Shrunk! (4 page)

Jacob Devlin's out there, giant and pink, handing out sweets to his mates. Only Jacob Devlin could get away with being dressed like a girl without anyone mentioning it. His mum, also giant and pink, thrusts a paper bag with more sweets over the school wall. I've got an apple from Grandma. Not just an apple, an enormous cooking-type apple – it might taste good, but I'm not eating it in public.

I lurk in the corner of the playground, turning my back on everyone else. I click the capsule open.

Nothing. No movement, no light, just a dull little round thing.

‘Hey! Model Village, what you got there, then?' It's Jacob Devlin. He's right next to me, I can smell the toffees on his fat breath. I click the lid down and stuff the capsule back in my pocket, but I'm not quick enough.

Jacob's hand reaches up and knocks it out of my palm and the capsule bounces across the gravel.

‘Here, me,' shouts one of his henchmen – and the capsule flies through the air, from one to the other, and I'm doing that stupid hopeless thing of running from one person to the next just as it leaves their hand.

‘Give it!' I shout.

And then it stops, with Jacob. He stands staring at me, towering over me, the capsule in his hand. He's chewing something, his blubbery lips going over and over, a little trail of spit at the corner of his mouth. He grins, his smile as smug as the one Tilly does.

‘Don't,' I say.

‘Why? You got a little model man in there? Special edition, for the model village?'

I try to grab it from him, but he skips backwards out of reach and the boats fall out of my pocket.

I rush to rescue them, but the henchmen swoop by, and get to them first.

‘Yeah!' shouts one.

‘Neat!' calls another. They dance in front of me, waving the little boats.

I stop. I'm never going to catch up with them. For a second, I form my thumb and middle finger into an ‘O'. I lift it up. Jacob doesn't fit inside. He's too fat.

He slips his nails under the top of the capsule. I step back, and join both my hands together, my two thumbs touching, my two middle fingers making an arch. He fits inside my fingers now. I could just click.

But I don't.

And he pops the lid off.

He peers inside. Then looks up at his adoring fans. ‘Ah, bless. Model Village Perks has brought an ickle tiny dinosaur to school with him today. Was that for show and tell? Ahhhh.'

‘No – it's not that . . .' I step towards him.

He dances backwards. ‘Scared I might want to keep it? Oh no, I won't do that – I won't steal your precious little dinosaur. I wouldn't do such a nasty thing.'

And grinning at the crowd, he empties the capsule on to the gravel, and grinds everything under his shoe.

I think they call it seeing red. I think that the things I did to Jacob this morning were only natural. I know I jumped on him, bounced off his huge belly, shouted at him, and tried to tear his ear off. I certainly hooked my fingers into his nostrils and pulled as hard as I could. It all hurt a lot.

There was this bit when my ears filled with a roaring noise – it might have been in my head, or it might have been everyone else screaming at us. Somehow he kicked me in the jaw, but it just made me angrier and that's probably when I bit his nose.

That'll be why I ended up here in the office corridor, alone, except for Eric, who's leaning over a sick bowl. Mr Bell let Jacob off. He even gave him a piece of cake from the staffroom. I wish I'd shrunk him. I wish I'd shrunk both of them.

I could shrink Eric's sick bowl, then it wouldn't smell so bad.

Eric's mumbling, so I lean forward to listen. It's a mistake; he stinks of Parmesan.

‘Dad told the school nurse I was sick because the solar system's sick.'

‘Say that again?'

‘I'm sure it's the chickpea fritters, but Dad told the nurse it's because the planets are out of alignment. Because Jupiter's been stolen.'

The headmaster's door swings open. Mr Devlin sticks his head out, sees Eric, sees me and goes back in.

‘Because he was abducted by aliens as a toddler,' Eric says. ‘Apparently, it's made me really sensitive to planetary change.'

‘Really?'

‘He's sort of right – the planets
are
out of alignment. With Jupiter gone, there's nothing to hold the rest of them in line. The Earth's moving towards the sun already – they can all hurtle towards the sun. 'S'a disaster,' says Eric, swallowing hard. His face is white with green snot and tiny bits of dried carrot now. It matches his hair.

