There's a Hamster in my Pocket (4 page)

It was a box. A carved, wooden box.

Kylie was beside me now, tugging desperately at my arm, but my eyes were glued to the screen. The woman was twiddling at the box, and it was changing shape, just like Nani's box from Samarkand. Now it wasn't a cube any more – it had bits sticking up at the corners, and it was glowing.

She was holding it up to the man with the pins, and both of them were screaming as if there was no tomorrow.

“Come on, Yosser!” Kylie shouted. “Come
on
!”

But I didn't. At that moment, not even the thought of being bludgeoned to death by Sniper could have moved me away from that computer screen.

Then our very worst nightmare happened. Heavy footsteps thundered up the stairs, and the bedroom
door flew open. The woman on the computer scream gave one last bloodcurdling shriek, and the bedroom filled with an overpowering smell of fish and chips.

Kylie and me clung together and backed against the wall. There, in the lighted doorway, was the enormous, hooded shadow of Sniper Teasdale. He had a fish tea in one hand, and a little bundle in the other. The little bundle was moving.

“Wot is you doin' in my room?” Sniper snarled. He indicated the ‘keep out' notice with his head. “Can you not
read
?”

Kylie began to edge towards the door.

“We heard your computer,” she said. “We knew you'd want it turned off. . .”

“Eats up energy,” I added, still with one eye on the screen, where the man with the pins seemed to be melting. “Increases your carbon footprint like nobody's business. . .”

With a grunt, Sniper dumped the fish tea on top of the computer and picked up a box of matches. He held the moving bundle to his chest and tried to open the box. All the matches fell out.

“No one,” he growled, “comes into my room without my
express
permission.”

He glared over at Kylie. “Specially
you
,” he added.

Then he pushed the little bundle into my arms, picked up the matches and lit a black, skull-shaped candle.

The bundle gave a whimper. Then it gave a distinct meow. In the candlelight I could just make out ginger-and-white stripes and a pink nose and a set of little white whiskers.

I don't know what came over me, but all of a sudden I had the most overwhelming need for something to cuddle. And I heard myself say, “Can I have it, please?”

Sniper sank to the floor in front of the computer, turned the volume up, and opened his fish tea.

“Sure you can ‘ave it,” he said. “It's name's Killer Queen. Belongs to Germane,” he added, through a mouthful of haddock, “but ‘is mum says ‘e can't keep it. An' neither can I, on account of Fang.”

It was the longest sentence I'd ever heard Sniper say, and it made waves of excitement zing up my back.

My own kitten. My very own cute, cuddle-able kitten!

Kylie was gesticulating wildly from the door and in a daze I sidled over to join her. I thanked Sniper, who muttered, “OK, now
git
,” and, gratefully, Kylie and me did.

In the safety of Kylie's room, we examined Killer Queen.

She was tiny. Her ears were flat and her eyes were only just open. She nestled into my neck and made little sucking noises. Then she began to purr.

My head was spinning. All I could do was hold her close.
Kylie leant against me and stroked her little stripy head with one finger.

“What about your gran's cat allergy?” she asked softly.

I could feel Killer Queen's heart beating against my neck, and I had to clench my teeth to stop from crying.

“I'm keeping her,” I said very firmly. “I'm definitely keeping her.”

I walked home with Killer Queen under my sweatshirt. She kept pumping her paws up and down and sucking at my tummy, and it was the most comforting feeling in the world.

And after the horrors I'd seen that evening, I sure as anything needed some comforting.

When I got home, Mum was in the kitchen, making naan.

They'd shifted Nani's bed into my room that evening, she told me. It had been quite a struggle, and it was an extremely tight squeeze. Now, Nani was so exhausted she was having an early night.

“Your nightie's on the door handle,” Mum said. “Be careful when you climb over her,” she added.

She wiped the flour off her hands and took hold of my chin. Closing one eye, she examined my face.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “You look peaky, and there's a funny smell. . .”

She pulled my right eyelid up, peered into my eye, then did the same with my left eyelid. I prayed that Killer Queen wouldn't make a noise.

