Finton Moon by Gerard Collins

to Finton, who wiped the blood from his lip and licked it away. “If he gives you more trouble, just give us a shout.”
    â€œThanks,” said Finton, as he flicked away a ladybug that had landed on his sleeve. “But I can take care of myself.”
    â€œI’m sure you can. But people like Slim won’t quit till you puts them in their place. I’m used to dealing with quiffs like him.”
    Finton nodded and wiped his nose again. The bleeding had already stopped.
    â€œJesus, I thought you were gonna bleed to death,” said Skeet.
    â€œFast healer,” said Finton.
    Sitting in the foxhole with Skeet, nursing his psychological wounds from dealing with Sawyer, Finton was reminded of why he was friends with this odd boy, who smoked and swore and often did things Finton would never do. He supposed it was because he admired Skeet’s moral code—he’d often seen him stick up for other “weak” members of the Darwinian tribe. But he didn’t fool himself. Skeet Stuckey was also a part of Finton’s own plan to survive Darwin’s brutality. As long as Skeet was around, Finton had a guardian angel. Skeet, too, had failed a grade, but had quickly found a use for his new, smaller friend—someone to help him with the occasional piece of homework.
    â€œThanks for saving my arse,” Finton said.
    Skeet spit into the foxhole, near Finton’s feet. “No problem—that’s my job.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œI dunno.” Skeet shrugged. “It just feels like it should be.”
    Finton didn’t push it any further. After all, even a lone wolf could use a friend.

The Gathering Storm

    Tom thought it would be a good idea to take Finton with him to Taylor’s Garage, where he worked, although Finton wasn’t sure why. He had no interest in cars except as places to read a book or listen to the radio. But he was the only one of the three boys who showed no aptitude for vehicle repair. Clancy was heir to Tom’s wealth of automotive information, and even Homer, who preferred woodworking to car maintenance, could change the oil, fix a tire, or help out with a brake job. Finton was mystified by his father’s mechanical world, with its language of carburetors, belts, lubricants, and manifolds—hard words that rebuffed emotion, neglected wonderment, and resisted interpretation beyond the mundane.
    That morning, his mother had looked pale and complained of a headache. The older boys, because it was Saturday, would spend the day with friends, but Tom thought it would be good to show Finton his place of work. “Who knows? Maybe he’ll take to it.”
    But, after only a few minutes, Finton desperately wanted to go home. Tom must have seen the discontentment in the boy’s face because he told him, “You’re here at least until I’m off for lunch, so you might as well get interested. What’s wrong with you?”
    He didn’t answer, just wandered around the garage, poking at old tires or kicking loose screws around on the dirty concrete floor. When he finally got bored enough, he pulled a Tintin comic from his jacket pocket and sat reading in the corner on a gigantic grader tire. Now and then, some man came into the garage and Tom would nod towards Finton and say, “That’s my boy over there.” Finton would look up, give a two-finger salute, and return to the fantastic world of Tintin, Snowy, and Captain Haddock.
    The bright-coloured pages, simple dialogue, and the captain’s cursing kept him amused while his father lay under a jacked-up, black Volkswagen, making clanking noises with a wrench and occasionally muttering obscenities. Tom seemed happiest when he was working on cars, but that was also when he did the most swearing.
    It was the scraping, metallic sound of something giving way that made the boy look up, just as his father screeched a bloodcurdling, “Fuck ya!” One of the cinder