Give Peas a Chance

  RESEARCH METHOD

  My research method consists of lying on the back lawn looking up at the stars and having dinner. I do that a lot. I love outer space. Plus Mum can’t see what I’m eating. Aunty Bev can if she’s got a torch.

  I started my research with a research question like you’re meant to. My research question was, If Aunty Bev has her way and nobody in our family ever gets to eat another sausage and onion sandwich after the one I’m eating now, how will we cope?

  Sometimes research questions can make scientists feel a bit upset and they have to gather more data till they feel better.

  I started gathering data about stars and planets. By counting them. Except as every scientist and person lying in a backyard knows, there are too many to count completely. But it does calm you down and help your digestion. It also helps you have a ripper of an idea for an experiment.

  THE EXPERIMENT

  A scientific method of demonstrating to a non-fat mother who’s gone a bit mental that she is not too big in any way, shape or size.

  THINGS YOU NEED TO DO THE EXPERIMENT

  1. Birthday money (all of it).

  2. Both of Mum’s large shopping bags.

  3. Fast walking to the supermarket and back so nobody notices you’re gone.

  4. Hiding place for the shopping bags as soon as you get home.

  5. Big bone to distract Buster so he doesn’t find the shopping bags behind the sofa and eat what’s in them. He’s got a few bits missing (one leg, half an ear, some of his tail), but that doesn’t mean he’s slow. His nose works super well, specially when there are large amounts of lollies in the house.

  EXPERIMENT METHOD

  A laboratory wasn’t available for this experiment so I used our lounge room which was better because that’s where the Think Small lot were meeting.

  I waited till they’d started, then walked in. Mum was there, and Aunty Bev, and Mrs Newman from the post office, and Mrs Newman’s daughter Gail who works at KFC, and Doug Walcott who’s been depressed and off his lollies since the snakebite. All lollies, not just jelly snakes. His wife reckons he’s already lost weight. Aunty Bev doesn’t. She reckons he’s still pretty porky.

  I asked if I could join in. Mum looked doubtful, but Aunty Bev beamed like big plastic earrings were on special and said I could as long as I waited my turn.

  Mrs Newman finished telling the others her Think Small Experience Of The Week. It was about how if you steam snow peas for too long they go mushy and you don’t want to eat them and you go even thinner.

  The others came out with their Think Small Experiences. Each one was about not eating something or else chewing it nine million times. Everybody in that room must have been starving.

  Then it was my turn.

  ‘Trace, do you have a Think Small Experience?’ said Aunty Bev. I nodded and dragged the shopping bags out from behind the sofa.

  ‘Behold,’ I said, which I think is a scientific word. ‘The Milky Way.’

  I ripped open a bulk bag of chocolate peanuts and tipped them on the floor. I didn’t use real Milky Ways because they’re the wrong shape.

  Everyone stared. Not at me, at the chocolate peanuts rolling across the carpet.

  ‘Imagine those are planets in space,’ I said.

  I emptied out another bag of chocolate peanuts and then lots of bags of chocolate sultanas, chocolate macadamias and chocolate hundreds and thousands.

  ‘Our galaxy’s got even more planets than that,’ I said, once the floor was covered. ‘There are loads we can’t even see.’

  Mrs Newman bent forward and peered under the coffee table. I opened a big tin of drinking chocolate powder and tipped it onto the carpet. Mum gave a kind of squeak, which I hoped showed she was getting my drift.

  ‘Each grain of chocolate,’ I said, ‘is a planet in our galaxy too.’

  Mrs Newman’s mouth was moving silently like she was praying. Or eating. I don’t think she was thinking about steamed snow peas, though. Doug Walcott’s eyes were bigger than really swollen big toes. (I’ve never seen any, but Dad told me.) Aunty Bev was standing up, furious, looking like she was gunna do me.

  I had to move quickly. I pointed to all the chocolate planets on the floor.

  ‘Our whole galaxy,’ I said, ‘is in a cluster with hundreds of other galaxies.’

  I held up a piece of chocolate nut cluster to illustrate the point.

