‘Quick,’ screamed Dad. ‘Turn on the shower, Terry.’
The shower? This was no time for a shower.
Dad started to lead Uncle Russell out into the corridor. The cat still clung to his head.
Mum ran into the bathroom and turned on the shower.
‘Oh,’ said Aunt Marjory. ‘Oh, oh, oh. What have you done to that cat?’
Dad took Uncle Russell into the bathroom. He looked like a man wearing a hairy blindfold. Dad pushed his head under the cold water. Knuckles dropped off, wet and bedraggled. Uncle Russell collapsed onto the floor, gasping for air.
Knuckles sped back towards the bedroom.
‘Quick, Terry,’ shouted Dad. ‘Shut the door. Don’t let him back in.’
I wanted to shut the door. I mean I meant to shut the door. I was just a bit slow that’s all. I wanted to see what was in the box. I had to know. I just managed to get a glimpse. Then I ran for the door. Too late. Knuckles flashed by. Straight back onto the box.
Uncle Russell wiped the blood off his neck. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘That cat is history.’
‘I know what’s in the box,’ I said.
They all fell silent and looked at me.
‘Well?’ said Mum.
‘Eggs,’ I said. ‘Two lovely bird’s eggs.’
4
We all stared through the doorway at Knuckles. He was curled up on the box, purring and looking happy. In an evil sort of way.
‘Isn’t he sweet?’ said Aunt Marjory. ‘He thinks he’s their mother. He’s trying to hatch the eggs.’
She was right. And she was wrong. He was trying to hatch the eggs. But he didn’t think he was their mother. I didn’t think so anyway. Not for one minute. Knuckles licked his lips.
‘He’s going to eat them,’ I screamed. ‘Knuckles is going to hatch the eggs and then eat the birds. That’s why Uncle Sam scratched “Keep Away From K …” on the lid. Keep away from Knuckles. Uncle Sam knew I had a pet cat.’
I could just see it in my mind. Two lovely little birds. Helpless. Harmless. Newborn chicks. Knuckles would eat them alive.
‘He’s right,’ said Dad. ‘And we don’t know what sort of birds they are. They could be very rare. We have to save them. That’s what Sam would have wanted.’
‘And me,’ I said. ‘That’s what I want too.’
Uncle Russell nodded. ‘Leave it to me. I’ll fix the ruddy cat. No worries.’
‘Don’t hurt him,’ said Aunt Marjory. ‘He means well.’
‘I’ll do it, Russell,’ said Dad. ‘You can be a bit rash sometimes.’
Dad went out to the backyard and fetched our rubbish bin. You know – the sort with wheels that you get from the council. Dad tipped out the rubbish and cut a small hole in the side. Then he put on a raincoat and slipped a garden glove on one hand.
We took the bin upstairs and Dad hopped inside and closed the lid. He looked out of the hole. ‘Wheel me in,’ he said. ‘Park me next to the box. I’ll stick out my gloved hand and grab Knuckles. He won’t be able to get at me because I’ll be inside the bin. Then you wheel me outside and we dump Knuckles in a cage.’
It was a good plan.
Uncle Russell carefully wheeled the bin into my bedroom. Knuckles hissed and raised his fur but he stayed curled up on the eggs. Uncle Russell quickly walked back to us. He was in a hurry to get out of the way. And I didn’t blame him. Not one bit.
We all held our breath and watched. The fingers of Dad’s glove slowly moved out of the hole. Then the whole glove. Then Dad’s arm, safely enclosed in the raincoat. The glove moved closer and closer to Knuckles. The cat didn’t move. Well, only his eyes. Knuckles’ eyes were glued to that glove. Dad opened his fingers just above Knuckles’ neck. At any second he would have Knuckles firmly by the scruff of the neck.
Peow. Talk about fast. I’ve never seen anything like it. Knuckles moved like a flash. His teeth sank into the glove. Into Dad’s fingers. ‘Ouch,’ came Dad’s muffled voice from inside. He shook his arm around like a crazy windmill. Knuckles hung on for grim death. A ginger streak, whipping back and forth through the air. ‘Et it off, et it off,’ came a shrieking voice from inside the bin.
