Boyz 'R' Us

by Scott Monk

  ‘C’mon, Sean. Why should I believe him? What proof do I have he’ll straighten out his life?’

  ‘Why should I believe you’ll reform and never get back into gangs?’ Sean shot back. ‘What proof do I have you’ll straighten out your life?’

  ‘You, Sean. You’re there to stop me from going back.’

  ‘Then be there for Dad when he’s tempted to drink.’

  I ran my hand down my face. Anger swelled behind it. Another argument. Another loss. My brother outsmarted me again.

  ‘Okay,’ I said, ‘here’s the deal —’

  ‘No deals, Mitch,’ Sean said. ‘Do it unconditionally.’

  Every swear word written in the Devil’s dictionary curled round my tongue. I just wanted to shout down my brother and father right there and then. This was stupid. This was another of Sean’s risks. I got seriously hurt in the past. Did I want to suffer more?

  I loved my father, but the father of the past. I didn’t know if he existed any more. He got washed away in the amber tide. Could this aging alcoholic, now in his fifties, become the man he once was? Could I forgive him? Could I love him again? What would Mum say? I wish she was here. She knew Dad more than the rest of us. She put up with his faults longer than any of us. But she wasn’t here. She was silent. I had to decide for myself.

  I breathed deep. ‘I’ll tell you what, Dad. If I can see an improvement over the next couple of weeks, I’ll drop the charges. If I don’t, we’ll see you in court. Now, I know this might sound strange, but I want everything to work out. I want a father, not an alcoholic. So does Allison. So does Sean. And I bet Mum would too.’

  With that, there was nothing more to say. Sean shrugged helplessly at the old man, slapped him on the shoulder and said he’d visit him tomorrow. Me, I gave a wave and said we might have dinner together in a month or two. Like I said, this family wasn’t the Brady Bunch. Nothing ended in love and kisses.

  ‘Thanks, Mitch,’ Sean said in the car.

  ‘No problem,’ I answered. But I was sure I didn’t mean it.

  We drove in silence back to Baulkham Hills.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Currier,’ Sean said, taking Allison’s small hand from the day-care parent. ‘I’ll drop the money in tomorrow.’

  ‘Okay, boys. Bye.’

  Allison skipped down Mrs Currier’s driveway, the happiest we’d seen her for a long time.

  ‘And what have you been doing all day, Missy?’ I said, scooping her into my arms.

  ‘Looking after Munchkin.’

  ‘That smelly rat?’ Sean teased.

  ‘It’s not a rat, silly. It’s a guinea pig.’

  ‘A guinea pig? That thing? Oh. I didn’t know that.’

  Allison giggled. ‘I’m smarter than you.’

  ‘Only the truth from the mouths of babes hey, Golden Boy?’ I joked.

  ‘And only wisecracks from the mouths of fools, kid.’

  I grinned. Finally, I’d scored a point!

  ‘It still stinks though, right Ally?’

  ‘Yep,’ she said, pegging her nose with two fingers. ‘Pee-yew.’

  We laughed as a family and stopped at the car.

  ‘What else did you do today?’ Sean said, opening the back door.

  ‘I talked to Mummy again.’

  Sean and I looked at each other. The time had come.

  ‘What did Mummy say?’ I asked.

  ‘That she’s going to be coming home any day now. That she’s going to make everything right.’

  I put Allison down on the back seat and squatted to her level. ‘Allison, there’s something Sean and I have to tell you.’

  But she already knew. In her eyes the truth welled and spilled down her cheeks.

  ‘Now what I’m gonna tell you isn’t easy. You’re gonna have to be a big girl, okay?’

  She started bawling.

  Sean put a hand on my shoulder. He was there. I needed that.

  ‘Allison — Mummy’s never coming home.’

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  After comforting Allison the best we could, Sean and I left her at our aunt and uncle’s place. Sean organised a jam session with The Heart Pirates to help get his mind off what she was going through. I tagged along for the same reason. Joel’s garage was back in Earlwood, near our old home. We needed the trip.

  Once there, The Heart Pirates set up their gear and warmed up with a few numbers. Joel Pogue rolled the sticks over the drums, Christine Volaski and Sean sang and played guitar, while Benjamin “the Yank” Gruman played bass. Soon ‘Pirate Rock’ was followed by ‘Rebel of Misery Street’ and ‘Heart of a ’67 Mustang’. The place jumped, man. The place jumped!