  ‘There are thousands of galaxy clusters in the universe,’ I said, chucking fistfuls of chocolate nut clusters into the air. ‘And there are even clusters of galaxy clusters.’

  Before I could get on to how they’re called superclusters and there are ten million of them in the universe, Aunty Bev grabbed me. She didn’t look as amazed as I’d hoped she would. I could see I had to finish the experiment fast.

  I looked around at the other stunned faces in the room. Then I concentrated all my look on Mum.

  ‘Millions of planets in millions of galaxies in millions of superclusters,’ I said to her. ‘Makes you feel really small, doesn’t it.’

  RESULTS

  1. I got sent to bed.

  2. After the others had gone, Mum spent ages out the back staring up at the stars and planets. Dad was with her. I peeked and saw them. Then they went into the shed.

  3. Next morning all my chocolate planets and galaxies had vanished. I didn’t ask Mum where they were and she didn’t say.

  4. I felt a bit depressed. What if the experiment had been a flop? I needed chocolate to give me hope. But there weren’t even any asteroids under the coffee table.

  5. I needn’t have worried. That night me and Mum and Dad all had dinner together in the kitchen. Sausage and onion sandwiches. Even the bread was fried. And chocolate nut clusters for dessert. It was out of this world.

  CONCLUSION

  Science is really good, and I’m not just saying that to suck. Next project I’m going to attempt an even harder experiment. See if I can get Aunty Bev into shorts.

  Odd Socques

  Macques was dreading the spelling test. The minute he walked into class and saw the substitute teacher sitting at Ms Conway’s desk, he knew there’d be one.

  Substitute teachers always did spelling tests.

  ‘Good morning 6C,’ said the substitute teacher. ‘Ms Conway is away today. My name’s Mr Green.’

  Macques could see something bulging in Mr Green’s jacket pocket.

  Spelling test prizes.

  ‘Good morning, Mr Green,’ chanted the class.

  ‘OK, 6C,’ said Mr Green. ‘I’ve heard you’re very good at maths and spelling. Would you rather have a maths test or a spelling test?’

  Macques sighed gloomily.

  He knew exactly what was coming.

  ‘Spelling,’ yelled the class.

  Mr Green looked around at all the shining eyes and excited faces. He allowed himself a quiet smile.

  A spelling class.

  He’d spotted it the minute they walked in.

  Then Mr Green spotted something else. A boy up the back, a boy with brown hair and a sad face, who didn’t seem very delighted at all.

  Can’t be helped, thought Mr Green. Every class has at least one bad speller.

  He pulled the bag of mini chocolate bars from his jacket pocket and waited for the cheer a teacher with lollies always got.

  It didn’t happen.

  Mr Green looked around the class, surprised.

  ‘A mini chocolate bar for every word you get right,’ he said, in case this lot were a bit slow and didn’t get how substitute teacher spelling tests worked.

  Still no cheer.

  Mr Green felt a moment of panic.

  But only a moment. The class were still looking excited and enthusiastic. Eyes still gleaming and lots of smiles. Except the boy up the back.

  How unusual, thought Mr Green. This lot seem to like spelling tests more than they like lollies.

  He decided to keep the words simple, in case he was right the first time and they were a
bit slow.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘First word. Pivot. Hands up.’

  Hands shot up.

  Mr Green chose a girl at the front.

  ‘P-I-V-O-T,’ said Jane Dillon.

  ‘Good,’ said Mr Green and tossed her a chocolate. ‘Next word, diesel.’

  Sam Webster got it right.

  Over the next few minutes the class also got snail, patch, gravity, blood, digital, drought, tickle and splash.

  Macques wasn’t surprised. He knew from experience the class were good spellers.

  They’ll probably get every single one, he thought gloomily. Until Mr Green asks them the one they’re waiting for.

  Which, a few minutes later, Mr Green did.

  ‘Fax,’ he said, taking another mini chocolate bar from the bag. ‘Listen carefully. Not facts, fax.’

  Every hand in the room shot up. Except Macques’s.

  Mr Green pointed to Tina Walsh.

