Lick'd

by Susan Berran

  “Noooo!!!!” Too late. As Jared pulled out both sides of the stereo unit, the entire insides dropped like a brick …

  Smash!! Straight down onto the airflow thingy, which squished down …

  CRASH!! Pushing in the amplifier and popping open the front …

  CRACK!! Vibrating through to the DVD/video recorder … shattering the display panel into tiny bits …

  SLAM!! Down through the stack … shooting a DVD out of the DVD/CD player right across the room like a bullet. It ricocheted off the lamp, across the room and straight back at us …

  “DUCK!!!”

  Smash!! … TINKLE TINKLE TINKLE … And finally embedded dead centre into the TV. It looked like a steel frisbee stuck in jelly. We both stood there staring at the telly, mouths wide open for what seemed like an eternity. In my mind I was picturing a scene from a movie. A giant shark suddenly appears and chomps a swimmer in one bite. But the shark had Aunty Ree’s face and the swimmer was me. Then I saw the scene where a man is sitting on a toilet and a Tyrannosaurus Rex knocks down the cubicle and chomps the man in one bite. But the dinosaur has Aunty Ree’s face and yes … I’m the guy on the toilet.

  “Look at the bright side,” said Jared breaking the silence. “At least the set-top box is OK.” He knelt down and pressed the power button … instantly the sides fell away and everything crushed down even lower to completely flatten the set-top box.

  Imagine a stack of six wobbly jelly sandwiches . . . sit them on the floor … stand on a ladder above them. Now, drop a bowling ball on top of them!! That will give you some idea of what I was looking at. A stack of squashed, high-tech, really expensive ‘jelly’. With all sorts of computer chips, tiny lights and wires sticking out everywhere.

  I was DEAD, DEADER than DEAD … I was so DEAD that I was not going to see my next three lives. I just stood there in the centre of the room, silent.

  “Hey, what about the piano?” Jared chipped in, snapping me back to life. Of course! It’s always the obvious place that you don’t think of looking in. And we couldn’t hurt that, surely. We only had to lift the lid and look in. After all, it wasn’t electrical or digital or thermostatically controlled, it wasn’t even computerized.

  “OK … we’ll do it!” I announced confidently. I slid out the seat for us to kneel on; it was pretty worn on top and fairly rickety. So as we knelt side by side on the seat, we had to balance each other just a little. We leaned forward and gently began to lift the lid. Then we heard it …

  cREEEAk … CRACK … Snap! The seat snapped right in the middle. The lid slammed down as we both let go and grabbed for the seat … WHAM!! Our foreheads smashed onto the keyboard with full force as we fell through the seat; landing on the floor on our knees … twang, twang, twang … we listened to the strings inside snapping as the tiny little hammers went belting into them.

  “Wow, lucky!” Jared remarked.

  “What … are you crazy!? How is this even remotely lucky?” I yelled back at him. “Because it’s old anyway so they won’t care,” he said happily.

  “It’s old because it belonged to my great-great-great-grandmother. It was a present to her from the Queen. And thirty seconds ago it was in original condition! It was worth thousands!” I replied angrily.

  “Gee a new one must cost an absolute fortune. No wonder they kept it even though it was falling apart,” Jared replied.

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Maybe we can fix it … you know, a bit of glue for the seat … tie the strings back together,” Jared said seriously.

  “If you were a brain surgeon, maybe … but first you’d have to operate on yourself!” I said, ready to snap.

  We couldn’t let the goats in again … could we? No, we had to tell the truth this time. We would have to take the punishment … the months and months and months of GHASTLY unbearable PUNISHMENT. Never ever hearing the end of it … looking after Smelly Melly until the end of time. Having to do the worst jobs that could be thought up.

  “You get the bikes, I’ll open the back door . . . let’s get those goats in here … c’mon Jared move, move, move!!”

  OK, so whatever the pets had been planning to do at Aunty Ree’s, Toffee’s and Booga’s, for some reason they hadn’t done it. Or they’d finished doing it and that was why those paw prints were scratched out on the map, follow? So what had or had not happened at those three places?

