Contents
Cover
About the Book
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Amy’s Spanish Dictionary
About the Author
Copyright
AMY WILD: AMAZON SUMMER
AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK 978 1 448 17201 6
Published in Great Britain by RHCP Digital,
an imprint of Random House Children’s Publishers UK
A Penguin Random House Company
This ebook edition published 2015
Text copyright © Helen Skelton, 2015
First Published in Great Britain
Corgi 978 0 552 56839 5 2015
The right of Helen Skelton to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
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THE RANDOM HOUSE GROUP Limited Reg. No. 954009
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This book is dedicated to families.
The ones we’re born into, and the ones we build around us.
I still can’t believe he told on me.
Seriously, my brother is such a loser. Gavin’s older than me, only by a year and eighteen days, but he goes running to Mam like a big crybaby when anything doesn’t go his way. It’s embarrassing! I mean, I know he had to give her an explanation – his eye was pretty much hanging out of his head. But he didn’t have to tell her it was me who hit him. He definitely didn’t have to tell her about the horseshoe I’d put inside the boxing glove.
I might tell his friends what a baby he is the next time they come over, just to see the look on his face. Billy and Jack are always at our house – we have huge football goals at the bottom of the farmyard, and Dad made us this brilliant tyre swing that two people can sit on at the same time. It was meant for all of us – Kate, Rebecca, Harpreet and me – but Gavin seems to think it’s only for his farty friends. They’re gross. They pick their noses when they’re on that swing, and I know they do it in front of me so I won’t want to go on it after them. It’s horrid, but I’m not letting them bully me off it. I don’t play on the rope swing at school because of that cow Sally Anne, so I’m not being bullied off a swing at my own house. (I would never call her a cow to her face, but she won’t read this so I can say it here. I bet she can’t even read). Anyway, with bogeys, as long as you wait until they’re dry, you can just flick them off. Everyone knows that.
My friends don’t come over much any more, to be honest. Their mams don’t let them. According to Rebecca’s mam, I am ‘a disruptive influence’. I heard my mam tell her I was just ‘spirited’. Go, Mam! I was proud of her for that – she never normally sticks up for me.
Gavin’s friends still come over all the time. Which is unfair, because the things I get in trouble for are almost always their fault. Like, ‘If you pinch those matches from your mam, we’ll let you come camping with us.’ I always get caught! Before too long I’ll nail it, though – then they’ll have to let me join in.
Just a few more weeks of school and then it’s the summer holidays, and after that I’ll be at the same secondary school as them. We’ll all go on the bus together, Gav’s friends will start to see that I’m OK – and hopefully my friends will be allowed to come round again. I really don’t want to wear that stupid uniform, though. Sally Anne calls me frumpy already – when she sees me in that pleated skirt she’ll have a field day. Still, who wants to look like a boring Barbie doll? All her friends have the same hair, wear the same lipstick and paint their eyebrows black. It’s so boring. Last week I told Rebecca she looked stupid when she tried to wear her hair in the same sideways plait they all have, and she had a massive go at me. She kept saying I was jealous! I’m not – I could plait my hair and sit on it, if I wanted to. I never get it cut because it takes ages, unless Mam offers me a good bribe. (I’ll go to the hairdresser’s if she makes it worth my while).
It’s days like that one that make me like hanging out with the boys. Granted, they are TOTAL show-offs. Gav is the worst. He got picked to play cricket for his year, and he won’t stop going on about it. It’s like he plays for England or something. I’m only allowed to play now because I can overarm bowl – and that took me ages to learn. Gav used to tell me, ‘You throw like a girl.’ Idiot. I am a girl! And what does that even mean?! Anyway, I used to go down to the silage pit on our farm, where my dad stores the grass for the cows all winter, and practise until my arm was so sore I could hardly lift it. I never told Gavin, then I just went and joined in his game one day, and he couldn’t stop me because they could all see I was pretty good by then!
Back to today. The thing is, Gavin and I fight. A lot. This time I am really mad. He grassed on me for going on the barn roof!
This might not seem like such a big deal, but I’ve been going up there for ever. I keep a stash of cherryade up there, and some sweets. It’s the best hiding place on the whole farm, and the highest point – you can see everyone and everything from there: when Dad goes outside for a secret cigarette he thinks Mam doesn’t know about; when Mam hides shopping in the garage she thinks Dad doesn’t know about.