‘Is it?'

‘Yeah, without Jupiter, we're –' And he vomits into the bowl.

He barely stops. ‘Yeah the whole solar system's kept in place by Jupiter and the sun, pulling in different directions. That's why it's getting really warm.'

‘Oh?'

‘Yeah, we're getting closer to the sun. And the Asteroid Belt will go mad without Jupiter. There's nothing to stop stuff from that crashing into us, and ultimately . . .'

Behind us, the door to the street swings open. Eric's dad, Colin, stands in the doorway. They look exactly the same, but Colin's bigger, lopsided and got less snot and carrot on his face.

‘Eric, sweetheart – a bit under the weather?'

‘Ultimately what?' I ask.

But Eric doesn't answer, just throws up over his father's trousers and staggers out.

I'm beginning to wonder if shrinking Jupiter was such a good thing. At the end of school I get to look for it in the playground. Fat chance – a thing the size and colour of a lentil in a gravel football pitch?

The boats are gone and someone's stolen the dinosaur.

I walk home, and to make myself feel better I do a bit more shrinking. Just a little bit. Nothing serious.

A bench,

Click
.

The large plastic hot dog outside the chip shop, which Mum hates,

Click
.

A sand sculpture of the Prime Minister,

Click
. It dissolves in my hand.

I stop for a moment. Mr and Mrs Albermarle go past. He's ever so tall, and she seems to be holding on to his coat as if he might run away.

Once they've gone, I look around for more things to shrink.

A pumpkin lantern from outside the pub,

Click
.

Another pumpkin lantern,

Click
.

It's getting dark, so the pumpkin lanterns look really cute, about the size of cherry tomatoes, but glowing. I take four more.

Click
,
click
,
click
,
click
.

Oh yes! I line them up on the sea wall and put the bench at the end. The bench is completely perfect in every way. It's even got a tiny drinks can scrumpled into the back.

Something whooshes over my head.

And another, and another.

Whoosh.

Whoosh.

Whoosh.

Shooting stars, masses of them.

Wow. Like fireworks.

They're going off all the time.

Awesome.

I blow out the candles in the pumpkin lanterns and put them gently into my backpack. The bench just fits on top with the plastic hot dog. Perhaps I'll give these to Tilly.

Eric's dad scuttles along the road. He's got a massive roll of wire that he's laying out behind him.

‘Oh – evening, Grandson of Amalthea.'

I nod. I really don't know what to say to him.

He points up at the shooting stars. ‘They're coming, Tom. Won't be long.' And he runs on, paying out his wire.

A band of trick or treaters career by, and I tuck myself in against a wall. Eric's hanging around at the back. I can tell it's him – even with make-up, no one has a face that white. He doesn't look very happy.

If I'd been sick at school, Grandma would never let me out, but I suppose that with a dad like Eric's anything goes.

They disappear around the corner. I wonder what the time is? I'd like to see the news, but I don't want to go anywhere near home, or the town hall, not with Mum dressed in a pumpkin suit. Who knows what Dad's dressed as – Frankenstein?

I hope nobody goes to ‘Mr and Mrs Magic's Night of Halloween Fun'. I hope it's a disaster and they give up and we can go back to London.

I cross the square and peer into the penny arcade. The man in the booth is watching the telly. There's a shot of London Zoo, and a picture of a polar bear, then a reporter stands by a big crater, and I can see that the wall of the zoo's disappeared. They show a tiny piece of rock, and some men in white all-in-one suit things and a load of zookeepers running around with torches looking in the trees. Then a red-faced man with a penguin under his arm starts talking to the camera.

Then they show a picture of the Eiffel Tower, with a chunk missing.

Then they show a map of the solar system with Jupiter missing.

It's all my fault.

I'm going to destroy the planet and there's nothing I can do about it.

I feel 100% rubbish.

Then I feel 100% angry. It's not all my fault – some of it's Jacob Devlin's fault. He was the one that emptied Jupiter out on to the playground.

I'll go home. Watch the news. Maybe tell Mum later?

