The Pain, My Mother, Sir Tiffy, Cyber Boy & Me

  • He could be a bit of a hothead at times.

  • He could also be a little up himself.

  • He didn’t get on that well with some (okay, most) of his teachers.

  • He was suspended that one time for creating an inappropriate social media page.

  • A couple of his friends were real jerks. The rest were just apprentice jerks.

  • His big brother Carmine, who finished school last year, had a reputation for being something of a loose cannon.

  • His even bigger brother Bodene, who was making a name for himself (and with the police) in the noble, gentlemanly art of bare-fisted cage-fighting, was more like a loose nuclear warhead.

  Jason Price’s PROs:

  • He was male.

  • His appearance was not unpleasant.

  • He had asked me out.

  • To the best of my knowledge, he was humanoid.

  Okay. Yes, you’re right. Jason didn’t appear to fully meet all my VERY STRICT CRITERIA so maybe I was somewhat desperate. There, I admit it.

  But the thing is, what if Jason and I were actually ‘meant to be’? I mean what if we ended up going to the graduation dance and then we stayed together all through Senior School and became such a hot couple that we earned a cool hot-couple-nickname like J-Mag and everyone else wanted to be us? And what if, when we finished school, we got married and he became a famous movie star and I became a famous director and we spent the rest of our lives making movies together, travelling the world, walking red carpets and adopting an army of children from a wide variety of poor countries?

  Now some people might say that’s all just a stupid, pathetic, childish, insane fantasy that’s never going to happen. And of course, those people would be absolutely right. But the thing was, right then, just having something stupid, pathetic and childish to actually insanely fantasise about was a BIG improvement for me.

  For the first time in ages I felt … Now, what’s the word for it again? … Ummm … Oh, I remember now … HAPPY.

  20

  Positive happy vibes

  That weird ‘happy’ feeling continued all through the next week and it seemed to be having some positive side-effects.

  It started when I got home from school that Friday. When Sir Tiffy did his usual thing of following me around and wailing, it just didn’t seem to bother me as much as before. Sir Tiffy even looked a bit different to me. Slightly better somehow. Not so much like a Texas Chainsaw Massacre victim. More like a Texas Chainsaw Massacre survivor. Even when he took over my lap while I was watching television that night, it wasn’t so bad. I actually patted him a bit for the first time ever and he responded with a rattly purr. And no random peeing.

  We were making kitten steps!

  Then when Mum got home from work and I told her about Jason she had no problem with it. I think it made her happy to see me happy and feeling good about something. She said it was karma and that I was being cosmically rewarded for my recent ‘pleasant and reasonable’ behaviour and for volunteering to help her and The Pain out in The Big Butt Backyard Blitz on Saturday.

  Speaking of The Pain, that was another side-effect of my happy feeling. I stopped thinking so much about him. I guess with my head crowded out with thoughts of Sunday week, there just wasn’t as much room left for the old Pain any more. When I started thinking about my movie date or the possibility of Jason and me going to the graduation dance together, annoying or worrying thoughts about The Pain just vanished. (Sista Lista, cover your eyes!) Jason Price was the ANTIDOTE to The Pain! Whenever The Pain threatened to return, all I had to do was take another dose of Jason Price and Ta- daaaa! – instant relief.

  And the positive happy vibes also seemed to be working their magic at the nursing home, because in that week’s session Bert Duggan and I had our first ever proper conversation. And wait till I tell you the subject matter that set it all off.

  Sir Tiffy!

  That’s right. At first everything had been grinding along as usual in Conversation Killer Corner. It got so bad that I was secretly cursing whoever had superglued the minute hand of the big lounge-room clock in place. Then as a last resort I pulled out the secondhand copy of The Hunger Games that I’d bought for Bert on the weekend and that changed everything.

  It wasn’t really because of the book.

  It was because of something I mentioned as I handed it over to him.

  ‘Sorry about the back cover,’ I said. ‘It’s a bit chewed up. Sir Tiffy’s fault. But at least he didn’t pee on it. I hope.’

