My Private Pectus

by Shane Thamm

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Um … the coaching of the team.’

  Again, I take my eyes off the road and see that he's squirming in his seat. I know what he's driving at, but I don't let on.

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘In a more general sense. You know, apart from Maloney.’

  ‘Apart from Maloney?’

  ‘Yeah, you know.’

  I shake my head.

  ‘About … about me.’

  Got him! He said it. ‘Dad, Maloney's all we've had the last few weeks.’

  He winds his window up, turns the heater on. ‘It's getting cold out there,’ he says.

  I drop him off home before going to Ryan's.

  ‘Have you checked your BMI lately?’ he asks before he gets out.

  ‘Twenty,’ I lie.

  He grins like a game show host, gets out, but holds the door open for a second and says, ‘You're doing good, Jack.’

  Ryan's home when I get there, but we don't hang out. I go straight down to the garage and get working on the Bluebird. We've still got some work to do if Gez wants it registered by his birthday bash. It was supposed to happen today, but considering I'm the only one doing the work, things have taken longer than expected. He's always out with Lisa.

  I replace the spark plugs, the leads and the battery. Last week I dismantled the carburettor, which mixes fuel with air before it enters the motor. It came apart in tiny pieces: springs, valves, vents, screws, you name it. Everything was covered with a layer of carbon. I soaked it in petrol, then cleaned it off and put it back together. I look at it, pleased with my efforts. Getting behind the wheel, I crank the motor. The fan belt gives a hangman's scream. It's too loose. So I turn the motor off and tighten the belt before giving the motor another rev. It farts and burps, but there's no scream. I tune the motor, making sure it's not running too rich with petrol, and then fix the timing with a timing light, a tool I bought on eBay. I stand back and listen. The car keeps blowing blue smoke, but the engine idles a treat.

  The next morning I sit with Gez, Cuppas, and some other boys at recess. It's while I'm with this group that Sam and Rachel come over to me and invite me out on Friday night. ‘Rachel's coming over, Greg as well,’ Sam says. ‘Would you like to join us?’

  I scan the boys who instantly look at each other and grin wildly. Some laugh and don't try to hide it. I wait for her to extend the invite to the others, but it doesn't happen. Her huge eyes rest on me, hopeful.

  ‘I think I've got something on,’ I say, looking at Gez, hoping he'll nod or affirm my statement. He does nothing.

  Sam pulls her ponytail over her shoulder and twists it. Eventually she turns and walks away. My heart sinks. I feel lousy. The boys start talking. Sam wants Sticks, they say, Sam wants Sticks!

  The P starts singing: ‘Fat and skinny are lying in bed. Fat rolls over and gives Skinny head!’

  They laugh so hard half of them bend over. Steve has tears in his eyes. If it was any other girl who liked me, they'd be amazed, but because it's Sam it's just plain funny. In my five years at St Phil's, not one girl has ever had a crush on me, not even a passing fancy. Now that it looks like a girl finally does like me, no one is surprised it's Samantha Dean. I'm her only hope. Or do they think she's my only hope? I'm not too sure.

  Word gets around fast and for the rest of the day eyes follow me, people ask if I like her too. Greg wants to know what I've got organised for Friday night, why I can't come, but I've got no excuse. Even Gez tells me I should go because he's on a date with Lisa, but despite their encouragement I can't hide from the fact that everyone else thinks this is a great joke.

  On the walk home, Sam says to me, ‘Don't get all excited about the invite, will you.’

  ‘I'll come,’ I say, now that no one else is around.

  ‘Are you ashamed of me?’ she asks.

  ‘No. Of course not.’

  ‘Then what's the deal?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She glares at me. ‘You're avoiding me.’

  ‘I am not.’

  ‘You're all smiles out of school, but at school you make me feel like I don't exist.’ Her eyes seem to be drilling through my forehead. I drop my gaze and stare at my feet. ‘I do exist, Jack!’ she yells, then marches off.

  •

  All the guys are at the unit for a change. Finally Gez isn't hanging out with Lisa, thank God. We head downstairs to the garage where Gez starts talking about getting the car registered. He promises to get it done before his party.

  ‘We'll go out cruising one night, just the two of us,’ he says to me and we shake on it. Ryan makes us seal the deal by sharing a joint. He's really into the sharing spirit tonight. He even goes out, buys some beers, then passes them around while telling jokes about customers at the convenience store. Mike's his usual useless self, so we give him the job of controlling the volume on the stereo. Gez and I do some cosmetic work on the car by plugging up rust. Ryan crawls underneath and forces some putty into a hole in the muffler.

