by Jacky Gray
‘Some kind of spice,’ Dave said with his mouth full. ‘Julie will know. Too hot for you?’
‘No, just an unusual taste.’
‘I think it’s paprika. You’re not allergic are you?’
‘Stop fussing Mum.’ Peter’s tone must have hurt.
Archer had to focus on something to redirect the anger boiling under his skin. He could not stomach the thought of putting any more of the repulsive food into his mouth. It had been altered beyond recognition. Pushing his plate away, he watched as Dave and Peter fought over the scraps like crazed dogs, stabbing at each other’s hands with forks. Julie’s pained expression meant she was suffering once more because of something he had done. He stood, abruptly. The chair leg caught on something and tilted back as though it was going to fall, but his quick reactions caught it before it made even more noise, causing further embarrassment for Julie.
She looked up. ‘Are you all right? You look a bit peaky.’
‘I’m fine; I just need some fresh air.’
‘I’ll come with you. I need the loo; it’s on the way.’
He had given up trying to decipher all the strange euphemisms people used in this world when they needed to relive themselves or why they felt it necessary to announce the deed to those within ear shot. It was one of the few rituals they regularly performed, like blessing someone when they sneezed.
As they reached the corridor to the toilets, Julie put her hand on his arm. ‘Are you sure you’re all right? You looked quite angry in there. Try not to let them wind you up so much. I mean annoy you.’ She had begun to translate the strange modern expressions automatically when he looked blank, and sometimes even if he didn’t. ‘The more you react, the more they will do it. That’s how they get their kicks. I mean they enjoy it, it entertains them. I just ignore them now; it’s the last thing they want.’
‘Do you mean it doesn’t wind you up any more?’ Archer’s smile was wry as he tried out the strange phrase.
‘No. Sometimes they can be quite cruel and it hurts, but I stopped letting them see how it affects me. Eventually I hope it won’t affect me at all.’ She gave a small, sad shrug and opened the door with a picture of a female shape.
Outside, Archer took several deep breaths to calm himself. Julie’s acceptance of her situation mirrored his own experiences before he had friends. It was a hopeless situation. What could he do to right the injustices in her life? No-one defended her against the constant drain on her energies. He would never change their attitudes; all he could hope to do was support her and show some gratitude for her efforts. Archer never imagined that anything he could do would have any effect on the other men in her life.
The next stage in Kalen’s cold face training was an advanced mental technique. Under his guidance, Archer learnt how to create a room in his mind where he could go when he did not want to show his emotions to the outside world. Taking several deep breaths, he conjured up that room now so he could endure their selfishness without coming to blows about it.
8 Pool Shark
When Archer returned to the table, Dave had bought another round of drinks and he and Peter were playing a game of pool. Julie was sitting with one of her manuscripts, pencil in hand, concentrating on the words and shutting out everything else. Watching the game, he quickly worked out the important factors were angles and forces. Peter lined up the stick to hit the white ball so it would knock the yellow ball into a middle hole.
Archer instinctively knew the alignment was not quite right. ‘You need to move an inch to the right.’
‘What, you’re some kind of expert? Dad, tell him, he’s trying to put me off my stroke.’
‘No actually, he’s right. Do as he says.’
Peter grumbled as he repositioned it. The ball trickled up to the pocket but didn’t quite make it.
Dave was in his element. ‘Nice safety mate, that’s going to make it a bit trickier for my next pot, but nothing I can’t handle. Blue stripe, centre pocket.’
Archer quickly picked up on the terminology. The sticks were called cues, the white ball was the cue ball and the holes were pockets. The other balls were either stripes or spots, and the first player to pot the black, won. ‘So you cannot hit any ball apart from the cue ball, is that right?’
‘You never played pool? Do you want a go?’
‘No, that’s not fair; I don’t want to watch.’ Peter’s good mood was rapidly dissolving into his typical gloominess.
‘How about me and Archer against you then? That should balance it up a bit.’ The lager made Dave uncommonly cheerful.