  Bert turned the book over in his hands.

  ‘Sir Tiffy?’ he asked.

  And that’s what got the ball rolling. I had to explain the whole Sir Tiffy saga and how he came to be at our place and after I did that, a miracle occurred. Bert Duggan began to speak. With your actual sentences!

  First he told me about the big grey cat his family had when he was little. It was called Smokey, and Bert said he was terrified of it. He said he used to think it was a ‘devil cat’. Tell me about it! So then we just began swapping horror cat stories, and thanks to Sir Tiffy, I had plenty to share. Before we knew it, our time was up. It was incredible. Last week’s session went so slowly I’m sure I felt a couple of seasons passing.

  That afternoon when I got home, I found Sir Tiffy himself sprawled out on my bed. Normally I would have been annoyed and tried my best to shoosh him off, but not this time. This time I owed him one. So after checking for unwanted piddle, I just gave his bony head a scratch and said, ‘That’ll do, Cat. That’ll do.’

  I paid for it later, of course, because I had to complete all my homework with Sir Tiffy lying on my lap and purring away like a faulty air conditioner. Which actually turned out not to be so horrible. And then on Friday afternoon when I walked in the front door, Sir Tiffy was waiting there to greet me with a welcoming Mwaaaaaaaaaaargh. And you know what? It sounded kind of nice.

  That brought to an end one of the best school weeks I’d had in ages, and the great thing was, there was still Sunday afternoon with Jason to look forward to. Of course, there was also The Big Butt Backyard Blitz with The Pain to get through before that. But I was feeling pretty positive about it. I didn’t want to jinx everything by saying it out aloud, but this is what I was thinking.

  Hey, maybe my life doesn’t suck as much as I thought and maybe having The Pain around isn’t really such a bad thing after all.

  21

  The stump thing

  MY LIFE TOTALLY SUCKS AND IT’S ALL THE STUPID PAIN’S FAULT!

  This was the inescapable conclusion I came to on Sunday afternoon as I looked back over the events of what I now refer to as the Weekend of Woe.

  Time for a recap. Let’s start with The Big Butt Backyard Blitz, shall we?

  Because The Pain had a late night shift at the hospital, The Big Butt Backyard Blitz didn’t kick off until just before one o’clock on Saturday afternoon, but then it continued right through till the light began to fade around six.

  Even though it had the potential to be a dangerously extended encounter with The Pain, our actual interaction was kept to a minimum. This was because there was a lot to do and we were all so caught up in our different specialised tasks. For example, The Pain did most of the big stuff like

  hacking away the thickest jungle, sawing, digging, lifting and carting rubbish out to the skip we’d hired. Mum focused more on weeding and pruning and generally being site manager. I covered the more complex, highly skilled tasks such as sweeping and raking and maintaining our water supplies to avoid dehydration.

  It was hard, hot work, but weirdly it actually felt good to be slowly but surely reclaiming our backyard space and putting it into some kind of order. By late in the afternoon most of the clearing and general tidying-up was done. A little while later, as the sun was just dipping below the horizon, Mum brought out a tray of mint chocolate biscuits, cream buns and clinking ice-cold drinks and officially called for us to down tools. I’m here to tell you that the best thing
about doing a hard day’s physical work is the totally guilt-free pig-out you can get stuck into when it’s over!

  Up till that point, the day had turned out much better than I expected.

  After that point, it was another story altogether.

  This story.

  Like most disasters do, it began innocently enough. The Pain and I were sitting on either side of Mum on the edge of the landing, looking out over our handiwork and rapidly demolishing the food and drinks. As she munched away at a mouthful of mint biscuit, Mum nodded towards the huge pile of leaves and mulch that I’d raked together and patted me on the knee.

  ‘Good work on those leaves, Mags (!). Really good job.’

  Yes, pushing leaves around with a tricky rake-type implement until they are all collected together over the same small area of earth is a highly complex and delicate procedure requiring enormous mental capacity. Fortunately I was a Master of Advanced Leaf Accumulation!

