Spud - Learning to Fly

by John van de Ruit

  Rambo smiled serenely back at Boggo, who was becoming increasingly irritated with lack of reaction.

  Eventually, Rambo shrugged his shoulders and nonchalantly said, ‘Pike will be de-prefected before the long weekend.’

  Boggo snorted derisively and the conversation soon turned to Mad Dog’s farm and once again the mood in the dormitory shifted dramatically. It would seem that the only person who hasn’t been invited is Garlic, who sat on his locker looking crestfallen and didn’t even ask a single question.

  Vern has returned to school a pyromaniac. He sat on his windowsill and lit about sixty matches in succession, watching each one burn to within a few millimetres of his fingers. I fear it won’t be long before Rain Man burns the school down with us being cremated in our beds. Thankfully, Meany Dlamini confiscated his matches at lights out and warned him about playing with fire. Vern grinned back at Meany Dlamini and said, ‘Meany Dlamini.’ The poor prefect clearly didn’t know what to make of this and glared at the rest of us through his glasses as if we were somehow responsible for Vern’s madness. He then angrily snapped out the lights and closed the door.

  Tuesday 28th April

  10:00 We have a new Geography teacher by the name of Mr Gordon Bosch, who made us all remove our watches as we entered his Geography classroom. He then locked them away in his desk drawer and led us out of the classroom and into the sunlight.

  There has been no explanation for why Mr Erasmus, our former Geography teacher, is no longer teaching us because he hasn’t left the school. Boggo said it was because Erasmus was as thick as a plank and couldn’t keep up with our class’s sheer brilliance. After watching half the class chasing Rooster Illingworth around a bush in an attempt to flick his bum with a ruler, I’m not so sure Boggo’s theory holds water.

  Bosch led us up the hill past all the staff houses towards the crest of the hill overlooking the dam. He made us sit down under a tree before saying, ‘I’m not going to bother with introductions because you’ll get to know me soon enough.’ He then took off his spectacles and gave them a clean with the corner of his shirt, which had become un-tucked on the brisk walk up the slope. After he replaced his glasses he said that we were incredibly fortunate to study in a place as rich in biodiversity as this. ‘Geography, boys,’ he said, ‘is about experiencing the reality.’ He picked up a small rock and held it up for us to examine. ‘Every stone has a story. Nothing just is. Real geographers look for cause and effect.’

  For the next hour we followed Bosch around the school estate, examining rocks eroded by wind and analysing examples of exfoliation and oxidation. It suddenly seemed like I have wasted three years learning things that could be easily demonstrated in five minutes. Bosch must be a keen bird watcher because he showed us a hole in the trunk of a thorn tree and told us it was a red-throated wryneck’s nest. Sure enough a nervous bird with rusty red patches on its neck squeezed out of the hole and flew off in a panic. Our teacher didn’t even mind when Fatty said the wryneck squeezing through the hole reminded him of releasing a prisoner before breakfast. Bosch laughed along but then told Fatty that he would be more comfortable if he used the biological term ‘defecate’ during his classes. Fatty seemed highly disappointed to leave the nest and move on before he had another chance to see the wryneck squeezing out of the hole again. Bosch also pointed out a jackal buzzard and an olive thrush, which made Boggo snigger and make a rude comment about Eve.

  We returned to the classroom to collect our watches. Bosch reckons as Africans, we should be able to tell the time by the angle of the sun.

  Rambo argued, ‘That’s all very well, sir, but what do we say to the millions of watchmakers we put out of work?’ Bosch grinned and replied, ‘Aha, a socialist?’ Rambo said he wasn’t a socialist but a realist. Bosch thumped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Touché, Black – you’re a sharp one.’ He then dismissed the class with a cheery wave of his pencil.

  11:30 We entered our English classroom to find a pile of books standing well over seven feet high. Frozen like a statue beside the tower of books was our English teacher who seemed to be undertaking some earnest reflection while chewing on the end of his pipe. We all sat down in hushed silence, not sure what exactly The Guv was up to. He ignored our entrance completely and continued with his earnest meditation. Once we were all seated and waiting, he turned to us and said, ‘Gentlemen, today we stand at the very brink.’ He exhaled an impressive cloud of pipe smoke and then said, ‘André Brink, to be exact.’ A few sniggers broke out from Boggo and Fatty’s desk and The Guv scowled at them like he was about to erupt into a nasty torrent of abuse. Instead he removed the pipe from his teeth and shouted, ‘To the man step forth and claim your literature in an orderly fashion.’

