Chapter 1

I

Luke was a worm. A weedy little maggot who would scuttle down the corridors on thimble legs, forever hunched over like a dog sniffing the floor for piles of shit left by alphas he couldn't hope to avoid. His squirrely little face and his ears like wing-mirrors were mating calls to a clenched fist, and he sure was no virgin to it. Even his voice… that stuttering, whiny mumble that nobody cared to hear, that couldn't win over a small crowd of disinterested mice, and the way he'd always, always be breathing through his mouth… I could remember the one time he sat behind me in class, and all I could hear was the popping of the bubbles of saliva as he'd inhale like a rusty vent. I could have just turned and kicked him in the shin, but I was already on a tightrope with Ms Thorpe. Even though Ms Thorpe disliked the weasel as much as anybody else.

And then there was the stare. The blank stare of a kid who didn't have a fucking idea what was going on. The blank stare of fear because everybody around him was bigger and better, and he would have to watch every step and every movement, so that he didn't so much as scrape against somebody's backpack and draw attention to his worthless self. If only he didn't smell of damp, sweaty clothing, he might get away with it every-so-often.

We called him Puke. We found it funny how he would twitch every time we said it. The name spread like a wildfire through the school, to the point where I even overheard teachers saying it. He went by other names as well: Dweeb, Cockroach boy, Shit stain, Who's-that-weed. Four-eyes.

Yeah, you could tell those specs from a mile away. Big, ugly red frame, with thick lenses that made his eyes all buggy. It only made the whole picture of him worse.

The kid was a total target. He was a practise shot for the rest of us, and as he past us in the school yard on a Monday morning, he knew that he was in for it later on. It was the first day back from Summer break, and we had to find some way of making the first week bearable.

"Hey Puke!" Dunstan called, following a blaring whistle. "Are those new specs?! They look bigger than normal!"

The kid barely acknowledged us with a look and skulked past a wall and out of sight. My group of four was at the far boundary of the school yard, leant up against the big brick wall that looked over the fence and the main gate that led towards the town. The other kids were dripping in, groups of two or three at a time. They were mostly smaller than us. We were among the largest in the school, despite only being in eighth grade, and many of them would avoid eye contact. Despite that, we were well-respected. Even by some of the teachers. Most of the time.

It was me, Dunstan, Bobby and Ed. We'd known each other since kindergarten and through competitiveness had risen to the top of the pile. We weren't smarter than the other kids, for sure, but we were stronger than them all. During school hours we found it difficult to pay attention, especially in all those boring maths classes, science classes, whatever… We loved sports though, and after school we'd use the gymnasium for a couple hours in a contest of no mercy. The winner was crowned, and those losers were punished accordingly.

"What a dweeb…" Dunstan uttered about a passing kid, just loud enough for him to hear.

"Hey, you know what? That reminds me of somethin'," I said. "You doing the forfeit?"

Dunstan dipped his round, short-black-haired head in annoyance. "Yeah."

Bobby, who had already started to sprout the beginnings of a golden beard – though entirely patchy – laughed gruffly. "No way, man! You wearin' your mama's underwear?!"

Dunstan rolled his eyes and turned so that no passing eyes could witness. He used both hands, one tugging downwards at the rim of his pants and the other pulling to reveal a bright pink, flowery set of women's' underwear. It set the rest of us into hysterics, and his cheeks to turn almost as pink as the garment he was compelled to don.

"Should teach you for bein' such a big girl." Ed suggested. He was the smallest of us all, with a mop of dirt-colored hair. Smallest in height, yeah, but the guy was shaped like a square. Kid was bulked to the max. With help from a constant diet of protein shakes…

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Dunstan grumbled. "Won't be me tomorrow! And it won't be yer mommy's underwear. I'm gonna make you wear that homeless guy's boots."

"Aw, man," I groaned. "I bet they're soaked with piss. Poor guy lives in a dumpster."

"Guy looks like a dumpster." Bobby added.

"You can't talk about Santorelli's best friend like that!" Ed defended.

I narrowed my eyes at him in disbelief. "What do you mean by best friend?!"

"Dude, we all saw you giving the guy your lunch!"

"Wasn't my lunch!" I replied, deliberately towering over him. "That was Puke's lunch!"

Dunstan snorted a laugh. "Who do you think you are? Robin Hood?"

"Guy looked hungry!" I said. "Might as well take from the weedy rich kid and give him somethin' tastier than rat shit."

"Speaking of somethin' nice…" Bobby said with a sly grin. He reached into his burgundy jacket pocket, and once we'd gathered to block prying eyes, he pulled out the brand new box of cigarettes, coupled with an cracked red lighter. "Dad got me these."