  What did they have in common? Aunty Ree and Uncle Karl, middle-aged, two kids grown up and living away from home. Toffee Thomas and big sister, Tia Tantrum, she’s always sooking. They’re both snotty and spoilt, Mum says they get it from their parents; they’re the biggest whingers in town. Booga Boris, he’s an only child who eats way, way too much junk food. And the places without any mark at all? Maybe the pets just hadn’t got to them yet. But that didn’t make sense either, because some were right in the middle of other houses that were already marked. Maybe we could figure things out by seeing what the ones not marked had in common. The church, empty most days, would make a great meeting place, but not marked. Itchy Mitch, one baby brother, parents out of work. Dopey Sophie, big sister lives in the city, nothing weird, well apart from her that is. Wheezy Reese, always sick. And Miss Croonarc, young, a teacher and a fitness nut.

  What was it!!?

  “Hey Sam, is this an arrow?” Jared was right. Now that the map had dried properly, we could see a line of arrows. I thought it was just a slime trail from one of the maggots. It started at Booga’s place then to Toffee’s and onto Aunty Ree’s. We had A Clue! All we had to do was follow it. The line continued on through each place with a paw print and letter. So we needed to be at the very next house before the pets … and I was betting that I knew where and when.

  We’d been at Aunty Ree’s on the Monday. The letters on that paw print were an ‘F’ and an ‘M’. When we’d been in detention we’d seen the pets go by on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. There was a ‘T’ on Booga’s paw print and a ‘W’ on Toffee’s. That had to be it! The letters stood for the day they would go to that house!

  The rest of the day we sweated enough to break the drought in three states. We worked on our utility belts, checking and double checking our weapons. Mini-Pellet-pooper-shooter and ammunition, in case we had to pooper-shoot our way out, check. Extendo Rod with fully retractable invisible rope for a quick and very cool looking getaway, check. The Mini-Single-Barrel-Sling-Shot, because hopefully they’re ALIENS that melt in water, check. And my genuine way cool totally awesome Bulravian Secret Spy Camera to get proof, check.

  We packed up some supplies from Jared’s place; with five brothers there was always heaps of quick packet stuff and junk food at their place. Not like at my house. Noooo, Smelly Melly had taken care of that as well. She was allergic to nuts, dairy, msg, wheat, preservative 202, gluten, colours 451 and 456 and lactose intolerant! The most interesting food we had at our place was … well … actually none. Mum had to prepare everything so carefully. We couldn’t have anything in the house that might ‘accidentally’ get given to Miss ‘my-stomach’s-so-fragile’ Prissy Pants or she might just blow up. So every meal at our place tastes the same; like cardboard soaked in old earwax.

  “It’s not that bad,” Jared threw in. “I liked the Boc Choy and Brussels Sprouts casserole your mum made when I came over,” he said.

  I stared at him in disbelief … I mean who even knows what Boc Choy is! And no one on this planet likes Brussels Sprouts! I was starting to wonder if Jared really was an ALIEN too.

  Anyway, once we had some food we hit the sack. It took ages to go to sleep. All we could think of was … what if they were ALIENS and were planning to take all the kids into slavery? Maybe we could do some sort of deal like …

  Miss ‘I’ll-work-really-hard-in-outer-space’ Melly instead of me. And Jared could do a ‘two-for-one’ offer on the twins. By the time the first rooster called, we were already up setting up our cardboard cut-out agents to cover for us. We got our utility belts on, leapt onto our bikes and headed fo
r the target. The paw print had a ‘W’ on it, so we needed to be there before daybreak.

  As we peddled into the sunrise, we could just make out another figure on a bike coming straight towards us. Who else would be out this early?

  Hmmm, it looked like a big round beach ball riding a bike with the sun glinting off thick glasses. It was Booga Boris and he was panting like an overweight dog in a sauna dying of thirst.

  We all stopped together and while Booga caught his breath, we told him how we were just out doing our usual morning exercise routine. Running ten kilometres, swimming ten kilometres, and cycling ten kilometres; which of course he didn’t believe for a second.

  “Fine then … we’re actually out hunting ALIENS that are trying to kidnap all the kids and use them as slaves on their home planet!” I told him.

