Jack Pepper Read online

  This book has been specially written and published for World Book Day 2014. For further information, visit www.worldbookday.com

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  Praise for Sarah Lean

  “Sarah Lean weaves magic and emotion into beautiful stories.” Cathy Cassidy

  “Touching, reflective and lyrical.” The Sunday Times

  “… beautifully written and moving. A talent to watch.” The Bookseller

  “Sarah Lean’s graceful, miraculous writing will have you weeping one moment and rejoicing the next.” Katherine Applegate, author of The One and Only Ivan

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Praise for Sarah Lean

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Read an extract from Hero

  About the Author

  Also by Sarah Lean

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  “Stop the car, Dad!” Ruby said. “look, Sid, look at the lamp post.”

  Sid pressed his nose to the back-seat window.

  “What is it this time?” Ruby’s dad said, enjoying trying to guess what Ruby might come up with next. “A ghost? A flying cat?” They’d had a long drive home after a day out at the Flight Museum, which meant Ruby’s imagination was in full swing, keeping them all entertained.

  “No, not this time! Now you’ve gone past it. Please stop, Dad!” Ruby said. “No, look, another one! Dad, stop there, under the next street light.”

  The urgency in Ruby’s voice made her dad steer the car towards the kerb. Ruby unclicked her seat belt and jumped out of the car.

  “Where are you going?” her dad called. He turned round as he heard Sid’s seat belt clunk and the back door open too.

  Sid joined Ruby under the copper beam of the street light. Ruby was mesmerised by a poster stuck to it, a hand-drawn picture of a small white and ginger dog. It said: Please help us find Jack Pepper.

  “It is him, isn’t it?” Ruby said.

  “You wouldn’t forget that dog,” said Sid.

  Ruby took in every last detail of the drawing. It couldn’t be a coincidence. There couldn’t be two dogs like this, two dogs called Jack Pepper.

  The world was upside down as Ruby slipped through the sky, lying back on the swing, looking at nothing but blue. She kicked against the invisible air. The weight of her body rocked from her head to her feet. The swing chain creaked; the fixing clicked.

  Creaked. Clicked.

  Creaked, like an aching heart.

  “Thought you’d be here,” a voice said.

  Ruby sat upright, dizzy. She scuffed her toes through the sand to stop the swing.

  “What are you doing?” It was Sid.

  “Nothing, just swinging.”

  Sid punched his football at the ground and caught it. Bounced it again. He saw the park was empty, and Ruby looked sad, which wasn’t like her at all.

  “Are you playing something by yourself?”

  Ruby spun herself in the swing until the chain was taut, but it unfurled again as if it couldn’t stand to be twisted. “I’ve got things I’m trying not to think about because it’s too hard to think about them,” she said. “It’s easier on my own.”

  “We are on our own.” Sid grinned, but there was barely a flicker of a smile from Ruby.

  Ruby sighed. “My brother,” she said. “Nothing’s the same since he’s been born and that’s all I’m going to say about that right now.”

  “I won’t say anything about that right now either,” said Sid.

  He glanced at Ruby to see if this was OK. Ruby caught his eye, blew out her cheeks, shrugged. The best agreement she could give.

  “So I’ll stay then,” Sid said.

  Ruby nodded. It was hard to be angry and sad, all mixed up. But Ruby knew if anyone could make her feel better Sid could. Sid wouldn’t make things harder.

  “Do you want to play football?” he said.

  “Not really.”

  Sid dropped the ball, rolled it under his foot, thought hard, kicked it up and caught it.

  “We could play your game?” he said.

  “Which game?” Ruby said. Nothing was fun right now.

  But Sid knew Ruby was the queen of disguising herself in her imagination.

  “The adventure game, the one where we can be whoever we want to be,” Sid said. “Then you won’t have to think at all.”

  Ruby leaned her head back, squinted at the cloud above her collapsing and blooming from a ship with sails, to a giant face, into the shape of something yet to be. She allowed herself a smile.

  Sid dropped his football again and pushed the swing to sway Ruby sideways.

  “How do we start?” Sid said.

  “There are no rules in this game, Sid. Start in the middle if you want.”

  He hauled one of the swing’s chains and let it go again. Ruby swirled in an unpredictable arc.

  Sid searched his mind for something that had nothing to do with Ruby’s baby brother. They both stared at the cloud morphing. Saw the creature that roared to be set free.

  “Dragon trainers,” Sid said, rolling the magic words in his mouth. “The dragons are wild and fierce, but… well, they only like us and we’ve made them ours, but now we need to teach them things.”

  Ruby dragged her shoes through the sand. She liked the sound, soft and gravelly. Like the slow, lingering breath of a dragon. She pulled her feet back and heard scales shuffle, like scorched leaves, as the dragon emerged from her mind.

  “Let’s train them to fly,” Ruby said, swinging again.

  She kicked off from the ground, shivering because of the huge dragon she imagined taking her up towards the clouds.

  Sid jumped on the other swing. Ruby was already high, soaring on the magnificent creature. Free from the rules that tethered people to the ground.

