Iggy and Me and the Happy Birthday Read online

  Iggy and Me and the Happy Birthday

  Jenny Valentine

  Table of Contents

  Cover Page

  Title Page

  Iggy the fish

  Iggy’s birthday list

  Poor Iggy

  Iggy and the Snow Queen

  Iggy and the birthday cakes

  Happy birthday, Iggy!

  Iggy on wheels

  Iggy and the hamster

  About the author

  Also by Jenny Valentine

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Iggy the fish

  My name is Flo and I have a little sister called Iggy.

  Iggy was learning to swim. Dad said she was taking her time about it. This was because Iggy pretended to swim by walking about in the shallow end and doing all the right things with her arms.

  “The top half has got it,” said Dad, “but somebody forgot to tell the legs.”

  Iggy didn’t think her legs needed to be told.

  “Look,” she said. “Swimming is easy.” And she hopped from one foot to the other and flapped her arms about.

  Dad said she looked like a duck coming in to land.

  Mum said, “Iggy, that isn’t swimming.”

  “Yes it is,” Iggy said.

  I was keeping out of it.

  On the way home on the bus, Iggy was falling asleep. Dad said she was tired from all her underwater running.

  “I’m not tired,” Iggy said, opening one eye and then closing it again. “And I wasn’t running.”

  “What are we going to do with you?” said Mum. “How are we going to teach you to swim?”

  “I can swim,” Iggy said.

  “Half of you can,” Dad said. Iggy folded her arms and turned away.

  “How did I learn to swim?” I said.

  “We dropped you in the water when you were a baby,” Dad said.

  Iggy sniggered and then pretended it was a snore.

  “Dad!” I said. “That’s not very nice!”

  “We didn’t drop you,” Mum said, elbowing Dad. “We were in the pool with you and we let you go.”

  “Is that allowed?” I said.

  Mum said, “We went to special classes. We didn’t just throw you in.”

  Dad said that all babies knew how to swim if you just dunked them in and helped them to remember.

  Mum said, “Babies are surrounded by water when they’re in the womb.”

  I looked at Mum’s tummy. Iggy opened her eyes again.

  “Why didn’t you do that to Iggy?” I said.

  “We tried,” said Mum. “But she didn’t like it.”

  “You didn’t like it,” said Dad.

  “She was crying,” Mum said.

  “Screaming,” said Dad.

  “Iggy didn’t take to it like you, Flo,” said Mum. “You were a little fish.”

  Iggy sat up straight on the bus seat. She said, “I don’t want to be a fish. Who’d want to be a fish?”

  “Exactly,” said Dad. “Who wants to be a fish when they can be a piglet?” And he tickled her until she snorted.

  Later that week, Iggy had her first swimming lesson. I went with Mum to watch while Dad was at work.

  It was in a secret, special pool that was hidden from all the other pools. You wouldn’t know it was there. It was small and there was no deep end – you could stand anywhere in it. And the water was warm, nearly hot, like a bath.

  There were four other people in Iggy’s class:

  a boy with Spider-man goggles and Incredible Hulk trunks;

  a girl with orange hair and an orange bikini, who cried and wouldn’t look at the water;

  a girl with a special float-suit on that meant she couldn’t sink, and which was probably cheating;

  and a boy from school called James, who was wearing pink armbands and looked even crosser than Iggy.

  “I want to go home,” Iggy said. “I don’t like swimming lessons.”

  “You’ve never had one before,” Mum said. “You might like it.”

  Iggy frowned and put her towel over her head. “I don’t want one,” she said.

  “Too late,” said Mum. “I just paid for six.”

  It was really hot in there with all our clothes on, and a bit funny-smelling, of pool water and other things. I took my coat off. The floor was wet so I had to keep it on my knee which was just as hot as wearing it. Everyone’s mums and dads and brothers and sisters were sitting on a bench at the side of the room. We were waiting for the teacher.

  The orange haired girl still wasn’t looking at the water. The boy in the goggles was fiddling with his trunk;

  James’s mum was blowing up his armbands till they were too tight for him to take off. Iggy was hiding under her towel.

  When the teacher came in she looked a bit like a mermaid. She had long wavy hair like mermaids do. She was wearing flip-flops and a red T-shirt that said LITTLE SPLASHERS on it in yellow writing. She got in the water with her T-shirt on.

  Iggy appeared from under her towel at the sound of flip-flops. “Is she allowed to do that?” she said.

  “I suppose so,’ said Mum.

  The teacher’s name was Sasha. She called the class over to sit on the edge of the pool. The orange girl’s mum had to go with her. You could see she was worried about her clothes getting wet.

  “Let’s see what you can do,” Sasha said.

  The orange girl did crying on dry land.

  The floating girl did floating.

  The boy with the goggles did splashing his brother.

  James did doggy paddle and swallowing too much water.

  And Iggy did running on the spot and flapping her arms.

  “Very good,” said Sasha.

  Iggy looked at us and pulled a face that said, “See? I told you I could swim.”

  Sasha said, “Who can put their head underwater?”

  Iggy ducked under and came back up again. “I told you so,” her face said.

  “Who can open their eyes down there?”