  Watching my brother play entranced me. He wasn’t perfect but he wasn’t an amateur either. Of all the things Sean could do, playing guitar came the easiest. I always hated him for that in the earlier days. When I picked up a guitar I couldn’t put two notes together, let alone a song like he did.

  Sean was an intelligent stud. He was a brain with a pretty boy face. Me, I was a rebel with no future. Bumming around, playing guitar was what losers like me did. I wished I could play and tour with a band, make a packet, then retire. Have my face on unlimited posters and albums for teenage girls to drool over. So did most people come to think of it. Everyone sings in the shower, dreaming of the millions of fans wanting more than just an encore.

  The Heart Pirates formed when the four met in seventh grade. Sean, Joel and Christine were all finishing up school this year, while Ben worked in a steady job as a second-year apprentice carpenter. At first the band started as a hobby, then gradually grew into a casual job. Friends and family hired them for weddings, birthdays and school events until they managed to nurture their own contacts. Now they played once or twice a month for pubs and clubs. Chances were, a glance in the music section of any Sydney paper would find a listing of The Heart Pirates playing soon.

  Their latest venture into the music industry was the cutting of a demo tape. A friend of Joel’s set them up, recorded one of their old songs, ‘Angel Soul’, and they mailed it off. Now the Pirates waited until a recording company liked their music or a disc jockey offered them free air time to plug their songs. I was sure they were going to make it into the big-time.

  Joel’s mother interrupted the jam session and the band called a take five. There was a phone call from a Miss Rowell for Joel.

  ‘Who’s this, eh Joel?’ Sean teased. ‘A mysterious woman, mate?’

  Joel grinned and winked. ‘Just one of many.’

  ‘It better not be,’ Christine said, setting down her Coke bottle. ‘If you’re seeing another woman —’

  ‘Hey, I’ve never heard of this Miss Rowell, Chris. Give me a break.’

  ‘Yer, I’ll give you a break. I’ll break your bones.’

  Joel came down off the stairs and kissed Christine on the hair. ‘But don’t break my heart,’ he whispered lovingly.

  Christine smiled and squeezed his hand. ‘Answer the phone first and we’ll see.’

  Joel disappeared inside as Ben stretched and rolled his shoulders. ‘So, Mitch, what do you think?’ he asked.

  ‘Pretty cool,’ I said. ‘Who wrote “Mustang”?’

  ‘Me,’ Christine said. ‘You like it?’

  ‘Yer. Chicks and cars are two of my favourite things.’

  ‘Well this “chick” wrote it in her spare time while her boyfriend upstairs toyed around fixing his car.’

  ‘So Joel has the heart of a ’67 Mustang?’

  ‘And the head of a leaky carburettor,’ she smirked, taking another swig of Coke.

  ‘Is that all you’re gonna play tonight? Or am I gonna hear more?’

  ‘Don’t ask me,’ Sean said. ‘Christine?’

  ‘Yer, why not? With exams coming up, there’ll be no time to practise anyhow. We might as well go through all the material. That sound fine with you?’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ Sean yawned.

  ‘Ben?’

  ‘No problem.’

  A cou
ple of minutes later Joel returned, dejected.

  ‘What’s up, “J”?’ Christine asked.

  ‘That Miss Rowell was a representative for Myth Magic Records.’

  ‘Myth Magic Records?’ Ben repeated. ‘Are you kidding?’

  ‘We didn’t get a deal, did we?’ Christine said.

  ‘No,’ Joel answered. ‘Another rejection.’

  The band sat around, silent and reflecting on lost dreams. This was their eighth failed submission.

  ‘Oh well,’ Sean said. ‘It’s not a matter of if, just when.’

  ‘Yer,’ they grumbled. The appeal of his words had sounded hollow after the fifth rejection.

  ‘C’mon,’ Christine said. ‘We better get back to practising. That gig’s in a week.’

  The guys agreed and picked up their instruments, lacking the enthusiasm they had before the phone call. But before long the trance set in again. Hands spidered over guitar strings faster and faster. Drumsticks pounded the skins louder and louder. Voices rang and walls shook. Man, it was happening.