  ‘That won't last two weeks,’ I tell him.

  ‘Long enough to get it registered,’ he says. Ryan's no perfectionist when he's stoned.

  ‘There's still more to do for that to happen,’ I say, going around to the boot, which won't shut properly. I tape it down with some packing tape, then pick up an air filter from the floor. I take the old one off the motor and replace it while the guys stand watching. Gez gets in to crank the motor; Ryan opens the garage to let the exhaust fumes out. I watch Gez through the windscreen. He grins at the sound—no backfires or stutters. But the blue smoke is so thick it fills the garage, even with the roller door open.

  ‘Turn on the headlights,’ I call out.

  ‘What for?’ Gez yells back.

  ‘Just do it.’

  He flicks the headlights on and I kill the garage fluoros. The headlights cut the smoke like a Hollywood movie. We stand back and admire the work.

  ‘Let's go for a drive around the block,’ Gez shouts.

  We don't stop to think about legalities. Mike, Ryan and I head outside as Gez revs the motor, blasting a thicker cloud of smoke. We wait for it to clear, which happens after the motor has been idling for another minute. Gez sticks his head out the window as he reverses to negotiate the rocks of a retaining wall.

  With hoots of excitement, we dive at the car. I scream, ‘Shotgun,’ but Mike leaps into the front before me and I'm left clambering into the back with Ryan, who's got another joint in his mouth.

  ‘No smoking inside,’ Gez says.

  ‘No way, that's not fair,’ Ryan whines.

  ‘My car. My rules.’

  ‘Just coz it's a dumb-arse car doesn't mean it should have dumb-arse rules.’

  Mike bursts into laughter. ‘He's having you on, ya tosser!’

  Ryan drags deeply. ‘I know that,’ he says, still cut.

  As we do a circuit of the block we talk about the rattle in the shock-absorbers, the smoke, and laugh at the stereo which only takes cassette tapes.

  ‘Let's go up to Kangaroo Point,’ Mike suggests.

  ‘Yeah, can we, Gez?’ Ryan asks.

  ‘It's not registered,’ he says.

  ‘But it's still got plates,’ Mike says. ‘The coppers won't know unless you speed or do something stupid.’

  Ten minutes later Gez parks the car above the Kangaroo Point cliffs, which overlook the Brisbane River and the city centre. We scramble over the stone fence that separates a footpath from the cliff edge. We sit, hang our legs over the edge, peer down at the park twenty metres below, the river, and the city on the other side. Not far behind us is a concrete bollard. A rope, pulled taut, wraps around it then dives over the edge near Ryan's feet. It twitches from the weight of a rock climber below. Ryan blows smoke into the cool air and Mike holds his hand out, asking for the joint. I look over my shoulder as people walk by, making quiet comments. Someone says they can smell marijuana. As if noticing the same thing, Mike drags deep, finishes it off and stubs it
out on the rock. He flicks the butt into the night. Ryan points, and we all turn to watch a couple of girls in tight tops skate past on fruit boots.

  ‘Bit nipply out there,’ Ryan says, which gets us onto the topic of girls.

  ‘How's your Lisa chick going?’ Mike asks Gez.

  ‘Good,’ he says after a brief pause.

  ‘Stuck it to her yet?’

  A rock climber's helmeted melon rises over the edge and baulks at the sight of us.

  ‘Wouldn't tell you if I had,’ Gez says.

  ‘BORING!’ Mike moans like the crowd at a cricket match.

  ‘How are you going, Mike?’ Gez asks.

  With a dejected sigh, Mike says, ‘I'm toey for some.’ His head follows another girl as she jogs along. ‘If you know what I mean.’

  ‘And you, Sticks?’ Ryan asks. ‘How you going with that girl from Westfields?’

  The climber looks at me. Jeez, I hate this. ‘Nothing's going on,’ I say, wishing that there was.

  ‘Gez says you two are hitting it off.’

  ‘That podgy one?’ Mike asks. ‘I've seen her in the corner store. Bit tarty, but I've seen worse.’

  The climber yells out to his belayer to lower him down.

  ‘She's not fat,’ I say.

  ‘You see,’ Gez says. ‘I told you there's something going on.’

  I look at him, annoyed.

  I press the issue. ‘There's nothing going on,’ but I can't say it forcefully enough to convince them.