  “Do dragons have claws or paws?” Sid called from the other swing.

  “There are no rules, Sid! It can have whatever you want!”

  Ruby pushed harder, towards the deepest blue of the sky.

  “I want claws for fighting!” Sid said.

  They pitched and rocked.

  Creak. Click. Creak. Click.

  The seat of Ruby’s swing lurched, as if it wanted to go further than the chains that anchored it to the frame. Ruby felt the weight of her body lift, as if she might keep going if she didn’t hold on so tightly.

  “And I want a whole heap of treasure,” Sid called. “There’s always treasure where there’s dragons! And it’s been stolen and we’re going to get it back.”

  But for some reason the thought of treasure drew Ruby back to thinking about what had happened that morning.

  Scales ruffled as Ruby imagined that her dragon dived towards the ground. Claws clattered, the dragon landed, lay down, coiled around the treasure.

  The chain creaked.

  The fixing c
licked.

  Ruby jumped from the swing.

  “I’m all right,” Ruby said, before Sid could ask.

  Sid dug his toes in to stop, leaped from his swing and ran over. Ruby rolled on to her back in the deep sand.

  “Dragon stalled,” she said.

  She brushed the grains from her palms, wiped down her clothes and shook out her hair.

  Sid collected his football. He watched Ruby as he punched his ball to the ground, bounce-bouncing it.

  Ruby squinted, pointing at the cloud, liking the way her raised arm felt wobbly and giddy. Her smile faded as the dragon cloud bloomed, collapsed, dispersed and began to look like a baby in a cot, which reminded her of what had happened that morning.

  “What would you do if you met a dragon?” Sid asked.

  “Train it to fly, like we said.”

  “But that’s in the game. I mean for real.”

  Ruby closed her eyes. Her imagination stretched, widened, began to eat her up. There was a dragon at home. A newborn dragon. Hatched, wrinkled, fierce and foul-smelling. Shrieking and demanding, cluttering up the arms of the mother dragon, making his sister feel left out. But she kept this to herself.

  “It feels real,” Ruby said, opening her eyes.

  Sid squinted at her. Ruby was in her own world. He liked to go there with her though.

  “You need to learn to balance,” he said, “so when the dragon turns, you turn with it.”

  He helped her up off the ground and pulled her over to the see-saw. They climbed on, shuffled until the plank hovered, balanced in mid-air, their weight equal. Sid waited for Ruby to push the game further, like she usually did. But Ruby was quiet.

  “If you really had a dragon, everyone would want to see it,” Sid said.

  Ruby pictured the dragon in a cage. She imagined everyone looking at it. In awe. In amazement. Their pride. Their joy. But how it roared and rattled the bars at her.

  She wanted to say something to the baby dragon. But she couldn’t find words it would understand. She didn’t even know what those words were. She imagined the unspoken sounds in her chest, like dragon’s breath. A swirling, hurtling ball of furious green flame. She let it out.

  “Aaargh!” she yelled.

  The searing sound hurtled across the park. It singed the football goalposts and stirred the trees over at the far side of the park, scorching everything the flames touched.

  Sid clamped his hands over his ears. But the image of the baby dragon wouldn’t leave Ruby. The creature ignored her yell and curled its retractable claws tighter. Ruby swung her leg over the see-saw handle, ready to jump again.

  Sid let go of his ears to hold on to the see-saw because it tipped now that Ruby had moved. Ruby jumped. The end thumped down on the rubber tarmac and jolted Sid.

  “Why were you shouting?” he asked.

  “To see if the dragon could hear me.”

  Sid frowned, grabbed his ball and turned it in his hands.

  “You sounded like a dragon,” he muttered. “And stop jumping off things. That hurt.”

  Ruby crouched beside the pillar at the middle of the see-saw and Sid sat beside her. She spat on her fingers and tried to wipe her hands clean. The dirt smeared. I feel like a dragon in a cage, Ruby thought.

  Just then, a small white shape right in the middle of the football pitch caught Sid’s eye.

  Ruby pulled in her legs and rested her chin on her knees. She picked at the peeling rubber on the edge of her shoes. She knew Sid was trying to cheer her up, but she couldn’t seem to do anything right today. She felt heavy inside, and only pretending she was someone else, somewhere else, seemed to help her feel lighter.

  “Sorry, Sid,” she said. “I wish I knew how to stop feeling like this about my brother, but I don’t know how.”

  “Let’s keep playing the game,” Sid said.

  “I can’t. Everything reminds me of what I’m trying not to think about.”

  Sid knew what the white thing in the middle of the pitch was now. A small dog, its ears turned towards them. The dog waited, watching them. Then a woman in a black skirt came into the park, tottering in high heels on the path alongside the pitch. She stopped when she noticed the little white dog. She looked all around. Walked on. Checked her watch. Turned back and looked again. Then she crossed the pitch, heading towards the dog, her hand held out.

  Ruby was thinking about the tiny dragon at home, settled to sleep. How could it be so content when she was not!