  “Stick to the exercise story … at least people won’t think you’re completely mental,” said Booga, now that he’d caught his breath.

  “So where are you going this early anyway?” Jared asked him.

  We listened carefully to every detail as Booga told us how he wanted to be at the store when the early deliveries came. He needed his chocolate fix badly because they’d run out at home. It had never happened before in his entire life. His mum always had the pantry stocked with all of his favourite stuff. But last Tuesday when his mum was at work, a plague of locusts or mice, or both, had gone through their place and eaten absolutely everything except for a couple of health bars. And there was positively no way he was eating any of those. So now he was cycling to the shop every day for his morning chocolate fix until his mum could restock. As he rode away, he told us how the plague was getting worse. Because it had gone through Toffee’s place as well, just last Wednesday.

  “And apparently mice and locusts love coffee too,” Booga exclaimed as he frantically peddled away.

  “Do you know what this means?” I said to Jared, all excited.

  “Yeah . . . he’s gonna need a gazillion mouse-traps.”

  Wow … if we could harness the power in Jared’s brain we could … light a match … maybe, but I doubt it.

  But I knew now that our theory was right. The pets had already been to Booga’s and Toffee’s. So it seemed they were all pigs. But apart from that, we still had no leads to discover what they were really up to. Our best chance was to get to the next target house before the pets did.

  There was just one itsy-bitsy problem though.

  How could we secretly get into Mrs Duckson’s house? She’d just moved in to the house right beside the school and her husband still lived in the city. He was going to be moving out to join her as soon as he could. He hadn’t seen Agnath yet; boy was he going to be in for a treat … Not!!

  Anyway, Mrs D was with him for the holidays so at least that made life a bit safer for us. Someone had to be minding Nicholas the galah for her though, because we’d definitely seen him at Aunty Ree’s with the other pets. There it was, Mrs D’s house. About the only place in Agnath that didn’t look like it was a HUNDRED-YEARS-OLD. There were huge windows at the front and a nice wide verandah all the way around it. A little white picket fence surrounded the entire yard. We needed to stay out of sight in case the pets were already in there. So we snuck up towards the side fence. The gaps between the palings weren’t big enough to slide through so we’d just have to hop over it. The garden looked like it was straight out of one of those puncy flower magazines. With swinging seats, arches and midget gnomes everywhere. There were gnomes on benches, reading, swinging, working … it was the lost world of gnomes. And smack in the middle of it all, was a giant water fountain with fancy edging and of course, sitting on the edge, a gnome fishing.

  We were trying to imagine Mrs Duckson in her garden, lovingly trimming flowers and chatting away to her gnomes; “Sit up straight!” “Eyes front!” “No talking!” “Grow!” They probably weren’t gnomes at all. They were probably some kids from her last school that she’d scared stiff … literally.

  We hid our bikes between the school and Mrs D’s place. The sun was just about up but we still weren’t taking any chances. We crawled through the long grass until we got right up alongside her fence. Then it would be just a quick leap over the little wooden picket fence and slither over to the verandah. I went first this time to show Jared how brave I am. Of course I was also 99 per cent sure that no one was home. As I lay in the garden bed by the verandah, I gave Jared the ‘all clear’ signal. That’s when I point to him and then tap my forehead … get it? I point to Jared, Jared … then tap my forehead, brain … all clear .

  … because Jared’s brain is gone! OK; he jumped up like a kangaroo sitting on an echidna and ran at the fence like it was a hurdle. He leapt … his front leg straightened and went rigid. It flew straight over the fence as his rear one left the ground. He flew like an Olympic champion; it was the leap of a world-class ballerina. THUD!! His rear knee hit one of the palings. He stopped mid-air and froze like a statue. Then, he dropped like a brick and came to a sudden and very painful STOP between two of the palings. Sitting upright with one leg sticking straight out on either side of the fence, Jared looked like a human coat-hanger. He didn’t make a sound though, not one; he just sat there with his mouth wide open and tears of agony welling up in his eyes. They were Bulging so much that I thought they were about to pop like little tiny balloons. He was stuck … wedged there.