  “Easy peasy,” Iggy’s smile said.

  “Who can make their bottom float up to the surface?”

  Iggy’s smile disappeared. She looked at the others. Floating girl could. James could. The Incredible Hulk could.

  Iggy couldn’t. She lifted one leg, and then the other. One half of her bottom floated at a time, but not the whole thing.

  “Oh dear,” Mum said. “It’s the moment of realisation.”

  “What’s that mean?” I said.

  “Iggy just found out she can’t swim,” said Mum.

  Iggy’s was frowning. She was biting her lip. Her face didn’t say, “See?” any more. It said, “Help!”

  “Come on, Iggy!” we said. “You can do it!”

  Iggy’s face said, “No I can’t.”

  “Right,” Sasha said to Iggy. “Let’s have a look at you.”

  Iggy did balancing on one leg at a time.

  Sasha put her hand under Iggy’s tummy. Both her feet left the floor and her whole bottom did floating. Iggy looked very surprised.

  “That,” Sasha said, “is what swimming feels like. Have a go.”

  Iggy flapped her arms and legs about like a wild thing, while her teacher held her up.

  “Perfect,” said Sasha.

  “Perfect,” said Iggy in the changing room.

  “Perfect,” she said on the bus.

  “Perfect,” she said when Dad asked her how the lesson went.

  “What was the teacher like?” he said.

  “Perfect,” Iggy said.

  I said, “She looked like a mermaid.”

  “No she didn’t,” Iggy said.

  “I thin
k she did.”

  Iggy looked at me like I was crazy. She said, “Flo, mermaids don’t have any legs.”

  Mum and Dad laughed.

  I said, “I meant her hair mainly.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  “What did you do?” said Dad.

  “Swimming, silly,” Iggy said.

  “Oh,” said Dad. “How do you do ‘swimming, silly’? Do you hop up and down and splash your top half about?”

  Iggy looked cross, Mum said, “Stop it,” and Dad said, “OK.”

  I was keeping out of it again.

  “We did floating bottoms,” Iggy said. “If you must know.”

  “What’s a floating bottom?” said Dad.

  Iggy giggled.

  “How do you float a bottom?” Dad said. “I have to know.”

  Iggy said, “It’s easy. You let go with your feet.”

  “Maybe you could show me next time we go swimming,” Dad said.

  Iggy said, “Can we go now?”

  “Not now, Iggy,” said Mum. “It’s almost bedtime.”

  “Can we go tomorrow?” Iggy said.

  “Maybe,” said Mum. “I think we probably could.”

  “Good,” said Iggy. “Then I can show all of you.”

  Iggy went to all six of her swimming lessons. Then she went to six more.

  One day we were all swimming. Mum and Dad, and Iggy and me. I was being a mermaid and going underwater to find treasure. Dad threw his goggles for me and I dived down for them. They were the treasure.

  Iggy was swimming along behind. Her feet weren’t touching the bottom. Her legs were kicking and her arms were flapping and she was doing everything right. She swam up to Dad and held on to him to get her breath back.

  “I’ve got bad news for you, Iggy,” he said.

  “What?” Iggy said. Her hair was all wet and peaky, and drops of water kept dripping in her eyes. “What?” she said again.

  “You’ve turned into a fish,” Dad said.

  Iggy smiled. “It’s better than being a piglet,” she said, and she swam off, with her whole bottom floating, to find Mum.

  Iggy’s birthday list

  A long time before Iggy’s birthday, we were all in the garden. Mum was digging and Dad was reading the newspaper. Iggy and me were putting food out for the birds.

  “Mum and Dad,” she said. “You know my birthday? Can I have a pet?”

  Dad rustled his paper and Mum stopped digging.

  Dad said, “What birthday?”

  Mum said, “It’s ages away.”

  “Is it?” Iggy said.

  “Ages,” said Dad, looking out from behind his paper.

  Iggy drooped a little bit, but she carried on anyway.

  “Well, when it’s not ages away any more, can I have a pet? For my birthday?”

  Mum and Dad smiled at each other. Dad shook his head.

  “What sort of pet?” I asked.

  “Just a small one,” Iggy said. “Like a puppy or a kitten.”

  “Puppies and kittens grow into dogs and cats,” said Dad.

  “I know that, silly,” she said.

  “Dogs and cats are big,” Dad said.

  “Well, smaller then,” said Iggy. “A rabbit or a guinea pig or – I know! – a hamster.”

  “What about an ant or a spider or an earwig?” Dad said. “They’re small and they’re very little trouble.”

  “Ewww,” Iggy said. “I don’t want them. I want something nice and soft and furry.”

  “Some spiders are furry,” I said.

  Iggy glared at me. “I don’t want a spider, Flo,” she said. “I want a hamster.”

  “Good luck with that,” said Dad, and he went back to his reading.

  “Put it on your birthday list,” said Mum.

  “What birthday list?”

  “A list of things you’d like for your birthday,”

  Mum said. “You could start making it now.”

  So Iggy did.

  She went straightaway to get some pens and paper. She sat at the table in the garden, and she put pebbles on the corners to stop her list flapping around and blowing away. Then she tipped all the pens out of her pencil case and put on her very busy face.

