First published in the United Kingdom by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2023

  Published in this ebook edition in 2023

  HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of

  HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  HarperCollinsPublishers

  Macken House, 39/40 Mayor Street Upper

  Dublin 1, D01 C9W8, Ireland

  Text copyright © Adam Baron 2023

  Illustration copyright © Benji Davies 2023

  Cover illustration copyright © Benji Davies 2023

  Cover design copyright © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2023

  Adam Baron and Benji Davies assert the moral right to be identified as the author and illustrator of the work respectively.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008596750

  Ebook Edition © October 2023 ISBN: 9780008424220

  Version: 2023-09-30

  For Naomi, who had to sit next to me.

  In memory of Majorie and Cecil Franklin,

  and Frances and Hans Smerd.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Acknowledgements

  Books by Adam Baron

  About the Publisher

  When Oscar woke up that Friday morning, he had no idea that a massive and very wild animal had entered his house. He’d been dreaming, images rushing through his mind like a raging river. The dream had seemed important, as dreams can, and he tried to hold on to the churning pictures. They vanished though, so he sat up, reached over to his bedside table and grabbed it – not just a book. The book. His complete and absolute favourite. Mack and the Lost Truck.

  Oscar stared at the shiny cover. The book was too young for him now, but he didn’t care because it was special. He got out of bed, about to run along the landing to his parents’ room. Then he stopped.

  Odd.

  On a school day, Oscar’s parents normally woke him up at 7.15, but the clock on his wall said 7.25! They must have overslept, so Oscar hurried towards their bedroom door, clutched the handle and turned it. He pushed the door open, expecting, of course, to see the familiar sleeping forms of his mum and dad, two long mountain ranges that he still loved climbing on. But Oscar did not see his parents lying there.

  Their duvet was quite flat.

  And sitting on it was something that stopped Oscar in his tracks so that all he could do was stare.

  A lion.

  A very big and very real male lion.

  ‘Ah,’ said the lion, turning to look at Oscar.

  Oscar didn’t reply. He simply couldn’t – of course. He just blinked at the lion’s massive head and shaggy black mane, at the huge paw the lion had been licking and was now setting back down on the bed in slight embarrassment. Oscar scanned the bedroom, taking in some bits of paper held down by a paperweight on his mum’s dressing table, and a chair on which a pile of clean washing was tottering, waiting to be put away. When he turned back to the bed, the lion grimaced in an apologetic sort of way, and winced at him.

  Oscar swallowed. ‘Have you seen …?’ he began.

  ‘Yes?’ enquired the lion, its voice like a rumble of thunder.

  ‘My …’ Oscar couldn’t say it. ‘My …?’

  ‘Parents?’ suggested the lion.

  ‘Yes,’ Oscar said, glad, for some reason, that he hadn’t had to say it himself.

  ‘Ah,’ said the lion again. ‘Were there … two of them?’ Oscar nodded. ‘The father tall? Blue pyjamas? A little patch at the back of his head where the hair has stopped growing?’

  ‘Yes,’ Oscar agreed, without much enthusiasm. ‘That sounds like …’

  ‘And the mother? Blue eyes? Blonde hair?’

  ‘I’d say it was more of a golden colour.’

  ‘Right. But the rest?’

  ‘Yes,’ Oscar said, really wishing he was saying no instead. ‘And, if she was next to my dad, then it definitely would have been her.’

  ‘Ah,’ said the lion, for the third time. And then it grimaced again, in a way that told Oscar that it had done something. And Oscar had a horrible feeling that he knew what that something was, though he really hoped he was wrong.

  The lion let out a long, and slightly smelly, sigh. ‘It’s just …’ it began.

  ‘Yes?’ said Oscar.

  ‘Well, it’s just this whole, well, being a lion. Thing.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘It most certainly is. One would like sometimes not to be one. To be, perhaps, a hamster. Something small and furry. Or a budgerigar.’

  ‘A …?’

  ‘You know, a budgie. Bright feathers. All flitty here and there and here again. Lovely song. But …’

  ‘You’re not one of those?’

  ‘No,’ the lion said. ‘As you can see, I am not. And that’s hardly my fault, is it? I mean, you couldn’t suddenly stop being you, could you? And be, say, a peacock?’

  Oscar couldn’t really argue with that. It would be very difficult indeed. He doubted whether he could even be a different person, let alone a different animal altogether.

  He had another look round the room and noted, again, the pieces of paper on the dressing table and the washing. Everything seemed completely normal. If there was no other explanation for the absence of his parents, then it was just one of those things, however difficult that was to accept. Something did bother him though – and quite a lot.

  ‘Was it …?’

  The lion seemed to guess what he was thinking. ‘Ghastly? Oh no,’ it said, shaking its head in a way that was clearly intended to reassure. ‘Trust me.’

  Oscar blinked. He’d begun to see rather awful pictures in his mind of what he now presumed must have occurred mere seconds before he had pushed his parents’ door open. There was no actual sign of anything, however, and Oscar was wondering if he should ask about this. The lion, though, was looking at Oscar’s hand.

