David Baddiel - Birthday Boy

“Don’t worry about that!” said Vicky. “It’s your birthday!” She looked over at the telescope. “Are the stars out? If you see a shooting one, you can wish on it! You should wish on it!”

“Really?” said Sam. “Does that actually, y’know … work?”

“Yes!” said Vicky confidently.

Charlie looked at her, and raised an eyebrow.

“Well. No one really knows. Do they?” she said defiantly.

“Um …” said Charlie, bending down and checking the telescope lens. “Well. What I would say is that tonight is too cloudy to see the stars anyway.”

“Never mind,” said Sam. “We’ll look through it tomorrow!”

He climbed up the little ladder and got into bed. It was a bunk bed, and sometimes Sam would show how good he was at balancing on that ladder by walking up without using his hands, although tonight he was too tired for that.

“Oh! And I liked it when the grans and grandpas came round for lunch,” he said. “They didn’t even fight!”

“I know,” said Vicky, clearly surprised herself. “They were on their best behaviour.”

“Yes …” said Sam, settling his head on the pillow. “Grandpa Sam didn’t even swear at Grandpa Mike. And Grandpa Mike didn’t even punch him or threaten to get his boys on him or anything. And Grandma Glenda and Grandma Poppy even smiled at each other.”

“I think that might have been a snarl …” said his dad.

“Shush, Charlie. Anyway … you should go to sleep now, Sammy,” said Sam’s mum. “I imagine you’re exhausted …”

“Specially,” said his dad, “having got up at the dot of six in the morning!”

“Was that the time?” said Sam.

“Well. It was one minute past six when you were knocking on our bedroom door, demanding presents. I’m sure of that …”

“But that was my favourite bit!” said Sam.

“Of what?”

“Of my birthday! I love how exciting it is to wake up on your birthday! And realise that it is your birthday! This day you’ve been waiting for, for so long, it’s finally here!”

“Yes,” said Vicky. “That is very exciting.”

“Not quite as exciting when you get to forty-three, though,” said Charlie, and Vicky laughed at his joke in a grown-ups-laughing-at-grown-ups’-stuff kind of way.

“Isn’t it?” said Sam.

“Pardon?” said Charlie.

“Exciting. Isn’t it exciting any more, your birthday?”

His mum and dad looked at each other.

“Well,” said Vicky, looking back at Sam kindly, and pulling his duvet back across him. “It’s always nice, yes. But maybe not quite as nice as it was when you’re ten … or when that of course turns into eleven.”

Sam nodded, but then shook his head.

“I’d like it to be my birthday every day!” he said.

His parents smiled, and then both of them got on the bed with him – climbed up the ladder and everything – and put their arms round him, something that in this family was referred to as a bundle-hug.

“Wait for me!” said Ruby as she hurried back into the room. She climbed up and joined the bundle-hug. She was holding a big science textbook, which made it a bit uncomfortable.

Then, after that, Vicky said:

“I’m glad the day went so well. Ruby, back to your room. Sam, time to go to sleep …”

And Sam smiled at her, and shut his eyes.

Normally, Sam had no problem sleeping. Normally, he was out as soon as his head hit the pillow. And his parents were right: he should have been more ready for sleep than ever, given how early he’d been up that morning.

But his birthday had been so great, and he was still so excited, that Sam just couldn’t sleep. He found himself tossing and turning in his bed, thinking of how much he just wanted to stay up and play with all his presents.

A lso , he thought, looking at the numbers on the clock by his bedside – 10.24 – it’s still my birthday ! F or another hour and thirty-six minutes! What am I thinking of, going to sleep?

N o – he also thought – I should be up, doing birthday stuff!

So Sam got out of bed. And tried on his trainers. And ran on the spot with them for a little while. Then he stood on his skateboard, which was great: his parents had splashed out on it – it was exactly the one he wanted, a flexiboard, customised with cool silver wheels and the right trucks and everything.

It would have been more fun to ride on it outside, obviously, but even in his quite small bedroom Sam was able to do some 360s and some frontside flips. Then he got Spock the guinea pig out of his cage, and did some more 360s, but this time with the guinea pig balanced on his head. The guinea pig didn’t look that keen on this. In fact, he looked down at his new master with quite a strong sense of, “If it’s all going to be like this, I’m going to be escaping to Peru. Which is where guinea pigs come from. In case you don’t know. Which I get the impression you don’t.”

(He had a pretty expressive face for a guinea pig, Spock. Which made him somewhat different, it has to be said, from the original Spock.)

Then, he – Sam, not Spock – ate some of the leftover marshmallow from the cake that his mum had brought up on a plate. Then he read the first few chapters of D emon D entist , which was very funny.

After thirty pages, Sam looked over at the clock, which said, now, 11.55pm. He still, amazingly, didn’t feel that tired. What he did feel was a bit sad. Mainly, he felt a bit sad that his birthday was ending, officially, now. He sat up, and said to Spock, who was lying on his chest – had, in fact, tumbled down into his lap as a result of him sitting up – “Oh, Spock! I wish it was my birthday every day.”

Spock looked up at him with quite a strong sense of, “I wish I could live in a cage made out of parsley, but we can’t have everything.”

Just at that point, though, a light fell across the room. Sam looked up to see that the source of the light was beyond his bedroom curtains. Moonlight.

Aha! he thought. If I can see moonlight, the clouds must have parted. And, if the clouds have parted, I can use my telescope!

So Sam got out of bed and moved over to the window. He drew the curtains, and looked out.

He was right. It was no longer a cloudy night. Noam Chomsky House stood on a hill, and the road from it ran down, after a few miles, to the river that wound through the city. Sometimes, when – like now – the sky was clear and the moon came out, Sam could see all the way to the river (even without a telescope); he could even see the reflection of the moonlight on the water, lighting up a small tree-filled island that sat between the banks.

But Sam wasn’t interested in looking down at the water. He wanted to look up at the sky. He wanted to look up at the sky through his telescope, and see the stars and the moon. All of which were suddenly out.

He put his eye to the lenspiece at the bottom end of the telescope. It was hard to see anything – all he could make out, in fact, was what appeared to be three or four massive spider legs, which at first, excitedly, he thought must be aliens but then realised were just his eyelashes. Gradually, though, his vision got used to it, and then he could see the moon!