by Susan Berran
There they were! Finally Dopey Sophie, Crabby Abbey,LOONEY MOON and a few of the other freak-a-zoid girls sat down and started their usual whinging talk on “how annoying Sam and Jared are”. Yep, we knew they were talking about us, AGAIN.
They were out in the open so we had to make sure we figured out which way and how strong the wind was blowing. As soon as we got close enough they all stopped blabbering and just stared daggers at us as we passed by. Crabby was sneering so hard I didn’t know if that was her face or the wrinkly backside of a NINE-HUNDRED-YEAR-OLD ELEPHANT. But we had what we needed. Luckily it was an ‘Itchy’ wind.
Oh yeah, sorry. Me and Jared have three types of wind codes. That way no one knows what we’re talking about or what we’re getting ready for. If we say it’s a ‘TofFeE’, then that means it’s a completely useless, wimpy little nothing sneeze-breeze. An ‘Itchy’ wind is a slight breeze that is annoying but we can put up with it. But a ‘Booga’, now that’s a “RUN FOR YOUR LIVES, GET OUT OF HERE!” windstorm … because a wind-blast like the ones from Booga’s massive butt could blow you into next year.
So anyway … we passed by and figured we had an ‘Itchy’. I could feel the RAZOR-SHARP eyes of Crabby stabbing me in the back of my head until we got all the way into the dunnies. And the second we rounded the corner … go!
We spun around, whipped up the sleeve, swivelled the SINGLE SHOT BUG FLUNGERS … “Load” … in went the Toenail Shots … “Ready” … we pulled down on the bowl … “Aim” … we chucked our firing arms around the corner … “FIRE!” … TWANG WZZZZZ … SMACK SMACK!
“OWEE!”
“EEEE!”
Woo hooo! We got ‘em! Quick, fling around the BUG FLUNGERS, pull down sleeves, wander out into the open and calmly head straight towards them.
It was sooo funny! Dopey and looney were twirling about, brushing and slapping at themselves. The other girls soon joined in, leaping up as well and frantically swatting away and searching all over themselves for the “NASTY BITING ANTS” .
As we passed by, we could see one of our shots was still hanging onto the back of LOONEY’S jumper. It was totally AWESOME. It looked like one of those stretchy rubbery toy frog things. You know, the ones you throw at a wall or a window. They sort of stick to the wall but then start to ‘walk’ down it by flip-flopping over and over.
So our tiny TOENAIL SHOT was ‘walking’ down LOONEY’S back, flicking over and over as the sharp bits of the toenails hung onto her jumper like Velcro. What a bonus!
Crabby Abbey was the only one still sitting on the ground, not moving, not saying a word, not freaking out, not smacking or slapping herself and not twirling about in a panic. She just sat there, staring at me and Jared as we walked by.
She’s like the snob from HELL!
At recess we got the guys again. They couldn’t see any ants on the trees so they figured they must have crawled away and it was now safe to lean against them again. Which made it sooo hilarious when we both got a direct hit on Booga … twang wzzzzz … SMACK SMACK!
“OWWW!”
He tried to move so fast that he lost his balance, fell back against the tree, CRACK WHAM! … which snapped like a tooth-pick and Booga fell to the ground right on top of it.
We felt reeeally sorry … for the tree.
Booga was rolling about, SCREAMING and slapping himself everywhere he could possibly reach, which wasn’t far. The other guys instantly leapt away from their trees and were suddenly stomping on every teeny-tiny, itty-bitty, poor little innocent ant that they spotted.
Unfortunately, we couldn’t get the girls again that day because for the first time ever, it didn’t matter what Crabby Abbey said to them. There was no way they were going to sit on the same grass patch for the rest of the day. RATS!
Anyway, we didn’t want to use the Bug Flungers too much in one day or someone might start to suspect us. So we decided to only use them a few times a week.
They’re sooo WICKED! And we’re still working on some other ideas for our mouldy FUNGUS toenails balls as well.
We did use a few special ones for a science experiment, though. Ones we’d been growing for a couple of weeks. We wanted to find out if nose picking wrecks your sense of smell or taste.
