Scumbuster

  Contents

  Lockie Leonard, Bloomin’ Stupido

  Pain

  Staying Off the Subject

  Pulveronic Engulfment

  Heavy Metal

  Losing Your Fruit Loops

  Taking Sides

  Adults

  The Living Hair Machine

  Blaah . . .

  Hot As

  Love’s Very Own Microwave

  Has A Chicken Got Lips?

  Musical Chairs

  X Marks The Dots

  Paint Me Green and Call Me Gumby

  Christmas Eve

  Stench

  Visitors

  The Count of Monte Cristo

  Locke Leonard’s Famous Sharkproof Swimming Machine

  Blast From the Past

  The Really Nice Boy

  Mister Media

  Locke Cracks A Sad

  Lepers

  Parents

  Return To Sender

  Operation Constipation

  A Major Stuff-Up

  A Major Weirdness

  Street Theatre

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Tim Winton decided to be a writer when he was ten. It seemed like a good idea at the time and years later he still hasn’t come up with a better idea. He is the author of twenty books and lives with his family in Western Australia.

  ALSO BY TIM WINTON

  Jesse

  Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo

  The Bugalugs Bum Thief

  Lockie Leonard, Legend

  Blueback

  The Deep

  For Jesse, Harry and Alice

  We are finding who we are

  We can see forever

  KING’S X

  So you cut all the tall trees down

  You poisoned the sky and the sea

  You’ve taken what’s good from the ground

  But you left precious little for me

  MIDNIGHT OIL

  It’s love that holds it all together

  I just had to let you know

  That it’s love that’s holding back the weather

  And the same will let it go

  KING’S X

  ockie Leonard bolted to the top of the dune and stopped dead. He dropped his board and towel without a glance. He didn’t wipe the sweat from his face or the flies from his heaving chest. All he could do was breathe and look. The rumours were for real. The sea was fairly pumping.

  Out in the Sound, the granite islands exploded with white spray that hung in the air like fresh washing. The water was grey as the sky and alive with huge bending swells that lined up regular as corduroy. They cracked against the headland, surged past the harbour and charged in to the bay. It was demented out there.

  Lockie felt the muscles twitching in his legs. He scratched his sunstreaked hair. His tan glistened with sweat. Down the beach he saw a few kids from school still dressed and sitting nervously on their boards. They looked over at Lockie, waiting to see what he would do. He was the hottest grommet in town, but no one seriously expected that even he would get in the water today. Already a couple of boats had broken moorings and come guts-up on the beach. You’d have to be loony to go out in that lot. Foaming at the mouth. A rubber-room candidate. Seriously impaired. Or at least a bit uninformed about death. This was surf movie stuff. These were the kind of waves you drew in the back of your maths book. They shuddered into the bay and peeled off thunderously, hollow and dark and evil as sewer pipes. They hissed and rumbled and moaned. Oh, Lockie heard them alright. That was the language of the hospital and the graveyard. No, you’d have to be an idiot with a head like a shoebox.

  But he was still the same old Lockie, the human torpedo, the kid mothers referred to as ‘that nice boy with the surfing addiction’.

  Lockie stripped down to his orange speedos, pulled on his boardshorts, and grabbed his board. That’s me, orright, he thought. Lockie Leonard, bloomin’ stupido.

  He got to the water’s edge as a beautiful lull came over the bay. Me luck’s changing! he thought. After a losing streak longer than the Indian-Pacific, things had turned around. He paddled out through the shorebreak in the strange calm and got out into deep water. No sweat. His luck was on the turn. First week of the summer holidays and a cyclone makes a two thousand kilometre detour down the coast and brings this! After a weird first year of high school, after losing your first and fabulous and only girlfriend and going down in flames in front of the whole school and being reduced to the level of the kind of person who sniffs bike seats for a thrill, something had to change.

  Lockie felt invincible. Which was probably his second big mistake of the day. The first mistake of the day was leaving the safety of that sand dune back there where some bogan kid stood watching him. The lull was over. The new sets were coming, and suddenly Lockie couldn’t see the sky anymore. The water was warm, but his blood went cold. He paddled out to sea, digging for his life. Spray lifted off the crests of the first two. Lockie paddled up hill and down dale, but he gave up when he saw what was behind.