  ‘What’s that?’ it asked.

  ‘Oh,’ Oscar said. ‘A book.’ He stared at it.

  ‘Is it now? And were you …?’

  ‘Yes?’ said Oscar.

  ‘Going to ask your parents to read it to you?’

  ‘My mum,’ said Oscar. ‘Though I can read it myself.’

  ‘I don’t doubt that for a second. But it’s nice to be read to.’

  ‘It is, though Mum would probably have groaned. She would have said, “Not that again,” or, “Haven’t you grown out of that yet?” She would have poked my dad awake instead. He would have yawned and said, “Heavens, must we? Surely you know what happens to blessed Mack by now!”’

  ‘But he would have read it to you?’ Oscar nodded. ‘Well, how perfectly awful.’

  Mournfully, Oscar nodded again.

  ‘In that case, nothing for it then, is there? Jump on up.’

  And the lion moved over to the far side of the bed, to make room.

  Oscar stayed right where he was. He could feel Mack and the Lost Truck in his left hand and he so did want to have it read to him. But he frowned.

  ‘How can I be sure that …?’

  ‘That?’

  ‘You won’t …’

  ‘Ah,’ said the lion, for the fourth time that morning. And then it offered Oscar all the assurances it could think of, the most convincing being that, while it had been ferociously hungry at certain points in its life, it certainly wasn’t now.

  ‘Currently, I am quite full.’

  ‘But how long will you stay full?’

  The lion tilted its head to the side and pressed its lips together. ‘Two days,’ it said. ‘I promise you. I will not need to eat for two whole days. Hop up!’

  And so Oscar did. He hopped up beside the enormous lion, still a little uneasy as the lion took Mack and the Lost Truck from him and put one of its great, muscular forelegs round his shoulders.

  Oscar waited, but the lion blinked, unable to start until it had taken Oscar’s dad’s reading glasses from the bedside table and put them on. Then it opened up Mack and the Lost Truck and began.

  And what a performance!

  The lion read slowly, not trying to whizz through to the end. It did amazing voices, including one for the Lost Truck itself, which it produced from right down inside its throat and that seemed to shake the very bed. And, on completion, the lion didn’t just toss the book aside. Its yellow eyes opened very wide, the black lump at the end of its tail thumping the mattress in delight.

  ‘Fantastic!’ it boomed. ‘Again?’

  And, after Oscar had nodded, the lion did read the story again. And even better this time, pausing dramatically just before page four when Mack first sees the Lost Truck! The third reading was better still, and by the fifth time it was as if he, Oscar, really was Mack, and the bed was the Lost Truck itself!

  The lion turned back to the beginning yet again but, for the first time in his life, it was Oscar who decided that he’d had enough. He’d heard a gurgling sound and was very pleased to realise that it had come from his own stomach.

  Not the lion’s.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ he said.

  The lion laid the book down on the duvet. ‘We’d better go and have our breakfast then, hadn’t we?’

  Oscar stared.

  ‘Sorry. I mean, you’d better go and have your breakfast. Come on.’

  And, with that, the lion hauled its huge frame on to all fours, its head knocking the lampshade to and fro. It stepped off the bed on to the floor, and Oscar slid down too, trailing after the lion as it padded out to the landing, where it left giant indents in the carpet before rounding the top of the banister.

  Oscar stared down at its huge shoulders and dense haunches, rippling with muscles as it descended: and paused. Should he follow?

  Really?

  I mean, was this happening? Had his parents actually been …?

  Oscar didn’t know, though one thing was clear: they weren’t here to look after him, were they? The answer was a definite no, something underlined when Oscar turned back to the doorway he’d just come out of. He stared at the very vacant, now slightly crumpled bed.

  On the floor, beside it, two pairs of empty-looking slippers sat, side by side.

  ‘Cornflakes?’ the lion said, sniffing Oscar’s breakfast with nostrils so big they looked like binoculars. Oscar moved his bowl aside and nodded. The lion pulled a face. ‘Some things I will never understand. Mack again?’

  Oscar tipped the bowl up and finished off the milk. ‘And the Lost Truck.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘It’s Mack and the Lost Truck. You can’t forget the Lost Truck.’

  ‘I stand corrected. But would you like me to read it again?’

  Oscar was about to say yes but, as he blinked at the massive lion towering over him, he had an idea. ‘Actually, there’s something else that you have to do.’

  The lion frowned. ‘That I have to do?’

  ‘Yes,’ Oscar said. ‘I think, after everything, that you owe me.’

  The lion shrugged. ‘I suppose. Care to give me a clue?’

  ‘There’s someone I’d like you to meet,’ said Oscar. ‘Wait here. Oh, and you’ll need to put the milk back in the fridge. My bowl goes in the dishwasher.’

