Reflecto Girl: Harsh But Fair continues (For the story so far, click here 🙂 )
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animals, badgers, cows
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animals, badgers, cows
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animals, badgers, cows
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Story continues on Monday.
Have a great weekend 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animals, badgers, cows
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Story continues tomorrow
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animals, badgers, cows
We love Louis Sachar (whose name rhymes with cracker – in case you were wondering) and after reading Fuzzy Mud I decided that it qualified as a vegan book for children 🙂 It doesn’t use the v-word but the main protagonist seems to be a plant-eater (there is no mention of any meat/fish/egg or dairy in her diet) and the grippingly entertaining story is wrapped around a vitally important environmental message. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to discover that Louis Sachar was veg*n but I have no idea whether he actually is. Anyway, this book qualifies so I wanted to share it with you 🙂
The story is about Tamaya who has a scholarship to a posh school and walks there every day with Marshall who is a year older than her (they’re pre-teens I think). They never go through the woods because there are creepy rumours about a strange guy who lives there. And they’ve been told not to. Meanwhile, on the other side of the woods a laboratory is developing a new “green” fuel, made of artificially engineered living micro-organisms, aka ‘fuzzy mud’. Well, one day, after being challenged to a fight by the school bully, Marshall decides, for his own safety, to go home via the woods. Tamaya doesn’t want to go that way but she’s not supposed to walk home alone so she follows him. And that’s when it gets really scary!
I’m not going to tell you anymore (and don’t spoil it for yourself by reading the Amazon blurb because it gives too much away) because you should get the book and enjoy the whole thing from the beginning 🙂
Author: Louis Sachar
Genre: Juvenile fiction/thriller
Recommended for readers aged 8 and up
Format: Paperback (256 pages) and Kindle Edition and Audio Download
Published: August 2016
ISBN-10: 1408864754
ISBN-13: 978-1408864753
Dimensions: 19.7 x 1.3 x 13.1cm
Available from Amazon and undoubtedly other bookshops and libraries 🙂
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, moles, animals,
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
Story concludes tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, moles, animals,
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
Story continues on Monday. Have a great weekend 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, moles, animals,
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, moles, animals,
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, moles, animals,
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
Use the zoom in your browser to enlarge for easier reading 🙂
Reflecto Girl: Sidekick continues …
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story
Reflecto Girl episode 5 is the latest story to get the Comic Life treatment 😀
And it begins here!
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Reflecto Girl: Sidekick
Story continues tomorrow 🙂
For earlier episodes of Reflecto Girl, click here 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
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That’s it for Venus Aqueous #5
Have a great weekend 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from Friday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
The story concludes next week but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
Have a great weekend!
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from Friday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues Monday but if you don’t want to wait, click Venus #5 now 😀
Have a great weekend! 😀
*************************************
vegan, vegetarian, animals, fish, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation, activism
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you want to read the whole story now, click Venus #5 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation
Story continues from yesterday.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you want to read the whole story now, click Venus #5 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights, conservation
Venus Aqueous episode 5 has been given the Comic Life treatment 😀
Instalments begin here.
To enlarge images for easier reading, use the zoom in your browser 🙂
Story continues tomorrow but if you want to read the whole story now, click Venus #5 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, animals, marine animals, children, children’s story, comics, children’s comics, vegan comics, vegan children’s story, animal rights
Megan is back from outer space and she’s got some investigating to do!
New story – episode 6 – starts next week 😀
You know where to find us 😉
And if you’re not familiar with Megan & Flos, you can catch up on the stories so far, right here, or via the stories for ages 8 and up page 😀
vegan children’s story, vegan comic, vegan fiction, vegan science fiction, vegan juvenile fiction
Story continues from yesterday:
😀
For the whole story, and the background and sources that informed it, click here
Let the dogs out is also available in paperback 🙂
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vegan, juvenile fiction, anti-vivisection, animals, dogs, illustration, animal rights, vegan story, vegan children’s story
Story continues from last week:
Story concludes tomorrow
For the whole story click here
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vegan, juvenile fiction, anti-vivisection, animals, dogs, illustration, animal rights, vegan story, vegan children’s story
Story continues from yesterday:
Story continues Monday
For the whole story click here
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vegan, juvenile fiction, anti-vivisection, animals, dogs, illustration, animal rights, vegan story, vegan children’s story
story continues from last week:
continues tomorrow
For the whole story click here
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vegan, juvenile fiction, anti-vivisection, animals, dogs, illustration, animal rights
story continues tomorrow …
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vegan, vegetarian, vegan children’s story, anti-vivisection story, art, illustration, watercolour
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vegan, vegetarian, anti-vivisection, children’s story, children’s book,
The Wicked Witch’s Plan To Get Rid Of Everyone, a new version of the fairy tale The Wicked Wicked Witch and the Ruinous Manipulation by Maud Earnshaw, illustrated by Beatrice Wilberforce, includes instructions about how to break the witch’s spell at the back 😉
Available from Amazon in the UK, Europe, USA and Canada
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vegan children’s book, vegan fairy tale, vegan children’s story
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 🙂
Chapter 16 continues from yesterday:
Mum opened the bedroom door.
“Luke, don’t you want to help decorate the tree?”
“erm, no thanks,” he said without looking at her.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you sure? You haven’t been yourself since we went to the Maybury Centre.”
Luke didn’t say anything. Mum tried again.
“What happened to upset you? I thought you’d like it there.”
Luke let go of his trains, sat back and looked at her.
“I’m fed up.”
“Why?”
“Coz I’m fed up of grown ups not doin’ what they say.”
Mrs Walker waited for more.
“Maybury is a animal sanctry wot says it teaches people to be kind to animals. A man from Maybury even came to give a talk at school to tell us not to keep animals in small cages, or let them have puppies.”
“Okay,”
“So why do people whose whole job is lookin’ after animals and teachin’ other people to look after ’em prop’ly, still let animals be killed for food? Why don’t they care about them animals? Why do they on’y care about some animals?”
“What makes you think …”
“They sell dead animals in their cafe.”
“Really? That does surprise me.”
“If I can’t trust people whose job is lookin’ after animals then I can’t trust nobody. ‘cept myself!”
“Ooh, that’s hard. No wonder you’re fed up,” said Mum sympathetically.
“And Joe,” he admitted.
“Well, that’s something. But you know Luke, you shouldn’t give up. You should tell them how you feel. You should tell them you are offended by their decision to sell meat in their cafe.”
“I did tell ’em.”
“Good. And what did they say?”
“Nothin’ sensible. Jus’ said it was okay coz it was rangin’ and stainable. Rubbish!”
“Tell them again. Write them a letter.”
“What’s the point? They won’t take no notice o’ me.”
Mrs Walker was sorry her son felt so discouraged. It was a terrible thing to lose your faith in humanity at such a young age.
“The thing is,” she told him, “you never know when someone might listen. The only thing you can be sure of is that if you don’t say anything, they definitely won’t get the message.”
Luke looked at her and didn’t say anything.
“Come with me, come and help decorate the tree,” she said.
When they got to the living room Jared and Dad already had things well underway. The tree was gleaming with glittery gold and silver tinsel and different coloured shiny baubles.
“Mm, pretty good,” said Mum, “but it’s missing something.”
“The star for the top,” said Jared, “I’m just about to do it.”
“Something else,” said Mum and she left the room.
A moment later she was back with a small box from the kitchen. She handed it to Luke.
“No Christmas tree is complete without a few sweet treats,” she said, smiling.
Luke looked in the box. It was full of chocolate Santas. On the wrappers were the words:
Moo Free Organic Chocolate,
DAIRY FREE, GLUTEN FREE, VEGAN
Luke’s jaw dropped and his eyes lit up.
“Are these for me?” he asked.
“No, greedy boy, they’re for all of us! Why don’t you hang them on the tree?”
“But, … how come …?”
“I found your leaflets,” Mum explained.
“What leaflets?”
“The ones stuffed in the back pocket of your black cords; the black cords you shoved under the bed and forgot about I don’t know how long ago.”
“Oh, I wondered where they were.”
“Well I found them and I checked the pockets before putting them in the wash, and there were these leaflets. One with a picture of a cow on the front entitled ‘The Dark Side of Dairy’ and one with a cute little brown and white piglet on the front entitled ‘Think Before You Eat’.”
“And you read them?”
“And I read them.”
“And that’s why …?”
“Yes it is,” she paused for a moment, searching for the right words. “Luke,” she went on, “you have good instincts. When you started this crusade for animals you did it on instinct. You hadn’t been told any of the shocking facts and figures that are in those leaflets, you just knew it wasn’t right. And you did something about it. You spoke out bravely and you acted. You broke the rules when you felt you had to and you endured punishments, but you never wavered; you never stopped fighting.”
Luke nodded. He wasn’t sure why his mum was explaining something that she must have known he already knew, but he waited. It would become clear eventually. She continued.
“So I don’t want you to give up hope now. I want you to know that if you keep trying, you will make a difference. You have already made a difference for Curly and Little Squirt and the rabb.., er, the damsons, but even more than that, you’re a good influence on other people.”
Now, those were words Luke never thought he’d hear from his mother.
“You have been a good influence on us.”
At this point she took his hand, led him into the kitchen and opened the freezer.
