Will Read online

  For my dad, Patrick Boyd, who understood and believed.

  and for all the Wills, Chrises, Marks, Zachs, Jocks and Tims who have touched my life.

  Thank you.

  Contents

  Dedication

  Title Page

  Chapter 1 - Friday Afternoon

  Chapter 2 - The Bus Stop

  Chapter 3 - The Moon

  Chapter 4 - Danielli’s Office

  Chapter 5 - Planting the Seed … or Not?

  Chapter 6 - The Weekend of Guilt

  Chapter 7 - Monday

  Chapter 8 - Period Five

  Chapter 9 - 3:30 P.M.—The Punishment

  Chapter 10 - Home

  Chapter 11 - Elective Music

  Chapter 12 - A Very Different Kind of Friday Afternoon

  Chapter 13 - The End of Freedom

  Chapter 14 - The Freak

  Chapter 15 - Mr. Andrews of St. Andrew’s

  Chapter 16 - The Boyfriend!

  Chapter 17 - Not Funny

  Chapter 18 - The Dumpster

  Chapter 19 - The Holdens

  Chapter 20 - The Smell of Guilt

  Chapter 21 - Still at Auditions—The New Guy

  Chapter 22 - Wednesday- Afternoon Detention

  Chapter 23 - The Special Assignment

  Chapter 24 - A Car Ride into Uncharted Waters

  Chapter 25 - That Girl!

  Chapter 26 - A Smooth Exit

  Chapter 27 - Tony and Polly

  Chapter 28 - Romeo

  Chapter 29 - Hangman

  Chapter 30 - Dead Man

  Chapter 31 - The Assignment

  Chapter 32 - Middle Eastern Feast

  Chapter 33 - The Kiss

  Chapter 34 - Chris’s Place

  Chapter 35 - A Different Game Plan

  Chapter 36 - This Week’s Game Plan—There is No Game Plan

  Chapter 37 - Gay!

  Chapter 38 - Monday Morning

  Chapter 39 - The Music Room

  Chapter 40 - Retarded Homophobe Neanderthal

  Chapter 41 - Making the Right Move

  Chapter 42 - Waddlehead

  Chapter 43 - The Aftershock

  Chapter 44 - The Run

  Chapter 45 - Pizza?

  Chapter 46 - The Love-In

  Chapter 47 - In Need of Bubble Wrap

  Chapter 48 - Pizza Again

  Chapter 49 - The Phone Call

  Chapter 50 - The Dark Side

  Chapter 51 - Singing Practice

  Chapter 52 - The Fallout

  Chapter 53 - Music Theory

  Chapter 54 - Bed

  Chapter 55 - The Incredible Shrinking Hypocrite

  Chapter 56 - One Down, Two to Go

  Chapter 57 - Round One

  Chapter 58 - Round Two

  Chapter 59 - Round Three

  Chapter 60 - Meltdown

  Chapter 61 - Holden Bear Hug

  Chapter 62 - A Cup of Italian Coffee

  Chapter 63 - Alone

  Chapter 64 - More Bloody Talking!

  Chapter 65 - The Kitchen

  Chapter 66 - Zachariah Cohen

  Chapter 67 - The Final Performance

  Chapter 68 - After the Show

  Chapter 69 - The Newmans and the Zefferellis

  Chapter 70 - The Party

  Chapter 71 - The Phone Call

  Chapter 72 - That Bloody Assignment!

  Chapter 73 - Special Delivery

  Chapter 74 - Something Else

  Chapter 75 - Midnight

  A Note on Australian Football Codes

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright

  Friday afternoon

  Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!

  The words reverberated around the playground of St. Andrew’s like the backbeat of drums at a live gig. The bell for the end of the day had echoed half as loudly fifteen seconds before and with it hundreds of boys had bolted out of homerooms, toilets, offices, corridors and bike sheds, sniffing the taste of freedom for another week.

  Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!

  With each round of the chant more and more boys diverted from their quest for freedom and converged on the top oval. Everything was in place for the undertaking of one of the most revered rituals in an all-boys school: it was a Friday afternoon, the wind was blowing, there were no teachers around and two skinny Year 9 boys had been conned into believing that the other had said something about his mum.

