by Katz, Danny
There are trees on the edge of the footy oval and we are running between them. Up ahead I see the footy scoreboard. It is on a brick wall that is the back wall of the maintenance shed.
‘Tom!’
???????
I stop and look up.
Five Asians in a tree.
Five hot blonde Asians in a big tree. All on different branches with their schoolbags on their backs: Angie Maningas and Mae Nguy on middle branches. Krissy Klang near the top on a high branch. Ji-Hyun (Jack) sitting on the branch beside her. And looking down from a low branch, right over my head, Brisley Weng.
‘Tom, you’ve got to help us. There are Year 12 girls on scooters who want to get us and we’re hiding from them.’
‘You mean the Superspicy-Girlz on Scooters?’
Krissy Klang goes ‘Well they’re not as super-spicy as us, but yeah, they’re on scooters. They’re jealous of our hotness and they’ve been chasing us but we managed to get up this tree.’
Brisley goes ‘Please, Tom, they want to jizz-bomb us’ and Mae Nguy goes ‘Yeah, do you know how hard it is to get paste out of colour-treated hair?’
Sumo-pig hasn’t waited for me: it’s way down near the footy scoreboard and I should be with it, not standing here. ‘What do you want me to do, Bris? I can’t do anything, I’m just trying to survive too.’
Krissy Klang says ‘Just find them and tell them to stop looking for us’ and Bris goes ‘Yeah, tell them we’ve gone home or something.’
Funny how she wants me to help her out NOW even though she walked away from SCUM this morning, then wouldn’t talk to me in the library when I didn’t have a country to sit in. Why should I help her and her stupid HAGZ who have never even spoken to me before because I’m an unworthy nobody little loser-lamer …
I can’t think of what to say so I say ‘Sorry gotta go’ and just run off and they’re all yelling ‘Tom … THIS IS SERIOUS … OUR HAIR!!!!! …’
The pig is at the scoreboard wall. When I get there, it walks round to the other side of the scoreboard. This is where the door to the maintenance shed is.
The door is closed and the pig just stands there. ‘You want me to open it?’
The handle is oily when I turn it. Open the door. It’s dark, can’t see—
‘GET BLUDDY OUUUUTTTTTTT!!!!!’
An old scary face pops out, scares the flarping flarp out of me.
‘… BLUDDY MAJ-MUNE JED-ANNNNN!!!!!’
It’s King Bozz the Yard Guy. His face is all crazy and he is holding the Yard Duty garden-grabbers and snapping them in my face, snap snap.
‘GET OUTTTTTTT, BLUDDY YEAR 12 RIFFRAFF!’
‘I’m Year 9, Year 9!’
He stops snapping: ‘Why you dress in bluddy costume?’
‘Yard Duty, remember? I did it this morning with you.’ He stands and thinks but I don’t think he remembers. I think he may be drunk on alchie.
He looks down and sees the pig and gets all happy. ‘Haha, bluddy pig have come back!’
‘Yeah the pig brought me here.’
‘Pig have been hiding with me all day. It is safe here from riff-raff.’
He opens the door and the pig goes in, then King Bozz says to me, ‘Awww you enter here also, bluddy maj-a-rac!’ Not sure if a maj-a-rac is a swear or a good thing because all Bosnia-words sound like swears, but I go in and he closes the door.
It’s dark in here, can hardly see a thing, and stinks too, like car petrol. Dangerous to walk in here too, cos of the darkness and all the crap in here.
You know those old Egypt movies where there’s all these booby-traps and deadly things in the pyramid and if you touch anything a spear will pop out or the floor will open and you will die? Maintenance Shed is like that. There’s this old rusty mower right in front of the door so I’ve got to carefully walk round that, then behind the mower is a flat paint-tray with something sloshy in it that I almost put my shoe in. Gotta duck a bit now because there’s a huge piece of wood poking out of nowhere, with a giant nail sticking out the end, and it almost gets me in the eye.
The pig goes to the back of the shed where a shelf is filled with old tins and brushes and jars with nails and stuff, then it sits on the ground. I am realising something amazing: the pig brought me here because it knew I would be safe. It took me the long way because it was the safest way. It is the most brave creature that I have ever known.
King Bozz goes over to a rusty wheelbarrow in the middle of the shed and uses his garden-grabbers to grab a can from out of it. There are lots more cans in the wheelbarrow that haven’t been opened. He must be pretty wasted on alchie because there are empty cans all over the ground, like seven or eight, foot-squashed.
