by Susan Berran
Once we managed to get Jared to stop his mental attack, we spent the next couple of hours letting our toe-jams all get to know each other by some sort of blinking code or mind-reading or something. I just thought they had CRAP in their eye. But every time we went to leave, they’d ‘BITE’ us.
Great, now my life had a school teacher on my back, Mum in my face and toe-jam on my legs running my social life. I don’t know if their eyelids just got tired of blinking or what, but finally we were allowed to go. OLD MR INDITE and MOLLY walked us down to our bikes. He even drilled a hole into Jared’s boxing glove hands so that he could slide them onto the handlebars. We headed off to our secret headquarters location; or as Mum calls it … “That dangerous pile of junk under the bulldozed shed that we’re not to go anywhere near because it’s a death trap.” … Yeah, that’s where we went.
It was a long silent ride.
Over the last rise and into the paddock, there was our fortress of invention, our kingdom of privacy, our castle of ‘NO–ADULTS–ALLOWED’, our …
“Aaarrrhh!!!”
Jared had been riding just in front of me, when one of the rags that was wrapped around his feet got caught in the chain. It yanked his foot from the pedal and twisted it inward, pinching the skin and instantly ripping out a chunk of hairs from his leg. As his leg was pulled towards the back wheel, the bike began to fall and his knee acted like a kickstand. Scraping along the earth and leaving a SKID MARK of skin and blood along the road. He couldn’t get his huge clubbed hands off the bike’s handlebars so he just eventually rolled to a stop.
He looked like a dwarf. With one leg hooked over the bike but sticking up in the air because the bike was leaning over so far. One knee was dug into the ground like a human kickstand and both arms were stretched out like an orang-utan because his hands were stuck on the handlebars.
I tried so hard not to laugh, I really truly did. Jared was not having a good day.
We hobbled into our hideout and drooped our bodies across a couple of old tractor tyres that we used as beanbags. We stunk like sewage, really really old people and armpit sweat, all rolled into one.
And Jared was doing what he does best, BLEEDING. He had blood all over him from the knee, right down his hairless leg and his toes. He didn’t seem to have many healthy bits left.
But right now toe-jam was all we could think about. What choice did we have? Get it wet, it grows, or become a human roast to kill it …
“I could stick my hands in the microwave oven,” Jared suddenly blurted out … “Nah, I’d chuck up when its eye pops,” he muttered.
“What if we wrap up your hands and my legs in aluminium foil and stick them in the oven, then we wouldn’t see them pop?” I suggested brilliantly.
“Yeah but imagine unwrapping that goop," said Jared, going even greener.
“You know,” he said, all of a sudden. “It just might be handy to have an extra life or two after all.”
And when I thought about it, the way Jared was going, he was definitely in need of a few extra lives.
So there was only one thing left to do.
“Homework, teeth and don’t forget a proper shower this time, you’re starting to smell like the cow paddock. Hurry up and get to bed, it’s a school night and my show’s about to start.”
“Yes Mum!” I yelled back.
Well, two out of three’s not bad.
Sitting on the edge of the bed in nothing but undies, I put the torch on the pillow and aimed it carefully. Then, pulling an almost-clean knee up to my chin, I grabbed my foot. It was nice being able to bend them again. I pulled apart the first two toes, an eye flickered open …
“ G o o d n i g h t ,” it blinked.
“Goodnight Toeby,” I whispered … “Oouch! Ok, ok, we’re going to see Jared and Buttsby tomorrow.”
Now I’m not saying where Jared’s toe-jam, Buttsby is living, or how he convinced it to live there. But Jared’s definitely taken over as the school’s famous but mysterious STINK BOMBER.
And you should see the awesome new bike course we’ve made. It’s definitely bigger, better and far more DANGEROUS than before. It’s so totally wicked. We used a heap of guttering to make most of the track. Then pulled one end up into this humongous tree. At the bottom of that, we joined some really long, twisted roof sheets that looked like giant pretzels. We sat them end to end to make three loop-the-loops, with a tunnel at the end of that. Then there’s a hay-pile covered with dirt to form another ramp so we can jump the four old squashed tractors that are lined up.
It’s sooooo incredibly wicked and cool! As usual, Jared wanted to go first. I didn’t mind at all, second always seems to be safer. I don’t think Jared has figured that out. And with him having a ‘Slushy’ for a brain, there’s a really good chance he never will. We climbed the tree and then hauled our bikes up on the rope. Jared sat his bike wheels into the gutter and balanced himself.
“Ready, set …”
“Hey Jared, do you think we should get our helmets???”
“GO!”
WOW! He screamed, really screamed.
He raced down the gutter track, his legs just a blur as they peddled incredibly fast. Through the loops, one, two, three. He glided straight through the tunnel and hit the ramp at a hundred miles an hour. He flew up and off the hay-pile, sailing through the air and across the tractors for an amazing and brilliant touch down into … into …
Oh yeaH, the other haystack that we were going to put there, damn! I knew we forgot something.
Oh well, at least we’ve got a few lives spare …
… right Toeby?
Sams’ life seemed to be heading down the toilet since his little sister, Miss ‘I’m sooo good’ Smelly Melly Prissy Pants was born.
But in the ‘sticks’ of Agnath he found a best friend, Jared, a tall skinny red-head with a gazillion freckles.
And when underground tunnels are discovered right below them, it’s Sam that encounters the deadly inhabitants.
These adventures are like no other you have ever shared. You’ll feel as if you’re right there with Sam as he discovers the shocking secret of the tunnels! And his Mum is just as annoying as yours too!
Ohh Crappp!!!
Fluff Butt just pooped right in the middle of the lounge room rug.
And not just some teeny tiny hardly noticeable little minor accident that mum probably won’t notice … oooh no!
This was the mother load … a week’s worth of tinned food; chunky beef tongue, chicken liver and lamb’s brain in gravy … all mooshing together; dissolving, rotting, for at least a week in the gastric juices of the dog’s stomach.
All deposited at once in a huge greeny-browny-yellowish dump!!
… crap! Why is it always dark?
You know … it’s midnight, there’s no moonlight and your head’s shoved into a toe-jammed, fungus-filled, smelly old gumboot. That dark!
I cautiously took a mirror out of my utility belt. My hands were sweating like a baboon’s butt wrapped in sheep. Gingerly I poked it around the corner (the mirror, not my butt), then, for a split second I saw it; teeth, really, really, really big teeth …
Sam and Jared are on holidays … in the most dangerous place on the planet.
With the poisonous plants, ferocious animals, tree-swinging hippies and Smelly Melly’s deadliest fungus-growing, chunky chuck-up nappies yet!
This time, adventure is hot on their heels . . . and they just might not be able to keep their stomach contents down.
I spent my childhood living in the majestic Blue Mountains and bushwalking there. In my teens, the family (three brothers, little sis, Mum and Dad) all piled into the Kingswood and moved to the country town of Albury.
I spent ten years in the Australian Army as an illustrator and photographer.
Now I’m in the ‘sticks’ of Bethanga, with my partner and daughter Mel, puppy, six budgies and five hermit crabs … (the two possums, one small eagle, one turtle, three quails, two budgies, one cockatiel, thr
ee dogs, three cats and four hermit crabs and Wally the lamb, have all now happily moved on) … I’d like to share with you some of ‘Mel’s Imagining Stories’ that I have told to her over the years.
I hope you enjoy them too!
To drop a note to the author - Susan Berran
email: [email protected]
or www.susanberran.com
