Nigel Goes to the Moon - chapter 1: iguana

A few years from now... Somewhere in the Midlands, England...

* * *

Bang! Bang! came the noise from Nigel's bedroom.

Clatter! Clatter! it continued.

'Cripes O Riley!' called his mum from downstairs. 'What's that god-awful racket?'

'Nothing, mum!' replied Nigel. 'I'm just getting ready for school.'

'Well be quick about it!' said his mum.

'Yes, mum,' said Nigel.

You could get anything on the Internet these days. Cures for head lice. Free membership to the Secret Society of Worm Worshippers. Instructions to build a spaceship. Nigel was mainly interested in the latter.

'How's it coming along?' said his pet iguana, McGinty.

'Very well, thank you,' said Nigel. 'I just need a Snickers wrapper and a PlayStation 2 memory card and we're off.'

'Speaking of off,' said McGinty, 'you'd better get off to school in a minute. Education is very important, you know.'

'Yes, McGinty,' said Nigel.

He had bought McGinty for £12.76 off eBay. Which is pretty good for a Talking Iguana. At Pets'R'Us, you would be lucky if you got much change out of £50. He had also bought a canister of GrowLessa for £4.38 from www.dontletyourlizardgrowtoobig.com, which he had sprayed McGinty with. Well the last thing you want is a fully grown iguana lolloping around the bedroom like it owns the place, isn't it?

(Fact 1: normal, non-talking, fully grown iguanas can grow up to six feet in length. Fact 2: McGinty would never grown past two feet. Fact 3: this suited Nigel just fine.)

'McGinty?' said Nigel, as he scootled off with his rucksack slung over one shoulder.

'Yes, Nigel?' said McGinty (who was lounging (as lizard's do) on Nigel's pillow, casually perusing a copy of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity).

'Could you do my maths homework for me while I'm away?' asked Nigel.

'I'll give you some hints for your trigonometry,' said McGinty, 'but you know you'll never learn things properly if I help you too much.'

Now that's one conscientious, talking, never-more-than-two-foot iguana!