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Authors: Edwina Shaw

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BOOK: Thrill Seekers
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When the police car pulls up in the driveway at home a few weeks after that freaky dream, it’s almost dawn. Kookaburras are laughing their heads off like it’s any other day. If I’m lucky, Mum won’t wake up to answer the door. But from where I’m sitting in the back, I see her already peeking out through the lounge room curtains. What the fuck am I going to say?

The pig beside me gets out and comes around to my door.

‘Can’t I just stay here?’

‘Out.’

He keeps a firm grip on my arm as we trudge up the overgrown pathway, behind the other two cops.

They knock like only trouble can, hard and sharp, like gunshots.

I hear Mum inside rustling around, chucking things behind the couch. She’s still tying the cord on her dressing gown, and smoothing back her hair into an elastic when she edges the door open.

‘Mrs. Spencer?’

‘Yes, that’s me. That’s my son Brian you’ve got there. Bri?’ She holds out her hand towards me and I lift my eyes from my sneakers. Hope she can’t tell I’ve been crying.

Mum leans towards me, her arms stretched wide and I’d do anything just to drop into them and hide. Be ten again and let her take care of everything. I step closer
to her but the pig beside me drags me back. ‘Hold your horses,’ he says.

Mum frowns and puts her hands on her hips. ‘What? What is it officer? What’s he done?’

‘There’s been an incident, Mrs. Spencer. Brian here has been charged with possession of a prohibited substance and is due to appear in court day after tomorrow.’ He checks his watch, ‘Make that tomorrow, at ten. Do you take full responsibility for his attendance?’

‘Incident? Illicit substance? What’s going on? A bit of pot? Is that it? I know my boys have been dabbling but they’re good boys really. You see they lost a good friend only a few months ago and their father…’

Oh shit, I hope she’s not going to tell the whole bloody story, break down like she usually does.

‘Mrs. Spencer I think we’d better come inside.’

‘No. I don’t think so. I know my rights. You just give me my boy and be on your way. I’ll be ringing my lawyer about this.’ She doesn’t really have a lawyer but it sounds pretty good. ‘Give me my boy.’

They let go of my shoulder and I let her hug me. Then something awful happens. I cry. Right there in front of the pigs. Can’t help it. Mum only comes up to my chin these days but there’s something about the way she holds me that makes me feel small. I struggle for breath, cling to her, trying to pull myself back together but I don’t know whether that’s possible. I feel like I’m a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle that’s been tipped onto the floor. Who knows if all the pieces are still there? It’s been one shit of a night. Once Mum finds out what I’ve done she may never hold me again.

She squints up at the police in the glare of the front-light.

‘What’s going on here? What’ve you done to my boy?’

‘Just calm down, Mrs. Spencer. We really need to come inside. There’s been an incident.’

‘You already said that. What is it? What he’s supposed to have done?’

‘Mrs. Spencer, it’s about your other son.’

‘Doug?’ she whispers. ‘Douggie?’ She sets her face for the worst, holding herself up on me. ‘He’s done it. He’s dead.’

‘No, Mrs. Spencer, he’s not dead. It’s not his life that’s in jeopardy. There’s been an incident, a serious incident. We really should come in.’

She tears me from her just like I knew she would. Shakes me. Hard. ‘Where’s your brother? Where’s Douggie? What’ve you done? Can’t you look after him for once in your life?’ She raises her hand like she’s going to slap my face but a policeman steps between us.

I open my mouth to tell her but nothing comes out except a groan.

Listen. Hear them whispering, telling lies? They say I’ve done something wrong, something bad. Too bad to be real. The pigs have been at me for hours, making threats, asking questions till I don’t know if my dick’s my own. Not sure what happened in the first place. But things aren’t looking good. They’ve locked me in here and it stinks of ancient piss. This isn’t how a star should be treated. Didn’t Paris get a room of her own? Didn’t she get a TV?

There’s no sound but their whispering, telling lies about what they say I’ve done. But how could I have done it? Was I even there?

What if I did?

I bang my head against the bars of the cell till my eyebrow splits and blood mixes with the tears and snot on my cheeks. I keep banging till they give me a pill of something that makes me feel as if I’ve floated away from my body. Like I’m someone else. The old me, before things went to shit and everyone got jealous.

Lying down on the bunk, I curl up in the scratchy blanket that reeks of
old-man
sweat and wedge my hands between my thighs. Take myself somewhere else, somewhere good.

It’s weird what pops into my head. I mean I haven’t thought about primary school forever, and here I am in lock-up thinking about that day about a year after Dad died when Beck and I were forced to dance together in front of the whole of grade seven. I used to think it was the worst day of my life.

Beck was paying out on me as usual. ‘Think you’re pretty cool, don’t you? With your long hair and smoking behind the shed and everything. Well you’re not, Douglas Spencer. You’re stupid. Just a stupid kid like the rest of us. So shut up and dance.’