"I'm down with that." I said.

"We got time," Ed added. "Let's get to the trees."

Bobby hid the box back in his jacket, and the four of us trudged casually towards the gate, moving opposite to the groups that flooded into the school yard. They parted like the red sea, as they always did. Except for Candy and her girls, who giggled and winked as we passed. They were the cheerleaders. We often mingled after football practise.

So through the school gate we went, and then we took a shallow left down a short bank and into the first of a long landscape of trees. We were well hidden, just a few metres after entering. The place was dark and a bit gloomy, and the ground was like a garbage dump, but it was much better than sitting in class. I kicked at a rusty, crushed beer can like it was a soccer ball, and leaned against the tree in its place. Bobby distributed the cigarettes, and the lighter was passed around the circle we'd formed. I flicked at the lighter once, twice, and then the tiny glow of flame licked at the open end of the fragrant cylinder. I inhaled, and the sweet, smooth taste filled my mouth. I dragged it in, placed two fingers around the base and brought the cigarette away, before blowing out a cloud of smoke. I passed the lighter to Ed.

I'd been smoking since I was eight. I never let Dad catch me, and Mom didn't care. After my time in the gym, I would shower and douse myself in deodorant to mask any scent that might linger. I knew it was bad for me, but you know what? It was the best part of the school day by far.

"Who do you think comes down here?" Bobby asked, stamping a foot down on a discarded plastic bag. "Bet they've got the right stuff."

"I bet it's the teachers," Ed grinned. "They comes here after class with moonshine and Doritos. They gotta put up with little shitstains like us all day. Makes perfect sense!"

"Rumour has it Ms Deacon had the janitor down here," Dunstan said mysteriously. "They say you can still hear her, every night, grunting like a stuck pig. Hmph-hmph! Hmph-hmph!" He illustrated with a look of simultaneous shock and bliss on his face.

"Do me like a Math problem!" Ed called out in a shrill impression, and we all laughed.

"Better hope she never says that to you," I told him after a tug on my cigarette. "You'd never finish!"

He laughed in return. "Don't talk shit, Santorelli. You wouldn't even know what to do with this…" He struck forward, hitting my groin with a glancing blow that caused me to scrunch forward in agony.

"You fucker…!" I groaned, bearing the laughter of my friends. "I'll split you in half ya piece of shit!"

"Ooh, I'm scared!" Dunstan mocked.

"You think I'm kidding?" I said as I returned to my more natural, if painful posture. "You just wait to gym later. You'll never wanna see a dodgeball again."

I sucked on my cigarette again and nursed my poor groin, the smoky drug doing a fair job of distracting me from the aching. I kept a paranoid eye on Dunstan, anticipating a second blow that never came.

Ed became distracted as Bobby and Dunstan began a conversation about the Football, and pulled the cigarette from his lips as he prodded at something in the dirt with his worn, old sneakers. "Hey, dirtbags, guess who found a dead squirrel." He muttered.

"Who cares about some dead tree-rat?" Bobby huffed, uninterested in the interruption.

"We could give the head to Santorelli," Ed explained. "He loves collecting the heads of dead things."

I shook my head, giving him little attention for the jab. No, my father was the head collector. He pickled them and kept them as horrible, ugly trophies. My friends said my house was haunted because of it.

"Come on, man!" Ed insisted. "This might complete your collection!" He kicked his foot forward, balancing the squirrel on top of his shoe and looping it through the air towards me. It fell just short of me.

"That shit is creepy," Bobby coughed past a smoke cloud. "Weird horror movie shit. Ever tell your Dad that?"

"You know I do. Think he cares?" I answered. "Anyway, I got a better idea. Got somethin' we can wrap it in?"

"Gonna have it for lunch?" Dunstan snorted.

"No dude. I know a guy who could do with this little furry friend…"

We finished up, discarding our cigarette butts indiscriminately into the trees. A plastic bag was wrapped around the rotting squirrel, amidst many groans of disgust at the sights and smells that came with the task. Since it was my idea, I was the unfortunate one that had to carry it into the school yard. The wrapping kept anything from leaking out, but the mere thought that I was carrying a dead squirrel almost made me want to vomit. Come on, Colin, I said to myself, it's just a dead squirrel, you pansy!

The yard opened out to a wide space split down the middle by a gravel path leading over to the benches where we'd eat our lunches on most days. Most kids were at the school now, about five minutes before we'd have to head inside for the usual morning bullshit. It wasn't hard to pick out targets here. Over the years, my eyes had been hard-wired to zero in on those deemed less-than-satisfactory. Those who refused to run, abstained from a scrap or hid in some instinctual fear of confrontation in dark, shadowy corners. Hunched over, malnourished and as imposing as a squeaky whisper. And the most hunched, the most malnourished and by far the squeakiest, was Luke, huddled against one of the benches like his was clutching his fat mama's leg. He thought he was inconspicuous. He thought he could get through the day without punishment.

