Pookie Aleera is Not My Boyfriend

by Steven Herrick

  and videos

  and

  back to the real world

  where I watch Mick and his gang

  laughing at something funny.

  Cameron rolling around

  his face bright red

  and Rachel looking misty-eyed at Alex

  and Alex trying not to notice

  and not one of them looks my way

  they are alone

  together

  I’m alone

  by

  myself.

  JACOB

  Tonight is Mum and Dad’s

  wedding anniversary

  and they want to go to the pub.

  They don’t want to leave

  me and Mick at home

  but Mick promises Mum

  he’ll ring her mobile if there’s a problem

  and he won’t let me

  burn the house down

  or

  flood the bathroom

  or

  let the chickens inside the house

  but

  luckily Mick doesn’t promise Mum

  that we won’t climb onto the roof.

  So ten minutes after they go,

  we climb out the bedroom window,

  Mick holding my hand tightly

  like I’m just a kid.

  We lean back against the chimney

  and start counting the stars,

  Mick calls each number out loudly,

  we’re up here for hours,

  ‘152,153,154 . . .’

  ‘Mick?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘What do you reckon Mum and Dad

  did before we were born?’

  ‘Dunno. I wasn’t here. 155,156,157 . . .’

  ‘Mick?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘How far away do you reckon the stars are?’

  ‘One hundred million light years . . . or more.

  158,159,160 . . .’

  ‘Mick?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Have you ever been on a plane?’

  ‘Nuh.161,162,163 . . .’

  ‘It must be like sitting on a star.’

  ‘164,165,166 . . .’

  ‘Mick?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Have you ever been on a submarine?’

  ‘167, 168, 169 . . .’

  ‘Mick?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Can I have a go at milking Delilah?’

  ALEX

  Late at night

  when I can’t sleep,

  I tiptoe out to the back verandah

  where Trudi, our pet kelpie, is waiting.

  She whines quietly

  and rests her head on my lap

  when I sit on the couch beside her.

  She can’t sleep either.

  Together we watch

  the wind swaying the plum trees in a slow dance

  and the moonshadows tilting across the yard.

  The cattle low softly in the far paddock

  and just as I’m about to nod off to sleep

  the rooster crows one long loud cackle

  like a skeleton rattling

  that sends shivers down my back.

  I check my watch.

  It’s midnight.

  I hear Mum’s voice from inside,

  talking to herself,

  ‘I swear if that bird keeps it up

  we’ll be having roast chicken for dinner!’

  Trudi, me

  and the man in the moon

  smile

  before drifting off to sleep.

  The rooster keeps quiet.

  JACOB

  Mick says

  Delilah’s not going to be happy

  because it’s past her milking time,

  she may not give us any milk

  and I’m to do it just the way he says.

  It’s muddy in the barn,

  lucky we’ve got gumboots.

  Delilah bellows

  which means hello in cow-talk.

  I’m carrying the stool,

  while Mick has a metal bucket

  and a clean washcloth.

  He pats Delilah gently

  and says her name over and over

  as he gets me to place the stool beside her

  and he sits on it

  and rests his head on her flank

  and he reaches underneath

  and washes her udder with the warm cloth,

  all the time saying her name.

  And when she’s ready,

  he stands and I sit on the stool

  and Mick tells me to gently

  just gently

  squeeze

  with my thumb and forefinger

  and I ask him which is my fourth finger

  and he says, ‘Forefinger, Jacob’

  and holds up the one next to his rude finger!

  I squeeze and pull

  and nothing happens except Delilah

  makes a grunting sound,

  which is cow-talk for

  get your hands off me, I reckon.

  I’m squeezing too hard

  or Delilah is too tired

  and wants to sleep

  but

  just when I’m about to give up

  I hear a splash in the pail

  and I so much want to cheer

  but

  I don’t want to scare Delilah.

  I slowly keep squeezing

  until I’ve done every teat

  and pretty soon,

  we have enough milk

  for a glass each

  and before we leave Delilah

  I give her a big hug

  around her neck,

  well, as far as my arms will reach,

  to thank her for the milk

  and for not kicking me.