I turn to go back to the house, but something's clattering on the street. Someone's dragging something.

Grandma's stick?

Again?

But it's not Grandma. It's something huge, with a stick pushing something smaller along the road. The smaller thing's whimpering.

I shrink back against the wall.

The huge thing's Jacob Devlin, and the whimpering thing's Eric. Jacob's got a plastic toasting fork in his hand, and he's pressing it into Eric's back. Jacob's wearing a shiny red plastic devil's costume. Even in the near dark I can see that it's meant for a much smaller person.

‘Right, Snot Face Geek . . .'

‘My name's Eric.'

‘
My name's Eric
. So?' He jabs at Eric.

‘So leave me alone.'

‘I might, if you give me all your sweets.'

‘But I haven't got any.'

‘All right then, if you can't give me your sweets, then I've got something for you. After all, you barfed on me – you “very kindly” gave me your breakfast. I want to give you something back, so I think I'll give you my dinner.'

‘What?' The pumpkin lanterns reflect in Eric's glasses.

‘I've been trick or treating,' says Jacob. He's doing something with the tail of his devil costume.

Eric doesn't answer. He pulls back, but Jacob's about twice his size and Eric doesn't get far. ‘And I've been eating since I came out of school.' It's hard to see in the dark, but I think Jacob's wrapped the tail of his devil's costume around Eric's hands. ‘I've eaten Monster Crunch, chocolate witches, popping candy frogs and toffee.' He lets out a belch. ‘Smokey bacon crisps, mint choc chip ice cream, flying saucers, cola, three hot dogs, lemonade, cheesy krispies, sherbert fountains, and chips.' Jacob lets out another belch.

Eric's pressing himself back against the wall, and Jacob's holding him tight. Or rather the mass of Jacob's stomach is holding Eric tight.

‘And I had those chips, with loads and loads of brown sauce, and I washed it all down with milk.'

I stare through the dark. I don't think Jacob knows I'm here.

‘So all I've got to do is stick my fingers, just like this.' I see his devil head go back, his fingers against the last light like a pronged tongue going into his mouth.

‘No – you wouldn't.' Eric sounds panicky.

Surely, even Jacob Devlin wouldn't . . . Maybe he would? I run five paces further back and before I even think about it I lift my hand, put the forefinger and thumb together, and,

Click
.

Oh no. I've really done it now.

Eric's still got his hands tied together, but there's this red string, reaching all the way into my hand. It stops at a little red squirming thing.

A cold hot rush sweeps over me, and for a second I consider dropping it and running.

‘Help!'
A tiny voice comes from the red shiny grub. Eric walks towards me, and I see that he's gone even whiter, and looks like he's going to be sick again.

‘No – it's OK,' I say, although I don't believe it myself for one second. ‘I did it.'

‘You?' Eric's voice comes out all scratchy and surprised. ‘That thing – that's Jacob Devlin?'

I look again at the horrible little grub on my palm, and nod my head.

We sit in Eric's utterly weird bedroom. I think we're both in shock. But Eric's finally stopped shaking. Jacob's shut in a tiny plastic treasure chest. I can hear him squealing. I've got no choice; he has to stay there until he shuts up. Honestly, he's as bad as the donkey. When the shrinking happened he squeaked at me for at least ten minutes, and I had to stick him in my pocket and hold the top shut until we reached Eric's house.

Eric's sitting on the other side of the room. He's back to ordinary snot and white now.

‘You, you shrank him?'

I nod.

‘Just like that – you, just shrank him?'

I nod again.

‘Let me out!'
Jacob shouts for the millionth time. We ignore him.

‘How?'

‘I don't know. I don't understand it. It just happens.'

‘It's completely impossible.'

I nod my head.

‘No, I mean, it couldn't possibly happen – I mean the laws of physics, biology, everything – it couldn't . . .'

‘It does.'

‘Wow,' says Eric.

‘Yeah,' I say.

‘Wow wow and triple wow,' he says.

I nod.

‘Do it again,' he says.

I look around for something that really doesn't matter. There's a huge chocolate bar on the desk, by the laptop. I put my forefinger and thumb together and,