TofFeE has his fingers shoved so far up his nose all the time that they probably sleep in there. So we got a nice big bunch of fresh toenails and put them into a plastic bag. Then into a really dark, damp place … the toilet cistern. You know, the box part of the dunny that fills up with water to flush. We left them in there for ages and when we eventually got them out, the plastic bag looked like it was full of greeny grey cobwebs or a really fine mass of tangled icky old ladieshair. Every tiny bit of the toenails had the beautiful FUNGUSSY MOULD growing all over it.
They were excellent!
We tossed the whole lot into Mum’s food blender, that she uses every night and chucked it on ‘FLAT OUT’ until it looked like greeny-grey sand. As we poured it back into the plastic bag the smell hit us. It hit us like a train made of bricks carrying bricks and smashing into a brick wall! It was sooo disgusting! It was sooo gross! It was like the meeting place for every type of ‘CHUCK-CHUNDER there’s EVER BEEN! Like mouldy green cheese meets hairy armpits meets sweaty feet!
It was absolutely … PERFECT!
We carefully sealed the bag and took it to school hidden away in Jared’s backpack.
Everything went according to plan. As each kid tossed down their school-bag, we watched closely to make sure we knew which one was TofFeE’s. Halfway through the morning class Jared just happened to have to go to the loo. While I stayed in class to make sure that TofFeE didn’t suddenly need to get anything from his bag. Once outside, Jared quickly grabbed TofFeE’s drink flask from his bag, shoved it under his jacket and took it up to the dunnies. Once there, he added the contents of our plastic bag to TofFeE’s flask, closed it, shook it really, really well then dropped it back into TofFeE’s bag, as he casually headed back into class.
It was really cool watching TofFeE eat lunch that day. We couldn’t take our eyes off him. We figured he’d have to chuck-up or PASS OUT or DIE or something, ANYTHING. But nah! He ate his squashed-flat vegemite sandwich and his sad, crumbling little cupcake. Then he finally picked up his drink flask, gave it a good shake and tipped it up to his mouth. He drank … and drank … andDRANK.
Huh! NOTHING! It was a TOTAL BUST!
We were so disappointed. I suppose it was pretty good that he didn’t drop dead … I guess. And anyway, we figured that it did prove our theory … that he’d obviously ripped out every single ‘smelling hair’ from inside his nostrils and completely covered every taste bud on his tongue with so much snot from all of the nose picking that he definitely couldn’t taste or smell anything anymore! But we were still pretty disappointed that he didn’t at least chuck-up.
And we couldn’t exactly hand in a science report with the results of chucking toenails and fungus into TofFee’s drink, or we’d be in detention until the dinosaurs come back.
Yeah … that was a good day.
No Jared at school … again! So I was stuck in Geography all on my own. The week was dragging bye so s l o w l y without him there to do stuff with.
I was sooooo bored!
I had to do something, something desperate, something crazy or I was going to die of total boredom … and Crabby Abbey was sitting at the desk directly in front of me! I couldn’t stand it any longer; it was as if her head was throbbing and growing larger and larger like the swollen butt of a Hippopotamus after a bee-stingATTACK! Her tangled, frizzy curls were screaming at me.
“Shoot me! I double dog doo-doo dare ya!” it yelled. “What are ya?A wuss?A sook? A teeny weeny little mouse in a big frilly skirt? C’mon shoot me! SHOOT ME!”
ARHHHHH! OK, so Jared wasn’t there to keep lookout. But hey, I was sitting right at the back of the classroom. No one was watching me. Crabby was sitting less than a metre, right in front of me! Surely I could get away with at least one shot.
Miss Croonarc was pacing back and forth at the front of the classroom, waffling on about something. I couldn’t hear anything except for Crabby’s MASSIVE throbbing head yelling at me!
I WAS GOING FOR IT!
I slowly leant down to my crumpled jacket lying on the floor beside me, and casually reached into the pocket to feel around for the toenail ammo. I knew I had a few shots in one of the pock … OW! Found them. Very slowly I …
“Are you all right Sam?” Miss Croonarc suddenly interrupted, looking right at me. In an instant every other kid had spun around in their chair and was staring right at me as well.
“Yep, just stretching,” I said as I sat straight back up in my chair.
I tried to forget about it, the risk was too great … but Crabby’s HEAD! It just kept yelling at me … “Do it! … Do it! DO IT NOW!”