Gavin didn’t know I could get up there until he spotted me this morning. He’s such a chicken he wouldn’t try and climb up – but if you scramble on top of the tractor when it’s parked next to the barn, crawl along the first roof, climb through a gap in the tin and balance on one of the beams, it’s easy.
Well, Gav’s decided I shouldn’t get to have a cool place because he doesn’t, and he’s told Mam, and he’s ruined it. Jealous idiot.
I went mental, chasing him all over the farm. I knew that sooner or later he’d run round the corner of the garage – and when he did, I was waiting with my boxing glove. (We got them for Christmas from our Uncle Dave, who Mam says is ‘Totally Irresponsible’. We have one each: Gav has the left one, I have the right.) I didn’t even really have to take a swing, because he was running so fast that he smacked straight into the glove.
I didn’t expect it to do so much damage.
It hurt me, too! I’d put a horseshoe in the glove to make it extra-hard, and it was rusty, so browny-orange bits flaked off and dug into my skin as Gavin’s face bounced off the cracked red leather.
It’s a shame, really. Without the marks on my hand I could have said it wasn’t me. His word against mine, and all that.
‘You’ve gone too far this time, Amy Elizabeth Wild. Too far! You could have taken his eye out. You could have blinded him!’
Classic overreaction. ‘You could have taken his eye out’? How?! I don’t have a pair of pliers and a spoon! She’s such a drama queen, my mam – just like that flipping brother of mine, who is Mam’s golden boy and favourite child. She drags me over to the bench in the kitchen that faces the door into the porch and makes me sit there while she tells me off. It’s the door my dad will walk through after milking, and he’ll meet my eyes, sigh and say, ‘What now?’ Sitting here, folded arms, anger bubbling up inside me, I listen to my soft-touch brother getting fussed over in the living room.
It’s always my fault. I’m always the one who has to sit here, being told to think about what I have done.
I am thinking about it – I’m thinking how all I was doing was getting even, yet once again I’m the one in the wrong. Gav is so Mam’s favourite.
It’s OK – I think I’m Dad’s, and I’m definitely Auntie Marg’s. That’s my dad’s older sister. Although that doesn’t really count for anything, because she has no real say; she’s just our funny old hippyish aunt who lives at the bottom of the vegetable garden.
‘I’m sick with worry all the time! Why can’t you learn to behave yourself?’ Mam witters on as she comes back into the kitchen.
‘I was only on the roof looking for rare birds, and I was going to do sketches for my teacher!’ I try to interrupt, but I stop when I see Mam’s reaction. Hands on hips. Face clenched. She doesn’t buy that for a second.
‘Don’t try and get out of this with a lie. You could have fallen. You could have broken your neck!’ She actually looks quite upset now, and old. All of a sudden, my mam looks old. The lines around her eyes are dark and deep, her eyes glistening like she’s about to cry.
‘Oh, I get it!’ I huff defensively. ‘If I broke my legs you’d have to run around after me like you run around after Gavin, and you haven’t got time for both of us. Only for him!’
Uh-oh. Too far.
I look from Mam to Bob, our shaggy Border collie. He can’t even look at me, curled into a ball, his head resting on his front paws.
‘To be fair, Mam,’ I start to protest, ‘the roof was actually quite a good hiding place, because—’
‘Don’t get smart with me!’ Mam snaps. She’s shaking with anger now, her face beetroot-red.
Mam is not normally as bad as this. Usually I get the Look – you know, when your mam says nothing but just stares at you in a way that makes your muscles freeze. You can’t breathe because you know when you get home you are getting one hell of a telling off. Ever had that look? I hate it, but I’d prefer it to this rant.
Mam takes a deep breath. ‘When your dad gets in we are going to have a serious talk about what to do with you. Now get out of my sight. I can’t even look at you – you have really let yourself down today. You have let us down.’
Mam storms out, slamming the kitchen door. The plates in the dresser wobble and rattle. I think she might actually be crying.
She had to play the ‘you let us down’ card. That’s the worst. When she yells, I don’t mind. I feel bad when she cries. But ‘you let us down’ – ouch. Gavin never lets them down; he makes them proud every single week. He’s the best at everything: football, cricket, maths. Even flipping drawing.
I’d like to make Mam and Dad proud, but they just aren’t proud of the things I can do. After all, that was an excellent hiding place. If we got invaded by an army, we could hide up there and I’d be the one to save my family and be a hero. For once. I’ll point that out when Dad gets in.
