she has to get up extremely early every day in order to get ready for school on time. She spends approximately FIVE HOURS in the bathroom each morning. And when she comes out, she looks exactly the same as when she went in.
‘We are going to be sooo late,’ she wailed. ‘Mrs Crumpton is going to kill me. This is the end of my life. Oh my God. I AM GOING TO DIE.’
Mrs Crumpton was Rose’s form tutor and she wasn’t a great one for TARDINESS (i.e. being late). This is when I decided that something was NOT QUITE RIGHT. Although Rose is a total drama queen at the best of times, it did seem very strange that Mum was literally nowhere to be seen. I decided I needed to investigate the situation more closely.
I launched myself out of bed, and still in my planet pyjamas, walked silently across the landing so as not to disturb the teenager when she was in FULL-ON MEGA MELTDOWN MODE.
‘Mum?!!’ I heard Rose screaming from her bedroom. ‘Mum? Where are you?’
By now I had reached Mum’s room. The door was shut. This was A BIT ODD as usually she leaves it slightly ajar, but I didn’t feel it was a cause for great alarm at this stage. I knocked tentatively in case she was in one of her moods again but there was NO REPLY.
This was an interesting development but again not highly unusual. I opened the door carefully and peered inside. Nothing was out of place. The bed was neatly made, and the curtains were tightly drawn. I decided to look under the bed.
I didn’t really think Mum would be under there, but it was where she usually hid the Christmas presents. And there were only nine days to go until the big day. It was completely bare. Not even a dusty tumbleweed in sight. THERE WERE NO PRESENTS!!! This really was a DISASTER OF THE HIGHEST ORDER now.
‘Mum?!’ Rose continued to HOWL like a deranged werewolf.
‘Mum?!!’ Her voice was SO LOUD it definitely could have woken the dead.
Whilst Rose continued to wail frantically, I decided to take matters into my own hands and look downstairs. Meanwhile Rose flounced into the bathroom like a highly strung show pony and slammed the door aggressively behind her as she went.
We live in a maisonette. There are twenty stairs down to the ground floor and I took them one at a time in order to give myself OPTIMUM (a lot of) time to think. I was only on the fifth stair when I heard a strange rustling, shuffling sound coming from the kitchen below.
I took the next four steps two at a time, landing on the tenth step, when I heard an even weirder noise coming from the kitchen. I paused cautiously for a moment. It sounded like a pig was in there. A WILD BOAR. It shuffled and rustled and then it snorted. REALLY LOUDLY.
Everything went eerily quiet for a moment, which usually means something is NOT OK, and by this point I had reached the bottom of the staircase. I needed to investigate further.
Suddenly the creature let out another LOUD SNORT. The hairs on the back of my neck began to prickle. I looked around for something large to arm myself with. Alas, all I found was an old umbrella which was quite big but not exactly LIFE THREATENING.
The SNORTING continued.
What if it had eaten Mum?
I gulped nervously before tiptoeing stealthily to the end of the corridor, brandishing the somewhat broken umbrella in one hand, and peered anxiously into the kitchen.
I was quite scared at this point of the story in case you were wondering.
I took a very deep breath and swept through the door, hoping to take the WILD BOAR BY THE HORNS and startle it into submission.
And there.
Asleep in her chair.
Snoring like a warthog.
Was GRANDMA.
It was not a dangerous, death-defying creature after all. Just a sleeping old lady. I put the umbrella down gently and tried to recover my wits.
Meanwhile, Rose was still in the bathroom.
And there was still NO SIGN OF MUM.
2
KITCHEN CHAOS
Having now established that we weren’t UNDER ATTACK from FLESH-EATING WILD HOGS and there was no imminent danger, and that Mum probably hadn’t been EATEN ALIVE, I continued with my search.
My grandma is a nurse at the local hospital and often works nights. She’s always reminding me that she isn’t even all that old but to me she seems ABSOLUTELY ANCIENT.
BTW, please don’t tell her I said that; she can still give as good as she gets, even at her age.
She also likes to remind me that she is a very busy lady, with an awful lot to do, so I need to SHOW SOME RESPECT and let her have A MOMENT’S PEACE every now and then.
Anyway, due to her old age long shifts at the hospital, she is always nodding off or catching forty winks or having a nap at unusual hours of the day. Which all mean she is ASLEEP. Just like now. And I am ABSOLUTELY FORBIDDEN from waking her up.
This still didn’t really explain why she was fast asleep in our kitchen at eight am. It was another strange event to add to an already MYSTIFYING MORNING. Looked like I was going to have to wait for her to wake up before I could find out what on earth was going on.
As Grandma was dead to the world and of no use to me on my present mission, I decided to continue my search for Mum. I skirted past Grandma’s chair, trying not to disturb her from her slumber as being woken up by children makes her VERY ANGRY. Even in the MIDDLE OF A CRISIS, probably. I didn’t want to wait to find out anyway.
Mum was LITERALLY NOWHERE TO BE SEEN. She wasn’t stood next to the kettle waiting for it to boil for her morning cup of coffee. She wasn’t setting bowls on the table or getting cereal out of the kitchen cupboards whilst wearing her dressing gown and slippers. She wasn’t even out on the balcony having a cigarette.