‘What did he say?’ asked Mum.
‘Sounds like “Get it off”,’ said Uncle Russell.
Before anyone could move, Dad pulled his hand back inside the bin.
The only trouble was, he pulled Knuckles in with it.
There was dead silence for about two seconds. I snatched a look at where the eggs had been. ‘Look,’ I yelled.
But no one did. A terrible yowling, howling noise came from the bin. Was it Dad? Or was it Knuckles? You couldn’t tell. The screeching and shaking went on and on and on. Something horrible was going on in there. The bin rocked and rolled. Hissed and heaved. There was a lot of pain inside that bin.
‘Don’t hurt Knuckles,’ yelled Aunt Marjory. ‘He means well.’
Suddenly a silence fell over the room. The bin stopped shaking. A bleeding and tattered glove pushed up the lid. ‘I surrender,’ came Dad’s voice. With a quick yowl, Knuckles flashed out of the bin and sat back on his perch. He licked his lips and started to purr.
Slowly, slowly Dad emerged from the bin. Like a long-buried corpse rising from the grave. He was scratched, torn and bleeding. His clothes shredded to rags. It was a terrible sight. He didn’t have enough strength to get out of the bin. Uncle Russell had to wheel him down the stairs into the kitchen.
5
Altogether Mum put thirty-five bandaids on Dad. He was scratched from head to toe.
‘At at as oo go,’ said Dad. He could hardly move his bleeding lips.
‘What?’ said Aunt Marjory.
‘That cat has to go,’ said Mum.
‘It does too,’ I said. ‘The eggs have hatched.’
They all looked at me.
I took a deep breath. ‘They’re funny looking birds with no feathers and great big beaks. And …’
‘Yes?’ said Uncle Russell.
‘Nothing,’ I said. I was too embarrassed to say. In case I was wrong. I mean I only had a quick look.
‘I’ve got an idea,’ said Mum. ‘We’ll put some cat food on a saucer outside the door. As soon as Knuckles comes out to get it, Russell can nip inside the room and lock him out.’
‘I dunno,’ said Uncle Russell. ‘He moves pretty fast.’
‘I’ll do it,’ I said. ‘I have to save those birds. They could be the last of the species. Uncle Sam put his trust in me.’
‘No,’ said Uncle Russell. ‘I’ll do it.’
Mum put two lamb chops on a saucer and placed them on the floor outside my door. Knuckles looked up and sniffed. Quick as a whippet he flashed over to the saucer and grabbed the meat.
None of us moved. We forgot all about shutting the door. We were too busy gawking at the birds. They had already grown feathers. Their beaks were enormous. They were squawking for food.
Knuckles grabbed the raw chops. But he didn’t eat them. He turned round and gave one each to the birds. They gobbled them down like crazy. Knuckles just stood and watched. It was like he was in a trance. Or a spell. Soon only the chop bones were left. Picked clean.
‘Isn’t he kind?’ said Aunt Marjory.
‘He’s fattening them up,’ I said. ‘To eat. Like in Hansel and Gretel.’
The birds screeched and chirped for more. They looked at Knuckles, standing there as if he was hypnotised.
We just stared at those birds. None of us had ever seen birds like them before. My eyes hadn’t tricked me. I really had seen what I thought I’d seen. They had teeth. Birds with teeth. Can you imagine that?
Dad closed the door. We all felt uneasy. I pressed my ear to the wall.
A terrible screeching, squealing, chirping and burping came from inside. ‘Oh no,’ I yelled. ‘Knuckles is eating the birds.’
We all rushed downstairs and out the door. Uncle Russell scrambled up a vine onto the porch roof and peered in the window. ‘Horrible,’ he mumbled. ‘Ju
st horrible.’
We all climbed up after him. There wasn’t much room on the porch roof by the time we were all perched up there. We stared inside. The birds sat on the end of my bed, wiping their teeth on my sheets. Knuckles was nowhere to be seen.
Suddenly it clicked. We all realised at the same time. KEEP AWAY FROM KNUCKLES. That was the message. But it wasn’t to stop Knuckles eating the birds. It was to stop the …
Knuckles lay stretched out on the floor. All that was left of him. There was nothing but bones. A skeleton, totally picked clean.