  During a song, I nicked outside for a smoke. To stop Sean catching me in the act, I took a stroll down the street. The nicotine gave me the usual head spin and my lungs protested with an uncontrollable fit of coughing. My throat started to retch, warm bile gurgling in my throat. Whoa! I was going to be sick.

  Spitting out the black and yellow muck, I staggered backwards and hung onto a tree. That had never happened before. Even the first time I ever smoked. And that was behind a butcher’s shop. If the nicotine wasn’t going to make me sick that day, the smell of carcasses was. I looked at the cig. Yer, it was the usual. A sixteen. It wasn’t tampered with. Sean hadn’t filled it with compost or pricked it with a pin. What was going on?

  The cigarette died in my hand and I reached for another one. It was probably just a bad weed. I lit a second one and dry retched. That was enough warning for me. I chucked the packet away, promising never to touch the stuff again. It was bad for my health and whoever’s garden I was fertilising.

  Chewing gum, I surveyed the ’ville. Marrickville was, well, Marrickville. Bored kids hung out the front of their house, fixing their cars or ogling the gorgeous new neighbour. Commuters from classier suburbs of Sydney sped through our roads trying not to take any of the filth back home with them. Planes boomed overhead, mothers shouted at their children and televisions blared with sounds of the 8:30 movie. Dogs barked at shadows and cats slunk into drains in search of a meal. Nothing new. Nothing spectacular. Things changed here only if they had to change.

  With a sigh, I sat in the gutter and chewed away. It was a nice night and everything felt all right. I could stay out here for hours and watch the stars. That’s if I could see the stars.

  A scrawny kid streaked by on a BMX, trying unsuccessfully to balance a bag of groceries and steer. I guessed he would get ten metres before dropping them. He surprised me by making fifteen.

  ‘G’day, Elias,’ I helloed, still seated.

  ‘Mitch?’ he said, standing and dusting himself off. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Chilling. And listening to Sean’s band play. How bout you?’

  He smiled lopsidedly and rolled his eyes. ‘Doing the shopping for my folks.’

  Always the mummy’s boy that Elias Batrouney.

  ‘And cooking scrambled eggs, right?’

  ‘What scramb —? Oh, man. Why’d they go and do that for?’ Elias bent down and drained the white shopping bag of runny, yellow goo and shell.

  ‘Need a hand?’ I asked. Hey, it seemed the polite thing to do. Not that I meant it.

  ‘Er — do you mind? I’ll need someone to walk the bike while I carry these,’ he said, indicating the bags.

  I did mind, but hey, Elias was some kind of friend, so I helped him out.

  ‘Thanks, Mitch. I’ll give you a Coke when we get to my place.’

  ‘You sure your mother’ll let you?’

  ‘Yes, sorry about that. Mum doesn’t want me to hang out with criminals — no offence intended.’

  I drew back the wad of flavourless gum and spat it out. ‘None taken.’

  ‘I heard they expelled you from school.’

  ‘Yer,’ I said. ‘Sternfeld finally got what he wanted. Not that I did anything. It was all the Thunderjets’ fault. They attacked Sean —’

  ‘Yes, I know. I was there, remember?’

  ‘That’s right,’ I said stupidly. A lot of things had gone on today after school. I couldn’t remember half of it. ‘Well, why didn’t you stick up for me?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘After you left. I got in trouble for it too.’

  ‘You? You got in trouble? Elias Batrouney the Brain got in trouble? What did you do? Drop your books in class?’

  ‘Hey, that’s not funny. I stuck up for you. Don’t make fun of me.’

  He was right. ‘I’m sorry. I just can’t imagine you getting in trouble, that’s all. Teachers love students like you. So what did you do?’

  I still expected him to say something as lame as ripping up his timetable in front of the principal. I’d go, ‘Oooh, that was tough,’ then laugh my head off when I got home.

  ‘I threw a stapler through Sternfeld’s window.’

  ‘What?!’ I burst out laughing, shocked that Elias even imagined doing such a thing. ‘You threw a stapler through Sternfeld’s window?’ I howled. This was fantastic.

  ‘Stop laughing,’ he pleaded. ‘It’s not a joke.’

  ‘Oh yes it is,’ I said.

  Elias looked at me, a grin forming on his lips. ‘You’re right. It is funny.’