  There are times in a thirteen-year-old’s life when he doesn’t know whether to pack his bags or pack his dacks. Most of the time you don’t get a choice so you do both at once.

  The wave that came at Lockie Leonard looked like it had been riveted together by Russian welders. It was not a pretty sight. Lockie thought it might be his last. He just turned and went with it. Might as well die standing up. Kids were on their feet in the dunes. He saw their mouths open and their hands up. He was a hell of a sight from the beach – a fly speck on the side of a moving mountain. You had to wince.

  He dropped down the nasty grey face with his mouth open and his eyes closed. Imagine jumping out of a plane on a lead skateboard. When he hit the bottom he was still standing. Not just standing; he was surfing! He could not believe it. What a hellrat he was.

  In a long wobbly arc Lockie cut a bottom turn, feeling his hand skate across the churning face. He climbed back up and saw the great wall of the wave hollowing out, ready for him. He fell into a crouch and suddenly he was inside. He needn’t have bothered crouching, though, because it was big as a two car garage in there. A two car garage with the roller-door down and the lights out.

  Aaaargh!

  Lockie plummeted.

  He flapped like a seagull.

  He pedalled like a ten-speed.

  He got quickly depressed. For about a quarter of a second.

  Then he hit the sandbar feet first and the board hit too. And bounced up. Right up. Right, right up. Oh, he felt it alright. Right in the goolies.

  The crowd dispersed shaking their heads and the beach was suddenly empty.

  ventually, slowly, horribly, Lockie washed ashore. How did cowboys do it, jumping off balconies right into the saddle on those old movies? The pain was hideous. It was like a dirty Venetian blind that shut out the rest of the world. He lay with his head on the sand beside his board and his feet still in the water.

  ‘You orright?’

  Lockie saw something blurry.

  ‘Hey mate, you okay?’

  Two black desert boots. A pair of grimy black Levi 501s and a checked flannel shirt tied around the waist.

  Gulp. This guy was not from a friendly tribe. A bogan. Bogans were Lockie’s least favourite kind of people. They were the enemies of surfers everywhere. Three of them gave Lockie a flogging last term at the roller rink in front of every kid in town. Even his girlfriend, Vicki Streeton, had dumped him for a bogan – what else could they do to him?

  ‘Urgh,’ said Lockie.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Brrgh.’

  Lockie looked up and saw the kid wore a King’s X tee-shirt. Black of course. His hair was black too, and cut in a stiff dunny brush do. He had the kind of tan you only get from living underground, and
his face looked like a pepperoni pizza. A bogan kid with world-beating zits, Olympic-standard pimples. This kid could represent his country in the skin problem playoffs. It took your breath away, but then Lockie’s breath had checked out already.

  Even though this kid was a bogan Lockie might have felt sorry for him, but he was too busy feeling sorry for himself. In the last five minutes Lockie’s gonads had become tonsils. He could feel them throbbing at the back of his throat. He broke out in a sweat. Aaarrgh! He was not having fun. He cursed the cyclone, the surf, this whole crummy little country town, and his rotten luck.

  ‘You nut yourself, mate?’

  ‘No, I’m listening to the chemical structure of beach sand – what do you think?’

  ‘I think you copped one in the groin, as they say. Wonder why they call it a groin?’ said the bogan kid looking out at the groyne inside the headland. ‘A groyne is just a pile of rubble after all.’

  ‘Rubble. That’s close.’

  ‘You gonna stay there half in the water?’

  ‘Only till I’m sixteen.’

  The pimply bogan laughed.

  ‘You got a sense of humour.’

  ‘Obviously.’

  ‘I saw you go out. You’re obviously not a very intelligent person.’

  ‘Obviously.’

  ‘You’re that Lockie kid, the one that Vicki Streeton dumped.’

  ‘Obviously.’

  The kid shook his head and scratched at his zits.