  ‘F-A-C-Q-U-E-S,’ said Tina.

  Mr Green looked at her, his hand frozen in mid-toss, the mini chocolate bar still between his fingers.

  Strange, he thought. I wasn’t told about any special needs students in this class. Perhaps she’s just a comedian.

  He gave her a quick frown, then pointed to the boy next to her.

  ‘You have a go,’ he said. ‘Fax.’

  ‘F-A-C-Q-U-E-S,’ said Garth Spence.

  Mr Green felt his face going hot.

  OK, he knew what this was. Not a spelling test. A substitute teacher test.

  Mr Green took a deep breath. He prided himself on always passing such tests. Well, almost always. There was the one unfortunate incident when he’d shouted at a boy for several minutes from a distance of about three centimetres, but that was months ago.

  Mr Green unwrapped the untossed chocolate bar, popped it into his mouth and savoured it like he was at a wine tasting.

  This didn’t get the laugh he’d hoped for, but at least he was showing them he was in control.

  ‘Let me help you,’ he said to the class. ‘Here’s another word very similar to fax. Sax. It’s short for saxaphone, my favourite musical instrument. Any jazz fans here?’

  Everybody put their hands up, except the sad boy.

  Mr Green had a feeling this class probably weren’t jazz fans, but he pressed on.

  ‘You,’ he said, pointing to a girl. ‘The word is sax.’

  ‘S-A-C-Q-U-E-S,’ said Lilly Potter.

  Mr Green hestitated, not sure what to do next.

  Move on to ‘tax’, or a maths test?

  ‘Sir,’ said a boy at the front. ‘There is one person in the class who might know. His name is…’

  The boy was trying not to giggle and he spluttered the name as he said it, but Mr Green was pretty sure it was ‘Max’.

  Mr Green smiled to himself. Perhaps this was a trap, perhaps it wasn’t. Either way he’d win. Always easier to punish one ringleader than a whole class.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said to the boy at the front. ‘Max, where are you? Stand up please.’

  Slowly Macques stood up.

  He didn’t try to explain. He’d tried with too many other substitute teachers and he always got the blame anyway.

  He knew the rest of the class were watching him. He knew they were struggling not to laugh. They always preferred to do their laughing a bit later, after the substitute teacher had got angry.

  ‘Max,’ said Mr Green. ‘Spell your name for us please.’

  ‘M-A-C-Q-U-E-S,’ said Macques, wishing for the millionth time in his life that his parents hadn’t done this to him.

  As usual, Macques walked home from school on his own.

  Near the corner of his street he heard somebody running up behind him.

  Macques told himself to relax. He reminded himself that the bullying almost never happened this close to the house. But when he turned to see who it was, he still felt a jolt of anxiety.

  It was Sam Webster.

  ‘That sucked,’ said Sam. ‘When that substitute teacher yelled at you. Unfair.’

  Macques glanced nervously up and down the street. Sam Webster usually hung out in a gang and he didn’t usually have anything to say to Macques. So why was he here now?

  Macques could only think of one reason. The street sign a couple of metres away. The one showing the name of Macques’s street.

  Knocques Avenue.

  Macques glared up at the sign like he did every afternoon. He wished he could rip it down. If only someone had done that ages ago, before its stupid spelling had inspired Mum and Dad when they were looking for baby name ideas.

  But it was still there and now it was the perfect mocking spot.

  Max braced himself for a mocking.

  Then he saw that Sam was glancing nervously up and down the street too.

  ‘Can you keep a secret?’ muttered Sam.

  Macques peered around again. He couldn’t see anyone else from school lurking about. He hesitated for a moment, wondering if Sam was for real. Could you trust a kid who flicked snot at substitute teachers behind their backs?

  There was a kind of haunted look on Sam’s face that made Macques want to trust him.

  ‘Yes,’ said Macques quietly. ‘I can keep a secret.’

  ‘Let’s keep walking,’ said Sam. ‘I don’t want anybody to hear this.’

  They walked along Macques’s street.

  Macques waited for Sam to speak.

  Sam looked as though he was having some sort of pain, possibly in the guts. Macques wondered if Sam had an allergy to mini chocolate bars.

