Loudmouth Louis - Anne Fine [2]
But sometimes what she says is news to me.
“See that bald man on the front of the telly guide, Louis? Well, when he was young, he had lovely thick curls and he looked like an upside-down floor mop.”
But I wasn’t interested in bald men, or fresh and tidy kitchens. I had a worry on my mind.
“Gran,” I said. “Today I did something really stupid. I didn’t sign on to help with washing cars or making biscuits.”
“Sounds smart to me,” said Gran. “Sit with your feet up and let other people do the work.”
“The trouble is,” I said, “that I told Miss Sparkes I had my own brilliant idea to make some money.”
“That’s good,” said Gran. “My Dance Club needs some money. I hope you won’t mind sharing your idea with me.”
“I would,” I said, “except I haven’t had it yet.”
“Pity,” said Gran. “Because all of us in the Dance Club want to go to Blackpool and stay in the Alhambra, and walk along the sea front, and go to the Tower Ballroom every night, and –”
So it was too late. I had missed my chance.
4 Don’t Mind My Dad
I tried talking to her again later. Dad wasn’t listening. He was slumped on the sofa watching Leighton Buzzard Wanderers’ Greatest Goals. Dad watches football videos for half an hour after he gets home. Gran tells him off. But Dad says if she’d had forty little savages yelling at her all day, she’d sit and watch Leighton Buzzard Wanderers’ Greatest Goals with him.
(My dad’s a teacher. Did I mention that?)
“Gran,” I said. “About this brilliant idea I need for making money …”
She had a think.
“You could put lots of lollipops in a jar,” she said. “And make people pay to guess how many there are.”
“Someone’s already doing that,” I told her.
“Sssh!” Dad’s voice came up from the sofa. “Here comes the first of Lenny Potter’s unforgettable match-savers.”
“Well, then,” Gran said to me. “How about setting up a Great-Big-Used-Book Sale?”
“That’s been picked too,” I said.
On the television, Lenny Potter took a penalty back in the stone age when Leighton Buzzard Wanderers wore those old yellow shirts with purple stripes.
“A pity about that nasty rash of his,” Gran fretted.
“Sssh!” Dad said.
I said, “He doesn’t look as if he has a rash to me.”
“That was back then,” said Gran. “When he was young and fit. I saw him last night on A Question of Sport and he’d come up in pink lumps.”
Dad raised his head over the rim of the sofa.
“Instead of joining the two of you to grieve over the poor man’s skin problems,” he said, “might I just be permitted to watch his famous left-footed volley from the halfway line in peace and quiet?”
(Don’t mind my dad. Like Mrs Heap, he can be very sarcastic.)
“Sad, too, about his poor wife …” persisted Gran.
“Sssh!” Dad said. “This is the corner kick that flew in above the great, late Juan Da Silva like a bird.”
“Her big mistake, of course,” said Gran, “was leaving a fine man like him to marry that bear.”
“She married a bear?”’
Gran gave me a very pitying look and turned back to Dad.
“What was his name, Brian? Giant great lump of a fellow who wore floppy bow ties and knew a lot about furniture. Always on Antiques Roadshow. You remember!”
Dad huddled closer to the television as Lenny Potter, now in a purple shirt with yellow stripes, booted the ball all the way from the hot-dog stand to the entrance to the Ladies. He had his fingers in his ears. (Dad. Not Lenny Potter.)
“Gran!” I reminded her. “About this brilliant idea I need for making money for school…”
Dad’s head came back over the sofa. “What does your school need money for now?”
“For the new library.”
He sank back down. “That’s all right then,” he told me. “Someone like you needn’t feel bad about not raising any. They’d never let you in anyway. Libraries are quiet places.”
“I can be quiet when I want.”
“And pigs can fly.”
He went back to watching his video. Gran could see that my feelings were hurt.
“You could always run a Raffle,” she suggested. “Or even a Bring-And-Buy