Burning Boy (Penguin Award Winning Classics), The by Maurice Gee Page A

use paper for anything.’ He grinned. ‘Except …’
    Mrs Sangster twisted her mouth and gave a snort. ‘That’s understood. I’m pleased you make connections.’ He did not know what she meant. ‘Writing-paper and toilet-paper.’
    ‘It was a joke.’ He felt in danger. ‘I just fill things up. I put in dots. That’s nothing much.’
    They came out of the trees and looked down towards the tennis courts, where Stella and Belinda ran and hit. ‘That’s my sisters.’
    ‘Yes, I know. I wonder who’s winning.’
    ‘Stell will win. She just hits them soft and Belinda gets mad and starts bashing.’ He was pleased to have this to talk about. ‘Last time Stella won six-four, six-three. The time before it was six-four, six-love. Belinda hit one ball over the road into the school. She was trying to hit Stella but she missed.’
    Mrs Sangster laughed. ‘Do you play tennis?’
    ‘I’m no good at sport. I chucked my bat away at softball once and hit the umpire fair on the head.’ He looked at the girls playing softball on the bottom field. ‘That’s Hayley Birtles pitching. She was Wayne’s sister. Wayne was the one that got burned with me.’
    Mrs Sangster drew in her breath. She waited a while before she spoke. ‘Do you mind talking about that?’
    ‘I don’t mind. No one ever asks me. Belinda used to ask me but she stopped. I think they think I’ll get upset or something.’
    ‘Do you miss Wayne?’
    ‘He was never one of my best friends. He was bloody silly lighting that cigarette.’
    ‘And the petrol just exploded?’
    ‘Yeah. How dumb can you get?’
    ‘Do you remember much after it happened? Straight after?’
    ‘Not much. Mandy chucked me in the pool. Mum lost all her new rugs trying to put Wayne out.’
    A bump moved in her throat where the skin was loose. It surprised him that a headmistress should be like anyone else, with tubes and spit, and a flake of dry snot in her nose, moving up and down as she breathed. He wondered if he should tell her about it. He guessed the question she was getting ready to ask.
    ‘Did it hurt very much?’
    ‘Didn’t hurt at all. It only hurt in hospital.’
    ‘They gave you things for that, of course.’
    ‘Still hurt. These grafts hurt.’ He touched his right hand with his left.
    ‘Can you use that hand all right?’
    ‘I can pick things up. They reckon I’m lucky.’
    ‘And your eye?’
    ‘I can see things.’ He grinned, enjoying her interest. ‘Can’t cry though. Lucky I’m not a girl.’
    Mrs Sangster seemed to feel a tickling in her nose. She took out her handkerchief and blew.
    ‘Some girls don’t cry a lot. And some boys do. You can do it without tears, you know.’
    ‘Yeah?’ He did not know what she meant and was disappointed she didn’t ask more questions about him. They went through an iron gate with spearheads on top and crossed a bit of park thick with clover and went through a back gate into her garden. New plants were growing in straight rows – lettuce were the only ones he knew – and she stopped to pull a weed out. One of her knees went click and she said, ’Ouch!
    ‘My apology for a garden,’ she said, straightening up. ‘I don’t get enough time for it. Do you grow things?’
    ‘Me? No.’
    ‘Josie does, doesn’t she?’
    ‘Herbs and stuff.’
    ‘And Tom? Your father?’
    ‘He only grows green peppers. For the salad. He’s trying to grow bananas too, in a kind of sun-trap, but they only grow about five centimetres long. He hit one bunch with a hammer once.’
    Mrs Sangster laughed. ‘I think Tom would like to speak the word. Come and have a drink. You must be thirsty.’
    They crossed a lawn where clothes were drying on a line. She felt a pair of knickers with her hand, then on her cheek. They had lace on the edge and see-through cloth. His mother had some pairs the same and he knew old women wore sexy things, though he wondered what for. ‘They’re pants for taking off,’ Belinda said. Who would want to