  In the kitchen, Mick adds

  two spoonfuls of Milo

  to our glasses

  and we have

  a rich, warm, thick, real milkshake,

  all thanks to Delilah

  and my brother.

  CAMERON

  She can ride a bike faster than anyone,

  I follow in her wake.

  She cradles a lady beetle in her hand,

  I wish I could hold it.

  (Her hand not the beetle!)

  She laughed for

  two minutes and twenty-five seconds at lunch

  but I didn’t tell the joke.

  On Mondays she wears a black beret,

  I tell her it’s my favourite colour.

  On Tuesday she wears a red ribbon,

  I tell her it’s my second favourite colour.

  On Wednesday her hair falls free.

  She answered four questions correctly in class,

  I answered three questions wrong.

  She got voted onto the school council,

  I got mumps and missed the election.

  She is the only girl in the school football team,

  I’m the only boy in the softball team.

  She has a dog named Napoleon,

  a cat named Louis,

  four goldfish,

  two chooks that lay eggs,

  and a mouse called Roger.

  I have a pet rock.

  I had a pet rock

  until Mum threw it away.

  Mum didn’t know it was a pet,

 
she said she was sorry,

  went out to the garden

  and brought me in another rock

  but it was just a rock,

  not a pet,

  so I let it go home.

  MICK

  ‘I broke Charlie Deakin’s cricket bat

  by hitting it against a tree trunk

  until the handle snapped.

  It’s true

  but . . .

  yes, sir,

  no buts about it,

  I’ll take this note home to Mum and Dad

  and I’ll pay for his bat.

  Yes, sir, I know

  his dad is the only doctor in town

  but . . .

  yes, sir,

  I’ll apologise to Charlie.

  I know I’m school captain

  and I should set a good example

  but . . .

  yes,

  I promise not to do it again, sir.’

  And then I walked

  slowly back to class

  the note to my parents

  in my pocket

  and the memory of Charlie

  with his brand new cricket bat

  practising his hook shot

  on the butterflies

  swarming across the oval

  killing five at a time

  with each swing of his bat

  before anyone arrived for school

  this morning.

  JACOB

  At dinner –

  chicken schnitzel, potatoes, beans and gravy –

  Mum says to Mick,

  ‘I’m very disappointed

  that you’d do such a thing.’

  Dad says,

  ‘You’ll work every afternoon

  for an extra hour on the farm

  to pay for his new cricket bat.’

  Mick quietly and slowly eats his dinner.

  Mum says,

  ‘We expect better of you, Mick.’

  Dad says,

  ‘What on earth were you thinking?’

  I can’t take it any longer.

  I say, ‘Tell them about the butterflies, Mick.’

  Mum says,

  ‘Now is not the time, Jacob.’

  Dad says,

  ‘This is very serious, Jacob.

  Your brother has . . .’

  ‘Tell them, Mick, tell them,’ I say

  interrupting Dad, which I never do.

  Dad looks angry and his face goes red

  but I don’t think it’s sunburn

  and he says,

  ‘Jacob!’

  I can’t stop now,

  so I say, in my loudest voice,

  ‘He killed the butterflies!’

  Everyone goes quiet

  and I don’t know where to look

  so I stare at my dinner

  for the longest time

  until Dad says,

  ‘Who killed what butterflies?’

  ‘Charlie,’ I say,

  ‘with his cricket bat,

  smashing hundreds of them.’

  Mum and Dad look at each other

  and now Mum’s face is going red too

  and then she gets up from her chair

  and walks around the table to Mick

  and she leans down close

  and all of a sudden

  Mick reaches out to hug her

  and he buries his face

  in her chest and sniffles

  and Mum hugs him tightly

  and Dad reaches across

  and pats my hand,

  ‘Thanks, Jacob.

  We’ll sort it out tomorrow.’

  He coughs, nervously,

  ‘We’ll fix it, no worries.’

  MICK

  Before bedtime,

  I go into Jacob’s room

  with my Lego plane,

  the model with the jet engines

  and plastic cockpit

  where the yellow-headed pilot sits.

  He has a weird moustache

  and he’s wearing a white helmet

  as if he’s expecting the plane to crash

  and for years

  Jacob has come into my room

  and picked up the plane on my desk

  and laughed at the scared, crazy pilot.