  ‘You should see how she looks at him,’ Gez goes on. ‘She wants him bad.’

  ‘You for real?’ Mike asks, ‘coz you should see how she looks at me when she comes into the store. She wants my stick of dyna-mike.’ He watches me for a reaction.

  The thought makes me feel sick. Jealous.

  ‘Nah, fair dink. She wants Sticks for sure,’ Gez says. ‘It's all over her face. She even asked him out at school the other day.’

  ‘No way!’ Ryan slaps his leg. ‘Why didn't you say so, Sticks? You gonna go for it? You have to go for it, right?’

  ‘No.’

  Ryan leans forward, peers over the edge, shaking his head. He then looks at his brother. ‘But she's okay, isn't she, Gez?’

  ‘I suppose,’ he says. ‘She's a goer, too. The whole school knows that.’

  ‘Sounds all right,’ Mike says with great enthusiasm. ‘Come on, Sticks,’ he moans. ‘Go out with her. Get a root.’

  ‘Sticks doesn't like a girl who gets around,’ Gez says.

  ‘Really?’ Mike looks at me, his face set, serious. ‘Sticks, you remind me of my old man. Stuck in nineteen fifty-five. If she's willing, good on her, I say. Once you've done it, you'll never look back, even if she is a slag.’ He gives me a nasty grin. ‘But then again, if you don't want her—’ He grabs his crotch, feigning pain and enjoyment. They all laugh, but he's not done yet. ‘You know what I reckon?’ he says. ‘You don't like her coz she's a heifer.’

  ‘She's not a heifer,’ I say.

  ‘Oooh, defensive,’ he says. ‘So you do like her.’

  I look out and wonder why the only time Mike gets anything right, it's at my expense. ‘I'll be right,’ I say. ‘I'll meet someone else.’

  Mike coughs, trying to hold back a laugh. ‘Sticks, you're joining the army.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘I don't know if anyone's told you this, but blokes join the army, not chicks.’

  ‘Some do,’ I say.

  ‘Yeah, but what will your chances be? The ratio will be a hundred to one and you reckon you're going to be that one bloke who gets laid?’

  I've got nothing to say to that.

  ‘I like you, Sticks, but mate, sometimes the truth hurts. It's not gonna be you.’

  Ryan gets up, moves across the cliff face and sits next to me. He puts an arm over my shoulders and waves to the city with the other hand. ‘Don't worry, mate. You're right. There's one out there for you.’

  ‘Are you being sarcastic?’ I ask.

  But he doesn't answer. He just opens a packet of cigarettes and passes them around. Needing to relax, I take one.

  Conversation dies as we stare out at the glow of the city. I can't stop thinking that maybe Mike is right: when it comes to girls I shouldn't care about the rumours or the stigma. When it comes to that stuff, Mike gets off on it. He laughs along, invites people to lay more crap on him. I've seen it happen when Ryan's uni mates come to the unit.

  What would Mike be like with a concave chest? I imagine him at a party: he'd rip his top off and suck in his guts, make his torso look like the grim reaper. It'd be his way of breaking the ice and getting attention. Maybe that's all I need to do: reveal myself and get over my issues.

  Why can't it be that easy?

  roger pask

  The next day I sit with Sam at school. The decision is made easier by the fact that Gez now spends every lunchtime with Lisa, but it's a brave one all the same. At least, that's what I tell myself. But something odd keeps happening. As we chill out quietly under a tree, a year 9er keeps looking at us from about ten metres away. He then walks off to the drink troughs, talks to two of his mates then comes back and stares. He suddenly shouts, ‘It's them!’

  His two friends saunter over—shirts out, socks down, faces covered in freckles and zits. One laughs. ‘Looks just like them!’ he says.

  The other one, with his cap turned sideways like a try-hard homey, just shoves his hands into his pants. ‘Oh, yeah!’ he says and nods.

  ‘Looks like what?’ I yell at them.

  ‘Like the wicked pic up on the wall,’ the homey says and points in the direction of the troughs.

  Sam and I look at each other. Worried about what it might be, I walk ahead of her to the drink troughs. Then I see it: a picture of her on the wall—actually it's a bad sketch. If it didn't have her name scrawled on there with an arrow pointing to a fat girl, gasping, with a broomstick between her legs, you wouldn't know it's her. You wouldn't know the broomstick was me either, if it wasn't labelled ‘Sticks’.

  I rip the picture off before Sam can see it.

