Free Selby Surfs by Duncan Ball Page B

in the nose and you want some pills for it, is that it?’
    ‘Spot od.’
    ‘Good. A bedicine company — I mean a
medicine
company — just sent me a sample of a new, super good runny nose medicine. You can be the first to try it. It’s called
Super Snot Stop.
Not the prettiest name in the world but I guess it tells you what it does. There are two pills in the bottle. Just take one and your nose will stop running immediately. The pills are very strong. Anyway, don’t bother getting out of bed, I’ll swing by and drop the bottle in your letterbox.’
    ‘Dank kew. You’re berry kide.’
    ‘Sorry?’
    ‘I said, “You’re berry kide,"’ Selby repeated.
    ‘Yes, that’s my name, Barry Kline. Did you want something else?’
    ‘Debbor bide.’
    ‘Deborah Vine is my partner. Do you want to speak to her?’
    ‘Dope.’
    ‘Well, you could at least be polite about it. Just because I couldn’t understand you doesn’t mean I’m a dope. Goodness me, Mrs Trifle. Oh, well, I guess we all get a bit cranky when we’re sick. I’ll drop the pills around straight away.’
    ‘Dank you.’
    Click.
    ‘Poor Mr Kline,’ Selby thought. ‘I hope I didn’t hurt his feelings.’
    Fifteen sneezes later Selby watched as the chemist dropped the bottle of pills in the letterbox and then drove away. In a second, Selby had snatched the
Super Snot Stop
bottle and brought it into the house.
    ‘Thank goodness,’ he thought. ‘Now to get the top off this thing.’
    Selby struggled with it for a minute without success.
    ‘This must be another one of those child-proof thingies,’ he thought. ‘Maybe you have to push it down and then turn it.’
    Selby pushed and turned and pulled and turned and even tried to slide it to the side but the bottle wouldn’t open.
    ‘This is driving me bonkers!’ Selby thought. ‘This isn’t only child-proof and people-proof, it’s even
pet
-proof! I’d ring Barry Kline again and ask him how to open it but it’s no good — he’d never understand me.’
    Selby threw the bottle on the hard kitchen floor only to have it bounce back up. He threw it again even harder and it bounced around the walls until it hit him on the head and dropped to the floor.
    ‘Youch! I’ll fix you!’ Selby said with a sneeze. ‘Where’s Dr Trifle’s big rock-smashing hammer?’
    But before Selby could even think to blink he heard two big sneezes — and neither of them was his. He spun around to see Dr and Mrs Trifle coming through the door.
    ‘No wonder I had a headache,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘It was a cold coming on. Now I’m —
ah-choo!
— all sneezy.’
    ‘Me —
choo!
— too,’ Dr Trifle said.
    ‘But look!’ Mrs Trifle exclaimed, picking up the medicine bottle. ‘It’s that new
Super Snot Stop
that’s had all the ads on TV. Where did it come from?’
    ‘I have no idea. I don’t remember buying it.’
    ‘You don’t remember lots of things, dear. But never mind, let’s see if it works as well as it’s supposed to.’
    ‘You’ll never find out because you’ll neverget the lid off,’ Selby thought as he watched Mrs Trifle struggling with the bottle top.
    ‘Here, let me try,’ Dr Trifle said, taking the bottle and opening it easily.
    ‘Crumbs,’ Selby thought. ‘How’d he do that?’
    ‘How’d you do that?’ Mrs Trifle asked.
    ‘First I pressed down, then I turned it one turn in the wrong direction, and then I pulled up and pushed it to the side. Nothing to it,’ Dr Trifle said, popping a pill into his mouth and handing the other to Mrs Trifle.
    ‘But how on earth did you know to do that?’
    ‘Simple: the bottle top is based on my new system — the one I came up with for the Tricky Twist Medicine Bottle Company,’ Dr Trifle said. ‘Hmmm, this
Super Snot Stop
is great. I can feel my sniffles disappearing already.’
    ‘So can I,’ Mrs Trifle said. ‘But tell me, how is anyone else supposed to figure out how to get the top off the bottle?’
    ‘Well you know how I said that