“What d’you fancy for Christmas dinner?” she asked.
Luke looked in the freezer. It was full – Mum always did a big shop for the Christmas holidays – and there were quite a few unfamiliar boxes and cartons. He lifted them out one at a time to read the descriptions:
Cauldron Wholefood Burgers
Made with Chickpeas, Cauliflower, Aduki Beans, Broad Beans, Spinach, Onions, Garlic & Potatoes
Cauldron Wholefood Sausages
Made with Grilled Vegetables (Peppers, Courgette, Onion), Beans & Wheat
Cauldron Aduki Bean Melt
“The combination of aduki beans, spinach and mushrooms deliciously filled with mango chutney and carefully coated in breadcrumbs gives a satisfyingly moreish taste.”
Biona Red Lentil Sun Seed Burger
A flavoursome vegan burger made with red lentils, pumpkin and sunflower seeds with a subtle hint of spice. Made using all natural, organic ingredients and free from artificial colours or flavours. Perfect loaded with your favourite burger toppings, added to salads or dipped in sweet chilli sauce as a tasty and nutritious snack.
Can be eaten hot or cold.
Dee’s 6 Leek & Onion Vegan Sausages
The perfect partner to velvety mashed potatoes and homemade gravy, our Leek and Onion Sausages will become an instant family favourite on your weekly menu.
Dragonfly Organic Bubble & Squeak Tatty
Our Tatty is a vegetarian burger that has a real bubble & squeak feel about it, made using locally sourced cabbage and onions
Linda McCartney Vegetarian Country Pies
Vegetarian pie made from a shortcrust pastry base, filled with rehydrated textured soya protein in a rich onion and beef-style gravy, topped with a puff pastry lid.
Linda McCartney Vegetarian Sausage Rolls
Vegetarian Cumberland sausage-style filling wrapped in puff pastry.
And there were three flavours of luxury organic vegan ice cream:
Booja Booja Hazelnut Chocolate Truffle, Booja Booja Raspberry Ripple and Booja Booja Caramel Pecan Praline.
Luke was no longer fed up. He smiled broadly at his mum.
“Are these for all of us?”
“Yes they are. For all of us,” she said happily, “and I got them from Besco’s. They sell them in mainstream supermarkets Luke and that just shows how much progress you’re making. That’s what happens when you speak out and you keep speaking out.”
Mrs Walker was treated to a rare hug which lasted a good half minute, and then Luke ran from the kitchen.
“Where are you going?” she called after him.
“I’ve got some letters to write!” he said.
Happy Christmas everybody!
We hope you have a good one!
❤ ❤ We’ll see you in the New Year! 😀 ❤ ❤
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vegan, vegetarian, vegan children, veggie kids, animals, animal sanctuary, Christmas, children’s story, vegan children’s story, children’s book, vegan children’s book, juvenile fiction, hope
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 🙂
Chapter 16 continues from yesterday:
“Luke! There you are!” called Mum, “you do have a penchant for wandering off.”
Luke had no idea what a ponshon was but decided to take her word for it.
“Look what I’ve got!” she said. She sounded excited. “I won it! Well, I bought so many tickets I almost bought it!”
Luke looked at the slightly torn, slightly scratched, slightly coming apart at one end, box she was carrying. He could hardly believe it.
“Is that the same as ..?” he asked her.
“Exactly the same!” she said. She sounded so happy. “Here you are darling, this is yours.”
She was holding a Hornby R.793 King Size Electric train set. It was exactly the same as Grandad Pete’s. Grandad Pete was Mum’s dad and he loved trains. He was a volunteer fireman at his local steam railway and he used to let Luke ride the engine with him when they visited at Easter and August bank holiday. His Hornby train set had three locomotives – a King Henry VIII, a Class 29 (type 2) Bo-Bo, and a Class 3F Jinty Tank. Plus it had coaches, wagons, trackside accessories and buildings. It was brilliant.
Whenever they went to visit Grandad Pete, Luke and Grandad went up to the loft and played with the train set for hours. It was always set up. Always ready to play.
Grandad died the day after Luke’s seventh birthday. He left Luke the train set in his will because he wanted it to go to someone who loved it as much as he had.
Sadly, Mum, because of an unfortunate series of events which were of no interest to Luke, accidentally backed over it with the car. Luke had been devastated. Mum equally so. She couldn’t replace it because they didn’t make them like that any more. And Luke didn’t want just any train set. But now she’d found one. And it really was exactly the same as Grandad’s. Luke was momentarily lost for words. He looked up at Mum’s glowing face.
“Thank you,” he tried to say but the words caught in his throat. He was overwhelmed. “Can we go home and set it up?” he asked.
“Now?” she asked, “are we done here?”
“I’m done here,” he replied.
***
On Christmas Eve, Luke pulled down the peak of his blue engine driver’s cap, blew his whistle and called,
“All aboard!”
The train pulled out of the station. It picked up speed and smoothly rode the tracks through Lego town, across the Scarf-River bridge, under the Bed-Tunnel through Bed-Mountain, and onto the Blue Pillowcase Coast. When it got to Seaside station it stopped to pick up Batman, Spiderman and a couple of soldiers on leave, before continuing on its journey to the end of the line. There was a near accident when a giant brown and white dog stepped onto the track but tragedy was averted when a quick-thinking observer lured the animal out of harm’s way with a Digestive.
Outside, a car door slammed.
“Luke, Jared – Dad’s home. He’s got the tree!” Mum called from downstairs, “come down and help me decorate it.”
Jared thundered down the stairs. Luke was too busy. Batman was late for a job interview – the train must keep going. As it sped towards the old suspension bridge, the driver noticed two of the shoe lace suspenders had snapped, and the others looked like they’d struggle to take the strain. He applied the brake but it was too late, the train was going too fast, it wouldn’t be able to stop in time. Suddenly Spiderman climbed out of the window and ran along the roof of the train to the front. He spun his web and ….
Mum opened the bedroom door.
“Luke, don’t you want to help decorate the tree?”
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Story concludes tomorrow 🙂 or you can read the whole chapter right now 😉
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vegan, vegetarian, vegan children, veggie kids, animals, animal sanctuary, Christmas, children’s story, vegan children’s story, children’s book, vegan children’s book, juvenile fiction
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 🙂
Chapter 16 continues from yesterday:
When he got to the cafe he decided to pop in. He knew that 87p wouldn’t ordinarily get him a cupcake but, since the end of the day was approaching, they might have made them half price. Or maybe there was a squashed one that nobody else wanted. It was worth a look. He stepped inside and picked up a menu. That was somewhat disturbing.
This animal sanctuary, this place of love and compassion, of respite and rescue; this place whose slogan, “We care about the well being of every animal”, was written across every sign and above every doorway, was selling dead animals in its cafe.
Luke spoke to the lady behind the till.
“Why are you selling meat?”
“Erm, well, it’s on the menu,” she replied.
“But why is it on the menu?”
“Because it’s a cafe,” she said, not knowing why he was confused.
“It’s a animal sanct’ry cafe,” Luke pointed out, “and meat is dead animals.”
“Ahh,” she replied, finally understanding where he was coming from. “All of our meat is from local, free range farms.”
“What does that mean?”
“It’s sustainable.”
“What does that mean?”
By this time a queue had formed behind Luke and when the manager saw that it wasn’t moving, he came over.
“Is everything okay over here?” he asked the lady on the till.
“Oh, yes, erm, this young man has a question about the menu,” she told him.
The manager steered Luke away from the counter.
“How can I help you?” he asked.
Luke started again.
“Why do you sell meat here?”
“Because people want to eat it,” the manager answered.
“But what about the animals who get killed for your meat?”
“Well, …”
“And your eggs?”
“Ah, the eggs …”
“And cheese and milk and ice cream?” Luke was getting louder and people were starting to look.
The manager spoke quietly in an effort to diffuse the situation.
“I assure you that all the meat, eggs, fish, and dairy sold here comes from local free range farms with sustainable practices.”
Luke was exasperated.
“That’s what she said!”
“Yes.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that it doesn’t come from factory farms where animals are kept in small cages. The animals are well looked after and are free to walk around.”
“Until they’re killed,” said Luke.
“Er, yes,” said the manager.
“And are the killin’ sheds free range?”
“Er, no,” the manager admitted.
“Are they special killin’ sheds or are they the same killin’ sheds what the factory farm animals go to?”
The manager knew a lot of eyes were on him and for a few moments he didn’t say anything. Luke, however, had plenty more to say.
“They’re the same horrible killin’ sheds aren’t they? And them animals is the same as the animals who you look after here; who you say you love; who you say should be treated kindly.”
At this the manager felt he had a good come-back. He answered with confidence.
“Ah, no, we don’t sell the meat of any of the species who live at the sanctuary. Only beef and pork and fish.”
Luke looked at him with disdain.
“And,” the manager added with a smile, “we do have vegetarian and vegan options on the menu. We’ve got something for everyone.”
Luke was bitterly disappointed in what he had thought was a wonderful place. That this was happening made absolutely no sense to him. He was so sick and tired of adults saying one thing and doing another. The manager, taking his silence as an end to their debate, turned to walk away. Luke touched his arm and said,
“So, you know about veggietareun food, you know there’s no need to eat animals, but you still have ’em killed because some people like eatin’ ’em. And Maybury says it wants to teach people how to be kind to animals but it doesn’t set a good example of not eatin’ ’em. It lets people think it’s okay to eat ’em. It pretends it’s not cruel to eat ’em so people keep on doin’ it. So it’s your fault when people keep on doin’ it coz you could ‘ave told ’em not to and you didn’t.”