Nobody comes to my school and cowers like a total wuss.

"There he is," I said to the others. "The little shit."

"Hasn't changed a bit." Bobby noted.

We approached, and Luke was immediate to catch onto the danger. He knew better than to run, but he never grew smarter than that. He shrunk, almost pretended to be invisible to the world like a baby mouse. It never worked, and it wouldn't this time, either. Summer break had done nothing to dull our senses, but only heightened them.

"Hey Puke," Dunstan greeted with a mocking sneer, whilst circling behind the bench he was seated on. "Long time no see."

Luke made a noise like a weak grunt. Whatever he said was unimportant.

"Whatcha been up to, Puke?" Bobby asked of him.

"Nothing…" Luke said warily. I could see him scrunching up like paper, twitching like he thought he knew what was coming.

Bobby nodded. "Cool, cool… Say, is that a new backpack?"

Luke's hand flicked down like a blade from a brand new Swiss Army Knife, grappling like a magnet to one of the straps. "No."

"Ain't seen it before," Ed claimed. "I really like it, though. Lemme see."

He flung out a thick, stumpy arm and took a hold of the other strap. Luke wailed in distress, and both of his hands were now clutched to the backpack as the reality of today's punishment became apparent. "Got off it, Ed!" He whined.

Ed must have been at least fifty times stronger than Luke, and he laughed when he applied just enough strength to pull Luke, kicking and flailing, from his seat. He was dragged across the ground, still grappling for dear life to the backpack.

"Let go, idiot." Ed groaned. He started to shake it, and when that failed he placed a solid boot to Luke's shoulder and pulled. It was more than enough to dislodge the screaming runt from his bag, and we laughed with joy as we scooted away towards the botanical garden used for certain biology classes.

I looked back. Luke was pretending that he didn't care, shrugging and refuses to rub the scratches he would have gotten. It only made me madder at him. We took your bag, you little fucker! Get angry! Show some balls!

So without anybody giving chase, we rejoiced in our success as we entered the garden, pushing through a small wooden gate.All around were little tiny stems poking up from patches of soil in neat rows, each one maybe a foot apart. I spotted mine, barely struggling to break the surface, just a speck of green amongst a world of brown. In the rows behind were much prouder plants, having an extra few months to grow. Leaves spread out gloriously to the Sun, rising up to steal what rays they could.

There was a greenhouse at the far end beside an old run-down shed. That was where all the equipment was stored. Buckets, garden forks, spades and a pair of rusty wheelbarrows. We were after the fertiliser, which was contained in big industrial plastic bags with the horse pictures on the front. Glorified horse shit. Just like our little friend, Puke.

Bobby and I crammed ourselves through the narrow greenhouse's sliding door, with Ed and Dunstan clambering to watch over our shoulders. Bobby dragged an open bag of fertiliser from beneath a rickety wooden bench and held the top wide open. "Puke is finally goin' to live up to his name." He spoke gleefully.

"Here. Fill it." Ed said, pushing the bag past my side and to Bobby. Bobby took the bag and threw back the zip.

The bag flopped open, one single green book falling out. Bobby put the book back in, but that was followed by a hand-shovel of warm fertiliser. And then another. And another.

"Put the squirrel in!" Dunstan cackled. "Put the squirrel in!"

Bobby stopped filling the bag for a moment and held it open towards me. I unwrapped the dead squirrel with the furthest tips of my fingers, and watched it tumble and roll onto the mound of fertiliser that half-filled the bag. It landed with a quiet, damp thud.

"That's so sick…" Bobby laughed. "Quick, get me water!"

Dunstan had anticipated, and had already started to unwind a nearby hosepipe from its housing. He pulls it over and reached past me, into the greenhouse, to give Bobby the nozzle.

We didn't really imagine what it would look like. The look of dirt and a dead squirrel spinning and swirling around a stream of high-pressure water, pages of books losing shape and perfect whiteness, and stray pencil dancing on the surface of it all. We had forgotten to salvage the lunch bag. I wouldn't recommend anybody eat it, even if it had been well-sealed.

We zipped the bag back up and cable-tied the zip to the fabric so that he couldn't open it with any ease. Bobby cautiously shook it, just lightly enough that the strings of dripping water didn't stain his clothing. The bag was returned to Luke with false sincerity, and from that day onwards, he was granted the new nickname Squirrel Boy.