saying she’s a speed freak and gone into a drug rehab centre and some are saying she’s home in bed with the chickenpox. I think the two Year 12 dudes, Cameron and Drenton, are spreading all the bad goss.
I’m in our home room at Bennett High and it’s the start of a new day.
‘That sister of yours is a living legend.’
Cooja’s my best mate.
He’s got a certain gleam in his eye.
‘Forget it,’ I say. ‘You’re s’posed to be on with Cathy, aren’t ya?’
‘It’s becoming seriously boring.’
‘Yeah. Well. One thing Leanne is not and that’s boring. But she likes older men.’
‘How does she know whether she likes younger guys if she hasn’t tried any?’
‘Well, it’s all hypothetical, isn’t it, seeing as she’s living in a phone box somewhere.’
‘Yeah?’
‘That’s her last known address.’
‘Cool it. Here comes Randy Andy.’
He’s our home group teacher. For the first term he kept sporting these massive hickeys on his neck. Now he’s hick-eyless and probably single again because his temper’s absolutely foul. Or it could be his hair transplant that’s making him edgy. He was wearing a hairpiece but suddenly he’s got these neat rows of hair like wheat in a paddock sprouting from his head. He gets real aggro when Belinda hums the jingle from Hair Fusion.
The thing about teachers with problems is that they give us kids a hard time. He calls the roll. Boring. He reads out the Daily Bulletin and it’s the usual drivel about netball try-outs and late library books and changed canteen prices. The bell goes for first period and we troll off to a double period of English.
We’ve had a teacher change because one got pregnant and left.
‘Must’ve been one of those immaculate conceptions,’ said Cooja when we were told the news. ‘She was just so posh ya can’t imagine …’
The great news is we’ve got Miss Heatherton.
Miss Heatherton is a babe. She’s got long blonde hair which she sometimes wears hanging down and sometimes piled up on her head. Either way is excellent. She’s got bright blue eyes, a different shade from my ex-girlfriend Belinda’s (hers are contacts), a wide smiley mouth, nice skin … I’m not good on descriptions. She’s slim without being skinny. And she’s super intelligent. She does PE sometimes and runs the surfing elective with Mr Borganio who’s also a top guy. They’re going together.
The thing about Miss Heatherton is she tries to make stuff interesting.
‘Okay,’ she says, ‘English is not just spelling and punctuation and reading good literature. English is the language of our culture, and with that come social issues, the way of life we enjoy, values, rules, manners and courtesies.’
‘Der,’ says Boxie (alias Francis Boxenhead but no one ever calls him that or he loses it and punches out pain like it’s the end of the world).
‘Exactly,’ says Miss Heatherton. ‘Sounds dead boring, doesn’t it? But it needn’t be like that.’
She bends down and picks up this bunch of boxes.
‘Hey. Board games,’ says Cathy, looking round to see if Cooja’s watching her. He isn’t. He’s writing BS on his arm with biro. BS. Barry Solomon? Brittany Salmon? BelindaStrachan? My Belinda? I mean, my ex -Belinda? and Cooja? Whoa! Not suited at all!
Anyway the guts of all this is we’re going to play this game called ‘Manners’ which sounds like a total yawn but it’s actually better than anything we’ve done before in the history of my whole school life, English-wise.
We play in groups of four and we’re allowed to choose our groups: I’m with Belinda, Cathy and Cooja. Then Boxie’s an odd number (in more ways than one but never mind, he’s okay on his medication) so he ends up with us.
‘My go,’ says Cooja, grabbing the dice.
We nearly have a full-on brawl as Belinda explains with eyelashes batting so hard the cards just about fly off the board, that we all have to roll the dice and whoever gets the highest
I’m in our home room at Bennett High and it’s the start of a new day.
‘That sister of yours is a living legend.’
Cooja’s my best mate.
He’s got a certain gleam in his eye.
‘Forget it,’ I say. ‘You’re s’posed to be on with Cathy, aren’t ya?’
‘It’s becoming seriously boring.’
‘Yeah. Well. One thing Leanne is not and that’s boring. But she likes older men.’
‘How does she know whether she likes younger guys if she hasn’t tried any?’
‘Well, it’s all hypothetical, isn’t it, seeing as she’s living in a phone box somewhere.’
‘Yeah?’
‘That’s her last known address.’
‘Cool it. Here comes Randy Andy.’
He’s our home group teacher. For the first term he kept sporting these massive hickeys on his neck. Now he’s hick-eyless and probably single again because his temper’s absolutely foul. Or it could be his hair transplant that’s making him edgy. He was wearing a hairpiece but suddenly he’s got these neat rows of hair like wheat in a paddock sprouting from his head. He gets real aggro when Belinda hums the jingle from Hair Fusion.
The thing about teachers with problems is that they give us kids a hard time. He calls the roll. Boring. He reads out the Daily Bulletin and it’s the usual drivel about netball try-outs and late library books and changed canteen prices. The bell goes for first period and we troll off to a double period of English.
We’ve had a teacher change because one got pregnant and left.
‘Must’ve been one of those immaculate conceptions,’ said Cooja when we were told the news. ‘She was just so posh ya can’t imagine …’
The great news is we’ve got Miss Heatherton.
Miss Heatherton is a babe. She’s got long blonde hair which she sometimes wears hanging down and sometimes piled up on her head. Either way is excellent. She’s got bright blue eyes, a different shade from my ex-girlfriend Belinda’s (hers are contacts), a wide smiley mouth, nice skin … I’m not good on descriptions. She’s slim without being skinny. And she’s super intelligent. She does PE sometimes and runs the surfing elective with Mr Borganio who’s also a top guy. They’re going together.
The thing about Miss Heatherton is she tries to make stuff interesting.
‘Okay,’ she says, ‘English is not just spelling and punctuation and reading good literature. English is the language of our culture, and with that come social issues, the way of life we enjoy, values, rules, manners and courtesies.’
‘Der,’ says Boxie (alias Francis Boxenhead but no one ever calls him that or he loses it and punches out pain like it’s the end of the world).
‘Exactly,’ says Miss Heatherton. ‘Sounds dead boring, doesn’t it? But it needn’t be like that.’
She bends down and picks up this bunch of boxes.
‘Hey. Board games,’ says Cathy, looking round to see if Cooja’s watching her. He isn’t. He’s writing BS on his arm with biro. BS. Barry Solomon? Brittany Salmon? BelindaStrachan? My Belinda? I mean, my ex -Belinda? and Cooja? Whoa! Not suited at all!
Anyway the guts of all this is we’re going to play this game called ‘Manners’ which sounds like a total yawn but it’s actually better than anything we’ve done before in the history of my whole school life, English-wise.
We play in groups of four and we’re allowed to choose our groups: I’m with Belinda, Cathy and Cooja. Then Boxie’s an odd number (in more ways than one but never mind, he’s okay on his medication) so he ends up with us.
‘My go,’ says Cooja, grabbing the dice.
We nearly have a full-on brawl as Belinda explains with eyelashes batting so hard the cards just about fly off the board, that we all have to roll the dice and whoever gets the highest
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