  ‘It’s not that difficult,’ I informed her.

  Then The Pain joined in the conversation. But at this stage he was just being a normal pain. Nothing like the chronic Pain he was soon to become.

  ‘What you really needed was the Leaf Lord 3000.’

  Both Mum and I turned his way and frowned. It was Mum who cracked first.

  ‘The what?’

  ‘The Leaf Lord 3000. Haven’t you seen it advertised on the telly?’

  Mum shook her head. ‘Must have missed that one. Sounds like some kind of a fancy leaf blower?’

  ‘Not just some kind of a fancy leaf blower. It’s the LORD OF FANCY LEAF BLOWERS! It leaves all the others for dead!’

  Mum and The Pain both laughed.

  I could only manage a grimace. But since I was still being pleasant and reasonable, at least I didn’t groan out aloud. Inside, yes.

  Then The Pain clicked his fingers.

  ‘Hey, Maggie. Maybe I could get you a Leaf Lord 3000 for your next birthday. You’d really be one of the cool kids at school then.’

  ‘I think I’ll pass,’ I replied in an awesomely pleasant and reasonable, groan-free way.

  ‘Really?’ The Pain said, looking offended. ‘I thought you’d be blown away by the idea.’

  Fortunately Mum groaned loud enough for both of us and gave The Pain a big shove.

  Then it went quiet for a bit, until The Pain changed the subject.

  ‘You know, I’ve been thinking about that stump …’

  The stump he was talking about had been unearthed from beneath the jungle by our blitzing efforts. It stood in the middle of what was once a small patch of lawn ringed by garden beds.

  ‘What about it?’ Mum asked.

  The Pain gave his stubby beard a scratch.

  ‘Well, now that we’ve cleaned things up a bit, it sort of sticks out like a sore thumb, doesn’t it? I was thinking maybe we could remove it completely and you could lay some new lawn all around there.’

  ‘Remove it? How?’ Mum again.

  The Pain considered the question for a few seconds.

  ‘I think we could just … push it out.’

  Mum and I turned to the stump in unison like a pair of beached synchronised swimmers.

  The stump in question was about a metre tall and maybe thirty centimetres in diameter – even wider at the base where a root bulged out on one side. Push it out? Of all the stupid and ridiculous things The Pain had ever said (or sung) since that first night when I opened the door and saw him standing there – and there had been plenty – this was the stupidest and most ridiculous of all.

  If he’d said, ‘I think we could just huff and puff and blow that thing out,’ it wouldn’t have been any less stupid or ridiculous, because what he was suggesting was actually impossible.

  Mum couldn’t help herself.

  ‘Push it out?’

  ‘Yeah. I know it looks pretty solid, but it’s been there a while, so a lot of the roots are probably dead or rotted anyway by now. I reckon if we all got on to it – all three of us together – and gave it one almighty push, it would come right on out. And I reckon we’re just the team to do it.’

  Team? I’d stopped looking at the stump by then and instead I was looking at The Pain. Not because what he was saying was crazy – which of course it was – but because I was starting to realise what this was all about.

  And I didn’t like it. Not one bit.

  Figurative Language Warning: Approach with Extreme Caution!

  Do you see it? Do you see what he was doing? This wasn’t really about getting a stupid stump out of the ground at all. This was about Mum and me – and him. About Mum and me and him, turning into an ‘us’ and taking on a challenge together, working as a team and pushing in the same direction … just like a family! See? The whole thing was ONE BIG METAPHOR for Team Us and he was trying to drag me in to be a part of it! Forget it! GET YOUR METAPHORICAL PAWS OFF ME!

  Mum, of course, still thought it was all just about a stupid stump.

  ‘Danny, I really don’t think you’ll budge it.’

  ‘Nah. I reckon we could do it, no problem. Watch.’

  And The Pain jumped up and strode over to the stump. He crouched down beside it, put his hands on either side of the trunk and leaned in with his shoulder.