He turned and walked out. He didn’t want a cake any more.
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Story continues tomorrow 🙂 or you can read the whole chapter right now, no waiting 😉
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vegan, vegetarian, vegan children, veggie kids, animals, animal sanctuary, Christmas, children’s story, vegan children’s story, children’s book, vegan children’s book, juvenile fiction
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 🙂
And here is the beginning of Chapter 16, the final chapter of the second book, More Luke Walker: animal stick up for-er:
Luke Walker and the Maybury Christmas Fayre
Luke reached for it at the exact same time as Jared. They scowled at each other.
“Let me have it. I saw it first,” Luke insisted.
“We saw it at the same time,” Jared argued, “and I’m the oldest so you have to do what I say.”
“I do not,” said Luke emphatically.
“Boys!” Mr Walker halted their squabbling, “what’s the trouble now?”
“I want to get this for Mum,” explained Luke, “I saw it first.”
“No he didn’t!” argued his brother, “I saw it first and I want to get it for Mum.”
The item in question was a dainty ceramic ornament depicting Little Bo Peep with a lamb – an ideal Christmas gift for anyone’s mother. Dad took it off them and asked the lady how much it was.
“All the small ornaments are 50p,” she told him.
Dad looked at Jared and appealed to his better nature.
“Luke doesn’t have much money Jared, so this is all he can afford. You’ve got your paper round money so you’ll be able to find something else. Let your brother have this one.”
Jared shrugged.
“Okay,” he agreed and wandered off to the home-made jam stall.
Luke pulled a sticky fifty pence piece out of his pocket and handed it to the lady. She wrapped the ornament in tissue paper for him. Dad smiled.
“Your mum’ll love that Luke, nice find.”
“Where is Mum?” Luke asked.
“Where d’you think?” said Dad, grinning.
“Tombola!” they both said at the same time.
This was the first time they’d been to the Maybury Christmas Fayre and it was pretty good. There were lots of stalls where you could buy Christmas presents for reasonable prices – some things were second hand, some were home-made. There were games, like Mum’s favourite, the Tombola, where you had to get a ticket ending in 5 or 0 to win a prize, and some which had a prize every time like the lucky dip or Luke’s favourite where you paid 50p for a jar wrapped in Christmas paper without knowing what was in it. If you were lucky it might be a jar full of sweets or marbles; if you were unlucky it might be full of tea bags. But even that wasn’t a complete loss because it could be a Christmas present for someone. Nan liked tea. There was also a cake stall, a raffle, and a dog show to see who was the prettiest dog and who was the cleverest dog and who was the most obedient dog. Luke knew that Dudley wouldn’t enjoy that because he was the type of dog who had no interest in performing. He was clever, but didn’t feel it necessary to prove that to anyone. He was his own dog and Luke respected that.
The other good thing about the Christmas Fayre was that it was in aid of helping animals. Maybury Centre for Animal Welfare was a sanctuary where they looked after horses and donkeys and sheep and chickens and tortoises and anyone else who needed help and came their way. They also rescued dogs and cats and rabbits and guinea pigs who’d been abandoned or neglected or cruelly treated, and they found happy new homes for them. Luke was very glad that his Christmas shopping money was going to such a good cause.
By three o’clock Luke had done all his shopping and was very happy with what he’d got for everyone: Little Bo-Peep for Mum; gloves for Dad; football book for Jared; jar of tea for Nan; bowling DVD for Grandad; and a jar of marbles for Joe. Plus he’d been lucky enough to score a jar of gobstoppers and a really cool stainless steel whistle for himself.
Luke had 87p left so while Dad went to find Mum, he decided to have a final look round. In doing so he came across a man wearing climbing gear standing behind a table with a pen and a long list of names and numbers.
“Sponsor me to abseil down the clock tower?” he solicited.
“What’s that?” asked Luke.
“Abseil means to descend down the side of a building on a rope.”
Luke looked confused.
The man tried again to explain.
“So, I’ll stand on the top of the tower wearing this harness attached to a rope which will be doubled through a loop. And I’ll jump off the top and bounce my feet on the side of the tower, going down bit by bit, sliding the rope through my hands until I get the bottom.”
“Yeah, I get what you mean, but why would you do that?”
“To raise money for Maybury.”
“But why don’t you get sponsored to do somethin’ useful, instead of abstainin’.”
“Abseiling,” he corrected. “Raising money is useful for Maybury. They can do a lot of good things with it.”
“Yes, but if the thing you got sponsored for doin’ was useful as well, like you could get sponsored for pickin’ up litter, then you would get money and at the same time you would have done somethin’ really useful.”
The man looked over Luke’s head at the elderly couple approaching his table.
“Sponsor me to abseil down the clock tower?” he asked them.
Luke moved on.
*********************************
Story continues tomorrow 🙂 or you can read the whole chapter right now, no waiting 😉
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Chapter 15 continues from yesterday:
The chairs were turned upside down on the desks; the bins were empty and the paint pots were washed up and stacked on the draining board. Everything except Mr Beardsley’s desk was swept and dusted and tidy.
Mr Beardsley’s desk was always a mess – he said it was the only way he knew where to find anything. Luke decided to see if there was anything worth finding. There were post-it notes, pencils, pens, two coffee mugs, a pencil sharpener, a stopwatch, a calculator – a calculator?!
“One rule for them, another rule for us!” thought Luke.
There were two piles of exercise books – blue maths ones and yellow history ones. Luke sought out his own for a sneak preview of his grades.
“He hasn’t even marked ’em yet!” he grumbled, exasperated, “what’s the point of makin’ us hand ’em in on Friday if you’re not gonna mark ’em ’til next week?!”
There was nothing else of interest on top of the desk so Luke tried the drawer. It was unlocked.
“Aha!” He lifted out a large hardback diary, “let’s see what you’re gonna make us do next week.”
He dropped the dog-eared book onto the desk and opened it to the first week of December.
Monday was left blank so Luke, cleverly imitating Mr Beardsley’s handwriting, wrote:
On the Tuesday page was a barely legible scribble which seemed promising:
The Wednesday page foretold a spelling test and a fire drill.
The Thursday page confirmed what Luke already knew: there would be a full dress rehearsal of the Christmas concert in front of the rest of the school and the senior citizens from the village. He smiled, knowing that meant no lessons.
The Friday page contained a still more glorious statement:
“Yo ho there! Ebenezer!”
Luke flinched at Kenny’s very loud portrayal of Fezziwig and knocked over one of the mugs which was still a quarter full of cold coffee. Thankfully, his reflexes were second to none and in slamming the diary shut he ensured the rest of the desk stayed more or less dry. He carefully placed the book back where he’d found it and rejoined his fellow Thespians.
***
“Will you check on Curly ‘n’ Squirt for me after school?” Luke asked Joe on Monday afternoon as the credits rolled at the end of Roald Dahl’s Matilda.
“Yeah, why? Another rehearsal?”
“Yeah. I’ll be glad when it’s over an’ done with.”
“Not long now.”
“Thank goodness!” said Luke with relief, “I think it was a mean trick them tellin’ us we can be in the play without tellin’ us we wunt be doin’ the practices in lesson time.”
“It was,” Joe agreed, having had to give up a lot of his own free time to paint the scenery.
Mr Beardsley switched on the lights and clapped his hands to get everyone’s attention.
“Wakey wakey everybody, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. It’s nearly half past three, so let me just remind you to bring your Christmas shopping money tomorrow. Full school uniform is compulsory – we don’t want to lose anybody.”
The bell rang loud and long, precipitating a riot of excited voices and chair legs scraping the floor.
“Exit quietly please,” he requested, “see you tomorrow.”
“I haven’t got any money,” said Joe to Luke confidentially.
“Me neither,” Luke replied, “but that doesn’t matter. It’ll still be good to get out of school for a few hours.”
Luke and Joe went their separate ways.
“See ya.”
“See ya.”
***
Luke made himself comfortable in the middle of the row of chairs at the back of the hall. He put his bag on the chair to his left, his coat on the chair to his right and his feet on the chair in front of him. He took out his reading book and his notebook, popped his gobstopper back in his mouth and, keeping one ear open for the approach of his cue, read.
After reading page 71 he wrote:
After reading page 78 he wrote:
After re-reading page 69 he wrote:
“Remove me! I cannot bear it!”
After reading page 80 he wrote:
“… but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased.”
Luke swiftly returned his books and his gobstopper to his bag and hurried to stage left. It was time for the Third Spirit.
*********************************
See you Monday for the next instalment 😉
But if you don’t want to wait, you can read the whole of chapter 15 now 😀
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Are you sitting comfortably?
Then we will begin chapter 15: Luke Walker and the school play
“I am here today …”
“Tonight.”
“I am here tonight to warn you, that you ‘ave yet a chance and hope of escapin’ my fate. A chance and hope of my procturin’, Ebenezer.”
“of my procuring.”
“Of my procurin’ Ebenezer.”
“You were always a good friend to me, thank’ee!”