  I wasn’t really into the mob fight thing, and I felt sorry for the two kids who by now probably wanted to bawl their eyes out and run home, but it didn’t stop me loving the chaos it created.

  Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!

  Right on cue the staffroom door swung wide open and out came security. Normally the PE blokes were the first to make it out, maybe because they were fit or maybe because they didn’t want to miss out on the action. This time the charge was led by Waddlehead, aka Waverton, the deputy principal; he was old, but when he was wound up he could move. He powered across the oval flanked by a collection of year coordinators, and the rest of the teachers who hadn’t already bolted to the pub for Friday-afternoon drinks. The door to Mr. No-Show Kennedy, the principal’s office, remained shut, as usual.

  The two skinny Year 9 kids, who had just managed to grab each other’s shirt collars and kind of swing each other around, had absolutely no idea the posse, led by Deputy Waddlehead, had arrived. On instinct, most of the mob legged it upon their arrival. Unfortunately the two heroes took the mass exodus as a sign they were off the hook, and let go of each other’s shirts, grinning stupidly at one another, completely unaware that they were seconds away from impending doom. Still grinning, they turned around to see where everyone had buggered off to. It was then that their eyes fell on the procession. Fear froze on their faces. Waddlehead deliberately slowed down on approach. Like startled animals they remained glued to the spot, mesmerized. No one did anything. Then, with the slightest lift of his chin and a razor-sharp point and curl of his index finger, Waddlehead seized his prey. The two prisoners turned back toward the school and made the long, slow walk across the oval.

  No, it wasn’t going to be a good weekend for those two buggers, no matter how much they swore to their mums that they were only sticking up for them.

  The bus stop

  The pack moved restlessly to the bus stop. They were unsettled, hanging around, waiting for something else to happen. They’d been left unsatisfied and were revved to the max. Because of the delay, most of us had missed our usual school buses. That meant there were even more of us squashed into a minuscule patch of grass just inside the school gates. We weren’t allowed outside the gates because some moron had managed to get himself flattened by a souped-up Torana three years ago. The kid was fine now, but Waddlehead has never got over it.

  I don’t know why we had to suffer because some idiot forgot to follow his road rules. But that was the way things went at St. Andrew’s College Lakeside. Lakeside was the name of the fake suburb where the school was built and, like most things at St. Andrew’s, the idea of it being near any kind of water, let alone a lake, was bullshit.

  I made my way over to where the boys were. Jock was causing havoc, as usual, running around trying to give any unsuspecting junior a wedgie. Tim, who was always up for anything, was Jock’s accomplice. They’d worked out this routine: they’d cash in on their rugby-hero status and their size, single out a kid, make him feel really important, and then one of them, normally Jock, would move in behind and give the poor unsuspecting bastard a wedgie. The other kids would fall about cracking up, leaving the victim not knowing whether to join in or throw a complete hissy fit. The funniest thing was, though, once they’d readjusted themselves, most of them looked like they thought it was the best joke ever. Some even asked, sometimes begged, for Jock and Tim
to do it to them next. Sad.

  Jock looked up above his midget fan club and waved me over.

  I shook my head and dropped my bag in our regular patch of grass. I noticed that one of the midgets had set up camp nearby with a music case half his size. He was definitely loving the Tim and Jock show—but only from a very safe distance. I was about to point out that he had to wait another four years before he’d earned the right to step on senior ground when I made eye contact. There was no way I could have told those eyes to get lost, they were too … trusting. Anyway, he wasn’t hurting anyone and if he went over there and became the next victim, I wasn’t going to protect him. I left the big-brother stuff to Jock and Tim.

  If I thought about it, Tim and Jock were my closest mates, except for Chris. Chris was my best mate, but because he lived across the road from the school he’d never been a part of the bus bonding. This was something that had killed him in Years 7 and 8 but now, when we were whingeing about bad body odor on thirty-degree days, he just smiled and told us he’d be home relaxing after a cool shower in two minutes’ time.

  Jock, Tim and me had gone through the same routine since we’d begged our mums in Year 7 not to drop us at the school gates and kiss us in front of our mates. And even worse, be at the bus stop when we got home! Back then catching the bus was considered a rite of passage. But now, four years down the track, it was a pain in the arse. The anticipation of our own set of keys to a car, any car, teased all of us. One more year before we could be masters of our own destinies and do as many burnouts as we wanted.