  ‘I’ve packed down in a few scrums in my time,’ he said as he wiggled his shoulder to get it comfortable. Then he breathed in, braced himself and gave three short sharp pushes. Ummph! Ummph! Ummph! He stopped then and sat back on his haunches. He looked over at Mum and me.

  ‘Did you hear that? Did you hear it start to give? Did you see it move there?’

  Aaaah, that would be a NO … and a NO … and let me see here … Well, blow me down … another NO!

  Mum and I moved our heads from side to side like a couple of mechanical sideshow alley clowns.

  ‘I definitely felt something. Yeah, something was definitely starting to give, all right.’

  Probably your brain, I wanted to say. But for Mum’s sake (and to hold on to my chances of getting new clothes) I kept that thought to myself.

  ‘Just requires more muscle power. Come on, you two. I need you. Can’t do it by myself.’

  Mum looked doubtful – and worried.

  ‘Danny, honestly, I really don’t think it’s possible.’

  ‘Well, we’ll never know for sure unless we try, right? Come on. Don’t be such a killjoy. Show some faith. Three of us against one wimpy stump. What chance has it got?’

  And there was that ‘us’ again. Mum shook her head but dragged herself up anyway to join The Pain. She found a spot to brace herself against the stump. Then she looked back at me.

  ‘Maggie?’

  Uh-uh. Sorry. There was no way I was going to join TEAM PAIN and be part of his stupid ‘one big happy family, we’re all in it together’ metaphor.

  ‘It’s ridiculous, Mum. Why are you even bothering? It’s never going to work and you know it.’

  ‘Come on. It won’t kill you,’ she said. ‘Danny’s just asking you to give it a try. I think that sounds reasonable, don’t you?’

  And then she hit me with a look that said, ‘That shopping trip of yours is hanging by a thread here, girly.’

  Wait for me!

  I wandered over and knelt beside her. I placed a finger on the trunk. It was the least I could do.

  ‘Ready,’ I informed them both cheerfully.

  Mum’s eyes were burning into me now. They were angry. I felt like an ant under a magnifying glass about to heat up and shrivel. Along with my new clothes. But there was something else in Mum’s eyes as well. Frustration? Disappointment? Sadness? All three?

  Right. Fine.

  I squeezed in next to her and grabbed hold of the trunk. THE PAIN was on the other side a little higher up, with his shoulder positioned. We were all pretty close together. It was awkward and uncomfortable and embarrassing.

  ‘All right, on the count of three, I want you to give it everything you’ve got, okay?’

  I fully intended to
give it some of what I had. Why go nuts? The stump wasn’t going to move. And you know why? Because a bulldozer couldn’t shift it and neither could we because we weren’t some kind of a super team who could do anything when we combined our separate wimpy powers and worked together. We were not an ‘us’. And we were definitely not a family. We were just Mum and me and some Castle Butt intruder.

  ‘Ready? One. Two. Three. GO!’

  We all pushed. The Pain growled. There was quite a bit of huffing and grunting all round. Not a lot from me. After a few seconds we stopped.

  The stump hadn’t moved. Not one vibration. Not a fraction of a millimetre. I’m not exaggerating here when I say that not a single atom of displacement had occurred. Great. It’s been fun. Thanks for coming. Can we all go home now?

  ‘We almost had it there,’ The Pain said.

  Mum and I exchanged a ‘you’ve got to be kidding’ look.

  ‘Yeah, I’m sure I felt something snapping and tearing down below. Now that was a pretty good effort, but I reckon it was only about seventy per cent of what we can do. Let’s just give it one more go. Absolute last time, I promise. But we need to give it everything. And I mean everything. Leave nothing in the tank, okay? Come on, guys. I believe in us!’

  Really? And the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny too?

  We got back into our positions. Mum looked even more worried. Almost scared. And I knew why. Because The Pain was about to make a total fool out of himself. We were about to metaphorically torpedo all the ‘we’re a team and together we can perform miracles’ nonsense he’d been trying to float. It was about to sink beneath the waves and disappear without a trace. Hopefully taking The Pain with it.

  ‘Last time. You all set? Okay. One. Two. Three. GO!’