  ‘Feelin’ lucky, are ya?’

  Lockie began to laugh; he couldn’t help it.

  ‘Yeah, I’m feelin’ lucky orright.’

  The bogan kid stood there a long time while Lockie writhed in pain and the light began to fade.

  ‘Sure you don’t wanna get outta the water?’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘Dunno what you surfies see in it.’

  ‘What’s your name?’ said Lockie wincing.

  ‘Geoff Eggleston. They call me Egg.’

  ‘You’re a Metal Head?’

  ‘I like metal music, yeah.’

  ‘Dunno what you see in it.’

  ‘It’s getting dark, you know. Can you walk?’

  ‘Walk? Mate, I’m just tryin’ to stay alive. When’s the last time you got nutted?’

  ‘Years ago. In a cricket match. Copped one fair and square.’

  ‘Geez, I hate cricket.’

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘Dunno what they see in it.’

  Egg laughed and Lockie managed a smile.

  Getting one in the goolies is like falling in love. It takes up most of your attention and it takes a lot of getting over. It was black dark when Lockie and Egg saw the torchlight coming down the beach.

  ‘Lockieee?’

  ‘That’s me dad,’ said Lockie. ‘Stand by.’

  Lockie’s Dad was the local police sergeant.

  He was kind of skinny and good looking. He tried to hold poetry readings in the lock-up and he confused the whole town; he just wasn’t anybody’s idea of a cop.

  He got wet through carrying Lockie up the beach to the paddy wagon but he was like that.

  ‘Snagged the wedding tackle, eh?’

  ‘Sarge – ’

  ‘Anyway, who’s this man in the King’s Cross tee-shirt?’

  ‘King’s X, Sarge.’

  ‘It’s a band,’said Egg.

  ‘Do they bite the heads off chooks?’

  ‘No,’said Egg.

  ‘Oh,’ said the Sarge, sounding a bit disappointed.

  ‘They just play music’

  ‘Sarge’s into Creedence and Neil Young,’ said Lockie as he was loaded into the paddy wagon.

  ‘Sad, really, isn’t it?’ said Egg.

  ‘Nothing wrong with Creedence,’ said the Sarge. ‘But I agree, Neil Young’s a bit of a drip.’

  ‘Why do you listen to him?’ said Egg.

  ‘Habit, son. I just got used to the little git.’

  In the back of the paddy wagon that stank of vomit and those little smelly deodorant pine tree things, Lockie and Egg watched the town lights flow by.

  ‘I didn’t think bogans had brains,’ said Lockie.

  ‘Uniforms – they’re all bulldust. Don’t look at the uniform, look at the person.’

  ‘Where d’you live, person?’

  ‘Up the hill a bit. Near the Baptist Church. My old man . . . well, he’s the minister.’

  ‘Oh, mate, we both got problems!’

  They laughed and laughed all the way through town and the warm rain fell in the streets and everything went steamy.

  ‘Where to, son?’ called the Sarge through the grille.

  ‘The Baptist Church,’ said Lockie. ‘His dad’s the minister.’

  ‘What’s your dad into then? Punk rock?’

  ‘Barry Manilow, actually.’

  The Sarge shook his head sadly and drove on.

  Lockie wondered if maybe he’d made a friend. But with a bogan?

  veryone at Lockie’s place that night tried to stay off the subject of . . . well, off the subject. Lockie sat crookedly and fiddled with his chops and potato but was still in too much pain to be hungry. Mrs Leonard, who was probably the most sympathetic person on the planet (she was so sympathetic it made your hair curl; sometimes you wished she’d see the worst in people just for a change) found it hard to get the smile off her face. She patted Lockie’s leg and the vibration nearly killed him. He rang like a bell.

  ‘Oh, sorry dear, did that jangle you a bit?’

  Phillip, his little brother, snorted and a chunk of mashed potato got caught up his nose.

  The Sarge stuffed his face full of meat to disguise his own grin and tried not to look at anyone else.

  ‘Come on everybody,’ said Mrs Leonard. ‘Eat up. Aren’t you hungry, Lockie?’