  At least this year was different. We had finally crawled our way up the bus chain and graduated to the top of the pyramid. The bus law of St. Andrew’s may not have been written in the student diary but every St. Andrew’s kid knew it. After five years we had earned the right to total bus control and power. We got on the bus first, the backseat was ours, and if anyone was going to peg something at someone it either came from us or was cleared by us. Only the Year 12 boys could pull rank. It was part of the unwritten student code, the one that teachers know nothing about.

  The moon

  I sussed the crowd. In the last ten minutes the rowdiness had grown to fever pitch. The fact that the buses were late increased that by a trillion.

  On cue I heard the familiar rumble of the Lakeside Girls school bus. It was sitting at the lights about to begin the daily ritual of passing our stop. Just like us, the girls had their own bus law and their own code of behavior. They stared from the buses giggling, giving the finger or rolling their eyes in bored condescension. All three reactions were dependent on status and age, and were as predicable as ours. The main offenders were the Year 9s. This may have had something to do with them having reached puberty and being about ready to self-destruct if they didn’t utter those romantic words, “Oi, you scrag!” or even better, “Get stuffed!”

  The restless pack sniffed the air. Girls! The gate tilted under the pressure of the boys trying to get prime position to give the girls some hassle. Everyone was ready to take their part when the hugest, loudest blowout, like the farts of thirty giants, came from the back of the bus. The girls screamed and the boys pissed themselves laughing. This continued until it dawned on everyone that in fact the bus was stuck and, even worse, that they would all have to actually look at one another.

  This was a clear breach of bus law, and everyone was a little unsure of how to act. Never one to let the boys down, I felt it was my opportunity—no, in fact my duty—to step in and save the day. I went over to Jock and whispered to him.

  No way, Willo!

  I smiled, extending my hand. Wanna make a bet?

  Casually I moved to the curb. I strategically placed myself so no other member of the public could see—we did have the good name of the college to keep up. I faced the entrance gates, looking directly into the stony frown of the school’s founder. The back half of my body was in full view of the stationary bus. Slowly, surreptitiously, I unbuckled my belt and grabbed the top of my school pants and boxers. I threw my head around ninety degrees on each side looking for the enemy, winked at the statue and dropped my pants. The first moon in full public view and in front of girls in St. Andrew’s history. Or so I was told afterward.

  It was over in a flash, pardon the pun. The impact of such a deed is such that too long means too much. As I rebuckled my pants, I looked up to see Tim nearly wetting his and Jock shaking his head shouting, Good on you, mate, as he reached into his pocket ready to square the bet. Admiration exuded from their every pore. There was noisy cheering from all the St. Andrew’s boys. However, that was nothing in comparison to the Lakeside girls.

  The bus looked like it had been invaded. Nearly the entire occupants had rushed to the St. Andrew’s side. Those who weren’t hanging out the windows screaming were bashing up against the glass. By this time the boys had bolted through the gate, others were climbing the fence yelling and bashing back. The bus driver could no longer be seen. He was surrounded by twenty teenage girls demanding their release.

  Those girls who couldn’t make it to the windows or doors were in the aisles, giggling, waving and then falling all over themselves when a St. Andrew’s boy gave them a response. It was only along the back couple of seats that there was no movement. The domain of seniors. Some stuck their fingers up; those who were bothered called out Loser! and the rest ignored me completely. I wasn’t worried. I was basking in the afterglow of the moon and loving every minute of it. I bowed to my fans on both sides. No doubt I did look like a major loser, but it’s not every day you find yourself at the center of such adoration, even if it was more about hyper hormone levels rather than me.

  As I looked up, I made direct eye contact with a girl sitting three-quarters of the way down the bus. I continued grinning, thinking the moon might be helpful in furthering Will Armstrong and Lakeside Girls relationships. A death stare that would have sliced concrete slammed that idea. And just in case I didn’t get it, she rolled her eyes and flicked her head away so hard she nearly collected the girl next to her with her ponytail and green ribbon as she made her way to the front. What was her problem!