I got her back. I called her Cock-
a-roach
, because her last name’s Roche. She was a goody-goody and a dag in those days, and worst of all, she was Russ’s sister and lived just three doors down from our place, so there was no avoiding her. Even on the weekends.

Me and Steve used to sit together up the back of the classroom, but a couple of weeks earlier Miss Bateman had moved me right up the front with freckle-head blood-nut Rebecca, and made Steve sit next to Ronald Forrester, a brain with thick glasses. Miss wanted to have us close, she said, to keep an eye on us. Sometimes she leant right over me so I saw every wrinkle on her old lady face and smelt the eggs she’d had for breakfast.

I hated sitting next to Beck and drew rude pictures of her with a dog’s face covered in spots which I folded into paper planes and flew over to Steve when Miss wasn’t looking. Steve almost wet his pants, he thought it was so funny. It was cool being seniors together. Bosses of the whole school. The little kids did anything we said, gave us their iceblocks or lollies whenever we asked. It was like being a king. It was good to be kings at school, when we were grommets on the weekends with Brian and the gang.

But right then I had to hold Beck’s hands and do the stupid Pride of Erin in front of everyone. They were lined up around the edges of the bitumen parade ground, watching and laughing. I don’t know why Miss picked me to do it. I wasn’t the best dancer in those days. It’s taken a while to learn the moves I’ve got now.

Up, two, three, kick. Back, two, three, kick. Beck kicked before me and made a face when I swung her around. Over her shoulder I caught a glimpse of Steve. He
gave me a look of sympathy but he couldn’t cover up the grin that told the truth. I looked like a total dickhead.

It wasn’t fair. Why hadn’t Miss picked him? My hands were sweaty and Beck was looking down her nose at me as usual. Even worse, I was going to be covered in girls’ germs, Cock-a-roach germs! I could’ve died. Man, if only I knew then what I know now. Give me girl germs, I want to swim in them.

We were practising some dances for our ‘passing out’ night at the end of the year. I didn’t even want to go. But it turned out kind of cool after me and Steve scabbed a joint and some beer off Brian before we went. That made it fun all right. I’ve always liked smoking joints, makes everything a bit magic. Things look better, colours are brighter, lollies taste sweeter, jokes are funnier. It’s sort of like changing from black and white TV to colour.

Right from when I got up that morning I knew it was going to be a freaky kind of day. Mum was sitting on my bed
wild-eyed
and excited about something. I don’t think she’d been to sleep all night long. It’d been less than a year since Dad died and she was still freaking right out. She smelt like vodka and cigarettes, her curly brown hair was messed up and her face looked like the skin was stretched too tight across the bones. She used to be pretty, my Mum. You should see her in some of the photos, like the wedding one. She looks beautiful in that. Got my looks from her I guess. Though my nose is better than hers, and my cheekbones are higher.

‘Time to get up now, darling,’ she said, then started singing some kooky
old-fashioned
song. ‘Wake up, wake up, wake up you sleepy head. Get up, get up, get up, get out of bed, lala, la, la la.’ She didn’t know all the words but it still sounded good to hear her sing. She used to sing to me all the time when I was little, but ever since Dad died she only sang once in a blue moon,
and it was usually some sad old song about a broken heart.

‘Guess what?’ she said, like she had some wonderful surprise.

‘What?’ I asked, picking yesterday’s school shirt off the floor and tugging it over my head.

‘I’m going to walk with you to school this morning. It’s about time I introduced myself to your teacher.’

Some great surprise.

‘You don’t have to Mum, you look tired. Why don’t you go to bed?’ I said, trying to get out of it.

‘Oh, no. I’m not tired. I feel like today’s the beginning of something wonderful for all of us. You just wait and see, Douggie. Mummy’s going to get her act together and be a proper mother from now on.’

‘But you are a proper mum,’ I told her and it’s still true. She may not be the same as she was before Dad died, but she’s still my mum and I love her, even when she forgets to make dinner and falls asleep in front of the telly with a cigarette in her hand. She’s just sad, that’s all.

She covered me in big sloppy kisses after I said that, even though I was thirteen, too big for kissing. I tried to wriggle away but not too hard. It felt kind of nice to have a cuddle.

Brian was already up and eating toast in the kitchen. He nodded in my direction as I came in scratching my head and pulling on my shorts. I couldn’t find any undies in my drawers.

‘What’s up with Mum today?’ I asked.

‘Buggered if I know.’

I rummaged in the bread bin.

‘Last piece.’ Brian waved the last bite of Vegemite toast in the air before shoving it in his mouth.

‘There’s no bread left, Mum,’ I said as she came in. She’d got dressed and put on makeup, orange stripes on her cheeks and shiny blue eyeshadow so she looked like the cover of the Women’s Weekly.

‘No problem, I’ll make pancakes instead,’ she said and started bustling around, crashing things in the cupboards.