“You will be haunted by three spirits.”
“Is that the chance and hope you mentioned, Jacob?”
“It is.”
“I—I think I’d rather not.”
“Without the visits, you cannot hope to shun the path I tread. Expect the first tomorrow, when the bell tolls One.”
“Couldn’t I take ’em all at once, and have it over, Jacob?”
“Don’t move that, it’s mine!”
“Luke! It’s your line.”
“Expect the second on the next night… hey! Leave it I said!”
“Luke!”
“That’s my bag!”
“She’s only putting it in the cloakroom, it’s in the way out here, someone might trip over it.”
“Oh.”
“Can we please finish this scene! Go from ‘Couldn’t I take ’em all at once’.”
Butler pulled a face at Luke who reciprocated.
“Couldn’t I take ’em all at once and have it over Jacob?”
“Expect the second on the next night at the same hour. The third upon the next night when the last stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate. Look to see me no more; and look that, for your own sake, you remember what has passed between us!”
Ms Robinson breathed a sigh of relief.
“Okay, that’ll do. Well done for getting the lines memorised both of you, but try to put a bit more feeling into it. Simon, remember you’re really scared, and Luke, don’t forget to rattle your chains and try to make your voice sound more ominous.”
Simon laughed.
“I don’t think Luke knows what ominous means,” he said with a smirk.
“Yes I do!” Luke replied indignantly.
Ms Robinson elaborated.
“Try to sound menacing, sinister. Make your voice deeper if you can.”
“I knew what you meant!” Luke lied, flashing Butler his most withering scowl.
“Okay Luke, take a break,” said Ms Robinson, “Simon, get in position for scene 3. First Spirit – where are you?”
Luke went to the cloakroom to find his bag. He didn’t trust anyone else with it – there was important stuff inside. He was relieved to find it safe on his peg, looking as though it hadn’t been tampered with. He confirmed this with the retrieval and measurement of his gobstopper – it was the same size it had been an hour and a half earlier when he’d put it in the zip pocket. He put the large sweet back into his mouth, took an orange plastic chair from the stack in the corner, and sat down to read his book. It wasn’t really his book, he’d borrowed it from the library, but it was so good that he thought he’d get his own copy if he got any book tokens for Christmas. The funny thing was, if Mr Beardsley hadn’t given them the book report assignment, he might never have picked it up. Its cover, a boring photograph of a corn field with a mountain behind it, would not normally have caught his attention, but its title – The Sustainability Secret – was intriguing. The word ‘secret’ had made him think of spies, secret agents, action and adventure, so he’d put the book on his ‘maybe’ pile and checked it out. He checked out seven books that day and after first trying and giving up on the other six, he decided, unequivocally, that The Sustainability Secret would be the subject of his book report. It turned out not to be about spies or secret agents but it was engrossing. He read it, and re-read it, every chance he got. Even when he was supposed to be watching rehearsals.
Participation in the school play had annoyingly failed to get him out of lessons because rehearsals were scheduled for after school and at weekends. On top of that Luke had had to spend an enormous amount of his free time learning his lines. Well, not an enormous amount, but some. As it turned out Luke was very good at memorising lines. Not only his own but those of everyone else in the scene. This was a very valuable skill to have and he determined to put it to more productive use in future. For example, there were lots of important facts in The Sustainability Secret that he wanted to commit to memory. A lot of it was scientific stuff which was harder to memorise but he wrote things down, over and over, until they stuck.
After reading page ten he wrote in his secret society notebook:
After reading page eleven he wrote:
“Good Heaven! I was bred in this place. I was a boy here!”
Butler’s voice could really carry.
Finding it difficult to concentrate, Luke closed his book and put it away.
“If they’ve on’y jus’ got to ‘I was a boy here’ it’s gonna be ages ’til I’m on again.”
He considered popping out to see Curly and Squirt but since time passed quicker when not at school he knew it was too risky. If he missed his cue again everyone would moan at him. He decided instead to hang out in the classroom. Pupils weren’t really allowed in the classrooms without adult supervision, not since the “mindless vandalism” of class 6, but Luke felt that since he wasn’t a mindless vandal, the rule didn’t apply to him.
*************************************
Story continues tomorrow 😀
Enjoy your weekend 😀
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Chapter 14 continues from yesterday:
A noisy, activity-filled party with only two adults in attendance was easy to sneak away from. It hadn’t even been difficult to get the matches from Mr Beardsley’s desk drawer. Fortunately there had been no rain for a couple of weeks so it didn’t take long to find ample dry twigs and fir cones in the churchyard over the road. Now all they needed was a big stone each and that would be no problem either because Luke remembered seeing some different coloured pebbles, curiously arranged in the shape of a fish, close to the church entrance. They’d just been left there. No one was using them.
It was just after nine o’clock and very dark in the churchyard. Two owls hooted back and forth. Every so often bats flew overhead between the bell tower and the vicarage. Now it really felt like Halloween. The children made themselves comfortable on the ground near the oldest gravestones they could find. Covered in lichen, the writing on them was almost illegible.
Making sure there was nothing flammable nearby, Luke built a small fire with the twigs and fir cones on the crumbling horizontal stone base of one of the graves. He had no trouble getting it going with the few scraps of paper found in Mr Beardsley’s desk drawer earlier.
As their teacher had told them, the game was simple. On Halloween night, participants made a fire and when the fire burnt out they placed a ring of stones in the ashes, one for each person. The following morning they would check the circle and if they found any stone displaced, it was said that the person it represented would die before the year ended.
Luke drew a circle in the ash with another stick. Their pebbles were easy to distinguish from each other. Luke’s was the biggest and the darkest. He put it in the twelve o’clock position, closest to the gravestone. Joe’s was a little smaller and had a notch on one side. He placed it at nine o’clock. Isabel’s looked like it had a nose, hers was placed at six o’clock and Tania’s, the smallest of them all, was placed at three o’clock.
“What was that?” Isabel turned suddenly to look behind her.
“Just a rabbit prob’ly,” said Luke, “or a badger.”
“Or a fox,” added Joe.
The boys looked around eagerly, hoping to see some majestic nocturnal wildlife. They weren’t so lucky.
“We’d better get back,” said Tania, looking at her watch, “it’s nearly five to ten.”
“Wait!” whispered Luke as he ducked behind a tree, “that’s my dad!”
The churchyard was a short-cut between the school and Luke’s road so he might have known his dad would come this way to meet him. Everyone laid low until he’d passed.
“My mum’s probably at the school by now too,” said Tania.
“They’ll all be there, waiting outside the classroom for us,” said Isabel anxiously, “how will we get back in without them seeing us?”
Luke and Joe smiled at each other. For seasoned outlaws like them, this wasn’t going to be a problem.
“Follow us,” said Joe, and they led the girls to a little known entrance to the school which was always left open when the caretaker was around so that he could duck out quickly for a smoke without going past the kitchens or the offices. The door led to the school hall which had a connecting door to Mrs Tebbut’s classroom which shared a cloakroom with Class 5A.
“Don’t tell anyone about this,” Joe added as an afterthought.
Without raising suspicion all four of them rejoined the rest of their class as they emerged from the party. They parted with a secret promise to meet early Saturday morning and check on the fire circle. Each agreed to wait until they were all together before they looked.
When all children had been collected Mr Beardsley and Thomas returned to the classroom to clear up the mess. They were tired but it had been fun; they were glad they’d done it.
“Excuse me,” Mrs Butler put her head round the door.
“Oh, hello,” said Mr Beardsley, “are you looking for your plate? It’s in a stack in the sink. I’ll wash it up and send it home with Simon on Monday.”
“Er, thank you, no, I’m looking for Simon. Did he leave with someone else?”
Mr Beardsley’s jaw dropped. Filled with dread he looked at Thomas. Thomas shook his head. At that moment the classroom door opened again and Simon walked in.
“Simon! Where have you been?” his mum asked, awash with relief.
“Looking for you,” he lied, “shall we go?”
********************************************************
Chapter 15 starts tomorrow 😉
***************
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Chapter 14 continues from yesterday:
“Hey! They can’t have them on Halloween! Who brought them?” he asked, pointing with disgust at the flesh food and surveying the faces around the table.
“What’s wrong?” asked Isabel.
Luke didn’t hear her. He angrily snatched the plate from the buffet, intending to dispose of the offending items.
“Mr Beardsley said it’s a Halloween tradition to be vegetarian,” Joe explained to Isabel, “so Luke is cross that somebody’s not doin’ it right.”
“So I see,” said Isabel as she watched Luke trying to move through the crowd holding the large plate of Scotch eggs above his head with both hands.
“Hey! Where you going with those?” Butler asked as Luke passed the music centre on his way to the toilets.
“Gettin’ rid of ’em!” said Luke, “they’re not Halloween.”
“Hey! Bring them back! My mum made them! Bring them back!”
Luke hurried through the cloakroom door with Butler close behind him. The music stopped and everyone could hear the two boys arguing loudly on the other side of the door.
Mr Beardsley hurried after them.
“Don’t come any nearer or I’ll drop ’em,” Luke threatened, forcing Butler to back off.
“You’ve got no right to throw away other people’s stuff!” he shouted angrily, “you think you’re better than everybody else! You think you’re so good but you’re not – you’re a thief! Give them back!”