Peter was sour as he reluctantly agreed. ‘Yeah ok, but I don’t wanna break.’
Dave racked up the balls, explaining the way they were arranged in the wooden frame, alternating stripes and spots. He blasted the white ball into the corner of the triangle and the balls split apart bouncing off the sides, many of them clustering back together.
‘That was nasty Dad, you’ve left me with nothing on.’ Archer looked at him curiously; he was still wearing the same clothes.
‘He means there aren’t any balls waiting to be potted.’ Dave rolled his eyes heavenward.
‘But they are just inanimate objects, they cannot wait.’
Dave was starting to get annoyed by the explanations, snapping ‘It means none of them are covering the pockets.’
This didn’t help, but Archer knew when to be silent. Peter tried to pot a stripe but got the angle wrong and it cannoned into the cluster sending three of the spots to cover pockets. Dave started lining up on one of them.
‘Hey Dad, it’s Archer’s go.’
‘I know, but he’ll mess it up and then you’ll get these three easy ones. He can go next time.’
‘That’s not fair. You said he could have a go.’
Archer couldn’t decide why Peter was supporting him so enthusiastically, but he was still a little uncertain of the rules. ‘So if I get the first ball in, then I can have a go at another one, is that right?’
‘Exactly. That’s why I want to take this shot, because I know I can do all three.’
‘So when you hit the cue ball, you have to use the right amount of force so it will rebound into a good position for the next ball.’
‘Yes, yes. You make it sound like a science lesson. Just get on with it.’ Dave handed him the cue and Archer lined it up over the middle spot. Dave’s tone revealed his desperate need to win. ‘Don’t do that one or you’ll never get the blue one in the corner pocket. Do the green first.’
Archer zoned everything out, hitting the ball with just enough force so that it potted the orange spot in the middle pocket and rebounded in a perfect position to pot the red.
‘Beginner’s luck,’ grumbled Peter. Dave looked on in amazement as Archer potted four more spots and had one of the remaining two covering the middle pocket.
‘Is there anything in the rules that says I cannot pot all seven balls and the black in a single go?’ Archer’s question was genuine, their reaction surprised him.
Peter snorted. ‘As if.’
Dave examined the other spot, surrounded by three stripes. ‘Yeah. The rule that says you’re a lying cheating brat. Never played pool before.’ His snort was the echo of Peter’s. ‘You’ve probably done little else for your whole short life. The rule that says you’re a smug git, but a hell of a pool shark.’ Despite his apparent anger, Dave was chuckling. ‘No lad, there’s no rule, but this ten pound note says you can’t do it.’ He put a tatty, scrunched up piece of paper on the ledge around the table.
Several people had realised something special was going on and were crowding round, but it cost Archer no effort at all to exclude their fidgeting and whispers of disbelief. The automatic calculator in his mind was computing all the possible strategies, with precise angles, ball velocities and forces involved, even though he did not know them by those labels. Finally, the way became clear, the sequence of shots and the final resting places of all the other balls played out in his head as though on
a TV programme. There was just one thing missing. ‘Do I have to pot the cue ball after the black?’
‘Yes,’ said Peter, grinning. He got a cuff for his troubles.
‘Take no notice of the lad, he’s a sore loser. No. If there’s any kind of foul on the black, he will win.’
‘Ok.’ Archer lined up on the ball in the cluster, ignoring Dave’s advice to go for the other one first. He hit it with such force that it rebounded off two sides, knocking away the only stripe that was close to covering a pocket.
‘Bad luck, mate,’ said Peter, moving to the table. But Archer’s shot was not yet finished. One of the stripes guarding the spot had rebounded with some force and was slowly trickling toward the other spot.