  Garlic jumped up first and sped to the front of the queue like he was about to receive Christmas presents. He then realised that he was far shorter than the pile of books that now stood before him. He became terribly unsure of himself and tried to back away from the pile for fear of knocking it over. Unfortunately, the class had already formed a tight line behind Garlic and his retreat ended when he bumped up against the stocky figure of Richard Smithers.

  ‘So it’s the herbaceous fellow to the fore,’ said The Guv as Garlic looked around desperately. ‘Perhaps the garlic now wishes he was a runner bean!’ exclaimed The Guv, clearly enjoying Garlic’s predicament.

  In a swift leap, Garlic landed on The Guv’s desk. He then grinned impishly and neatly snapped a book off the top of the pile. He held his set work aloft and announced, ‘Sir, we Garlics may be small but we have brains and cunning!’ Our English teacher shouted, ‘Bravo, old man!’ and refilled his pipe while chuckling merrily to himself. Garlic then leapt off the desk and crashed into Smithers who had just stepped forward to reach for his own copy. Garlic bounced back off Smithers and with a high-pitched shout, flattened the entire pile of Brink’s Rumours of Rain.

  After the chaos was over, The Guv stated that the next two months would be a very, very long, dry white season, before winking at me and instructing Rambo to begin reading aloud to the class. Garlic kept his head bowed for the rest of the lesson and buried his face in his book, but he couldn’t hide his bright pink ears burning with embarrassment and shame.

  17:00 I entered the showers to find Boggo shaving the head of Meany Dlamini. At his feet lay piles of hair of different colours and textures and bulging out of Boggo’s back pocket was a thick wad of cash.

  ‘Tenth cut of the afternoon,’ announced Boggo proudly.

  ‘He’s making a killing,’ said Fatty from the toilet stall where he sat spread-eagled with a block of Gouda cheese, half a loaf of white bread and the morning newspaper at his feet. Meany Dlamini reckons Boggo’s doing a brilliant service to the house because the prefects’ rate was even cheaper than the barber at the taxi rank in Edendale township. Boggo looked thrilled that he had undercut the market and told Meany Dlamini that his new haircut was bound to get him laid. The merest hint of a smile spread across Meany’s lips and he replied, ‘Hey, Boggo, I don’t need a fancy haircut to lash chicks.’ Boggo was so impressed with Meany Dlamini’s sexual exploits that he gave him a twenty-five per cent discount on the spot.

  Judging by all the dark muttering from the locked cubicle in the corner, Vern was deeply upset at the sinister new developments occurring in his bogs.

  Wednesday 29th April

  Garlic’s birthday.

  15:00 Garlic may just have struck upon the only possible method to avoid a bogwash. The Malawian is the first person in living memory to actually vomit on his attackers before reaching the bogs. At present Garlic is hiding somewhere in the hills and still hasn’t had his birthday initiation yet. Thankfully, I wasn’t part of the lynch mob that was suddenly forced to abandon the bogwash after Garlic erupted at the foot of the stairs.

  DRENCHED

  Pike

  Whiteside

  Eggwhite

  Rambo

  Thinny

  SPRAYED

  Vernr />
  Spike

  Runt

  Sidewinder

  LUCKY TO ESCAPE (BUT STILL SEVERELY GROSSED OUT BY THE EXPERIENCE)

  Boggo

  Fatty

  Meany Dlamini

  Barryl

  Pike was so incensed with Garlic’s dramatic escape that he ordered the Fragile Five out on a full-scale manhunt (after cleaning up the mess). He said if they didn’t return with Garlic by dinnertime then he was personally bogwashing the lot of them.

  18:00 Garlic was nowhere to be seen at dinner. Rumours were flying around that he had run away and that the Crazy Eight was almost defunct with dropouts on consecutive days. Fatty was the only one undisturbed by the afternoon’s events and helped himself to piles of uneaten roast chicken and potatoes.

  21:25 Pike arrived for a typically gloating lights out. He called Rambo the captain of a sinking ship and suggested he should jump before he’s pushed. He then crowed on about mentally cracking Simon and how Garlic was already halfway back to Malawi. ‘That’s two down, five to go!’ he said. ‘The big question is just who will be next?’ His mean eyes settled on mine and he grinned, before spitting more venom and switching off the lights.