“It’s no meat for Halloween!” Luke asserted, “dint your teacher tell you that?!”
“We don’t have to do what you say! Some of us want to eat meat – most of us actually – coz it tastes good! Mmm, I’d love a nice bacon buttie right now, or a nice bit of fish and chips, or a big juicy burger.”
His infuriating smirk pushed Luke to the limit and he lunged for the toilet door.
“Stop!” The boom of Mr Beardsley’s voice did not encourage disobedience.
Luke froze, plate in hand, his back to his teacher and his adversary.
“Could someone please tell me what on Earth is going on here?” Mr Beardsley asked more calmly.
Both boys talked at once: “He’s throwing my mum’s food in the toilet” / “Meat’s not allowed on Halloween!”
“Stop!” their teacher said again, “Luke, what are you doing out here with that plate of Scotch eggs?”
“They shouldn’t be here! You said people dint eat meat on Halloween! It’s tradition!”
“Yes, that’s true, I did, it is traditional not to eat meat on All Hallows’ Eve.”
“But my mum made them! He’s got no right to throw them away!”
“Simon!” Mr Beardsley quieted him, “no one’s going to throw away your mother’s food. Go back in to the party please and get the music going again.”
Simon reluctantly did as he was told and Mr Beardsley turned back to Luke.
“Give me the plate please,” he instructed.
“But they’re not …”
“Luke, now please.”
Luke handed him the plate.
“But you’re not gonna put ’em back on the table are you? They’re not s’posed to be …”
“Luke, I know you feel strongly about this and I respect that but you can’t force your beliefs on other people. Everyone has to be free to make their own choices.”
“Yeah right! Tell that to the chickens and pigs they’re made out of! If they’d had free choice they would’ve said NO THANK YOU VERY MUCH, I DON’T WANT TO BE A SCOTCH EGG!”
“Yes, alright Luke you’ve made your point. Now kindly return to the party and stay away from Simon Butler.”
Back in the classroom Luke found his plate and his friends and told them the whole story.
“You’re right,” said Tania, “Simon knew he was supposed to make something from the traditional vegetarian recipes Mr Beardsley gave us. He should’ve been reprimanded for not doing it right.”
“Typical!” added Isabel, “look at that, Beardsley’s just putting the scotch eggs back on the table. That flies in the face of everything he taught us! What’s the point of teaching us about historical tradition and saying you want to have a traditional party if you’re just going to let people be inauthentic?”
“Yeah! It’s fraudulent!” Tania concurred.
Luke hungrily polished off his sweetcorn while he listened to the impressive but unfamiliar vocabulary being employed by the girls and was in no doubt that they agreed with him.
“I think we should boycott this party!” Isabel declared.
“Whaddaya mean?” asked Joe.
“On the grounds that it’s a sham.”
“What?” said Luke and Joe at the same time.
“She means it’s bogus,” Tania explained, “spurious, phoney, false, fake.”
“Oh, yeah, it’s fake alright,” said Luke, catching up, “he’s ruined it. It’s not thentick at all now!”
“If we want a truly educational, authentic, realistic, traditional Halloween experience, we’ll have to do it ourselves,” Isabel went on, “we should go now and play the other game he told us about. The one he said we couldn’t play.”
The others gasped and then grinned.
“That’s ezzactly what we should do,” said Luke.
*************************
story concludes tomorrow 🙂
but if you can’t wait you can read the whole of Chapter 14 now 😉
*********************************
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Chapter 14 continues from yesterday:
Luke decided to change the subject.
“Where shall we put these then?” he asked.
“Not here,” said Mr Beardsley, “or they might get eaten. Put them on my desk behind the screen.”
The boys did as they were told and made their way through small huddles of various royalty, warriors and poets, a couple of Shakespeares and a Jesus. No sooner had they placed the food on the desk than Mr Beardsley asked Joe to give him the treacle scones and string so that he could set up the game. They would be starting in about ten minutes he told them. Music was already playing and a few people danced self-consciously in the middle of the room.
“This one’s for you Joe,” came a familiar voice through the speaker when the record changed.
Luke and Joe looked around to see Simon Butler behind a turntable across the room, dressed in a short blonde beard; a gold fitted jacket zipped up to his neck; short gold trousers fastened below the knee; long socks and large-buckled shoes. He thought he was so cool because Mr Beardsley had let him be the DJ. The Lunatics Have Taken Over The Asylum by Fun Boy Three filled the room and Butler laughed excessively at his own joke. Luke and Joe paid him a visit.
“So glad you took my advice Joe,” he said privately, “you look even more like a loon than usual!”
“I’m Pythagoras,” said Joe, holding up the right-angled triangle he’d made out of three rulers.
“Oh, yeah, I know you think so, lunatics often think they’re somebody famous,” he chuckled smugly.
“I’m not a lunatic! I am Pythag…”
“What are you s’posed to be anyway?” Luke interrupted their pointless argument to draw attention to Butler’s ridiculous ensemble.
“Sir Walter Raleigh,” Butler confessed without shame.
Luke cast his best contemptuous glance at his arch enemy and said nothing.
“Okay, switch the music off now Simon, it’s time for the games to begin,” Mr Beardsley called across the room.
Mr Beardsley and Thomas had put out four small tables at intervals around the room. They were set up with different traditional Halloween games.
“Take it in turns to play the games at each table,” Blackbeard instructed, “have fun!” He was the kind of teacher who didn’t believe in too much control. He liked to give the children enough room to find their own way and, since he’d already explained the games in class, he chose not to recap. “You can put the music back on now Simon,” he added.
“This table is for apple bobbing,” said Thomas who, unlike his colleague, preferred to make sure things were being done properly. “One at a time. Katia – you go first.”
Luke and Joe decided to come back later for apples and wandered over to see what was on the next table. Joe’s treacle-covered scones, with long lengths of string tied to them, were suspended above the table and dangled at different heights. Queen Elizabeth I and Boudicca were already tucking in. With hands held behind their backs, Tania and Isabel tried to bite the scones and every time they got a nibble, the sticky pendulums swung away and then back, bumping their noses, their chins, their cheeks and their hair. Boudicca, being less concerned about her appearance than the Queen, finished her scone first and bowed her grinning, sticky head in gratitude for the applause of her peers. Queen Liz, dignified in defeat, shook her opponent’s hand and went to the sink to wash her face.
“Us next!” said Luke, standing beside the table and leaning forward. “Go!” he shouted before Joe was ready, and tried to grab an untouched scone in his teeth.
Joe hurried to join in but found himself at a disadvantage when one scone stuck to his thick beard, just below his bottom lip, and prevented him from getting close to any other. Thomas laughed and reminded Joe that he couldn’t use his hands but he needn’t have said anything because Joe was not a cheater. Luke was the clear victor, finishing his scone in just four bites, and afterwards Joe was allowed to manually detach his scone from his beard and eat it normally. There were less hairs on it than one might expect.
At the next table were small plates with chunks of barm brack on them, cut from the fruit breads that Luke and a couple of other people had made.
“I’ve got a coin!” said Isabel as she broke up her piece with a fork, “that means I’m going to be rich!”
“I think you’re s’posed to just bite it,” said Joe, “it might not work if you pull it apart like that.”
“I don’t wanna risk choking!” Isabel explained sensibly.
“Plus it’s dirty,” added Tania, “money’s really dirty you know. Just think how many people have touched it without washing their hands.”
Joe had already bitten into his chunk of barmbrack and discovered that he too had a coin. He spat it quickly into his hand.
“It’s not dirty,” Luke assured him, “don’t ya think I washed ’em before I put ’em in?”
“Is this the one that you made?” Joe asked, a little relieved.
“Yeah,” said Luke confidently, “well, it looks …, yeah, definitely.”
Luke bit into his piece of bread and found only currants and orange peel.
At the next table were three large dishes of colcannon, accompanied by a stack of small bowls and spoons. The game was the same. If you found a coin it meant you would be rich; if you found a ring it meant you would find true love. Luke hadn’t had any rings to put into his baking, and he’d put all his spare coins into his barm brack, so he loaded his bowl from the colcannon he’d made himself, knowing that the only thing he was in danger of finding was a pile of delicious grub. Thoughtful as always, he didn’t spoil the game for the others by telling them that.
A few minutes later, Luke, Joe, Tania and Isabel, all happy in spite of finding nothing but cabbage in their mash, found their newly stimulated appetites craved more and made their way to the long table. It was a good job they hadn’t left it any longer as many of the other children were already digging in and the good stuff was going fast. Luke took a large paper plate from the pile and filled it with roasted sweetcorn, monkey nuts, roasted pumpkin seeds, bonfire toffee and … oh no, Joe got the last toffee apple.
“Oh, do you want it?” Joe offered when his hand reached it just before Luke’s.
“Nah,” said Luke, trying to sound casual, “it’s yours.”
“We’ll share it,” Joe decided.
Luke smiled.
“Okay.” This was a good party.
Then he noticed something bad on the table. Something not in keeping with the celebration. Something odious. Something which was in shockingly bad taste: Scotch eggs.
*********************************************
story continues tomorrow 🙂
but if you can’t wait you can read the whole of Chapter 14 now 😉
*********************************
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To read the rest of the Luke Walker stories, click here 😀
Chapter 14 continues from yesterday:
“Not Mr Darcy! Mr Wilberforce!” Luke insisted. “I don’t want to look like some posh bloke from Priden Precipice!”
