20 Bye-Bye, Boy

20 Bye-Bye, Boy Peanut ruffled Doodle's scribbly fur. ' Bye-bye, boy. I'll be back soon, I promise.' The dog cocked his head to one side and watched as Peanut ran back towards the door. She grabbed the knob, pulled it open and dived through. As she landed on her bedroom carpet the door slammed shut behind her. Peanut looked back just in time to see it slowly crumble and fall from the roll of paper, leaving a small pile of grey dust on the floor. She stood up, took her dressing gown off and started to mentally prepare for the inevitable roasting from Mum, who must be back from her date by now. Peanut left her room and headed downstairs.

Unsurprisingly, the lights were all still on. Peanut wondered whether the police would be there yet. Knowing her mother, they probably would. She remembered the time she and Little-Bit had arrived home after taking Giles for a walk to find six police cars parked at strange angles outside their house. They had only taken twenty minutes longer than usual (Little-Bit thought it would be a fun experiment to let the dog escape in order to find out if the microchip embedded in his neck actually worked) and Mum had filed a missing person's report. Peanut steeled herself and went into the kitchen but, to her relief, there were no police officers there. In fact, there wasn't even a mum! Just Leo, who was slowly loading the dishwasher while wearing his headphones. ' Er, Leo. Why are you still up?' she asked. Leo pulled a headphone bud from his ear. Uh, 'Probably because I'm not six years old. 'What do you mean? What time is it?' She looked at her watch.

'WHAT THE—?' she shrieked. How could she have only been gone for nine minutes? 'Something wrong?' said Leo, his tired eyes flashing with anxiety. ' Oh, Er, no. It's nothing. Don't worry about it,' stammered Peanut. Actually, I'm really tired. I might just head up to bed. Peanut went back upstairs, brushed her teeth and put on her pyjamas. As she climbed into bed, she thought about Doodle all alone in the snow. She imagined him curled up at the base of a tree, frightened, trying to keep warm, and she felt guilty. Something had scared him Maybe she should have brought him back with her. No, that wouldn't have worked remember what happened to the door. The idea of Doodle turning into a pile of grey powder didn't bear thinking about. She grabbed her discarded dressing gown, reached into the pocket and took out the pencil. Then she picked up the wooden box from her bedside table ready to stash Little Tail safely in its hiding place, but as she opened the lid, one of the Post-it notes caught her eye. Suddenly she sat bolt upright in bed and stared at the drawing. 'No way!' she gasped. 'I knew he looked familiar!' On the Post-it was a picture of a dog. A scribble of fur with legs and a tail. He was standing on a snowy hillside next to a tall signpost with lots of flat, arrow-shaped arms coming off of it, all pointing in different directions. Coming out of

the dog's mouth was a little speech bubble, inside which was written, 'Hi Peanut!' 'It's Doodle,' she whispered. 'It's definitely Doodle. And that's definitely the signpost that says "You are in The North Draw" at the top. She stood up as the enormity of what this meant began to sink in: not only must her dad have visited Chroma, but he must have met Doodle too—and maybe the Markmakers. Perhaps the answer to why he'd disappeared was in Chroma! She grabbed a strip of passport photographs of her and Dad pulling funny faces from her pinboard. It was at that moment that Peanut made the decision that would change her life forever. She spoke directly to the photographs. 'Tomorrow, I'm going to go back to Chroma. I'm going to find out who these Markmakers are and I'm going to take Doodle back to them... She took a deep breath. and then I'm going to ask them if they've seen you. She kissed the picture. Don't worry, Dad. I'm coming to find you.