It was as if she had suddenly VANISHED INTO THIN AIR. Mum always made us eat breakfast. She said it was the most important meal of the day. But, as no one was around to make it for me, breakfast was going to have to wait today.
And I couldn’t even get to the fridge if I wanted to as Grandma’s chair was in the way, Rose is the only one of us tall enough to reach the cupboards where the cereal is kept, and I wasn’t allowed to touch the bread knife under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES without the presence of a RESPONSIBLE ADULT.
It looked as though I was going to have to go hungry until lunchtime at least. I would have to try my best to ignore my growling stomach until then. It sounded as if a VERY ANGRY TIGER was going TOTALLY BERSERK in there.
So that’s when I decided something very strange was definitely happening. And I couldn’t ask Grandma about it until she woke up. I could potentially be waiting a very long while. I decided to write a list of all the possibilities of where Mum might be in order to kill some time and give myself a moment to think.
I grabbed my notebook from the pocket of my pyjamas, where I keep it safely nearby to record my observations and EMERGENCY SITUATIONS such as this one. It has a ballpoint pen covered in planets clipped to the side which is VERY HANDY INDEED as mum says I am prone to ABSENTMINDEDNESS (forgetfulness) and am always LOSING THINGS.
The cover looks just like the Milky Way, but I know for a fact it is not an accurate representation and even if it was, the stars you see in the night sky are actually THOUSANDS OF YEARS OLD and ALMOST CERTAINLY DEAD BY NOW anyway.
I opened a fresh page of my notebook and started to write my list.
places mum might have gone:
1. The EU
2. The Bahamas
3. Prison
4. Tesco
5. Christmas Shopping
6. Oxford Street (see point five above)
7. Hospital
8. Lukas’s house
9. Dad’s
10. Dead?
It seemed HIGHLY UNLIKELY that she was DEAD given that she had no MAJOR ENEMIES as far as I was aware, and we had already established that she hadn’t been EATEN ALIVE by WILD HOGS. And, in any case, it was JUST TOO AWFUL to even consider without any specific evidence. So, I decided to cross that one off the list.
This was certainly a huge relief, but it still left NINE OTHER POSSIBILITIES to investigate. It was going to be a VERY BUSY DAY. I closed the notebook and shoved it deep into my pocket where I knew it would be very secure and I wouldn’t lose it. There really was NO TIME TO WASTE.
By now it was eight thirty am and we were undoubtedly going to be LATE FOR SCHOOL. On a normal day, I would have walked to school with my best friend Lukas, but this wasn’t a normal day, and he would already have left by now.
If I waited for Rose, who knows how long she would take. And Grandma was still asleep. So, I decided to SEIZE THE MOMENT and walk to school by myself. I wasn’t really supposed to walk to school on my own without Lukas or Rose, but I knew the way and there was no one else around to take me after all.
Mum was who knows where, Grandma was out for the count, and Rose was still getting ready. And it was getting LATE. As this was an EMERGENCY, I needed to USE MY INITIATIVE which is what Mum always tells me to do when I ask her a homework-related question that she doesn’t know the answer to.
As my stomach continued to rumble loudly, protesting the LACK OF SUITABLE PROVISION (food), I raced back up the stairs to put on my school uniform. As I ran past the bathroom door, I noticed steam pouring out OMINOUSLY (in a spooky fashion) from underneath it, as if a somewhat HAPHAZARD WITCH was brewing potions in there.
I wouldn’t be able to brush my teeth but that was OK as I hadn’t had any breakfast yet anyway. At least my appalling morning breath might keep NEIL THE SCHOOL BULLY at bay.
I grabbed my school bag from where I’d flung it on the desk the Friday before and, transferring my notebook carefully into the trouser pocket of my school uniform, raced back down the stairs and out of the front door.
sundays
We always spent Sundays together. Just the three of us. Mum and Rose and Me. Even Rose wasn’t allowed out with her friends on Sundays. Sometimes she would sulk and moan and throw a wobbler, but she would always come around in the end. Sundays were family time.
Mum would be in a good mood when we were all at home, and she wouldn’t get angry or upset. Sundays were good days. We would stay in our pyjamas and watch TV all day, lying on the sofa tucked beneath blankets.
Sundays felt like safe days. Days where nothing bad could happen. Sometimes Mum would fall asleep. No one called on Sunday, and if they did we didn’t answer. No one came to the door. Not even Dad.
In the evenings, we were allowed takeaway chicken and chips from the high street. I liked chicken nuggets best. We’d come home to plates hot from the oven. We were even allowed Coke on Sundays. And any snacks we wanted. Chocolate. Cake. Crisps.
After dinner Mum would run me a hot bath, and afterwards I would read one of my favourite books, wrapped up warm in my dressing gown and slippers before bed.
Sunday was always my favourite day of the week. When we all got to spend time together and Mum wouldn’t be sad for a while.
And this particular Sunday was no different from usual, until Mum went missing.
That’s why it seemed so strange.