6
It was time for a council of war. Dad nailed up my bedroom door and we all sat around the kitchen table.
‘Sam must have bred them,’ said Dad, ‘to even things up. To get rid of feral cats.’
‘That’s what the message was for,’ I said. ‘He knew I had a pet cat. He wanted to warn me.’
‘It’s not right,’ yelled Aunt Marjory. ‘Birds that eat cats. It’s not right.’
‘Why not?’ I yelled back. ‘Feral cats eat birds. What’s the difference?’
‘Sam hated feral cats,’ said Dad. ‘He must have bred these birds to give the native animals a chance.’
‘To save the environment,’ I said.
‘What are we going to do with them?’ asked Uncle Russell. ‘They could be the only two in the world.’
‘They’re mine,’ I said. ‘Uncle Sam gave them to me. I’m keeping them.’
‘Better call the zoo,’ said Mum. ‘They’ll take them off our hands.’
I didn’t want them to go. They were my birds. I loved them. They couldn’t help it if they liked cats (so to speak). I wasn’t going to let anyone take them away.
Suddenly Aunt Marjory jumped up. She ran outside and grabbed a shovel. ‘I’ll take them off your hands,’ she yelled. ‘Murdering mongrels.’
Oh no. She was going to kill the birds. She ran over to the vine and started climbing. I followed as quickly as I could. Aunt Marjory lifted up the shovel and smashed my window before I could stop her. Then she started to climb inside. I tried to pull her back but she was too strong. She clambered into my room. I went in after her.
Where were the birds? They were nowhere to be seen.
There were two lumps under my bed covers. The birds were snuggled down in my bed. Aunt Marjory rushed over and pulled back the covers. The birds were twice as big as before. I have never seen anything like it. They had hatched and become adults in less than a day. The birds looked up with funny smiles that showed their teeth.
No, they weren’t smiling at Aunt Marjory. No one would want to eat her. They were smiling at the open window.
Before anyone could move they flapped their wings and flew out into the sunshine. They rose high in the air and circled over the house. Then they headed west into the sunset.
We never saw them again. I was so sad. Uncle Sam had left those birds in my care and now they were gone.
They were cute in their own way, were those birds. Even if they did have teeth.
‘Probably gone back to the desert,’ said Uncle Russell.
‘They’ll never make it,’ said Aunt Marjory. ‘It’s a long way. Someone will shoot them.’
I looked at Aunt Marjory. ‘You are so mean,’ I said. I ran up to my room and shut the door. I was heart-broken.
I jumped into my bed.
I touched something with my toes.
I looked under the covers.
I smiled.
I decided not to tell anyone what I had found.
I put the two freshly laid eggs into Uncle Sam’s box and gently closed the lid.
Then I went over to the window and looked out at the rising moon.
It was a lovely summer’s evening. I could see a cat on the prowl. Someone had let it out at night. And it was hunting for birds. It turned and looked at the box in my hands. Then it started to walk towards me with a funny expression on its face.
Just Like Me
I love you.
Now that’s a thing no self-respecting twelve-year-old would say to a girl.
Well, you couldn’t really, could you? Not when she was the most beautiful girl in the class. In the school. In the country. In the whole world. In those days I would have said the whole universe.
A skinny, dorky kid like me couldn’t have said it to her.
Here I am, a grown man. Twenty-one years old and my stomach still gets the wobbles when I think about Fay.
Maybe it’s because I might see her again. In five minutes or so.
See, we buried a time capsule in the wall of the old school. And Mr Wheeler made us promise to come back exactly nine years later. When all the kids would be twenty-one years old. I feel a bit foolish actually. Probably no one else will turn up. They will have forgotten. I’ll be the only idiot there. And I’ve flown all the way out from England.
I turn my car into Brewer Road. Soon I’ll be at the school. Everything looks different. Where did all those office blocks come from?
The old park has gone. And the fish and chip shop. And the pond where we used to catch frogs.
Oh, oh, oh. No. It isn’t. It can’t be. It must be a mistake. Look what they have done. No, no, no.
