Cosmic by Frank Cottrell Boyce Read Free Book Online Page B

father, Edhem, says, “Childhood is a happy time, and how can we be happy if we don’t have the things we want? So I give Hasan everything he wants. After all, it’s only money. And I can always get more money. For instance, he really loves thrill rides and he wanted to be the first ever to ride the Rocket. So I found the number of the girl who won it for charity. I phoned her and I offered to give the charity twice as much money as she could raise with sponsors. Simple! Everyone has their price!”
     
    If the competition was over, then the music should stop and the lines should be closed. But the music was still playing. Then I realized that if he’d bought the German girl’s place, then he wasn’t the fourth winner.
    He was a replacement first winner.
    There was still one chance left.
    And now the music had stopped and there was a ringing sound. I was being put through! I pulled the phone out of my pocket and got ready to speak.
    A hand snatched the phone out of my hand. It was Mr. Middleton.
    I pleaded with him not to hang up. “I’m in a queue, sir. I have been since eight o’clock this morning.”
    “No mobiles in class—an invariable rule and basic good manners. You should know that.”
    “Please don’t hang up.”
    I could hear a friendly woman’s voice talking on the phone. I was through!
    He snapped the phone shut and smiled. “Tell me,” he said, “what was important about the new ideas that Omo used to promote their washing powder in the 1960s?”
    “What was important about them?”
    “I’ll give you a clue. Suds. Longer-lasting suds. Now then. Anything? No. You weren’t listening to me, were you? What were you listening to? Little voices in your head? Or on your mobile? Maybe you’d like to tell the rest of us what they were saying.”
    It was a Level Seventy Monster Question, the kind you’re supposed to walk away from. But I Engaged instead. I said, “Recent studies have shown that the chances of an asteroid hitting Earth any time in the next hundred years are fivethousand to one. Blatantly the odds get stronger with every day that passes. A big enough asteroid could cause total global extinction. And therefore, it doesn’t matter how long your suds last. And it doesn’t matter if you’ve been specially selected or not.”
    Sometimes you don’t need to take the Elixir of the Mages first. Sometimes if you simply step up to the monster, the elixir just comes.
     
    He sent me out of the class.

Fathers Have Children
    That was the night I finally took down my “It’s Your Solar System” glow-in-the-dark mobile. It wasn’t even astronomically accurate. It still had Pluto on it. Everyone knows that Pluto’s not a planet anymore. It’s something a bit too big for an asteroid, but too small for a planet. It’s nothing.
    Like someone who’s too big to be a kid and too young to be an adult.
    Then the phone rang.
    A friendly voice said, “Hi. Drax Communications. Still want to be the World’s Best Dad?” This time I waited for the options to come up. But they didn’t. There was a pause and the friendly voice said, “Hello? Mr. Digby?”
    “Oh. What? Yeah. Yeah, that’s me. Who’s that?”
    “Dr. Dinah Drax here. I’ve been waiting for your call.”
    “ You ’ve been waiting for my call?!”
    “Yes.”
    “But I tried to call this morning and I was on hold for about a year. I thought there must’ve been a million people in the queue.”
    “But I told you that you were specially selected. Didn’t you believe me?”
    “Yeah. But…the on-hold thing went on so long.”
    “I really wanted to share that piece of music with you.”
    “Well…thanks. I enjoyed it.”
    “And to find out how patient you were. Patience will be an essential quality on this trip.”
    “Oh, I can be patient. Really. I can sit for hours.”
    “Good. Well, Mr. Digby, you’re through.”
    “That is completely cosmic.”
    “A car will collect you from your registered address at oh-eight hundred