King Bozz sits on the edge of the wheelbarrow, opens the can and takes a massive sip, like almost half a can in one go. Don’t know how he can do it, alchie tastes rank AS. Like sugar mixed with hospital smells.
‘What is name then?’
‘Tom Zurbo-Goldblatt.’
‘SERBO?’
‘No, Zurbo. Tom ZURBO-Goldblatt.’
‘Good, no bluddy Serb EVER come in my shed, bluddy jebb … EMM-li … mahj-KU!’
I don’t know where to sit because there are no other wheelbarrows around. I sit on a roll of chickenwire against the wall but it bends in the middle and I sink into it. King Bozz goes haw haw while he’s taking a sip from his can and the drink misses his mouth and goes down his chin. He has to wipe his chin with his big dirty Yard Duty hand. His hands are always dirty with mud because he digs out plants without gardening gloves, just using his fingers as a digging tool.
‘What bluddy name is Tom Zurbo-Gold— Gold—?’
‘Goldblatt. Yeah, weird I know. When I’m older I’m going to change it to something more normal. Thom Zurbo-Goldblatt. Then I’ll sound like Thom Yorke from Radiohead. You like Radiohead?’
…
Guess not. So I sit and watch King Bozz finish the rest of the can, then he drops it on the ground and squashes it flat with his boot. He gets two more new cans out of the wheelbarrow then stands up, comes over to me, holds one can out like he wants me to take it.
‘You drink with me.’
I try to act cool, like I am a profesh alchie-drinker, ‘Nahh, not up for it today, really need to have a non-drinking day.’
He pushes it in my face: ‘In my country, when we was hiding from war criminal in our village and someone offer you drink, YOU BLUDDY TAKE DRINK BECAUSE IT MAY BE YOUR BLUDDY LAST!!!!!!!’
I don’t like alchie and I don’t like what it does to me. I once had like just four little sips of wine at my Uncle Steve and Aunt Pen’s place and I went all demented in my brain and felt really sick and Mum had to take me home early and I chucked up in my hands in the car. But his yelling freaks me out so I take the can and open it: ‘Aighhht, just a sip,’ then he lifts his can in the air and says ‘Drink can escalate happiness when there is nothing else to make happiness! NAZ-DRAVLJE!’ which must be the ‘cheers’ they do in Bosnia-land, so I lift up my can back, ‘Yeah … naz-raz-yyy.’
He takes a massive sip, the whole can in one go; I take a tiny bit in my mouth and just secretly spit it straight back into the can so he thinks I swallowed but I didn’t. But actually it does taste pretty good and un-hospitaly.
‘Very nice alcohol, King Bozz,’ I go and he says ‘Not alcohol! I am Bosnian Muslim, we do not drink alcohol. Lemonade. I not give alcohol to young boy. Pfah!’ I look at my can: it’s hard to see in the dark but yeah, it’s definitely lemonade, a cheap dodgy brand I’ve never heard of. Ravo won’t believe this when I tell him that King Bozz is actually a very sad lemonade-oholic.
King Bozz sits back down on his wheelbarrow: ‘Now that we have drunk lemonade together, we are comrades and I will tell you sad story. Hiding in shed all day from riff-raff has made me think much about my bluddy village, in war we are having against Serbs twenty years ago. When I was boy, same age as you, bluddy war criminals come to my village and I am hiding in barn with donkey. Me and small donke
y. I should have gone outside barn and fought war criminal but I do not do that. I just hide like bluddy disgrace while war criminal go round shooting up bluddy village …’
Don’t know what to do or say. He’s staring at me like a big scary statue: ‘If you are pushed down by bad enemy, you must not run away and hide, you should rise up and fight war criminal. Be brave-boy, not bluddy coward-boy like me. Get up! Get out! Help your village! Help your people! LIVE BY HEART AND FIGHT WITH HEART!!!!!’
He bangs hard on his chest then waits for me to do something, so I get up, but the chickenwire roll has shaped itself into my arse so when I stand, it comes with me and I have to kind of pull it off my arse. King Bozz stops being sad and is laughing haw haw haw.
I don’t know why I am doing this but I’m trying to pick up the pig.
It’s hard to pick it up.
Because—
—it’s slippery with Vaseline.
And it doesn’t really want to be picked up, it is flipping round in the middle …
‘Look at boy pick up bluddy pig haw haw.’