Mrs Walker pulled the black trousers, white ruffled shirt and long black coat from The Village Players’ costume trunk.
“William Wilberforce would have dressed like Mr Darcy Luke, these will be just the thing,” she assured him, “I’ll just give them an iron.”
“Okay,” Luke tentatively agreed, “but what about Joe? Is there anythin’ in there that Joe can wear?”
Luke’s mum set up the board and plugged in the iron.
“Who’s he going as?” she asked.
“Depends what costumes you’ve got,” said Luke, keeping an open mind.
Mum had only recently joined the local amateur dramatics group so she wasn’t sure what costumes they’d got. Most of them were a bit worse for wear but they were lucky to be allowed to use them.
“See for yourself,” she suggested, “have a rummage and see if anything captures your imagination.”
Luke rummaged. Pink tights, brown tights, knickerbockers, caterpillar costume, spider costume, Cheshire Cat costume, blue dress with white pinafore. So far not so good. Red ball gown, green ball gown, yellow ball gown, purple tutu, red clown shoes. Really not good.
“Rubbish!” said Luke ungratefully, “it’s all rubbish!”
Mum sighed and switched off the iron.
“Luke – don’t just throw them around like that! You’re lucky we’ve been allowed to borrow these,” she said, exasperated.
Luke was sorry. He just wanted to find something good for Joe to shut Butler up. He helped Mum pick up the costumes and re-fold them.
“Sorry,” he said.
She pressed her lips tight together and looked him in the eye.
“That’s alright,” she said. Then, just as she was about to put the folded pile back in the trunk, she noticed a couple of things Luke had missed.
“What about these?” she said.
“A nightgown and a Father Christmas beard?” said Luke, unimpressed.
“Not a nightgown, a robe,” she explained, “men used to wear these in the olden days, especially in hot countries.”
Luke’s blank expression indicated he needed another clue.
“Who’s that maths guy you like?”
Still blank.
“Vegetarian? Triangles?”
“Pythagoras!”
“Yes!” Mum smiled, “I bet he would have worn something like this. And he probably had a long white beard when he got old.”
“Yeah!” Now Luke was excited, “We’ll both be veggietareun people from history! Joe can be Pythagoras and I’ll be William Wilberforce’s ghost!”
“Why not just William Wilberforce? Why do you have to be his ghost?”
“Coz it’s a Halloween party. Ya know: Ha-llow-een. It’s all about ghosts and scary stuff.” He thought his mum would have known that.
“Yes, but you’re all going as people from history.”
“Yes.”
“So they’re all dead.”
“Yeah.” There really was nothing confusing here.
“So why doesn’t Joe go as Pythagoras’s ghost?”
“It’s supposed to be someone who’s dead. So he’s Pythagoras. The man.”
“Yes, I see, so why aren’t you the man?”
“I’m going to be William Wilberforce’s ghost.”
“Not man?”
“No.”
“But if you’re a ghost why isn’t Joe going to be a ghost. Or if he’s the man, why aren’t you the man…?” She caught sight of her own reflection in the mirror and paused, wondering why she kept asking questions to which there could be no satisfactory answer.
“Can you iron this one as well please?” her son asked, handing back the white robe, “I’m goin’ to phone Joe and tell ‘im.”
***
On Friday 31st of October at 7.08 pm, Luke and Joe said goodbye to Luke’s dad at the school gate and walked towards the classroom carrying their contributions to the party food. Luke had followed the Halloween recipes given to him by Mr Beardsley for barm brack (a kind of fruit bread) and colcannon (mashed potatoes mixed with cabbage). Mum had helped a bit. Joe brought the treacle-covered scones he’d made with Janet’s assistance, using another of their teacher’s traditional recipes. He’d also remembered the string.
Mr Beardsley’s classroom was almost unrecognisable.
Hanging from the ceiling were two large imitation crystal chandeliers, covered in cobwebs and emitting a very dim, creamy light. Long dark-purple velvet curtains replaced the Venetian blinds that usually hung in the windows, the bottoms of which sat in folds on the floor around large pumpkins carved with grotesque gargoyle faces.
The boys approached a long table at one end of the room. It was draped in a ragged, dark red table cloth whose dusty hem skimmed the dusty parquet. On it fifteen white candles stood tall on three candelabra, complete with realistic-looking orange and yellow tissue paper flames and untidily littered with long drips of dry wax. Various plates and bowls of food, brought by the children, were set upon the table. Luke and Joe added theirs.
“No, not on there boys,” Mr Beardsley startled them, suddenly appearing as he did. “Those are for the games, remember?”
Luke and Joe looked at their teacher and then at each other and laughed. Mr Beardsley had really pulled out all the stops for this party. His already lofty frame appeared even taller than usual, and his apparently-severed head rested in front of his chest, supported by his left arm. Atop the severed head sat an enviable black hat, with wide upturned brim and a sinister-looking white skull and cross-bones on the front.
“Who are you supposed to be?” asked Luke.
“Can’t you guess?” teased his teacher, rubbing his brand new coal-black beard.
“No,” said Luke. Joe also shook his head.
Mr Beardsley tutted.
“Boys, boys boys,” he said, shaking his head, “don’t you ever listen to my lessons?” he asked rhetorically. “I’m Blackbeard. Remember? The famous pirate who was beheaded in 1718?”
“Pirate?” said Joe, looking daggers at Luke.
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story continues tomorrow 🙂
but if you can’t wait you can read the whole of Chapter 14 now 😉
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vegan children’s story, children’s book, children’s stories, juvenile fiction, vegan children, veggie kids, vegan, vegetarian, Halloween, humor, humour, comedy, funny, vegan children’s books
For all the Luke Walker chapters so far click here 😀
Here begins Chapter 14: Luke Walker and the Halloween Party
Luke, Joe, Isabel and Tania looked at the circle and gasped. They hadn’t believed it could happen. Now that it had, they were scared.
“That’s it then,” said Luke eventually, “I’ll prob’ly be dead by Christmas.”
***
Three days earlier everything had seemed so ordinary. Boringly so. Class 5A were doing History. History was sometimes interesting, sometimes exciting and often-times boring. This particular lesson seemed like it was going to fit into the last category. Mr Beardsley was talking whilst writing on the board, which meant he had his back to the class, which meant very few people were even pretending to listen.
“… historians believe that many of these traditions originate from Celtic harvest festivals, but others are of the opinion that it has always been a Christian ….”
“T,” whispered Luke.
“No,” said Joe, as he drew a diagonal support on the gallows.
“F,”
“Yes,” said Joe and filled in the Fs.
“Ooh, two Fs! Is it coffee?”
“No,” and he drew the noose.
Mr Beardsley rambled on and Luke found it disturbed his concentration. He felt sure he was close. There couldn’t be that many words with double F. Then the teacher said something that caught his attention.
“… Christians historically abstained from meat on All Hallows’ Eve, which is why it was traditional to eat certain vegetarian foods on this special day. In particular they ate apples, potato pancakes, and soul cakes.”
“What’s he talkin’ about?” Luke asked Joe. Joe looked at him blankly. Isabel Jessop tapped him on the shoulder and passed him a note which said ‘Halloween’.
Luke nodded a thank you to her. He pushed the note across to Joe.
“Halloween is a veggietareun day! We’d better listen coz he might want us to explain things to the others.”
Joe nodded and smiled uncomfortably. He’d never been called upon to explain anything to anyone and the idea didn’t appeal to him. However, realising that if any explanations were needed his friend would certainly provide them, he regained his composure. The boys watched their teacher and listened.
“All Hallows’ Eve, otherwise known as All Saints Eve, Allhalloween or, nowadays, just Halloween, begins the three days of Allhallowtide during which people remembered saints and martyrs and other dead people.”
“Oh my gosh!” thought Luke, “it seemed like it was gettin’ int’restin’ so we stopped playin’ an’ now it’s borin’ again!”
“… such as roasted sweetcorn, roasted pumpkin seeds, toffee apples,…”
“Toffee! Is it toffee?”
“No,” said Joe, drawing the condemned man’s circular head.
“… and they would enjoy these foods at Halloween parties where they’d also play some fun games.”
Mr Beardsley had their attention again.
“So I thought we could have a Year 5 Halloween party. We’ll invite class 5B and play some of these traditional games.”
A buzz of excitement filled the room.
“When?” someone shouted.
“On the 31st of October of course. The day after tomorrow. Friday.”
“Where?”
“Here. At seven o’clock ’til ten. I’ll send a note home to your parents today.”
Mr Beardsley was so disorganised. Luke liked that about him.
“Will it be fancy dress?”
“Indeed it will, but stop shouting out and let me finish. I’ll answer any questions you still have at the end of the lesson.”
***
Friday’s party was eagerly anticipated by everyone. It was going to be historical. They were going to play traditional games and eat traditional food – which they would have to make from scratch over the next couple of days. Mr Beardsley had given them recipes to take home. And they needed costumes. There was a lot to do and very little time in which to do it. Luke and Joe talked about it while they put on their coats and boots at the end of the day.
“I’m going to be a pirate,” said Joe.
“You can’t be a pirate, it’s not historical.”
“Isn’t it?”