I slipped forward, slowly slumping down low in my seat again. Sliding further and further down, with one arm dangling about over the side of the chair. I carefully felt about in my jacket, searching for the right pocket again. But this time I kept my eyes firmly glued on Miss Croonarc up the front.
OW! Wow, they were sharp. Damn, there were four or five of them stuck together in a clump and I couldn’t manage to work them apart with just one hand. I just had to keep them hidden in my hand and slowly bring the AMMO clump up to my lap. where I could use both hands to try and carefully separate the precious Toenail Shots.
Miss Croonarc was still pacing up the front … Crabby’s HEAD was still yelling at me … I tried to keep my eyes on the teacher … but the damn ammo wouldn’t come apart. ARRRR, come on, I thought as I glanced down quickly. Pull apart will ya?
“Sam.”
C’mon. I was twisting and turning and pulling at the little suckers.
“Sam!”
ARRR, OW! They were piercing the skin of my fingertips over and over. If I could just …
“Sam – stand up!”
“What!?” I said, instantly snapping back to reality and what was happening around me, while shoving my seat backwards, leaping to my feet and chucking my hands behind my back all at the same time! I was also suddenly very aware that every pair of beady little eyes was once again staring right at me. In a daze I stood there, hands clasped behind my back and, as gently as possible, still holding the clump of TOENAIL SHOTS as they stabbed deeply into my skin.
“What are you doing Sam? You obviously weren’t concentrating on what I was saying,” Miss Croonarc stated.
“Uh … I was … ummm … ”
“I think he was playing with something in his hands, Miss Croonarc,” Crabby blurted out proudly. RRRR, she’s such a SUCK-UP!
“What’s behind your back Sam?” Miss Croonarc demanded.
“Nothing!” I said chucking my brain into a zillion miles an hour HYPER-DRIVE to try and figure out how to get rid of the evidence.
“Well, let’s see your hands then,” Miss Croonarc continued.
“Yeah, show us your hands Sam!” Crabby threw in, sitting there with a huge smarty-pants grin across her gross, UGLY face. Boy she was sooo going to get it!
“Fine then!” I said, thrusting out both hands and stretching them wide open for everyone to see. “Told ya!”
Crabby’s eyes narrowed; she looked sooo disappointed and annoyed.
“Right. Sit down, Sam. Eyes front everyone, let’s get back to work!” Miss Croonarc said as she turned back to the board. Crabby turned sooo s l o w l y , her eyes burning through me for as long as possible.
I tried to pretend I was sitting, but actually I was trying to keep my bum hovering a few millimetres above my seat for as long as I possibly could. But after a minute or two it was impossible. I tried to sit down sooo softly and sooo carefully while at the same time trying to gently wiggle my undies about. But it was too late. The ammo clump had broken apart the moment I dropped it into my undies from behind my back. And as the weight of my body pushed me down further and further into my seat … the Toenail Ammo cut deeper and deeper into my poor soft butt cheeks. For the next two hours I sat there trying desperately not to move, sweating, with tears of PAIN welling up, biting my lip harder and harder. It felt as if I was sitting on an echidna with razor blades for spikesEXPLODING into my butt!
With every breath there was a tiny butt-movement. I was in absolute agony as the toenails stabbed and buried themselves deeper and deeper into my butt-cheeks.
Geez, I wish I’d worn boxers instead of undies.
When afternoon recess finally came around I took off for the dunnies. It took ages to dig out each of the offending toenails because they kept breaking apart, leaving even smaller bits of mouldy toenail clippings embedded all over my poor little backside.
The rest of the day was no better. It felt like I was sitting on pins and needles until I finally got home that afternoon, grabbed a packet of frozen peas from the freezer and shoved them down the back of my pants. AHHHHHHHHH.
SCHOOL SUCKS!
FRIDAY: 7:00am.
Pleeease let this be the last day of the school week, and not just some dream where any minute now I wake up and find out that it’s actually only TUESDAY.
I leapt out of bed and WALKIE-TALKIED Jared fast!
“C’mon you have to come today! Today’s like the easiest day of the week!” I pleaded with him.
“We have Phys’ Ed’ all afternoon,” he whinged weakly.