Then Mum noticed the bulge. “Are you constipated?” she said, glaring down at it.

“Just a bit,” I said. “But basically I'm fine. . .”

Mum, however, was not convinced. “Stick out your tongue,” she ordered.

I was absolutely terrified now. If the kitten started to squirm, I was done for.

Sticking my tongue out as far as it would go, I backed away towards the door. With a determined look, Mum followed me, and I was sure I was in for the full abdominal examination.

Thankfully, however, she changed her mind and decided to go with her initial diagnosis. She gave me a cup of milk, stuck four dates onto the saucer, and told me to go to bed immediately. Massively relieved, I made my escape.

I reckoned there was only one place to hide Killer Queen, and that was Nani's room, so I crept in. It was empty, apart from a small pile of boxes in the corner.

I sat on the windowsill in the dark and ate the dates. Then I poured some milk into the saucer, and watched Killer Queen lap it up. After three saucerfuls, she clambered shakily onto my lap and fell asleep.

There was a good view of Kylie's house from Nani's bedroom window. The light was still on in Kylie's bedroom, and I pictured her snuggling under her pink ‘Princess' duvet, worrying herself sick about her mum and Sniper.

Then I looked along to Sniper's room. His windows were deadly black, and I thought about his bags and boxes with their terrible contents, and the dreadful man with the pins in his head, and the box.

The puzzle box that looked so much like Nani's box from Samarkand. . .

My stomach was churning badly now, and the last thing I wanted to do was to go to bed and lie in the dark, listening to Nani snoring, but I knew I had to. I took off my sweatshirt, laid it inside one of the boxes, and put Killer Queen on top. Then I tiptoed out.

I clambered over Nani, avoiding her bulgier bits, and I lay, wide-awake in the half-light, watching Smartypants swimming round and round, peering round the
Elastoplast box at the wildcat's gaping jaws. I don't think I've ever felt so scared or so miserable.

Then the weirdest thing happened. The room began to glow, and through a misty haze I saw Smartypants swimming nearer and nearer, till he was floating right in front of me, like a big frilly orange balloon.

His big black eyes sparkled dazzlingly bright, and then, suddenly, they weren't big and black any more. In fact, they weren't Smartypants's eyes any more. They were small and pale, and they smouldered with evil.

They belonged to the man with the pins in his head.

This close, I could see every pin and every flap of skin on his face. I could also see that he was clutching something in his hand, and I knew it was the puzzle box.

I tried to scream, but no sound came out. I tried to move, but it was as though I was stuck fast to the bed.

It was such a helpless feeling. I knew that Nani was lying right there beside me, but I couldn't speak to her or even touch her. I was paralysed with fear.

Then the man with the pins spoke. “Beware the Curse,” he told me in a gravelly whisper. “Beware the Curse of Samarkand!”

I heard a clicking noise and I saw a light, so I knew he'd opened the box. Then I felt him pressing down on me, and the glow from the box got brighter and brighter till it hurt my eyes.

“Look inside,” the pin man said, with an evil laugh. “
Dare
to look inside. . .”

I couldn't, though. I shut my eyes tight, and all the time the light was getting brighter, and the terrible box was getting closer.

The laughter was getting louder too, because now there wasn't just the pin man floating above my bed, there was Sniper too. His face, underneath a gigantic grey hood, pushed up in front of the pin man, and he waved an enormous mallet at me.

“Open the box,” Sniper chanted. “Open the box, or I'll bang-bang-bang you wif me mallet. . .”

He raised the mallet high in the air and as he did, the weight on my chest got so heavy, I could hardly breathe. I managed to make a little whimpering noise, and that made Sniper shout at me again.

This time, however, he seemed to have forgotten all about the box.

“Where's me cough linctus, Yosser?” he roared down at me. “Where have they put me cough linctus?”

With one great jump I woke up. I was drenched in sweat, and my arms were flailing about. There was Nani sitting astride me, shining a torch into my face.

I was never so pleased to see anyone in my life. I squirmed out from underneath her and searched among the stuffed animals till I found the cough linctus, and
then I poured some into the little plastic cup and gave it to her.