JackG@killerschool

by Pauline Gerber

no carving to be done here – too many cars. Will he have to wipe out? Six metres to go. The light turns green. Jack enters the crossing with people on the sidewalk stopping and staring. A bakkie that planned on jumping the light comes to a screeching halt, front wheels already in the crossing. Capetonian drivers are staring in shock, but instinctively refrain from hooting. One slight miscalculation or wrong movement can result in death. You do not want to give this little daredevil a fright.

  The next robot shows red, and turns green seconds before Jack whizzes through the intersection.

  “Kykaai klein dywel! Hy’s maller as n vet politician op n election run deerie Cape Flats!” shouts one of the pedestrians from the sidewalk. [Look at that little daredevil. He is even madder than a fat politician on an election run through the Cape Flats (a part of Cape Town where many disadvantaged and discontented people are living).]

  Another thirteen-year old has come out of her father’s shop, just in time to see Jack whizzing past her.

  “That’s what I want to do,” she thinks. ”I must fly like that until I am high, and gone.”

  Her beautiful, wide eyes follow Jack as he goes for the next crossing.

  Three hundred metres further the red tourist bus is blocking Jack’s way. It is moving, but at a much slower speed than Jack is. A Japanese tourist who has seen him coming, starts taking photos from the open roof. Soon the bus looks like the press conference for a celebrity, as the camera flashes of the entire tourist paparazzi focus on Jack. He will have to hug the bus to get past. Cars are everywhere. He leaves Damien and the Mercedes behind.

  When he is past the bus, there is no space for him, except the 10 metres in front of the bus. He carves in. The bus’ brakes screech. Most tourists lose their balance. Jack wipes out. The helmet connects mercilessly with some polystyrene packaging that was hanging out of the car boot in front of Jack. [I have learnt to plan ahead at lightning speed years ago – 13 years ago to be exact.]

  He rolls towards the pavement in a wave of white polystyrene chips. Jack does not make it to the pavement, though. The bus comes to a halt, about half a meter from where Jack is lying in the road.

  The brown Mercedes passes the bus. Damian shouts through the open window:

  “Jack Gullible! You’re rubbish! RUBBISH!”

  He drives off, tyres screeching. Jack rolls onto his back.

  “It’s official. I’m rubbish,” he thinks to himself.

  When the girl with the wide, sad eyes hears Damien’s shout, fear grips her heart like a cold, evil claw.

  “You’re rubbish!” That’s what her father’s hateful friend said as he had left her painfully injured. But worst of all is the fear that does not want to leave her. It smothers her, leaves her gasping and sweating, and seeing the cruel hands, the belligerent eyes. Every time the fear comes, the empty space inside her grows like some strange vacuum, and she is powerless against it all.

  “That’s what I want to do, only better.” she thinks, pulling her mouth resolutely, showing the dimples in her cheeks. Only her wide eyes show the fearfulness of her situation. “I want to fly away like that, with wheels under my feet, and wings on my back; to a place where no evil will find me.”

  When all schools started, 4000 years ago

  When no teachers, schools or universities existed, the first Jack and his wife knew nothing but love and bliss. He, being the inventor of the very first GPS, was making a good living by helping people to navigate by the stars of Love– all the myriads of those stars. His instruments were simple to use, tuned by the Breather of Stars and Times Himself.

  When the snake saw the beauty and simplicity of it all, he could not sleep any more. He needed slaves. He needed blood. When he saw how gullible Jack was, it gave him an idea. He thought it was brilliant.

  “I shall persuade little Jack to change the basis of his navigation just a tad,” he smiled, showing his forked tongue, “just a teeny weeny angle, but acute. Nobody will notice, but the longer it runs, the further it will be removed from the true North, until the gap is millions of light years away from the Breather of Stars. And then, hopefully, it will be T-O-O L-A-T-E.”

  So he did. It was easy to convince innocent Jack Gullible the First that knowledge, and not love, was the thing of the future. It was so vital for everyone’s survival to know, and to know thoroughly, the difference between good and evil.