  Poor bloke, he thought, that’d be a bit rough.

  Finally Sam spoke.

  ‘I’ve got a dumb name too,’ he muttered.

  Macques looked at Sam, surprised.

  Sam wasn’t a silly name, nor was Webster, so it must be a secret middle one. Parents did all sorts of bad things with middle names. The worst ones were usually from dead pop singers or footy players. Elvis and Archibald, stuff like that.

  Macques waited for Sam to unburden himself.

  ‘Sam isn’t spelt S-A-M,’ said Sam, staring at the footpath. ‘It’s spelt S-A-H-M.’

  Macques looked at him, even more surprised.

  ‘My parents didn’t want me to have an ordinary name,’ said Sahm gloomily. ‘They wanted me to be special and different and um, what’s that other thing, unique.’

  Macques knew all about parents wanting that.

  ‘But…’ said Macques. ‘How did you… I mean how come nobody knows? How come you don’t get the same treatment as me?’

  Sahm glanced up and down the street again.

  ‘I was lucky,’ he said. ‘When I enrolled in school the office got it wrong. They thought S-A-H-M was a spelling mistake, so they put me down as S-A-M. My parents never found out. Nor did the other kids. But next year we go to high school. Nobody gets that lucky twice in a row. What can I do?’

  Macques thought about this.

  ‘How come your parents haven’t spotted that the school is spelling your name wrong?’ he asked. ‘The school sends letters home all the time.’

  Sahm didn’t seem to hear the question.

  Macques wasn’t suprised.

  Sahm’s face was desperate and pleading. Obviously all he could think about was avoiding six years of high school bullying and misery.

  Macques knew exactly how Sahm felt.

  For a few seconds Macques hesitated.

  Should he tell Sahm his secret? It was risky. He hadn’t told anybody his confidential plan to survive high school. If it got into the wrong hands, the whole thing would be ruined and the next six years would be as bad as the last six had been.

  But Sahm needed his help.

  ‘Listen,’ said Macques quietly. ‘I’ve been talking on a chat site to some other kids with tragic names like ours. They reckon they know people who can hack into any school computer in Australia. These people charge a lot, but I’m saving up. Once I’ve enrolled in high school, I’m going to chuck my stude
nt card away, pay them to hack in and change my name to the proper spelling, then get a replacement card.’

  Macques realised he was out of breath, even though he and Sahm had reached Macques’s front gate and had stopped walking.

  Sahm’s eyes were shining.

  ‘It’s two hundred dollars,’ said Macques. ‘Can you save that much?’

  Sahm didn’t reply. He stuck his hands into his pockets.

  ‘If they do yours at the same time as mine,’ said Macques, ‘perhaps I can get them to charge you a cheaper price.’

  Sahm still didn’t say anything.

  Macques understood. Sahm was probably in shock about how expensive a safe and happy high school education was these days. Macques was feeling very stressed himself. If any of the kids at school found out about this…

  Suddenly Sahm gave a big relieved grin.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, and slapped Macques on the back.

  ‘Think about it,’ said Macques. ‘If you want to give it a go, let me know.’

  ‘I will,’ said Sahm. ‘Thank you so much. You’re a legend.’

  For a second Macques thought his new friend was going to burst into tears. Sam was struggling to keep his face under control.

  Poor bloke, thought Macques. I won’t invite him in. Give him a bit of time on his own to calm himself down.

  He gave Sahm a wave and headed for the front door.

  On his way there, he had a nagging thought. The way Sahm had slapped him on the back. Kids at school didn’t usually do that. Not unless…

  At the front door Macques turned and glanced back at Sahm. And saw the giggling faces of the rest of the gang, crouching in the hedge.

  Sahm, or rather Sam, didn’t look tearful any more. He was laughing even harder than the others.

  Macques managed to get the key in the lock. Inside, once the door was shut, he squeezed his eyes closed and struggled with his own tears.

  Real ones.

  Then he wiped his eyes and checked his back in the hall mirror. He wasn’t surprised to see something stuck there.