“No, it’s made up. Like in Peter Pan.”
“Pirates are real,” Isabel couldn’t help pointing out when she overheard their conversation.
“Not Long John Silver, or Captain Hook, or someone with a parrot on ‘is shoulder,” Luke clarified.
“What are you comin’ as then?” asked Joe.
“William Wilberforce’s ghost,” said Luke proudly.
“Ooh, good one,” said Tania as she returned to Isabel the scarf she’d borrowed.
“I’m coming as Queen Elizabeth I,” she added, shaking her auburn curls.
“Who can I be?” Isabel wondered aloud. The girls walked away in deep discussion. Luke and Joe were not far behind. Joe was disappointed that he couldn’t go as a pirate.
“What can I go as then?” he asked his friend.
“Go as a lunatic from one of those old asylums,” suggested Simon Butler who’d appeared from nowhere, “then you wouldn’t need a costume!” And he laughed so loud on his way out that Mrs Tebbut shouted ‘PIPE DOWN OUT THERE!’ from the classroom next door.
Luke scowled.
“Idiot Butler! Not even s’posed to be in this cloakroom,” he hissed under his breath. “Don’t worry,” he told Joe, “you’ll be somethin’ better’n ‘im!”
*************************************************
Don’t go far away, the story continues tomorrow 😀
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vegan children, vegan children’s story, veggie kids, vegan children’s books, Halloween, vegan, vegetarian, fancy dress, school, juvenile fiction, humour, comedy, funny
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 😀
To read the whole of Chapter 13 click here 🙂
Story continues from yesterday:
In the Sunday School room Luke was unsurprised to find quaint and colourful cardboard fishing boats stuck to a massive collage that covered a whole wall. The boats were manned by friendly fishermen pulling up nets by hand. The water beneath them was gleaming turquoise and filled with colourful fish who looked only too eager to swim into the welcoming nets. A golden beach was pictured behind with market stalls where smiling fishmongers sold fish to happy villagers under a soft blue sky. A red and white striped lighthouse kindly warned the fishermen to stay away from the rocks. And across the sky large paper letters spelled out the words:
“Typical!” said Luke with contempt and uncharacteristic brevity. There was no time for lengthy verbal condemnations. They just got on with it.
Forty-six minutes later Joe was on his way home with gratitude as Luke dropped the last armful of tinned fish into the wheelie bin behind the building. Tomorrow there’d be no Joe. Tomorrow Luke would be on his own. Which wasn’t a problem, because he wasn’t a coward.
***
Luke was quiet at breakfast on Sunday and Mum sympathised.
“You’re very preoccupied this morning Luke, are you worried about talking to Eric?”
“Er, kind of,” Luke admitted.
“Mm, it’s never easy to tell someone something they don’t want to hear but it’s better to be honest.”
“Yeah,” said Luke, enlivened by a slight resurgence in confidence, “it’s better if they know the truth.”
At ten to ten, Luke and his mum approached the chapel gate. Mrs Walker wondered what was going on. People were standing around on the lawn outside and the village bobby was there, talking to the minister.
“What’s going on?” she asked Gordon.
“Vandalism,” he said, flatly, “a horrible mess.”
“Oh no! How awful!” she said and rushed in. Luke followed at a cautious distance. Mabel, standing in the doorway, advised Mum not to enter.
“All our work yesterday – ruined!” she mourned, “it’s a horror show in there!”
When Mrs Walker stepped forward the first thing to strike her was the awful smell. She shielded her nose with her hand. Draped over the pulpit was a huge, orange, fishing net, tangled, filthy and stinking with rotten seaweed and the small fish and crustacean victims who’d been trapped and strangled by it long after the fleet had left it to drift untethered. The communion table and the floor around it exhibited a collection of old lobster pots and traps, a mess of wire and barbed hooks, a couple of rusty knives and a matching set of hooks, pliers and other fishmonger blades that looked hardly used.
These were set off to best advantage by numerous anchovy and sardine corpses variously strewn and interwoven throughout. The whole ensemble was liberally splattered with what looked like blood.
Eric emerged from the Sunday School room.
“There’s more in here,” he told her.
Mrs Walker had a bad feeling.
Apprehensively she followed Eric into the Sunday School room and discovered the picturesque fishing village scene was no more. There were no fish, no happy villagers and no fishmongers; the lighthouse had fallen into the sea and the colourful fishing boats had crashed into the rocks. Some of the paper letters had been rearranged across the sky to spell
“I told you we should have done the normal fruit and vegetable display!” Mrs Kirby chimed in authoritatively, “I said to the minister last week – people want a traditional harvest festival with fruits and vegetables and golden sheaves of wheat. Genesis 1, verse 29: I have provided all kinds of grain and fruit for you to eat,” she quoted, “This is a message from God!”
Mabel was irritated.
“God didn’t do this!”
“Whoever did it was sent by Him!” retorted Mrs Kirby, and no one dared disagree.
***
Mrs Walker kept her anger buttoned down. She didn’t say anything until they were well out of earshot of the other church-goers. It would be too shameful if anyone else knew what she suspected. Not to mention Luke might get a criminal record. Eventually, when they were almost home, she asked coldly,
“Who do you think did it Luke?”
“I’m with Mrs Kirby,” he answered honestly, “whoever did it was sent by God.”
Have a lovely weekend 😀
Join us on Monday for the beginning of Chapter 14:
Luke Walker and the Halloween Party
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For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 🙂
Luke Walker paperbacks:
Luke Walker: animal stick up for-er (the first eight chapters);
More Luke Walker: animal stick up for-er (chapters nine to sixteen);
and Luke Walker: animal stick up for-er: my privut notebook
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vegan, vegetarian, harvest festival, veggie kids, vegan children, fish, animals, vegan children’s story, vegan children’s book, children’s stories, humour, creative writing, illustration
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 😀
To read the whole of Chapter 13 click here 🙂
Story continues from yesterday:
At 3.47pm Luke and Joe stood in Curly and Squirt’s shed. There was a big old wooden ottoman at the back. Joe had never noticed it before because ordinarily Luke kept a bale of hay on top of it and the whole lot was usually covered with a tatty blue tarpaulin. Luke started to lift the lid and then hesitated, looking over his shoulder to make sure the shed door was shut. It was.
“This is where I keep the stuff I’ve constigated on holiday,” he told his trusted friend, confidentially.
Joe looked puzzled. Luke put him in the picture.
“Remember me Nan and Grandad’s got a caravan at the seaside where there’s fishing boats on the beach? Remember I told you?”
Joe nodded.
“Well,” Luke went on, “whenever we go there I look out for things on the beach wot need takin’ outer circle-ation. Dangerous things.”
“And you constigate them?” Joe asked with the appearance of comprehension.
“Mm. Well, some I jus’ find, abandoned. Some I constigate from people wot are doin’ horrible things with ’em.”
Joe peered inside the trunk but wasn’t sure exactly what he was looking at. It was a miscellaneous jumble of what looked like rubbish – bits of plastic, rope, cord, wood, wire. All very unpleasant and dirty. It stank.
“And now you want to move it somewhere else?” Joe tried hard to make sense of the little Luke had told him so far.
“Yeah. On’y it’s too much stuff for one trip with just me. Your mum’s got one o’ them shopping trolley-bag things, and mine’s got two, an old one and a new one – I reckon we could fit all this stuff into them and move it without anyone bein’ able to see what we’ve got. They’ll just think we’ve done the shoppin’ for our mums.”
Joe nodded.
“Okaaay.”
“And,” Luke went on, “can you get any left over paint off your dad? Somethin’ he wun’t miss? Somethin’ he’s finished with and wun’t mind you havin’. Somethin’ he would rather you dint bother ‘im by askin’ for. Somethin’ he’d be pleased you took off ‘is hands without botherin’ ‘im. Somethin’ reddish.”
Joe wondered.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
***
Saturday was the day that Luke always helped Dad on the allotment and today, more than ever before, he was very glad of it. It gave him the perfect excuse not to help decorate the Sunday school room for the Harvest Festival. He remembered they were meeting at 10 o’clock and imagined that it wouldn’t take them more than an hour or two so they’d be done by lunch time. Then the ladies on the cleaning and flowers rota were going to decorate the chapel. Mum was one of those ladies and she got home at twenty past four.
“Put the kettle on love,” she called to her husband, “and if you look in the pantry I’ve a feeling you might find a packet of chocolate hobnobs behind the teabags.”
“Well, half a packet anyway,” Luke’s dad grinned as he nodded towards the dining table where six or seven of them adorned a small plate. Mrs Walker dropped exhausted into a chair.
“I knew there was a reason I married you,” she smiled as he handed her a hot cup of tea and sat down with one himself. “Thank you love,” she said, “that whole afternoon was an uphill struggle. Mrs Kirby was complaining the whole time that she thought we should be doing the traditional Harvest Festival display of fruits and breads and stuff, and Mabel was arguing that change was good and we should embrace change and move with the times. What’s modern about fishing I do not know! And then every time they stopped arguing Gordon would get them going again with ‘I suppose we have to do what the committee decides, never mind what the rest of the congregation wants!’ I don’t know what was more exhausting – scrubbing the kitchen floor or listening to ….”
“Shhh,” Mr Walker interrupted, “forget about all that now, it’s done. Drink your tea.”