  “I can’t even trust my imagination, Sid,” Ruby whispered, as if the dragon shouldn’t hear.

  Sid remembered when he hadn’t been picked for the football team and Ruby had invented a game of football in space against aliens. He was player of the match as she cheered from the sidelines.

  “Yes you can, Ruby. Rules of the game,” Sid said. “You’re the best at this.”

  Ruby folded her arms, but her eyes twinkled. She knew Sid wasn’t going to give up on her.

  “I’ve told you before, there are no rules!” she smiled.

  “Not even in space football.”

  Ruby remembered. She sighed. It was easier making someone else happy.

  “Trying not to be jealous of my brother is really hard, Sid. And I don’t think he likes me anyway.”

  “He’s just a baby. They only know how to sleep and eat and poop.”

  “Thanks, Sid,” Ruby muttered. “So you think he won’t like me as soon as he learns how, because I’m not perfect like him.”

  “No, I didn’t mean… ”

  “Anyway, I don’t want to like him.” Ruby caught her fingers in a tangle of her hair. She wasn’t sure she meant to say that.

  “You could pretend,” Sid said. “You’re good at pretending.”

  Ruby imagined being nice to the baby when anyone else was around. But it was too hard. One minute she could choose whose lap to sit on, turn up her music if she wanted. Now she had to wait for her breakfast, nappies needed changing just when she had something important to say to her mum, and she had to be quiet most of the time because the baby was sleeping! The creature had invaded her life; it was ugly and unlovable. This didn’t feel like a game at all.

  “I don’t think you’re supposed to pretend to be nice,” Ruby muttered.

  Sid was still watching the woman get closer to the little dog. And an idea blossomed.

  “But you said we can be whoever we want when we imagine it,” he said. “Not what we do, but who we are, what we’re like.”

  Ruby opened her mouth, but the words were unimportant. Sid understood something she hadn’t. She was being the type of sister she didn’t want to be.

  “Even someone who isn’t jealous of their brother.”

  Sid grinned. He held Ruby’s hand and dragged her across the playing field. “In the meantime, one of our dragons has escaped!”

  “It’s my game now,” Sid said, as they ran towards the dog on the football pitch. “Just do as I say. Wave your arms and shout.”

  “Why?” Ruby asked.

  “You’ll see,” he said.

  Ruby’s face lit up with the running and the warmth of the sun on her skin that made her cheeks glow. Her eyes sparkled and it felt as though this morning had never happened. Just for a minute she could be free to choose who she was.

  The little white dog walked away from the woman who was still holding out her hand. His ears pricked and his tail swayed at the children racing towards him.

  As he got closer, Sid saw it wasn’t a small dog, it was a puppy. Ruby saw it then too. Small, white, with little sturdy legs and circles like ginger biscuits on his back. He had ginger fur like a mask over his eyes, and ears that looked as if he was hiding who he really was.

  The woman was there already. She bent down and picked up the puppy. He paddled at the air, waiting for the children to arrive. But he couldn’t wait any longer.

  He wriggled free from the woman’s hands. He jumped, rolled and picked himself up and raced towards Ruby and Sid as if he knew just where he
was going. Ruby saw him coming and, without thinking, bent and opened her arms and scooped him up.

  “Oh, he’s yours!” the woman said. “I thought he was lost.”

  Sid took a deep breath. “He belongs to Ruby.” Ruby’s eyes widened, a smile spread. “We thought we’d lost him for a minute,” Sid said.

  “Thank you for finding our escaped dragon. He’s still in training,” Ruby said, quick as anything. “But we haven’t trained him properly yet.”

  The woman opened her mouth.

  “Oh,” Ruby said with a shake of her head. “You thought he was a puppy. Well, it’s a disguise.” She put a finger to her lips and whispered, “You’ll have to promise not to tell anyone or our people from the Society of Secret Dragon Trainers will probably find you and… ” Ruby drew in her lips and shook her head slowly.

  Sid mimed a slice across his throat and shook his head too.

  The woman raised her eyebrows, smiled a little. “He should really be on a lead,” she said.

  “She only got him last week and he hasn’t got one yet,” Sid said.

  “We have to get back now, before he gets hungry,” Ruby said. She swallowed. “You don’t want to be near a dragon when it’s hungry.”

  “Sweet little puppy,” the woman said. “Very small for a dragon, but still, perhaps he should have a collar and a name tag?” She smiled. “What’s his name?”

  “Jack,” Ruby said. The first word on her lips, the last words she meant to say. “Jack Pepper.”

  She froze for a moment then hugged the puppy in close. The real treasure. Jack Pepper. Her brother.

  They sat in the grass and the puppy rolled over and bared his tummy. Ruby inspected the puppy’s ears and eyes and fur for dragon scales and the seams that concealed him.

  “That’s where the zip would be for his disguise,” she said. “Pull down the middle and out comes the dragon.”

  Sid held the delighted puppy’s front paws.

  “Claws, Ruby. For fighting battles. And look at his white teeth. One day they’ll be strong and sharp, like swords.”