  Vern sketched a brilliant picture of Garlic’s empty bed lying in moonlit shadow. He then scribbled the name GARLIC underneath the sketch and stuck the artwork to his footlocker.

  ‘Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold?’

  Thursday 30th April

  Garlic was first in line for morning roll call. Looking showered and fresh, he wore a great beaming smile on his face and whistled Yankee Doodle loudly and repetitively. He nudged me in the ribs and said, ‘Hey, Spuddy, I think I just beat the system.’ Pike didn’t look overly thrilled to see Garlic at roll call and read his name out as ‘Vomit Face’. Garlic shouted ‘Sharks’ and resumed his whistling.

  13:30 Boggo charged into lunch looking pale and breathless. He carried a large brown box that he thumped down at the foot of the table. ‘Oh, my God!’ he gasped, and downed a full glass of orange juice, refilled it and said, ‘You are never gonna believe it!’ He then floored his second glass of orange juice, which ended in a nasty coughing fit. Fatty handed Boggo a glass of water to help with the coughing attack. Boggo downed that viciously, too, cascading water all over himself in the process. Vern thought that Boggo was issuing a challenge and began glugging water out of the jug and succeeded in drenching half the table. Rambo had enough of all this downing madness and ordered Vern out of the dining hall before Norm Wade slapped us with a punishment. Vern grinned sheepishly and left the dining hall with a drenched shirt and staring guiltily at the floor.

  Boggo immediately launched into a description of the absolute beauty of Mrs Bosch, wife of our Geography teacher and the new school stationery shop manager. ‘If Eve is a six and a half, then Bosch is an eight.’ This declared, he began discussing her beautiful long legs at great length. Boggo reckons Mrs Bosch was flirting with him outrageously and that it’s only a matter of time until another member of the Crazy Eight romps a teacher’s wife. ‘Slamdunk!’ barked Boggo with a snap of the fingers, coughing loudly again.

  ‘So what’s in the box?’ asked Rambo, who didn’t seem very impressed with Boggo’s story. Boggo looked at Rambo like he was an imbecile and said, ‘Stationery.’

  ‘Stationery?’ repeated Garlic in confusion.

  ‘So how much did you spend?’ questioned Rambo without seeming too interested in the reply.

  Boggo huffed and puffed and said that he had needed to jack up his supplies what with his business booming and exams around the corner. He also said that there was a tidy special running on dictionaries and thesauruses.

  ‘How much, Greenstein?’ demanded Rambo.

  Boggo paled slightly and said he’d spent more than eight months’ pocket money.

  A great roar of laughter echoed around the table but Boggo stared proudly down at his tomato soup and waited for the mockery to subside.

  ‘Business lesson number one,’ said Boggo haughtily. ‘Spend big to score big!’ He then downed his tomato soup, grunted loudly as he lifted up his stationery box, and staggered out of the dining hall.

  Friday 1st May

  Assembly: The Glock was in his best mood in ages. This is probably due to the return of his wife from Austria after her broken back. Garlic said he saw her walking around the rose garden with a walking stick, although it must be remembered that Garlic has never seen the woman in his life before.

  The Guv was absent from class today and Mr Lilly sat in for him. Lilly read out a short note from The Guv saying that he had recently contracted syphilis from a gypsy and that he would be on his death bed until Monday morning by which time we must have read the first ten chapters of Rumours of Rain.

  He then wrote:

  Happy Workers Day

  Regards

  The Proletariat

  Poor Lilly blushed terribly while reading out The Guv’s letter, especially the bit about syphilis and the gypsy, and spent the entire lesson unsuccessfully attempting to reload his stapler.

  11:00 The rugby trial lists were posted on the notice board. I was thrilled to see my name down as fullback for the fifths. Considering there are eight senior teams and that I’m not particularly good at rugby, this felt like quite an achievement. Rambo is down for the seconds while Vern and Garlic are in the eighth team. Trials begin tomorrow at 10am on Trafalgar.

  I returned to the house to find Rambo sunning himself on the bench. He had rolled up the sleeves of his school shirt over his shoulders and appeared to be tanning his triceps. ‘What do you think?’ he asked me, still admiring the muscles in his arms. I congratulated him for making the second trial team and told him that I was fairly chuffed with making the fifths. Rambo grinned and said, ‘Then I take it you haven’t read the theatre notice board in the last hour?’