Dad won’t be too mad. He gets cross when I do something that makes extra work for him on the farm, like when I made a water slide on top of the black plastic sheet that protects the winter feed. That wasn’t too bad, because I made myself cry when he was telling me off. He hates seeing me upset.
I can’t turn the waterworks on with Mam, though. She invented that trick. She knows exactly what I’m doing and it just makes her even madder.
For now, though, I can’t just sit on this bench and wait for Dad to come in. I’m off to Auntie Marg’s caravan. She’ll know how to win Dad over; she always does.
Auntie Marg has lived at the bottom of our vegetable garden for ever. She spends a lot of time in our house, but then again she grew up here, so it’s kind of her house too.
She’s meant to help Mam on the farm, in the house, with us. But she doesn’t. She’s left us at the school gates a few times, not because she forgets, but she just gets caught up taking her photos. She can spend hours watching a bird or a frog, and when she’s close to the perfect photo she can’t just abandon it, because the perfect photo is worth waiting for, apparently.
Her caravan is only about a hundred metres from our house. I can see it from my bedroom window. It’s pretty ugly from the outside, with funny windows that don’t open. Inside, though, it’s amazing. It’s packed to bursting with treasure from all over the world: a peacock feather from India; a tribal stick from Uganda; scarves and sarongs in every colour you can imagine.
She’s not precious about it. I go in there and nose through it all the time, and she doesn’t mind. ‘That’s from Bolivia,’ she’ll say casually. ‘I found that in Bangladesh,’ she’ll add, as I pick up rocks and stones, holding them in the dappled light breaking through the tacky net curtains she refuses to replace.
It’s a really old caravan now. Auntie Marg bought it when she was twenty with her first big pay cheque. She used to get paid to go all over the world taking photos for magazines and newspapers. She was a big deal back then. She hasn’t been on a proper expedition for years, though; all the people she used to train up and take along as her assistants get the gigs now. ‘I’ve had my day. They’d laugh at my efforts now!’ I’ve heard her wail at Mam and Dad. One of her old assistants is the editor of a big magazine now, and he asked her to go and do some ‘new stuff’ recently, but she freaked when she got the email from him. I heard Mam and Dad saying she’s lost her confidence. (I earwig a lot!)
I don’t know why she doesn’t go away on trips any more. I know she misses it. She looks at her photographs all the time. She’s got boxes and albums and piles of prints, newspapers and magazines, all with Margie Wild, a place and date printed boldly on the back: Margie Wild, Namibia, 1978. Margie Wild, Chile, 1969.
She’d go off for weeks, sometimes months at a time. Once she lived with a load of women in an abandoned school in Tanzania. She went to Cuba to take pictures of some people she said we could all learn from, and once she followed families in Mongolia up hills on horseback.
It would be good if she went on the road again, so I could prove to my friends what a cool auntie she really is, rather than just some funny woman who floats about in long skirts, occasionally popping up at christenings and weddings. She hates all that family stuff, but Mam and Dad sort of make her go along. They think it will help get her back into it.
When I push open the door to her caravan, Auntie Marg is sitting at her laptop, tapping away, a frown on her face. Her fingers are covered with silver rings, her long red hair knotted and messy. A bit like mine, except I’m blonde. ‘Hello, my darling,’ she says as I plop down next to her, but she seems distracted.
‘What are you looking at?’
She sighs. ‘The photographs from that Egypt trip that I didn’t go on. It just looks so wonderful.’
‘Again?’ I say. ‘Auntie Marg, you’ve been looking at them all week!’
Before Christmas, Auntie Marg had talked about going to Cairo. Some friend of a friend was filming pyramids for a TV company, and Auntie Marg was going to take photos for publicity or something like that. She loves creepy stuff – the idea of dead bodies wrapped in bandages that have been sealed in a tomb for thousands of years really excites her (although can you imagine how much they must stink?). It was the kind of photography she’d love to be doing again. But the friend of the friend asked someone else as well, and they said yes immediately, and got the money for the plane ticket together more quickly, so Auntie Marg missed out. Whoever that person was must have been pretty good because the photos have been everywhere, in loads of different papers, and the first time Auntie Marg saw them she burst into tears.
The caravan door swings open again and Gav sticks his head inside, grinning. Unsurprisingly, he doesn’t look to be in pain at all. ‘How long are you grounded for, then?’ he asks me, smirking.