  And so it came about that the stars were on one navigation system, ruled by love, and that Jack the First’s navigation devices were ruled by quite another, based on the knowledge of all kinds of things; good and evil. The more knowledge it gained, the more was needed to navigate through the intricate systems. Soon a whole army of slaves were building the University of Babel.

  The people of Disconnectedania, of course, did not want to fall behind; so they built crèches and schools of all sorts: charm schools, circus schools, finishing schools, model schools, beauty schools, ordinary boring schools [they misunderstood boarding] and of course UNISA. They invented airtime, so that everybody from the beauty schools could stay in touch with their looks.

  So here we are stuck with one of the products of these schools, who has just crawled from a car wreck at the bottom of Muckleneuk hill, staring expectantly into the eyes of one of the slave professors of philosophy.

  “This GPS…you see... it says here, “ says the woman-driver who wanted to reach Table Mountain.

  “Yersinia, dearest, I told you and that snake to leave that, that man, that GPS builder alone,” moans a rather overweight little man with a bad skin. He is trying to emerge from underneath a heap of broken writing tablets that have landed in the passenger seat of the convertible. “We shall never be able to find our way again!” So right you are

  “Madam,” the professor speaks sternly. “You have destroyed my entire philosophy department! How dare you! I shall have you banished to the woods until the end of all days!”

  “But you are a sl…”

  “I am a learned slave! I can do this, and I will!”

  “No, no please!” cries the woman, but a powerful whirlwind is already sweeping her up, with her wrecked car and the little man with the bad skin. Soon her cries can be heard in the distance: “But there are no slaves there – no slaves! No shackles!”

  And deep inside its dark lair, the snake hisses: “But there will be, and they will all be mine. I shall own every gullible human on this earth!” And his evil laugh resounds through the dark labyrinths of his dusty abode.

  The Breather of Stars makes a decision

  “My Liege, what will become of all those humans? They will never come out of the woods. Oh, they are lost to the Kingdom of Agapantia!” It is a being with four wings that is bowing in front of the Breather of Stars and Times.

  “Now, now my friend, you know I could never just leave those dear creatures to their own devices! Yes it is true; Jack Gullible should never have listened to that snake of an enslaver, but I have my Word, my Beloved Word. So there is no need to worry.”

  “Surely You are not…”

  Yes, I will – when it is the Fullness of Times – I will.”

  The winged creature bows again.

  “My Liege.”

  “In the meantime, dear friend, will you please ask Amahl to help with the re-arranging of the stars? I have already breathed the 11 trillionth one for the new Jack G who will be born in 4 000 earth years’ time, but first I must help those three kings who wish to find their King. And for that, it is best to rearrange everything somewhat.” The affection in his voice is unmistakable. “You may also tell Amahl that he will be assigned to Jack Gullible the 100th. He will be a skateboarder, and no ordinary one either – this Jack G.”

  “Yes, my Lord,” says the winged creature, before pushing off on a furiously fast, fiery skateboard.

  Banished

  The woman and her only slave had landed right in the middle of the woods, from where the snake had made thorough use of a
ll the tablets full of words that were scattered throughout the woods from the broken-down Toyota prototype. It had scattered the words into the trees, causing a confusing din of chatter.

  From the bushes, another woman peeped at them.

  “Who is this little newcomer? I shall have to show her that I am the Superwoman of the Woods, not she! The Enslaver will like me, not her!”

  “Don’t worry, my love,” the little man said to the woman Yersinia, who has crashed. They had just completed their base camp. “We shall build our own little paradise here. You will be very happy, because I love you.” But Yersinia spat a beam of venom at him.

  “Go get me some wood for smoke signals ,” she ordered. In our present age, even she would learn to call it airtime – and how to use it. “To have to be here with YOU, until the end of all time…What an INSULT!”

  But privately she thinks: “A slave, I have a slave! How convenient!”

  What the man did not know was that the woman was a snake charmer and that she did not want anybody’s love except that of the enslaving snake. All other men – and women- had to be her slaves. When she found out that the snake was an admirer of a future woman called Lady Macbeth, she decided to become Lady Macbeth.

  Soon her and the snake’s twins would be born. She would send them out into the woods, to be called Doubt and Fear.

  So the man with the bad skin went to get the wood. He looked up at the sign that the woman