  ‘What is it?’ she asks, catching up.

  Scrunching it up, I hold it behind my back. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Show me.’ She grabs my arm by the elbow and tries to reach behind me.

  ‘No!’ I hold the paper out of her reach.

  ‘Why, what is it?’

  ‘I don't want you to see it.’

  ‘Don't be a pain!’ She puts a hand out, expecting me to hand it over.

  ‘You don't want to see it,’ I tell her again, then drop it into a bin, on top of someone's putrid, stinking lunch. Sam runs over, peers in, then pulls away. She turns to me, eyes questioning, eyebrows cross. She cramps my space. ‘What was it?’ she demands.

  ‘You don't want to know. It wasn't nice.’

  ‘Was it another picture? Was it about me?’

  I don't want to hurt her feelings. I don't want her copping flak because of me. ‘It was about me.’

  ‘Jack,’ she says, suddenly concerned. ‘What did it say?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She reaches for my hand, but I pull it away.

  ‘It was nothing, all right!’ I snap, hoping it will get her to back off. But it doesn't work.

  ‘You can tell me,’ she says, and her huge brown eyes rest on me, full of concern. And for a moment I don't know what to do. When was the last time someone looked at me like that? But just as I'm about to explain the picture, I hear a snigger from behind. I spin around and see The P and Steve.

  ‘I'd rather not,’ I tell her, then walk away, leaving them all there.

  ‘What?’ she says. ‘Jack!’ I can hear her small feet drum after me. ‘Why don't you tell me?’ She grabs my hand.

  I turn and face her nuggety frame.

  She peers up at me, her face set despite the laughter from the boys further back. ‘I know what it's like having lies about you stuck on the walls.’

  ‘Lies?’ The P yells and bursts into hysterics.

&
nbsp; ‘There's no lies!’

  But she ignores him. ‘Jack!’ she says, ‘Jack, listen!’

  But I can't, not in front of them.

  She waves her hands in my face, demanding me to look at her. Eventually she gets my attention. She drops her hands to her hips. ‘Do you think I screwed that guy?’

  ‘I don't know!’

  She moves closer until her breasts squish against my stomach. At first I like it, then the boys’ voices fill my mind; their laughter about her appearance. I look at her frame again and don't know what to think. I can smell her, see her cleavage. I feel repelled; feel turned on.

  Still peering up she says, ‘I thought you weren't like the other guys.’

  I notice a stretch mark on one of her tits. I am, I think. I am just like them.

  ‘But you snogged him, right?’ I say.

  ‘Jesus!’ She pushes me away. ‘That doesn't mean I put out!’

  ‘Does so!’ The P screams.

  ‘Clear off!’ she yells at him. Then she takes my hand and drags me away. Their laughter recedes as we go around the corner of the building.

  ‘Don't you believe me?’ she asks.

  ‘Did you like him?’

  She pulls me to a stop. ‘No,’ she says. ‘I was drunk. It was stupid.’ Then she half smiles as she poses me a question: ‘Haven't you ever got drunk and kissed someone you didn't like?’

  The answer is no, but I can't say it. It makes me sound stupid, inexperienced. ‘Of course.’

  She laughs and looks at me with those huge eyes. ‘Then chill out,’ she says.

  Friday night swings around and I can't wait to go to Sam's little get-together. I still can't believe she invited me out in front of everyone. What a statement! I give her a call and tell her I'm looking forward to it. She says, ‘I'll save you a drink. What would you like?’

  ‘Beer,’ I say.

  She laughs. ‘What else do guys drink?’

  I spend an hour in the bathroom, grooming. When I shower, there's not a bit I don't scrub and by the end I've removed a layer of skin. Using the handtowel, I wipe the condensation from the mirror. I pull a face at myself and smile. Sam likes me! This feeling is ridiculous, but I love it. Turning side-on, I check my chest and cup my hands over where my ribs protrude on either side of the crevice. It's hard to feel confident with this. I roll my head from side to side trying to release the tension in my shoulders. The bottom vertebrae of my neck grind over each other before releasing with a sharp crack. Standing front-on again, I spot a lone black hair in the middle of my chest. The last thing I want is to end up with an Austin Powers shag pile like Dad, so I grab the hair between my nails and give it a firm tug. It pops free, leaving a red spot like a green ant bite. It stings like one, too. But as I wash the hair down the basin, a feeling of regret comes over me as if I've just washed away my sole bit of manhood.