I leap at him, jump on his back and grip his head tightly between my arms, then push my thumb into his bruised, swollen eye. ‘You’re fine! I knew you were fine!’ I yell into his ear.
‘ARGGHHHHH! Get off me – that kills!’ he snaps, throwing me down to the floor, onto my back.
‘What are you going to do, tell Mam again?’ I shout.
‘Darlings, my darlings!’ Auntie Marg tries to shush us. ‘Please, stop fighting. Your mother will hear you! Look – we’ll put something on the telly and all watch it together. How does that sound? Look on the Sky Plus thingy, Amy – I might have recorded something good.’
Scowling at Gav, I pick up the dusty remote control and switch the TV on, flicking through the channels. Auntie Marg shouldn’t really have so many channels in here but Dad got her an illegal aerial thing. Mam doesn’t know, and we aren’t to tell her either. Even Gav is in on this one as sometimes he sneaks in here and watches football until midnight. On school nights.
‘Ooh, what’s this?’ says Auntie Marg as a creepy, shadowy, steamy jungle fills the screen.
A man’s deep voice booms. ‘We are now deep inside the Amazon.’
‘Where you buy books?’ I ask.
‘The place, you idiot,’ says Gavin, punching the top of my arm so hard that even my fingers tingle. ‘The Amazon rainforest.’
The voice continues. ‘This creature kills with one bite. You won’t see it, but it will know exactly where you are. It’s a powerful beast that can swim, climb and run, and ambushes its helpless prey. With one snap of its jaw, the caiman can and will break your hand.’
‘What’s a caymarrn?’ I ask.
‘Shhh!’ Gav and Auntie Marg hiss in unison, both staring at the telly. The picture has changed to a murky-looking river surrounded by trees, a pair of piercing yellow eyes sticking out of the water.
‘Oh, so it’s like a crocodile?’ I say. ‘Cool!’
Gavin grabs the remote from me and starts to fast-forward, whizzing between shots of snakes and jaguars, monkeys and lizards. He zooms through a section all about huge, furry black spiders, not even stopping to listen to the voiceover. Gav HATES spiders. I’m not the least bit scared of them. I use this to my advantage as much as possible. If I can find even a harmless little daddy-longlegs in one of the barns, I keep it in a jam jar in my room until I hear him go to the bathroom in the night, then I sneak in and leave it on his pillow. He doesn’t always see it, but when he does it’s excellent!
I snatch the remote back from him and hit play.
The voice booms: ‘At night the caiman, snakes and jaguars hunt for food, pouncing on unsuspecting creatures, tearing them from limb to limb. However, there are larger, more dangerous forces at work in the shadows. Forces that cannot be fully explained. It’s said that many legends roam the riverbanks.’
‘Oooh, this sounds fascinating,’ says Auntie Marg, leaning forward.
An eerie, high-pitched wail echoes through the caravan. ‘The legend of el tunchi is one of the most famous,’ the voice continues. ‘Hundreds of walkers have lost their way, following the shrieks and cries of what sound like people calling to them from the treetops. Locals claim they are the spirits of those who took their last breath within the Amazon. Many don’t make it out . . .’
‘Don’t make it out? Where do they go, Auntie Marg? Does he mean they die?’ I ask. Both Gavin and I are now staring at the screen.
‘Shhh, listen!’ Auntie Marg replies excitedly, hovering above her seat.
‘El bufeo colorado, the pink river dolphin of the Amazon, is real enough, but some say they are more sinister than they look. Are they really dolphins, or are they men trapped in the bodies of dolphins, destined to lure children to drown . . .?’
‘What?!’ says Gavin.
‘That’s weird,’ I add. A cool feeling creeps over my body. The two of us are sitting side by side, more calmly than we have in years, our breath deep, fear in our lungs.
We watch the second half of the documentary. Our bums are numb but we are unable to move, fascinated and freaked out in equal measure. As the booming voice details more myths and creatures, it has us all gripped. ‘And finally, there’s la lupuna,’ it says softly. ‘A tree that is sacred to the people living in the Amazon. Many communities are built around it, believing it has magical powers to protect them and their families. It will punish anyone who disrespects them. Poison them . . .’ Scenes of a steamy jungle fill the screen. The fierce yellow bloodshot eyes hold our gaze again, and the voice echoes around the caravan: ‘The jungle is dense and full. Animals remain undiscovered, plants untouched and stories unexplained.’