‘Hold on.’ Dave pulled him back, and the watching crowd seemed to be waiting with bated breath as it kissed the spot which rolled to the edge of the pocket. It seemed to be having a protracted debate with itself about the pros and cons of actually making the jump into oblivion. A pin dropping would have been loud enough to break the tension in the room, but the vibrations set off by the massive round of cheers and stamping of feet did not actually begin until after the ball had chosen not to stay. Amidst the repetition of “in-off” which rippled round the delighted crowd like a handshake at a reunion, Archer quietly potted the remaining spot and the black.
‘Here son, this is yours and well deserved. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that done in all my born days.’ Dave handed over the crumpled note. ‘I don’t care if you are a ringer, that shot was amazing. It’s like you’d actually calculated all the angles and speeds or something.’
Peter seemed to have forgotten his hostility for a while, raising his hand in a “high-five” which was similar to the victory handclasp used by Archer’s people. ‘Awesome, mate. Truly awesome. I can’t wait to tell the others.’
Even Julie had forsaken her manuscript to come over and watch, repeating Peter’s ‘Awesome’ at the end. Dave seemed to be taking full responsibility for the whole thing, claiming to have “taught him everything he knows.”
Dave was not happy about getting back in the car, but Julie insisted and he was in such a good mood because of all the attention, that he finally agreed. Archer thought it strange that he could swap between such different moods so quickly, one minute laughing and joking, the next, angry and shouting. It was easy to see where Peter got it from, although he had an extra streak of meanness when he was with his friends.
Seeing him with his little cousins, Archer could easily believe there wasn’t a mean bone in Peter’s body.
They obviously worshipped him as some kind of hero, but then Mikey was only five and Geena only three. She was small and cute, hugging her toy rabbit as she sucked her thumb. Mikey had a toy sword and shield made of a smooth, flexible material Archer knew was called plastic. Like paper, it took a lot of energy and resources to create. The weapons looked authentic, with intricate sculpted patterns which made them appear real, even from a distance. It was just an illusion, they were nothing like as solid as the wooden imitations he played with as a child.
Mikey wanted to play rough games, pretending to fight like any boy of that age, and Geena wanted to be swung around in circles. When Archer stopped doing that, she just wrapped herself around Peter’s leg, making it difficult for him to defend himself against Mikey’s attack. There was no doubt in Archer’s mind that this was the real Peter, the boy he could be if he wasn’t continually exposed to the ignorance, lack of respect and ingratitude of the males around him. Even as he was enjoying this carefree play, Archer was attuned to potential danger, so he saw the accident building up long before it was anywhere close to happening.
Peter had turned his body and one of his legs to escape the constant battering, but the other leg was firmly anchored where it was by the clinging Geena. Mikey ran in front and barged at them with his shield like a battering ram. Archer’s warning shout came just as Peter began to fall. If the combined body weight of the two of them landing on Geena wasn’t peril enough, he could see that her head would land exactly on the edge of a low tree stump.
9 Calamity
Archer reacted instinctively, throwing himself at them from the other direction, bearing the brunt of their weight on his left shoulder. Somehow, he managed simultaneously to shield Geena’s head against the impact and deflect her so she would not be crushed by the weight of the three bodies. The boys ended up in a tangle of limbs, but she had been thrown clear. She was badly shaken and started crying, but Archer knew she had no idea how much danger she had been in. He picked her up and dusted her down, then distracted her by making a big deal of how much her toy rabbit must be hurting and how brave he was not to cry.
Peter knew exactly how much danger Geena was in – that was evident from his expression as he fell. He too was traumatised and needed to release the reaction energy, but since big boys don’t cry, he did the only thing available to him, taking out his fear and frustration by shifting the blame.
Mikey was so terrified he couldn’t cry, whimpering like a wounded puppy until Peter shouted at him. ‘Shut up you little runt; you’ll have all the grownups out and I’ll get the blame.’
Archer was the voice of reason. ‘No you won’t Peter, it was an accident; nobody meant it to happen.’
‘It doesn’t matter, they’ll still find a way to blame me, they always do.’ Peter turned on his nephew who by this point was howling even louder than Geena. ‘Shut UP Mikey!’