Never had this strange kind of not-scared feeling before. Most moments of my life I am usually in Xtreme Scaredy Mode. I don’t know if it’s King Bozz’s speech or the paint fumes from the paint-tray or the cheap dodgy lemonade, but I am walking up to the door with the pig in my arms.
‘You are right, King Bozz! From the moment I stepped into school this morning I’ve been running and hiding. And I’m sick of running and hiding like a scaredy little dickweed!’
(Why am I am opening the door? Why am I stepping out of the shed?)
‘I am going to fight back! I am going to help my people! I am going with my pig!’ King Bozz says ‘Good luck to you Zurbo Gold-boy. Now close door! In my country, when people are hiding from war criminal, YOU CLOSE BLUDDY DOOR!!!!!’
Soon as I close the door, I realise that leaving the shed was a pretty crap idea cos there is a lot of stuff going on out here. On all sides of the oval, Year 12s are running over to the tree where the HAGZ are. Lots more are already there, standing round the tree laughing and throwing toilet paper and eggs up there.
I need to help Bris but I don’t know how to do it. Got no weapons, got no posse, got nothing. I could run over to Teachers’ Carpark and find a teacher. But nah, can’t go there, I can see Year 12s over there in stupid jester hats, standing round teachers’ cars and spraying shaving cream all over the place.
S’pose all I can do is run down the middle of the footy oval then get to Admin and try to get help there. Okay, that’s what I’m doing then. I’m not fit enough to jump the oval fence so I go under it, and now I’m running toward the middle with the pig in my arms but I’m not going fast enough because I’m already being chased.
Someone’s going ‘Oiiiiii’ and someone else is yelling ‘Mate, stop!’ They are getting close because the yelling is right in my ear.
‘STOP!’
Can’t run faster because I am so unsporty: the wrong leg goes in front of the other leg, and now I am tripping and falling to the ground. I don’t want to hurt the pig so I land on my back and now I am looking up at the sky with the sun in my eyes.
The pig is okay. It crawls off me onto the grass. But two Gangstas in Hoodies are looking down at me: they have scarves over their faces and one has the Weapon of Mass Sprayduction on his back and he is pointing the sprayer at my head.
At least I died bravely. Running away.
‘You’re Grassy’s mate, right? You brought the pig this morning.’
He is not shooting me with the sprayer.
The second Gangsta goes ‘Everyone reckons that you and Grassy in those sumo-suits was the funniest thing of the whole day.’
When I fell with the pig, its nappy came off and went over my face. So they can’t see who I am.
They think I am a mate of someone called Grassy and that I was one of the guys in the sumo-suits: ‘Uhhhhh … yeah … me and Grassy, haha.’
The first Gangsta pulls me up from the ground and I try and keep the nappy over my face with my other hand. It smells ploppy but I don’t care. ‘Why’d ya change out of your sumo-suit?’ he says.
‘Uhhh, got too hot.’
He looks at my T-shirt: ‘BOY, haha. That’s a funny costume too, haw haw.’
‘Yeah … well … better go, lads, gotta get this pig back – to – its farm.’
The second Gangsta is looking at my clothes: ‘Wait up. How’d you get through Muck Up Day without getting a single mark on ya?’
The first Gangsta points his sprayer at my face. ‘Yeah, you don’t actually look like you’ve done any mucking up at all …’
Be a good idea to run now, Zurb.
‘… and that’s probably cos you’ve been stuck taking care of that pig all day and haven’t had any fun. Wanna have a go on the sprayer?’ He takes off the spray-pack and puts it on my back: ‘It’s bloody heavy anyway, so I’m tired of carrying it round.’
The second one says ‘It’s full up. We drank all these Staminades at lunchtime and worked up a pissload of piss then we pissed our piss into the spray-pack and topped it up with water.’
‘Awesummm.’ Hope I sounded impressed.
‘Go to the locker shed,’ says the first one. ‘There’s a kid there. Got him this morning with fish sauce and got him this arvo with piss. You can shoot him for as long as you want and he doesn’t even care haw haw.’
‘Yeah, we’re going to get some Asian chicks who are stuck in a tree,’ says the second one, ‘join us when you’re finished’ and they run off toward the tree with the HAGZ in it where everyone seems to be going.
I look down at the pig: don’t know how you keep doing it, but you saved my life again. I throw the nappy on the ground, hold out my arms, and the pig jumps into them. This is better: I got a weapon now. And I know where to find a posse now. And I think I can save Bris now. I’m running to the locker shed, with someone else’s piss sloshing around on my back.