  At the top she wrote IGGY’S BIRTHDAY LIST in big, all-different-colour letters.

  “Look Flo,” she said, and she held it up for me to see.

  “Cool,” I said.

  Then she put 1: A hamster

  “Look, Flo,” she said again. “That’s good.”

  Iggy sat and thought for a minute. “If I only put one thing on my list, will I definitely get it?”

  “No,” said Mum and Dad together.

  “What will I get then?” Iggy said.

  I said, “A surprise.”

  “I don’t like surprises,” said Iggy.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don’t know what they are.”

  Dad laughed.

  “That’s the whole point,” I told her. “That’s what surprises are.”

  Mum said, “Do you remember when you thought we were going to the supermarket and we went to the Safari Park instead? You were really surprised then.”

  “Oh yes,” Iggy said. “I forgot. I do like surprises.”

  “Good,” said Mum.

  “But I like hamsters more,” Iggy said. “Can my surprise be a hamster?”

  “No!” said Mum and Dad.

  Iggy looked at her list of one thing for a long time. Mum did more digging and Dad did more newspaper rustling, and I waited for the birds to come and eat their snacks.

  “What shall number two be?” Iggy said.

  Mum said, “There’s no hurry,” and Dad said, “What about a motorbike?”

  Iggy frowned at him. “I’m not allowed a motorbike. I’m too young for one of those.”

  “You’ll think of something,” said Mum.

  I said, “I bet there are loads of things you want.”

  “Oooh,” said Iggy. “If I write loads of things on my list, will I get them all?”

  “No,” said Mum and Dad.

  “So why am I writing them?”

  “To give us an idea of what you want,” Mum said.

  “A hamster,” Iggy said. “A hamster, a hamster, a hamster!”

  “OK, enough,” said Dad. “This conversation is going round in circles.”

  “Hamsters do that,” Iggy said. “Gruffles, the hamster in our class, is going round in circles all the time.”

  Mum looked very carefully into the hole that she was making and Dad looked very carefully at the news. They didn’t say anything.

  Iggy worked on her list of one thing until lunchtime.

  “Look Flo,” she said.

  Next to 1: A hamster there was a very good picture of a hamster in its cage. It was peeking through the bars with its twitchy nose and its little hands showing.

  Underneath that, Iggy had written 2: ??????

  The question marks were all the colours of the rainbow.

  “I don’t know what else to want,” she said.

  I said I would help her.

  For lunch we had omelettes and tomatoes and lettuce. Normally Iggy is a big fidget and a big chatterbox at the table, and she takes ages to finish. Today she was still and quiet and eating.

  “Are you OK, Iggy?” Dad said. “You are acting very strangely.”

  “No I’m not,” said Iggy. “I’m thinking.”

  “Thinking about what?” Mum said.

  “What I want that isn’t a hamster,” Iggy said.

  Mum and Dad laughed, and she frowned at them. She said, “It’s harder than you think.”

  After lunch we started thinking together.

  “What do other people have that you would like?” I said.

  “Our whole class has a hamster.”

  “Apart from one of those,” I said. “That’s on the list already.”

  “Frankie Day’s got a bike,” Iggy said.

  “What sort of bike?”

/>   “A brilliant one. It’s got tassels on the handlebars and a bell. It’s got a basket for stuff at the front and a special seat for teddies at the back.”

  “Wow,” I said. “What colour is it?”

  “Pink and purple.”

  “What colour bike would you have if you could?”

  “Pink and purple,” Iggy said. “If I could, I’d have one exactly the same.”

  “So write it down.”

  Next to 2: Iggy put A bike like Frankie’s, and she drew it too, with tassels and a bear all strapped in behind the saddle.

  When she had finished we both looked at it. “I’d really like one of those,’ she said.

  I said, “That’s why it’s number two on your list, because you’d really like it.”

  “So,” Iggy said, “if I didn’t really want something, it would be really later on in the list.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “Like what?”

  “Like poo on a stick, or to have to kiss a frog, or get tickled till I’m sick.”

  “Those could be really low down on your list,” I said. “Or you could just not put them there at all.”

  “What else?” she said. “What else do I want that other people have got?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. I told her about my best friend Star. She’s got a plug-in piano in her bedroom. I’d really like one.

  “Noah Green has got a telly in his bedroom,” Iggy said. “Shall I want one of those?”

  “Don’t bother,” said Dad, walking past with his cup of coffee. “It will never happen.”

  Iggy screwed her face up with more thinking. “I know,” she said. “I like Elsa Russell’s shoes.”

  “What are they like?”

  “They are red trainers with her own name on. She made them on the computer and they arrived in a box.”

  She put 3: Shoes with my name on, and she drew them too. The way Iggy draws shoes is funny. They looked like big boats.

  “What about clothes?” I said. “Would some new clothes be good?”

  Iggy chewed her pencil. She wrote 4: A party dress for my party.

  Then without any help at all, Iggy wrote and drew

  5: A treehouse with curtains

  6: A trampoline

  7: A doll with real hair you can cut and not get told off