‘Mikey won’t stop crying until you stop shouting at him. Tell you what, why don’t we all run to the bottom of the field shouting as loudly as we can, then they’ll think it was all just a game.’ Archer picked up Geena and they both ran off shouting silly words like “sausages” and “rabbits.”
Mikey looked uncertainly at Peter who was rolling his finger in a circle near his temple to indicate that Archer was mad. He followed suit, copying Geena by waving his arms around, although the words he shouted were far more colourful. Mikey copied everything Peter did and by the time they reached the hedge they were all laughing.
‘You’re a bloody nutcase you are, but you certainly know your stuff with the little kids.’ Peter’s praise was genuine. ‘Have you got any brothers or sisters?’
‘No, but where I come from, the older kids have to take a share in looking after the little ones, teaching them things and showing them the right way to behave.’
‘Like a role model. That’s what Mum’s always telling Dad, “You’re not a good role model for Peter.” Dad hates it. Says that’s what they pay teachers for, to teach us how to behave.’
It was the first time Peter had attempted anything like a decent conversation with Archer and as they took a slow walk back up the steep slope, he shyly opened up, asking questions about Archer’s previous foster home and where he’d learnt how to play pool.
‘That really was my first game. I’d never seen anything like it before today.’
‘Well how did you work out the angles then? And how hard to hit it?’
‘Like your dad said, it’s basic geometry and physics. You just need to balance things.’
‘Sounds like equations. I’m pooh at algebra.’
‘You pooh at algebra? Doesn’t that make a mess?’
Peter laughed, pretending to wipe the tears from his eyes. ‘You can be such a dork sometimes. You need to start talking more like we do or the kids at our school are going to eat you for breakfast.’
‘No. Really? I was reading about people like that in the encyclopaedia. Cabbilans or something.’
‘Cabbi…oh, you mean cannibals. Can I give you a piece of advice if you want to survive in this town?’
‘Sure, that would be most helpful.’
‘Nah mate, you can’t go round talking like something off a black and white movie. “That would be most helpful.” That’s so poncey you’ll get called a pussy. And that is something you do NOT want.’
‘A pussy is bad?’ Archer frowned as the image of a fluffy white kitten scampe
red through his mind.
‘A pussy is very bad. It doesn’t get much worse than that. It’s like being called a wimp or a wuss or a girl.’
‘Ah, we do that all the time. To someone who is weak or afraid, or just bad at sports.’
‘Ok. Well look, if something is “most helpful,” you say it’s cool. Or sweet.’
‘Got it. That’s cool.’
‘Good. Now here’s the big piece of advice. If you don’t know what something means or what it is, don’t ask.’
‘But I was always told you don’t learn unless you ask.’
‘I don’t mean don’t ever ask, I just mean don’t ask in front of people you don’t trust.’
‘Like Jack and Kyle.’
‘Exactly. You come over like a right dweeb, where in actual fact you’re probably brighter than both of them.’
‘Brighter? You mean I shine more?’
Peter laughed. ‘What are we going to do with you? I mean smarter, cleverer. But I’m having my doubts.’
‘So is a dweeb the same as a dork? Someone stupid?’
‘Pretty much. More geeky than stupid.’
‘Geeky?’
‘My God, you really don’t know nuffin’ do you. A geek is someone with glasses and bad acne, scruffy hair and trousers that don’t touch the floor.’
‘That’s about how they look, not how smart they are.’
‘Oh they’re usually quite clever, read lots of books, but they’re not street smart. They’re completely uncool.’
‘So cool is something I want to be.’
‘Definitely. Here endeth the lesson for today.’
‘Just one thing.’
‘What?’
‘If I don’t know nuffin’, then I must know something.’
Peter pretended to scream. ‘Stop that now or I’ll throw something at you.’
‘You’d miss, you throw like a girl.’ Archer was off and running before he even finished the sentence and Peter chased after him, leaving the younger ones to amble back more slowly. They arrived back at the house just as Julie and Dawn came round the corner.