  Oscar went to get dressed then, finding his school uniform on his chair as if Flat Stanley was lying there. Was it the last time they would ever be arranged for him like that?

  For a second, Oscar pictured his mum’s long arms laying the clothes out, and he felt a little volcano of tears well up in his chest. But he shook it away. Whatever had happened, crying wouldn’t help. And the lion was waiting for him. So he got dressed, cleaned his teeth and went downstairs again.

  After checking that the kitchen was tidy (it was), and feeding Freddie (his hamster), he stopped at the front door to put his coat and bobble hat on. Then he pushed the door open and peered out at the quiet, frosty lane.

  A few small birds were rattling the feeder in the front garden, but they paid no attention to Oscar. It was only when the lion appeared behind him that they stopped, bunched and shivered up into the nearest, leafless tree.

  ‘Chaffinches,’ the lion said.

  ‘Sorry?’

  The lion arched its back. ‘Up there. Chaffinches.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Oscar. ‘Do you like birds too? My granny likes …’

  ‘Yes?’

  Oscar had been about to say, ‘My granny likes birds.’ He still forgot, sometimes, that six months ago Granny had had what his parents called a ‘heart attack’. That she wouldn’t ever take him to Greenwich Park again to look for woodpeckers, or on cycle rides along the Thames where different sorts of ducks rode the wakes of passing boats.

  Granny’s loss had been almost unbearable, and the sadness of it hit Oscar all over again, making him feel horribly alone. This was made worse by the fact that his parents had vanished too – though he wasn’t alone, was he? He jerked his head, and the lion followed him out on to the lane he lived on, hidden in the roads near Blackheath.

  Staring up the lane, he saw that it was empty, and he wasn’t quite sure whether he was pleased. Had there been a police officer, he might have been able to complain about what had happened that morning. Or get the lion arrested. That would have left him alone though, and it also seemed a little ungrateful after the lion had read to him. And put his bowl away. It would also have scuppered his current plan. In any case, there was no police officer so Oscar walked on, the lion following until they came to a house, nearer to the main road.

  ‘Friend of yours live here?’ the lion asked.

  Oscar didn’t answer. He just blinked at the long, straight driveway, the flat roof of the big house visible over the tops of some solid, square hedges. He walked up the drive until the house came into full view. Oscar hesitated – he didn’t know when these people got up, and it was still early. A light shone in one of the downstairs rooms though, so Oscar pushed on, the gravel crunching under each footstep until he came to the big front door.

  Here Oscar stopped again, intimidated by the wide stone steps and the door itself, which was flanked by columns and twice as big as his own front door. He remembered the only time he’d ever walked through it – and swallowed. He was about to turn round and go back home, but a B-U-M-P from behind sent him right up the steps and into the door itself.

  ‘Hey!’ he said, scowling at the lion. The lion, however, just shrugged, before using one of its huge yellow teeth to pick a piece of gravel from its paw.

  Oscar sighed, straightened himself, and reached up for the door knocker.

  The knocker thumped, the sound far louder than Oscar had intended. He waited, his mouth dry, the palms of his hands clammy. It hadn’t been like that last time he was here. Then he’d been excited.

  Because of the party.

  That time, the door had opened. His mum had chatted to Carlton’s mum while he had set the present down on a table in the hall and then gone to meet the other children. Carlton was in his class, but the others weren’t, some not even at their school. They seemed perfectly normal though – until all the parents had gone.

  Then they called him midget.

  And weasel. Other words that he didn’t understand.

  They put grass down his shirt.

  They ran round the garden and fired Nerf guns at him, before Carlton asked if he wanted to play a special game. That involved going upstairs to find a sleeping bag, which he slid over Oscar’s head. It was hot inside, and dark, though the other kids were having fun: he could hear them giggling. They picked Oscar up and spun him round until he was all dizzy. When they put him down on the floor, he was relieved, but they didn’t let him out.

  ‘Where are you?’ Carlton shouted.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Oscar, from inside the bag.

  ‘Guess!’ Carlton demanded and, when Oscar pleaded that he had no idea, Carlton laughed.

  ‘Crawl forward a bit,’ he said. ‘Then you’ll know.’

  So Oscar did – and immediately regretted it because Carlton was right: he did know where he was now. At the top of the stairs, though he wasn’t there for long. With the most sickening feeling in his stomach, Oscar began to slide forward. In desperation, he tried to stop himself, but his hands, inside the bag, were useless. He slid faster and faster, rolling over and over until !!THWACK!! he was at the bottom, sliding across the polished hall floor, the force so strong that Oscar flew right out of the bag, crashing into a grandfather clock, which clanged in angry protest.

  Oscar clambered to his feet. He was dazed. The stairs and the floor and the ceiling all spun round him – until he heard footsteps. A man. He’d marched into the hall and was staring in outrage at the clock. He turned to Oscar and told him off for nearly wrecking it. He wanted to know what on earth Oscar had been playing at. He wanted to know if Oscar knew how to behave at other people’s houses.

 

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