The picture freezes and a list of names roll up the screen. We are silent, stunned.
Auntie Marg jumps to her feet. ‘This, my darlings,’ she says, grabbing my shoulders with both hands, ‘is going to get me back on the map! Didn’t you hear what that man said? “Animals remain undiscovered, plants untouched and stories unexplained!” This is it! I need to go there. With my camera, I will capture it all, the beauty, the magic!’
‘Auntie Marg, there are Google maps now – you can just put the postcode in and have a look that way,’ I offer, but the sound of her silver bangles clanging together as she waves her arms drowns me out.
‘I will never photograph another wedding again – I will be the photographer I once was! Now, I need to immerse myself in the culture. I need to learn as much as I can.’ She skips towards her laptop, her fingers fumbling over the keyboard.
Gavin’s back in control of the remote now, and is whizzing backwards and forwards through the programme to find the biggest bugs.
‘So creepy. So intimidating. So wild. I love it!’ says Auntie Marg, bashing at the keys.
‘What are you looking for?’ I ask. She’s not completely rubbish at computers like Mam, but I know I’m better. I edge closer to her and lay one hand on the laptop. ‘Give it here. I’m quicker. I’ll help you,’ I offer, snatching it from her grip.
‘Look for those amazing snakes, and the adorable little monkeys. Look for el tunchi – how spooky! And what was that other thing called – la lupuna, I think? Incredible – a tree that can poison you if you disrespect the jungle! The pink dolphins, too! Did you hear that bit? People believe that the pink dolphins are really the trapped spirit of a man trying to steal children – or did he say children trying to steal . . . Anyway, let’s Google it . . . and then I’ll find out how much the flights cost!’ With every word, Auntie Marg gets louder, her bangles clattering, her pitch so high I think only Bob will be able to hear her soon.
‘I want to know if there are really fish that can swim up a person’s stream of wee and get inside them and eat their insides!’ shouts Gavin over the excitement. His back is to us, his eyes on the football match now filling the screen. ‘Are there really vultures that can peck your eyes out and eat them for tea?’ he continues.
Vultures . . . fish . . . poison . . . Amazon . . .
I’m typing as fast as I can.
‘Some of the spiders are so poisonous they can kill you just by crawling over your hand,’ hisses Gav from just outside my bedroom door. ‘You won’t even know it’s there. It will feel like something’s tickling you, and then—’
‘Gavin! Shut up! You’re only jealous. Just because Auntie Marg chose me to go to the Amazon with her! I’m not even scared of spiders, I’m not a chicken. Get lost. I have to pack.’
Although I don’t really know what to pack. It’s not exactly Spain or Scotland, is it? We once went to Spain, but we can’t really take long holidays because of the farm. I once got invited on holiday with Harpreet’s family, but just before they booked it I set fire to our cat (by accident!). As punishment Mam and Dad said I couldn’t go.
This is different, though. Auntie Marg has said she needs me. She needs my help – and I will help. Gavin keeps saying I’m going to muck it up, but I won’t. I will not break anything or smash anything. I’ll be the one they’re all proud of. Gav is going to be sick of hearing Mam say, ‘Amy was so useful on the trip to South America. Marg couldn’t have done it without her!’
Mam’s not quite at that stage yet. Unsurprisingly, she’s really nervous about me going to South America with Auntie Marg, and she was dead against it at first. Auntie Marg suggested it the night we watched that documentary. She popped over after tea, when Gav and I were getting ready for bed. Mam and Dad think I can’t hear it when they ‘discuss’ things, but Gav and I worked out years ago that if you sit at the top of the stairs with your head through the banister railings, you can listen to whatever’s going on in the kitchen.
‘It might be a good way to channel her energy, Janet,’ I heard Auntie Marg offer.
‘Energy?!’ screeched Mam. ‘You try dealing with her energy for more than a day and you’ll change your mind about wanting her to come! She gets into enough trouble in our back yard. God knows what she’ll do on the other side of the world! This is a ludicrous idea.’
‘Margaret, I think it’s time you went back to your caravan,’ Dad cut in. ‘Let me and Janet discuss this alone.’
Auntie Marg left the kitchen, her bangles jangling so loudly I missed what he said at first. Then Dad said, ‘Marg has a point,’ and suddenly I was listening very carefully. This was getting interesting. ‘Maybe it would