  I was already running. Behind me I heard Rambo chuckling and an angry shout of ‘Hey!’ from Whiteside. But I couldn’t be stopped, and sprinted across the quad and down the cloister to where a large crowd of boys had gathered.

  A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM AUDITIONS!

  This will be a joint production with Wrexham College for Girls to be staged from 15-18th September. The Dream is the inaugural production of the new Wrexham Trinity Theatre and participating boys will spend the entire third quarter at Wrexham College, where the teachers of that school shall conduct their studies. Permission for involvement in the production will have to be obtained from your relevant housemasters and will be decided upon such factors as academic achievement and good behaviour.

  Lists are posted outside Mr Richardson’s office. Please select an audition time and write your name CLEARLY in pencil.

  Regret no Matrics or Post Matrics will be considered for the production owing to trials and finals examinations.

  Break a leg.

  Saturday 2nd May

  Viking gave me the hairdryer treatment in the quad outside his office. He accused me of ‘fouling up’ his audition list. In truth I had crossed my name out three times before finally settling on an audition time. I had initially booked 15:10 on Monday, the first day of the auditions, but then Rambo said I was basically committing suicide because by Friday afternoon Viking will barely remember that I even auditioned in the first place. I then opted for 16:40 on Friday afternoon, but then Boggo said this was a terrible blunder because by Friday, Viking will be so jaded after a week of auditioning that he won’t even give me a fair shot – even if I’m brilliant. After much thought I split the difference and settled for Wednesday afternoon, but then Fatty said that he’d heard a rumour that it was Viking’s birthday on Tuesday and that it might be one of the rare occasions when he doesn’t scream and shout and threaten people. I quickly scratched my name out once again and settled on Tuesday 17:00. Unfortunately, the net result is that I did make a bit of a mess of Viking’s audition list.

  ‘If such indecision continues to bedevil your acting career, you’re dead in the water, Milton!’
boomed Viking at the top of his voice. ‘In fact,’ he added, ‘I have a good mind to bar you from auditioning altogether.’ There was a loud guffaw from the house bench where Fatty and Boggo were sitting.

  ‘You have a problem, Greenstein?’ barked Viking, his green eyes glaring at Boggo.

  ‘No, sir,’ replied Boggo innocently.

  ‘Stand up when you speak to me, godammit!’ yelled Viking with clenched fists and teeth.

  Boggo moved from a slouch to bolt upright and standing beside me in less than a second. He then tried to sweet talk Viking down from his rage by asking him if it was his birthday on Tuesday. Viking’s eyes narrowed, and then he spoke in an unnervingly quiet and vicious voice, ‘Do you think a man needs constant reminding that his fiftieth birthday is fast approaching?’ Then he bashed the new audition list to his door with a pounding fist and disappeared into his office.

  Boggo whistled. ‘Jeez, talk about a midlife crisis.’ He sniggered and said, ‘All right, it’s official – anybody auditioning on Tuesday is DOA!’

  I took a closer look at the new audition list with many names already printed.

  Tuesday 17:00 J Milton.

  Once again:

  BACK YOUR INSTINCT, MILTON!

  10:00 Rugby trials …

  Since I was knocked unconscious and am now lying horizontal in the sanatorium with a blinding headache and no memory of how I got here, I have stuck the following ‘story’ into my diary. Initially, Boggo offered to write down today’s events directly into my diary but since he is a known diary thief and backstabbing gossip, I refused. I tried to explain to the idiot that I don’t have to write down every single episode of every single thing that ever happens to me. That would bore me to tears, perhaps lead to criminal prosecution, and result in my parents and grandmother being institutionalised. Boggo reasoned that as an eyewitness to the ‘classic’ events of this morning, and in the interests of honesty and integrity, I should allow him to write today’s diary entry. We eventually agreed that he would write his entry on a piece of paper and then I would stick it into my diary. Unfortunately, Vern then demanded that I also stick in one of his pictures. I tried to make the point that it was my diary, for my own thoughts and reflections and if they wanted to write in a diary so desperately then they should start their own diaries. Boggo looked at me like I was crazy and said, ‘There’s no point in starting one now, you’ve already cornered the market!’ Vern nodded in agreement and without the slightest shred of irony informed me that the whole school thought I was absolutely crazy.