90 Packets of Instant Noodles by Deb Fitzpatrick Page A

they said to me but I just went, ‘Nah,’ and swung a 90-degree walk-off. I thought I was going to get smacked. I missed my bus home. I ended up walking most of the way. They probably only wanted a smoke or whatever but...
    After that I began to really appreciate how Craggs handled those situations.
    I hold the shack’s only piece of mirror up to me. It doesn’t even get my whole face in. I look pale and flat and uninteresting. Then I add a smile, and it all comes together. I’ve got an okay face; Bella says my eyes have a sort of kindness in them. There’s a bit of ratbag in there, too, but overall I don’t look like a shitty person. But I know: I have been. I’ve been involved in some evil stuff—I’ve been across a line that almost everybody else does not cross. I can’t ever take that back. I can’t undo it. It’s like I’ve got a stamp on my forehead that says juvenile offender, but it’s not like other stamps that you can wash off later. This one’s a tattoo. Those things don’t come off without surgery.
    People say stuff like Something good often comes from something bad, but quite frankly I think that’s a full load of shit. What good thing can come out of me ruining my life, getting a criminal record, losing most of my mates, freaking Bella out and having to be so far away from her, pissing off my old man, almost getting kicked outta school for The Rest of My Natural Life (jeez, bummer) and screwing up my mind? Uh, hello, as the girlies say. Not much, I’d suggest. Not much at all.
    I grab a piece of paper off the mouldy stack.

    Joel Stratton is ... tired, pissed off, lonely, stupid. Bored. Boring?

    Joel Strattan is: student on sabbatical, juvenile offender, problem youth, screwed up, messed up, fucked up. Blowjoel to Craggs, Joeyjoel to Bella that night down by the river, Joel Cameron Strattan to the cops. Just Joel. He is dangerous, safe, doing okay, going bad, on his way, on a one-way, on the wrong way, on the highway. Highway to hell. He’s a kid in the forest, a kid with a past, a kid with a heart; a livewire, a loser, a lost soul; a boyfriend, a son, a kid with a file.

    Joel’s like junk in a river, drifting this way and that, going nowhere, maybe going somewhere, origins unknown; getting sucked down, murky down, way way down, going, going...

16
    I stagger out of the shack in the morning like an old dero. I just have to get out of the place, get some sun. I want to write to Bella but not with my head the way it is at the moment, or I’ll probably say all sorts of lame stuff I regret. I’ve got a bottle of water and a packet of Saladas with me so I should be okay for a few hours. It’s clear like space out here—everything looks hyper-real in the morning sun.
    I take some deep breaths as I get going and try to settle my head a bit. I’m going walking; I’m going to find the swimming hole. That’s today’s list of activities from start to finish. Thinking, you may notice, is not on the list. Especially that psycho twisty-thinking that’s like being on one of the rides at the Royal Show—you go over and over and over and over the same patch of ground until not only do you need to hurl into the crowd but you know nothing’s going to change as long as you’re on that ride.
    The bush is thick and I get hell scratched trying to follow the old fenceline, but I can’t afford to lose sight of it because it’s my only guide. I hug the fence as it heads deeper into the forest, in the opposite direction from town, until it meets the hiking trail. The Bibbulmun or Bubblegum or Bubblebum or whatever the hell it’s called. I work out that it’s about 2 kilometres from the house, based on the estimate that it takes me about ten to fifteen minutes to walk a kilometre. As in, extremely bloody slow. You end up doing about 4 or 5 kilometres an hour, depending on how much you’re