“Don’t shush me!” Mum snapped. She hated it when he did that.
“I was just saying don’t worry about it, calm down ….” He never learned.
“I am calm! I’m not worried, I was just telling you what happened! I don’t like being shushed!”
“I’m with Mrs Kirby,” thought Luke as he took advantage of his parents bickering and swiped the chapel keys from Mum’s bag before heading for the front door.
“Jus’ goin’ to check on Curly and Squirt,” he called.
“Home by six!” Mum called after him.
“Six?!” he thought, grabbing the shoppers from the hall cupboard and hurrying out.
It was just after five when Joe and Luke arrived at the chapel gate. Luckily no one was around to hear its metal hinges squeal. They slunk across the lawn past the large wooden crucifix with the spikes on top to stop pigeons landing on it, and Luke unlocked the heavy door.
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Story concludes tomorrow, so don’t miss it 😉
Or you could read the whole story here now 😀
***************************************
vegan, vegetarian, harvest festival, veggie kids, vegan children, fish, animals, vegan children’s story, vegan children’s book, children’s stories, humour, creative writing, illustration
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 😀
To read the whole of Chapter 13 click here 🙂
Story continues from yesterday:
“What?!” Luke could hardly believe it. “They’re proud of killin’ sea animals are they? They want to show off about killin’ God’s creatures do they? That’s very Christian – I don’t think!”
“Well, Luke,” Mum tried to calm him down, “I know you don’t like it sweetheart but Jesus ate fish didn’t he? Some of his disciples were fishermen.”
Luke was unconvinced.
“How do we know that? Just coz someone wrote it in a book thousands of years ago in a diff’rent language. P’rhaps they din’t translate it right. P’rhaps they din’t tell the truth. Prob’ly whoever wrote it wasn’t even there at the time so they wouldn’t even know!” He was gaining momentum. “And, Jesus was perfect,” he went on, “so he wun’t ‘ave done somethin’ that hurt someone else on purpose. And he told them disciples to stop bein’ fishermen din’t he? And he wun’t ‘ave done that if he thought they were doin’ a good thing. And Jesus said God cares about every sparrow so if he cares about every sparrow then he definitely cares about every fish and he said ‘thou shalt not kill’ so he couldn’t be clearer than that!”
Red in the face from talking so fast without taking a breath and satisfied he’d settled the point, Luke stomped out of the room. Mrs Walker winced as the hall door slammed and Luke’s heavy footsteps pounded the stairs. She held her breath until all was quiet and then, just as she relaxed back into scrubbing potatoes, her son’s face re-appeared around the door.
“Oh!” she gasped, “you made me jump.”
“Don’t get any fish,” he entreated, “please.”
The following morning at breakfast Luke was distracted. He made no argument when Jared consumed the last of the frosted flakes; he didn’t defend himself when Dad told him off for knocking over the sugar bowl even though it was actually Jared who’d done it in his haste to grab the frosted flakes. The rest of the family were too busy to notice, but Luke was not himself. Eventually, when Jared and Dad had left for the day and Luke was left alone with Mum he told her,
“I’ve decided I don’t want to go to Sunday School any more.”
“Well I know you don’t want to go Luke, but you’re going. It’s good for you. I want you to learn good values, to be a good boy,” she responded firmly.
“I’ve got good values!” said Luke, indignant. “What do you mean values?” he added.
Mum sighed.
“Oh Luke, being a Christian means being good and kind and respecting your father and mother and not stealing and not lying, things like that,” she explained, “doing as you’re told,” she added.
“And not killin’,” said Luke.
“Of course not killing Luke, that goes without saying,”
“But they’re killin’! They’re celebratin’ killin’ fish and if that’s Christian I don’t want to be it!”
“Oh Luke why do you have to get so angry over these things? You might not want them to eat fish but they do. People do. People always have. And so do bears and cats and birds, and even other fish Luke. It’s the way of the world and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“I don’t want to go! I’m not going!” he insisted. Mum inhaled deeply and counted to ten.
“Fine. But you are not going to just disappear like a coward without telling them why. You’ve got to be grown up about it and make it clear to Eric why this sea harvest upsets you.”
Luke sulked. He was not a coward. He wasn’t afraid of anything. They walked to school in silence, Luke was deep in thought. When they entered the school gates they were almost run over by Simon Butler racing across their path on his new bike and then, when he knew he’d got their attention, he pulled a wheelie.
“He’s a bit of a show-off that one,” said Mum, amused.
Luke snorted.
“A bit?!” he scoffed, “more like a lot! He’s a lot of a show-off. He’s pretty much all show-off! There’s nothing else to ‘im. ‘cept idiot. And creep. He’s a idiot creep show-off!” Luke concluded decisively.
Mum chuckled.
“Boys will be boys,” she said, “he’s just making a point. He’s just making it clear to everyone watching that he’s good at that.”
***
All morning, while Mr Beardsley was talking about the ancient Greeks, Luke was thinking about what Mum had told him to do. He considered very carefully exactly what she’d said and by the time Dionysus had whisked Ariadne away from Theseus he was satisfied that he could do as he was told without compromising his prince pauls. He’d need Joe’s help.
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Sounds like Luke’s got a plan 😉
Join us tomorrow to find out what it is,
or just read the whole story now 😀
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vegan, vegetarian, harvest festival, veggie kids, vegan children, fish, animals, vegan children’s story, vegan children’s book, children’s stories, humour, creative writing, illustration
For all the Luke Walker chapters click here 😀
Chapter 13: Luke Walker and the Harvest Festival begins here:
“And then what happened? Luke?”
“Erm,”
“Weren’t you listening? What happened in the end?”
“Oh, um, in the end she saved ’em all, and then they saw she was a girl, coz they thought she was a man before, but they didn’t kill ‘er because she’d saved China.”
Eric, the Sunday School teacher, looked at Luke blankly, as if he wasn’t there.
“Mulan? Are you talking about Mulan?” he asked after a long pause.
Luke wondered, not for the first time, why his mum insisted he came to Sunday School to listen to a man who seemed unable to remember, from one minute to the next, what he was supposed to be teaching them.
“Yeah. Mulan. Who saved China from invaders. Remember? Who you’ve bin tellin’ us about.”
“Okay Luke, well, you are clearly capable of paying attention – to Disney films anyway – but you’ve obviously not heard a word I’ve said today. I’ve actually been talking about Miriam, Moses’s sister, who hid him in the bulrushes as a baby, and later helped her brother lead the Jews out of Egypt.”
Luke frowned in deep thought.
“Oh,” he responded at last.
Eric turned to the other seven children in his charge and continued. Luke resented the ‘I give up’ look that Eric’s features expressed before they withdrew. He’d seen it many times. It was uncalled for.
“Mulan. Miriam. They’re both ancient. They’re both women. They both saved a whole country. They’re both heroes. They both start with an M. Anyone could easily get them mixed up,” he thought as he leafed through the parish magazine.
At last he heard the final hymn being sung by the grown-ups in the room next door and he unhooked his jacket from its peg.
“Hold your horses Luke,” Eric recalled him to the group. “You can go when your parents come for you but remember that next week is Harvest Festival so I’d like all of you to be here at ten o’clock on Saturday to help me decorate the Sunday School room. The church secretary told me that the committee has decided to do things differently this year… blah blah blah …”
“Saturday? Not likely!” thought Luke. He could hear the scraping back of chairs and the hubbub of grown-ups talking, getting gradually louder. Any minute now the blue door would swing open and Mum would effect his release. Any minute now.
Eric finished whatever he was saying, Luke slipped his arms into his jacket sleeves, the door opened, and he hurried towards it.
“Bye Luke,” Eric called after him, “See you Saturday.”
“Bye,” he replied without looking back.
***
At school on Monday Luke noticed a familiar theme. Mr Beardsley had written on the board:
He concluded that either Mr Beardsley had copied his project idea from Eric or Eric got it from him. This was no bad thing. He could get two for one. Score points with the same work twice.
Mr Beardsley explained that they should all bring in donations of food this week to make a Harvest Festival display in the school hall. Then they would have a special afternoon assembly on Friday to thank God for the harvest. As the food would later be donated to the homeless shelter in town he requested no perishables, only tins and packeted dry goods please.
So Luke went home that afternoon and explained to Mum what he needed for the Harvest Festivals.
“Looks like I won’t be able to do it once and hand it in twice though, coz they’re givin’ all the school festival food to the homeless shelter so I’ll need another lot for Sunday School. Tins and dry stuff he said. Have we got any of that?”
Mum looked in the pantry. “Yes, we’ve got some dried lentils and pasta, and some tinned beans you can have. I’ll get something for the church harvest when I go shopping. Tins again I think, otherwise it’ll smell.”
“What will?”
“The fish.”
“Whaddaya mean fish? Why are you gettin’ fish?”
“Didn’t Eric tell you? The chapel committee want to do a different kind of Harvest Festival this year. Instead of the usual fruits, vegetables, grains and bread etcetera etcetera, they want to do a display of the harvest of the sea.”
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Uh-oh 😮
Find out tomorrow what Luke thinks of that idea 😉
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vegan, vegetarian, harvest festival, veggie kids, vegan children, fish, animals, vegan children’s story, vegan children’s book, children’s stories, humour, creative writing, illustration
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