  Tonight I place the plane

  carefully on Jacob’s bedside cupboard

  and he sits up in bed and giggles,

  ‘We’re all gunna crash!’

  I walk to the door and say,

  ‘Goodnight, Jacob.’

  He waves, laughing,

  ‘We’re all gunna crash!’

  LAURA

  I thought it would make Mr Korsky happy.

  It took hours searching the internet

  for just the right site

  and I printed out recipes

  of things I never knew you could make

  from a plain old bush of purple flowers.

  All he needed was a saucepan

  and a stove or a barbecue.

  I can picture him

  cooking it up,

  leaning over the bowl

  smelling the perfume as it steams.

  I bought a folder from the newsagent

  and I put all the pages inside

  and tied them with a purple ribbon.

  This morning

  I got Mum to drop me at school early,

  before Mr Korsky arrived,

  and I ran to the lavender bushes

  and picked a single stalk,

  held it up to my nose

  and placed it in the folder.

  I slipped the folder under his door

  and calmly walked to the oval

  to watch him, from a distance.

  LAURA

  I can’t explain the feeling.

  It’s too big, overwhelming,

  like the sky in summer.

  He had a frown on his face

  when he picked up the folder,

  thinking Mr Hume

  had slipped more work under his door.

  And then he saw the stalk of lavender

  and, I swear, I could see the wrinkles of a smile

  stitched across his face.

  He stood at the shed door

  and read through every note I’d included.

  He took the pencil he keeps in his top pocket

  and added his own ideas to my notes.

  There were a few kids around the playground now,

  I had to be careful or else someone would notice.

  When he finished he put the notes

  back in the folder,

  tied it with the same ribbon

  and walked into his shed,

  placing it on the top shelf above his bench,

  where no one could reach it.

  He came back outside,

  the stalk still in his hands,

  he held it up to his nose

  and laughed,

  it was the best laugh I’d ever heard.

  MICK

  I got to school earlier than usual.

  I thought no one was around

  until I saw Laura.

  She seemed to be spying on somebody,

  so I ducked behind a bottlebrush

  and felt like a real fool.

  She was watching Mr Korsky unwrap something.

  A present?

  Maybe it was her mum�
�s acupuncture kit?

  To help Mr Korsky with his bad back.

  You wouldn’t catch me letting someone

  stick pins in my body

  like I was a voodoo doll!

  Laura wandered around the schoolyard

  watching Mr Korsky.

  She almost walked into a tree

  she was so involved.

  And when Mr Korsky laughed,

  booming loud,

  I could see the smile on Laura’s face.

  Two of them,

  sharing a secret.

  MICK

  I don’t get it.

  Mr Hume comes up to me at recess

  and says he got a phone call from Dad

  and they agreed

  I don’t have to pay for Charlie’s cricket bat.

  The school has a few spare bats

  and one of those

  will be given to Charlie

  to replace the bat I smashed.

  Then he coughs

  as if he hadn’t wanted to say that word,

  smashed,

  and he looks like he wants to say

  something else

  but he can’t quite manage it

  so he coughs again

  and says

  we should all just forget,

  this unfortunate incident,

  that’s what he calls it.

  And as he walks away

  the question comes to me . . .

  what if Charlie

  uses the new bat,

  the school bat,

  to practise on the butterflies again?

  ALEX

  My Grandpop

  leans against the counter

  in the barber shop

  while Mr Chambers

  carefully snips the hair

  from around my ear.

  Grandpop says,

  ‘In my day, Alex,

  my dad would take to me

  with sheep shears

  and, Bob’s your uncle,

  I’d be shorn true

  and booted outdoors to work.’

  Mr Chambers laughs

  and carefully snips at my fringe.

  Grandpop says,

  ‘In my day

  us kids didn’t have iPads

  and iPhones and iPoodles,

  or whatever they’re called.

  We had a bat, a ball and a bike.

  Too many gadgets, too much . . .’

  Grandpop’s mobile phone beeps

  with a text message.

  He moves away from the counter

  and pulls it out of his overalls

  and starts to text back.