He’s crying and sitting by himself on the ground outside the locker shed. His pants have got a hole on the knee and his shirt is pulled open in the front with buttons missing and a shirt pocket ripped off. His whole body is covered in wetness. Two schoolbags are there beside his legs.
‘… hhhHHH … Zurb?’
‘Flarping hell, they got ya again.’
‘Was getting my … hhhHHH … my bag from the locker shed and the Gangstas in Hoodies came and … hhhHHH … they sprayed me again …’
‘Why didn’t you run?’
‘Couldn’t, because I had my bag … and … hhhHHH … I also had your bag …’
That’s a true SCUM-friend. He got my bag out of the locker shed. That’s what slowed him down, that’s why he got sprayed.
His nose has powerful smell-glands and he can smell himself: ‘… I think … hhhHHH … they sprayed me with piss …’
‘It’s Staminade piss.’
‘That’s the worst … hhhHHH … kind …’
Even at his lowest point, he can fire off crackers.
‘Yeah, but Ravo, look what I got.’
He looks up: ‘… hhhHHH … a pig?’
‘No, dick-knuck!’ I turn sideways so he can see the spray-pack on my back: ‘The Weapon of Mass Sprayduction. We can spray them back!’
‘Nah … hhhHHH … I’ve had enough… hhhHHH.’
‘Lissen Ravo, don’t spend your life hiding in a barn with a donkey! Live by your heart, fight with your heart!’ He’s looking at me weird, the bit about the donkey in the barn must’ve confused him. But I keep going ‘Come on, Ravo! We are SCUM and it’s TIME FOR REVENGE!’
He gets up, picks up his bag. ‘Nah, not feeling it, Zurb … hhhHHH … gonna go home … hhhHHH … Gran’ll make me a nice bath with marjoram and lavender bath fizz …’
He’s walking away so I try one last thing: ‘Brisley’s in trouble.’
He stops for a sec: ‘Brisley?’
‘Yeah, she’s stuck in a tree near the oval. She’s up there with the rest of th
e HAGZ. The Year 12s have gone to get them.’
He turns and starts walking back, his eyes all different: ‘Brisley needs help?’
‘Yeah, and if you want, I’ll let you have the Weapon of Mass Sprayduction and you can spray the Year 12s and save Bris yourself.’ I take the spray-pack off my back and put it on the ground in front of him ‘You up for it or nah?’
He stares at the spray-pack full of piss for a few seconds, thinking, thinking …
‘I’m up for it!’ He drops his schoolbag near my feet then grabs the spray-pack and flips it onto his back in one go. He looks all action-hero-ish with the pack on his back, his shirt kind of open so his skinny little chest bones show underneath, his nose poking out longer and prouder.
He holds the sprayer bit and puts his finger on the trigger bit and points it in the air: ‘Got a spray-pack full of piss and I AM PISSED OFF.’
Which is the kind of killer line you hear in movies before the action-hero shoots up all the druggie child-killers who have stolen nuclear bombs.
Ravo runs off toward the oval and I run behind him with the bags and the pig, huff huff; when this is all over I am going to keep this pig, it is going to be my new pet at home and I will build a wooden box in my bedroom where it can sleep with me and I will make sure it has a joyful long life in a bacon-free Jewish household. Actually, we’re a half-Jewish household so we do eat bacon sometimes but we’ll only eat it when Sumo-pig isn’t watching or is asleep, that will be my promise.
When we get to the oval, lots of stuff is happening on the other side. Flarp.
Zombies in Army-Camo, Gangstas in Hoodies, Harry Potters with Supa-Soakers, Gorillas in Netball Skirts, Smurfs with Guns, Superspicy-Girlz on Scooters, an extra Superspicy-Girl who is filming with a camera, and a bunch of randoms who are not part of any of those groups and are just wearing like pyjamas or an arsey hat or face-paint.
They are all around the tree with the HAGZ in it. The tree is getting eggs and water and jizz and shaving cream, just about everything, chucked, sprayed, and shot at it. Wet toilet paper is hanging from all the branches. Wet streamers as well, and silly string all over the place. You can’t see any of the Hot Asian Girls in the tree but you can hear them screaming up there – I think Ji-Hyun (Jack) is screaming the loudest. The only one you can see is Bris – she is hanging upside down from the bottom branch. One Superspicy-Girl is trying to grab her skirt and pull her down from the tree but Bris keeps fighting and punching at her head.