The school is not there.
There’s a dirty big shopping centre. With a car park and thousands of cars. Signposts. Balloons. Loud speakers. Escalators. Security guards.
They have pulled down the school and the trees and the bike shed. They have pulled down my dreams and built a nightmare.
I park my car and wander in through the huge doors. Jaws, more like it. I ride the escalators to the top of the mall and look down at the fountain far below. There are hundreds of shoppers. People sipping coffee, staring into windows, pushing trolleys, dragging children, carrying parcels.
There is no one digging out a time capsule from a school wall. There is no one from Grade Six at Bentleigh West State School. And even if there was I wouldn’t recognise them.
All I have left is memories.
I think back and remember what I wrote when I was twelve. The letter I put in the time capsule. The letter that has gone for ever. That no one will read. The letter I wrote to a girl I will never see again.
Dear Fay,
My Mum and Dad are moving to England. So it looks like I will never see you again. Not till I’m twenty-one, anyway. And that’s ancient. Anyway, that’s how old you will be when you get this letter. If you are there. When they dig out the time capsule, I mean.
I will be there for sure.
I feel stupid writing this. But no one will know. If Luke Jeffries knew he would give me heaps. So would his nerdy mates. They pick on me. Just because I’ve got freckles. I hate them, I hate them, I hate them.
My first day at this school was awful. I knew I would cop it. I’m not like you. See, you are the netball captain. You are good at everything. You get A’s for every subject. The teachers always pick you to do jobs. They hold up your work out the front.
You are good-looking. No – scrub that. You are better than that. I’ll tell you what I think about you. It will be all right because no one will read this until the time capsule is opened.
You are gorgeous. If I was a cat you would be the cream. If I was a dog you would be the bone. If I was a rock you would be the waterfall running over me.
You are the top and I’m the bottom. I’m not any good at anything. Except drawing. Mum says I’m a good drawer.
Anyway, I’m getting off the track. I want to tell you about my first day at school. There I was standing out the front with nowhere to sit. In the end I had to use Mr Wheeler’s chair. He said, ‘You can sit there for the present.’
Everyone gawked at me. You were the only one who smiled.
When the bell went I stayed on my seat. Mr Wheeler said, ‘What are you waiting for, Ben?’
I said, ‘I’m waiting for the present.’
Everyone packed up. They all laughed like mad. Except you. My face was burning, I can tell you that. Talk about embarrassing.
After that my problems just got bigger and bigger. I couldn’t get out what I was thinking. When they picked on me I couldn’t say a thing.
I would like you to be my friend. But you are popular and I’m not.
You sit at the desk in front of me. Your ponytail hangs down and swishes across my books. It is gold like the tail of an angel’s horse. I would like to touch it but of course I never would.
My stomach goes all wobbly when I look at you.
I wanted to give you something. But I didn’t have any money. Mum is always broke. ‘Make something,’ she said. ‘It’s the thought that counts. If you want to give a present make it yourself.’
Well, it was coming up to Easter so I decided to draw on an Easter egg. Seeing as how I am good at drawing.
I got an egg and put a little hole in each end. Then I blew out all the insides and started painting.
Three weeks. That’s how long it took. I sat up every night until Mum went crook and made me put out the light. It was going to be the best egg ever in the history of the world. I painted rabbits. And a gnome with a fishing rod. And a heart with your initials on it. All covered in flowers.
Mum reckoned it was a little ripper. ‘Ben,’ she said. ‘That is beautiful. It is the most lovely Easter egg I have ever seen.’
So I wrapped it up in cotton wool and put it in a box.
Then I start to get scared. What if you didn’t like it? What if you showed everyone and they laughed? What if you laughed?
Oh geeze. I’m scared, Fay. I’m glad you won’t get this till I’m twenty-one.
It turned out worse than I thought.
As soon as I walked in the school gate I was in trouble. Luke Jeffries grabbed the box. ‘Look at this,’ he yelled. ‘Ben has a cute little egg for Fay. I wonder why?’
All the kids gave me heaps. They really rubbished me. ‘Give it back,’ I whispered. My face was burning like an oven.
Uncovered! Page 6