  She must have been some sort of prefect or house assistant or something—that type of thing was big at Lakeside—because she was trying to get everyone to shut up and get back in their seats. And it wasn’t working. Sucked in, serves her right for being such a brownnose and for having zero sense of humor.

  It was right about then that another girl who actually was having a laugh started pointing, serious over-the-top pointing, at the school entrance. I just kept grinning and waving back. On the third attempt she gave up and stuck her head out the window.

  The bus driver, you idiot! He’s on the phone….

  It took me three seconds to get past the idiot comment and actually figure out what she was saying. Bus driver on phone. Bus driver not on the phone to his mates. Bus driver on the phone to dob in some loser senior who thought it would be a laugh to drop his pants at the Lakeside Girls school bus.

  Instinctively I turned to face the principal’s office and at that exact moment Waddlehead and Mr. Danielli, the Year 11 coordinator, left the staffroom and began heading directly toward us.

  Willo, run! Willo! Get out of here!

  It was Tim, thirty seconds behind as usual. But there was no point in running. It was too late and, besides, it wasn’t my style.

  The bus stilled instantly. The girl had obviously given the word. An occasional giggle escaped, silenced by a loud Shhh. The St. Andrew’s mob needed no such warning. Each boy was programmed to recognize Waddlehead’s walk from twenty meters away. Each boy also knew what it meant.

  It became deadly quiet. The boys parted, creating a guard of honor delivering me to my fate. No way around it.

  Busted. Busted bad.

  Walk with me immediately, Mr. Armstrong.

  Danielli’s office

  I watched Waddlehead and Danielli from behind as I followed them back into the school. Waddlehead was pointing to his watch
and shaking his head, Danielli was doing a lot of nodding. They shook hands and turned in my direction. Waddlehead made laser-like contact, zapped me with one of the best teacher death stares of all time and hissed, Monday!

  Instantly Monday was no longer a day of the week but the launch day of an attack.

  I followed Danielli through the senior quad over to his office. This was not going to be good.

  It’s not that I like being in trouble. I mean, what difference does it make if your shirt’s not tucked in or you have gel in your hair? It’s not exactly helping the pursuit of world peace, is it? But the past few months had been different. I had well and truly moved on from “minor misdemeanors” and was heading for the expulsion end of the scale. The afterglow of the moon was fading fast.

  William, come in, please.

  The air instantly cooled in Danielli’s office. The more trouble you were in the colder it was. I don’t know how he did it, but it got me every time. Right at that moment, the mercury was around one degree and falling.

  Danielli stood there silently, running his hand through his hair. He was taking big breaths and letting them out really slowly. I figured it was best if I didn’t look in his direction just yet.

  The Danielli domain was more like an old library than an office. It was jam-packed with folders, books and magazines all about the same thing: ancient Greece. And if that wasn’t enough, every single bit of wall space was plastered with pictures of old Greek guys. Not old guys like some Greek kid’s grandfather, I mean really old famous guys who came from ancient Greece. I didn’t know exactly who they were, but every time I was in Danielli’s office I would read the same quotes about democracy and everybody having rights. Which was pretty funny considering every time I was in there I was trying to defend my own rights. Apparently they didn’t count.

  There was one particular guy who sat on top of Danielli’s filing cabinet. He was made of cement and had no arms. The story goes that six or seven years ago one of the Year 12 boys stole it during muck-up day. Then, every day after that, Danielli received ransom notes and photographs warning that if he didn’t meet the demands, the Greek guy was going to be smashed to pieces and poured into some Greek family’s entertainment area somewhere in Marrickville. Everyone thought it was pretty funny. The statue even had his own Web site—until Waddlehead got involved, that is. It turned out that Danielli had been awarded the statue from a uni in Greece for some type of special study. Waddlehead said it was the “despicable action of an ignoramus who had forfeited his right to attend the college.” Before one of Waddlehead’s famous inquisitions fired up, the kid turned himself in. He was Danielli’s top Ancient History Extension student, who anyone with half a brain could have seen was just having a laugh. Waddlehead, however, was all for expelling him before he could sit his Higher School Certificate. Parents were up in arms and kids were talking about protesting. Somehow Danielli calmed everyone down. No one had touched the statue since. But I got the impression that this time around no matter what Danielli said to Waddlehead, he wasn’t going to be able to save me.