“Yeah, but we’ve got History all morning! You can handle it.”
Suddenly all I could hear were muffled sounds “Hh … hhhh …BLUURRRRR! ”
Hmmm, I guess not.
GREAT! I was so peeved. I dragged myself out to the kitchen where Mum was doing her usual morning routine of running around like a cheetah with a porcupine on fire strapped to its backside.
With a piece of toast hanging out of her mouth, Mum had one hand stuffing little Miss Melly Useless Daks’ face with some sloppy food mixture, one foot was shoving a bowl of dog food skidding across the floor towards Fluff Butt, and the other hand was slapping about jam onto a piece of bread … yeah, that would be my lunch … yukk!
I slumped down into my chair at the kitchen table and tipped up the box of cereal … a fine dust of crumbs fell out of the box and instantly disappeared as it blew away in the breeze.
“Mum, is there any more cereal?”
“I’m shopping after work today. Have toast, ” Mum called as she scooped up Melly, threw out the dog, shoved her bag under one arm and Melly under the other. “Here’slunchluvyabye! ” she continued as she slapped down my ‘sandwich’ and sped off towards the front door.
“There’s no bread left!” I called after her as I examined the empty plastic bag.
“Yep, it’s on the list. Have cereal. Bye. ” … BANG! …
“But there’s no cere … ”
… and she was gone!
Oh yeah, it was very obvious today was going to suck as well!
I struggled to lift my backpack and sling it across my shoulder … I could hardly raise my leg over my bike frame … I barely peddled a few times before letting the bike just roll along with my toes dragging in the dirt by the road. I pushed to get myself through the school gate for the final day of the week … I dragged my bag from my shoulder and let it SLAM to the floor … I slumped into my seat and let the weight of my head cause it to drop heavily onto my desk … THUD! … waiting for the bell to ring.
DING DING DING …
Woo hoo. Yeah. Whoopee. I wanted my head to explode. I wanted it to blow up into a gazillion pieces and scatter across the entire universe, just to be absolutely sure that no one could put it back together again. I wanted it to blow up, get tossed into a blender, mixed up and chucked on the barbecue to cook, fed to wild lions, their poop gathered up and set alight and then buried deep at sea.
I was sooooo over this week.
Just then Miss Forest walked in the door to start the lesson.
“Are you OK, Sam? You don’t look too good,” she remarked seriously.
&n
bsp; “Uh huh,” I grunted without even lifting my head from the desk and barely taking any notice of her.
“Hmmm, I wonder if you should go home?” she continued.
“He’s just missing his boyfriend!” came the annoyingly snobby voice of Crabby Abbey sticking her incredibly wide nose into where it was definitely not wanted.
“No I’m not!” I shot back with a sneer.
“Yes you are. You’re all sad and crying about your boooyfriend, Jared, being away all week.”
“No way! I’m totally fine so nerrr, SHUT-UP!”
“Oh good, then we can all get on with the lesson. Open your books,” Miss Forest jumped in.
“Ummm … but … but … ” I said, suddenly realising what Miss Forest had just said.
“Come on, open your book Sam!”
What … what happened? How did she … what was … oooh crap!
History! Wonderful, terrific, fantastic. Another lesson where Miss Forest tries to teach these losers something about the past. But every week it’s the same old thing. She tries to explain how some really cool guys were brave enough to head off into the unknown. Not knowing what WILD, FEROCIOUS, MAN-EATING animals they’d have to face and possibly fight to survive. Not knowing whether they’d starve to DEATH. Not knowing if there was any chance of them coming back alive. But they’d still head off to explore some huge RUGGED MOUNTAIN RANGE somewhere or some DEEP DARK FOREST or even to cross some DEAD, desolate, SEARING HOT DESERT, just to see what was out there.
But every single time, just when it gets interesting, one of the class ‘DODOS’ jumps up and starts waffling on and on about one of their rellies, like we care … NOT!
“My great-great-great-cousin’s best friend’s neighbour was the first one to walk over the hill that’s in the middle of Agnath,” Itchy MiTCH interrupted. “That was when they discovered there were people living on the other side of the hill. It took him almost four hours to cross it and he was a hero because before then, people on both sides of the hill just thought the whole area was haunted. Because they could hear far-off voices in the night.”