‘I’m off,’ said Brian. ‘I’m meeting Jacko down the park to have a kick before school.’ But he wasn’t. They were pulling cones instead.

‘Can I come?’

‘No way, no grommets allowed. Maybe on the weekend,’ he said over his shoulder as he slammed the screen door behind him.

I thought Brian was the coolest big brother in the world then. Everyone wanted
to be like him and Jacko, not just me. On the weekends we had some wild times. Sure they called us grommets and paid out on us big time but it was cool to smoke joints and drink goon with them. Besides, what else was I supposed to do?

Mum tipped flour into a bowl to make pancakes.

‘Can I help?’ I asked.

‘Sure. Get out some milk and eggs, would you?’

When I was really little, Mum used to let me help her make cakes all the time. We used to do lots of stuff together. I still remember.

But there weren’t any eggs, or much milk either.

Mum and I had glue biscuits with jam for breakfast. We both pretended they were delicious.

By the time I looked at the clock it was almost nine, so I was happy when Mum offered to drive me to school. I should’ve just made a run for it. Mum screeched out of the driveway at a hundred miles an hour, almost killed three kids and an old lady who were crossing the road, and jumped the gutter in front of school.

‘Thanks Mum,’ I said, already half out the door. ‘See ya.’

‘Wait for me. I’m coming to meet your teacher, remember?’

How could I forget?

‘You don’t need to. Really. She doesn’t like to meet parents.’

‘Oh don’t be silly. I’m coming and that’s that.’

Luckily the bell had gone and almost everyone was already in their classrooms, so I didn’t have the horror of an oval full of kids seeing me walk in holding my Mum’s
hand. I tried not to but she kept grasping for it, so I had to.

At least she looked okay. She was wearing a pretty dress with flowers on it. But the straps kept falling down so you could see her bra, and she was still wearing her slippers.

‘You’ve got your slippers on,’ I whispered as we walked up the stairs to the top floor. I could hear Miss Bateman calling the roll in her posh voice.

‘Oops,’ Mum giggled looking down at her pink scuffs. ‘Don’t worry. She won’t even notice.’

But I knew better. ‘Maybe you should see her another day.’

Too late. We were at the door and Miss was looking over her cats-eye glasses at us from behind her desk. She seemed kind of surprised. I watched as her eyes moved over my mother, straight to her feet.

Her eyebrows moved up but at least she didn’t say anything except, ‘Can I help you?’

Mum went to say something but the words got stuck in her throat so I said, ‘It’s my mum, Miss Bateman. She wants to say hello.’

As Miss came walking over, smoothing her long skirt, I rushed to my desk, trying not to look, praying Mum wouldn’t find out how often I’d been up the office lately and that she wouldn’t say anything too embarrassing.

‘Nice slippers,’ said Beck with a smirk.

‘Shut up.’

I rummaged in my desk for books, determined not to look around. But I knew, even without seeing it, that the whole class was giggling and whispering and watching every move my mother made. My ears felt sunburnt they were that hot.

Then, just as I thought it couldn’t possibly get any worse, it did. Miss went back to the front of the room and Mum came trailing behind her, heading straight for my desk.

She’s not going to… No! Oh God please no! I felt like I was waist deep in creek mud, sinking deeper with every step she took towards me. In my imagination only my head was still out when it happened. She gave me a big kiss, right in front of everyone.

Plop! My whole head went under; so that Steve’s guffaws and Beck’s high pitched giggles were muffled. I kept my eyes screwed up tight till I couldn’t hear anything except the shuffle of Mum’s slippers moving away and the door closing behind her. Miss Bateman’s voice droned on and on. Right then I never wanted her to stop talking.

You’d think that was enough embarrassment for one day, but no. It was like God was having a pick-on-Douggie day, just for laughs. It was really hot at
lunchtime so, after sharing a ciggie down behind the swimming shed, Steve and I started a water fight, ballooning our cheeks with water from the taps and spitting it over Gary and Tim.

Other kids joined in and we were having a great time chasing each other around the school, squirting and bucketing each other. We were laughing and concentrating on filling up bottles when Gary and Tim came up behind us and pulled down our shorts all the way to our ankles.

Dakked!

Suddenly kids were everywhere as we scrambled to pull up our pants. It was okay for Steve, at least he had undies, but I didn’t have any.

The whole world saw my bum. And then I swear I heard someone say, ‘Check out Doug Spencer’s willy! It’s as big as a Twistie!’

I hitched up my daks and roared after Tim, my eyes firmly on his stubbies, when I bolted around the corner and crashed straight into Mr Heggy, the headmaster.

He grabbed me by the ear. ‘Just what do you think you’re up to, young man?’

‘Tim dakked me, Sir.’

‘Look at the state of you. The bell’s about to go. Go to the sick room and get a towel to dry off. You too Steve. I’ve got my eye on you boys; I don’t want to see you in my office again this month. Got it?’

‘Yes sir.’

BOOK: Thrill Seekers
11.85Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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