  ‘Nah. Sorry.’

  ‘I hear the surf was really throbbing down there today.’

  That was it. Not the best choice of words, but that was it. The Sarge and Phillip roared and blasted and thumped and choked. Mrs Leonard covered her mouth with her hand. Only Blob didn’t notice. His little sister sat in her highchair just looking at them. All Blob did all day was fill her pants and gnaw the wallpaper, so he was safe from her.

  Lockie got up from the table.

  ‘Come on, son,’ said the Sarge recovering a bit. ‘We didn’t mean any harm,’

  ‘Sure,’ said Lockie. ‘My understanding family.’

  They all looked a bit sheepish now, all except Blob who looked like she was building something nasty inside her nappy. Lockie got up and went to his room.

  Lying on his bed while the others watched ‘The Simpsons’, Lockie thought about things. He was thirteen years old and he’d lived in Angelus for nearly a year now, but he was still lonely. It was weird being a copper’s kid at the best of times, but in a little town like this it was like having 666 tattooed on your forehead. On top of that, Lockie was a city kid and no one was going to let him forget it. He was on his own.

  It hadn’t always been this tough. Actually the rest of the year had been a bit of a hoot. For a while there, a couple of terms back, Lockie Leonard was a total somebody. A surfing legend. A romantic goer. Vicki Streeton and him were the School Couple. Man, she was so clever and pretty. Lockie’d never been so happy in his life. He was popular; he was hot-as.

  But Vicki dropped him and his life went down the dunny. He was crushed. It was worse than a whack in the nuts, that’s for sure. Then school finished and he drifted back to being a loner. There was a hole in his life the size of Fremantle Harbour. He mucked around with Phillip and tried to help him along with the terrible bedwetting stuff, but you can’t hang out with your ten-year-old brother all day.

  He listened to the frogs in the swamp outside his window. Lockie figured one night this crummy old house would just sink into the slime – gloop, gloop, gloop – and in the morning there’d just be the wonky old TV aerial sticking up out of the mud. In a thousand years’ time archaeologists would di
g it up and find the Leonards – homo swampus – and they’d discover they’d been watching ‘The Simpsons’ all those years ago and eating cornchips. They’d find the ancient remains of lamb chops, peas and mashed potato on the table and they’d come across Lockie Leonard, human torpedo, lying on the ruins of his bed (still with the Sesame Street bedspread he had since he was four). His Mambo tee-shirt and Rusty boardshorts would identify him as a true grommet. Samples of his sunbleached blond hair would confirm this, as would the little bits of wax imbedded in the four hairs on his chest. And if anyone was in any doubt they only had to uncover the complete collection of Midnight Oil tapes under his bed and the Surfing World mags dating back to 1974.

  In a thousand years, science would reveal that his tricky bits had taken a sharp blow from an obsolete Mark Richards quad-fin with a nasty ding on the left rail. Yes, under X-ray those goolies would have surfboard written all over them. But would scientists be able to tell that he was lonely? Fat chance. Would hot-shot gizmos show that his thirteen-year-old heart was broken by Vicki Streeton, that total spunk? Forget it. No way. No one now or in the future could know how rotten he felt inside.

  Lockie closed his eyes and waited for the house to be swallowed up. Go on, let us have it! he thought. But you could tell by the chirpy sound of the frogs out there that nothing was going to happen tonight.

  ext morning Lockie went back down the beach. Surfers are like that. They just never learn. Besides, Lockie figured being terrified was one way of taking your mind off things. Figure that out.

  But when he climbed the last dune he knew that there was a limit to how much you really wanted to have your mind taken off things. The whole bay was off its face. On a scale from one to ten it was about 15¾. Even the fish were emigrating. The water surged up the dunes and smothered the islands. Each wave was like a building falling over. It was beyond nasty; it was one hundred per cent not-nice.

  ‘You got a death-wish or something?’ someone said behind him.

  Lockie jumped. It was that pimply kid, Egg, complete with Pearl Jam tee-shirt and wraparound shades. He looked shocking.