9. Ship Science

Ben jumped down from the railings with his pockets full of various pieces of litter and other paraphernalia that the sea had dumped on the deck earlier on that day. He turned the corner to look for more and bumped into his family.

"Ben!" Pete cried, "What are you doing? We were worried sick"

"Collecting some things," the boy replied, "for science" he added, quickly

"What do you mean by 'things'?" Sue asked.

Ben ignored the question and walked off in the direction of a door back inside the ship. Pete sighed and signalled to Sue, Karen and Jake to follow him. They caught up with Ben a couple of minutes later as he turned down the corridor to their cabin. Once inside, Ben produced his haul. He had collected some cigarette ends, a fish skeleton, a half-eaten burger, the front page of a magazine and several small pebbles. He set the lot down on the surface in the bathroom and reached into his other pocket and picked out a cigarette lighter. He then started to set fire to the cigarettes…

"NO!" Sue and Pete screamed in unison as Jake dived to grab the lighter

"What?" Ben asked, innocently, "It's only science, there's nothing wrong with it!"

Karen huffed and again showed herself to be wiser than her age might suggest, "If you burn down the cabin Ben then we'll be asked to leave the ship forever and then the fire brigade will have to come and put out the fire which will cost hundreds of pounds and then the ship builder people will have to replace the room and any other parts that get burned down. Mummy and Daddy will be charged thousands of pounds for the repair and it'll be your fault and also the ship will have to close while they're fixing it which means that everyone else's holiday will be ruined."

Pete looked at Sue with an expression of pure amazement as Ben meekly apologised to his parents. Meanwhile, Jake had been collecting the stuff up but got distracted when his phone rang.

"Mikey!" he exclaimed as he answered, dropping Ben's collection over the floor "Nah, mate, I'm on holiday with my family, didn't I tell you? Uh huh… yup… mmhm... Okay, bye." As he hung up, Jake looked slightly depressed and walked over to his bunk bed and began to play with his phone.

"Jake?" Sue began, but as her son turned his head away, Pete advised her to not continue. They decided to leave Jake alone for a while and took Ben and Karen up to the café, dumping Ben's latest experiment equipment in a bin on the way.

"So," Ben said as he began his juice, "what CAN I do an experiment with on here?"

"I don't know dear, what about watching how the weather changes as we move around?" Sue suggested.

"Good idea," Pete said, "it's quiet, free and won't have any damaging impacts"

Ben rolled his eyes, obviously not happy with that particular suggestion, but was soon distracted when the waiter presented him with his giant pepperoni pizza with extra cheese – an order that completely overshadowed the sandwiches everyone else had ordered. A few moments later Jake wandered up to the table, still looking rather upset. Pete was about to ask what was wrong, but a subtle glance from his wife told him otherwise – Jake would tell when he felt he was ready to. The boat was due to stop in the Alagarve but Karen and Ben had refused to get out because of the Madeline McCann situation. No amount of parental persuasion would change their minds, so it would be another day or so on the ship before their next destination.

"So, kids," Sue said, as the plates were cleared away, "the next stop is Greece!"

"What, like the movie?" Karen asked, innocently. Jake smirked at this inane question, as Pete and Sue sighed with relief – whatever was troubling Jake couldn't be that bad…. Could it?!