  I crawled over to him but he didn’t seem to see me. His eyes were just staring off into space with tears rolling down his cheeks. His feet didn’t quite reach the ground so he was just hanging there, silent, a sort of pale yellowy-greeny colour.

  “C’mon Jared, stop hangin’ around, we’ve got to get in there,” I said trying to snap him out of it. But he was stuck, really stuck … and apparently he had a splinter the size of a broom-stick in his backside. The sun was coming up fast and we had to get inside. We had to find a good place to hide. I needed to get him out of there, but how?

  AH HA! A garden shed, a fancy cream garden shed with a tiny little window, a tiny little door and a tiny little padlock … OH CRAP! I didn’t have time to muck around so I slid open the window and took a long run up. I leapt up and grabbed the ledge, my feet whacked into the side of the thin flimsy shed and put a dent in it the size of a watermelon. There was probably a good chance that Mrs Duckson would notice that. But I couldn’t think about that now, Jared was looking even paler than before. I lifted myself up and stuck my head through the window, then my shoulders; it was getting a little tight. But if I just pulled my arms through, I could reach the rake leaning against the other wall and then lever Jared out. One arm … two arms … OK now stretch, just a little more … a little more … got it! I had the rake and now I just had to drop gracefully back to the ground. Leaning the rake against my head, I just had to squigee backwards … just squigee backwards … just squig … yes, now I was also stuck, I couldn’t even get my arm back out.

  I could hear the muffled voice of Jared; he was trying to whisper really loudly. At first I thought he was still just complaining. But then I heard what he said, very clearly. He could see a cloud of dust way off down the road and coming this way. Terrific, Jared was sitting on the fence like a human lollipop, I was half a body hanging out a shed window and the pets were on their way.

  With every wiggle, the whole shed shook like it was about to fall apart. So I tried to wiggle very carefully, which wasn’t really working. Maybe if I bounced, my skin would slip. So I bounced … and bounced . . . I moved!! Just another few bounces … one more … crREEEak …

  Aaaahhh! CRASH!

  The whole wall fell outwards with me still wedged in the window … my feet hit the ground and the wall dropped off me like a steel hula hoop. As I stood there with my arms still stiff and pointing up to the sky, I stared in disbelief as the other three walls fell outward as well, dropping like a house of cards.

  I don’t think I needed to worry about the dent from my feet any more.

  Grabbing the rake, I headed back over
to Jared and slid the handle of the rake under his butt. Then with both hands, I started to lean down on it to try and lever Jared out of there. EEEEEEE!!!

  A high pitched scream broke the air and my eardrums … it was Jared. Wow, I didn’t know Jared could make that sound. But when a splinter is being shoved further into your butt by a rake handle … apparently you can. With a little adjustment, I repositioned the rake and started to push. The cloud of dust was getting closer. I lay my stomach across the rake and bounced. They were getting closer …

  POP! HE WAS OUT!

  The pets were just about at the end of the street. I sprinted to the verandah and rolled underneath it to hide. I thought Jared was right behind me, but when I rolled over again, he wasn’t there. As I looked back, there he was, legs wide apart doing this sort of dance on tippy-toes. Going from side to side. If I didn’t know better, with the way he was walking, I’d have thought he’d had an accident in his pants. But then again, after what he’d been through, maybe he had. Watching him try to get under the verandah was interesting. He really couldn’t close his legs just yet.

  Just as Jared dragged himself under the verandah, the cloud of dust arrived at the front gate. The gate swung open and we watched through the garden bushes as Fluff Butt led the others along the path and up the steps to the front door. As we lay in the dirt we could see paws and claws above us through the deck. Fur and feathers were everywhere, just waiting to go in and … eewww … I couldn’t say a word, but half a dozen little pellets dropped between the floorboards followed by two white splats. All landing on Jared’s neck and chin, then sliding around into the back of his shirt like a couple of raw eggs. His eyes widened in disgust but he didn’t move a millimetre. Just like us, they were probably trying to figure out how to get in. Maybe they’re not as smart as we thought, maybe … NICHOLAS! He’d been sitting on a cat. All of a sudden he just flew up to the verandah light, plucked out a key, opened the door and they all just walked on in.