  So, like a couple of comedians, we laughed it up.

  ‘What happened? Did you get in trouble?’

  Elias bowed his head. ‘Yes. I got suspended.’

  ‘Suspended? You? Hah!’ I slapped him on the back. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Only for twenty-four hours though.’

  ‘Twenty-four hours? That’s nothing. Try getting suspended twenty-four days! Now that’s a bummer.’ I offered Elias a stick of spearmint chewy. ‘What else?’

  ‘I’ve got to pay for a new window out of my own money. My mother and father weren’t happy when they both got a phonecall at work today about what their son did to the principal’s office. I nearly got the belt when they came and picked me up this afternoon.’

  I knew how that felt.

  ‘What did Sternfeld say?’

  ‘To expect to be on garbage duty for the rest of the year.’

  I started laughing again, and Elias joined in.

  ‘I get rubbish taught to me at school, and now I’ve got to go and pick it up.’

  ‘You idiot,’ I said. ‘You did this for me?’

  ‘Of course. I knew what happened. I tried explaining it to Sternfeld but he wasn’t listening after you left.’

  ‘What did everyone at school do after they found out you smashed his window?’

  ‘Invited me to a party on Saturday.’

  I laughed again.

  ‘You going?’

  ‘I can’t. My parents grounded me until I’m married.’

  ‘So sneak out. Have fun. Come back. Get yelled at. It’ll all blow over after you roam round the house for a week and get on your oldies’ nerves. They’ll unground you after that. And if that doesn’t work, threaten to put them in a retirement home when they’re seventy. They’ll probably give you the keys to the car.’

  We laughed some more, jibing about school, Sternfeld and our oldies. It felt weird being this happy. Refreshing even, what with everything that had happened in my life over the past few weeks. I was opening up. Seeing people differently. I didn’t want to be a loner any more, hating the world and dying inside.

  Looking at Elias, I said, ‘You’re a pretty cool kid — for a brain.’

  ‘And you’re pretty normal — for a bomber.’

  ‘Friends?’ I said, offering a handshake.

  ‘Friends,’ he said, accepting it.

&n
bsp; The bond sealed the future. Elias would be there when I needed him, and vice-versa. We were a couple of loners in search of friendship. True, we were totally different, but that fact promised to be interesting.

  Crossing Wardell Road into Beaman Park, The Tower, dark yet inviting, loomed over its original owners. Its present tenants, the kids we helped rebuild it, were packing up for the night. Comics, cards and videos swapped hands and see-you-laters were exchanged. Already in trouble for being out at this hour, they hopped on their bikes and pedalled home.

  The Tower was no longer ours.

  ‘Not a bad job, don’tcha think?’

  ‘Not bad at all,’ Elias summed it up.

  ‘D’you ever think we’ll have times like those again?’

  He hesitated. ‘No.’

  ‘C’mon.’ This might be the final time I’d ever see The Tower. ‘Your parents have probably rung the police by now.’

  ‘I can imagine the call over the police radio. Wanted: missing fifteen-year-old kid by the name of Elias Batrouney. Beware. He is armed. I repeat armed. Last report said he was carrying a stapler.’

  Laughing, we left Beaman Park and The Tower for the last time. We wound along the bank of Cook’s River, cut across the golf course like in the old days and headed for Beauchamp Street.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ‘What a coincidence,’ a voice called from the darkness. ‘We were just talking bout you.’

  Elias and I stopped. Wheeler! How’d he know I was in the area?

  ‘Anything good to say?’ I asked, rolling up my sleeves and trying to act calm.

  ‘Maybe — for us.’

  “Us” being the Thunderjets.

  Every kid who swore the blood oath to the Marrickville Thunderjets had assembled on the grounds of the local golf course tonight: Peeper, Marc, Flash Jack, Husk, Judge (and his chick Jury), Ninja and Doctor Lock to name a few. Thirty-five in all. Forty tops. The Thunderjets never met together in numbers like this unless there was a rumble going down. And it was usually against the Cabramatta or Homebush gangs. No matter what our guys were doing at the time, they had to fight. Such was the Oath. But I hadn’t been told of any fight. And Marc would’ve passed the word if there was one. Then again, a chicken doesn’t know what time the fox will come either.