This remark made Lou bristle. ‘I bet you’d be too scared to go to Dragonland.’
‘Why? Scared of what?’
‘Because … because … ‘
For once Lou was lost for words. Arch’s face was beginning to slip into its usual sneer. I had a flash of inspiration. ‘Because if anyone wants to enter Dragonland, the dragon breathes on them and their clothes smoulder off their bodies until they’re naked,’ I said quickly.
Nudity was sacrosanct. Everyone at school was simultaneously thrilled and terrified by it. That nudity was the rule at Dragonland caused ripples of excitement throughout the entire school and everyone regarded Lou and me with even greater respect.
The next time we went to Dragonland, we were almost there when Lou announced that we were going to stand at the brink of the dragon’s mouth and throw all our clothes off, into that ominous black hole. ‘What?’ I spluttered. ‘That was just a story. Wasn’t it?’
‘It was your idea,’ Lou replied sharply.
She strode on ahead, the very briskness of her pace daring me to challenge her. I knew whatever protest I made, she would overrule with some convincing argument. But I had to avoid it. There were several desperate reasons why it was inconceivable that I should shed my clothes, let alone throw them into that hole, from which I’d never dare to retrieve them again.
Things had changed. My body had become something I was ashamed of. I had gotten fat.
I hadn’t noticed it happening, but the last time my mother and I had gone clothes shopping there were no sizes big enough in boyswear for me any more. That was shaming enough. But it wasn’t just my belly that had swollen out. I’d developed these big blubbery breasts of sheer fat. They looked terrible. All the other boys at school had these perfectly flat little chests, punctuated by pale violet nipples, while I was all flabby curves and spare tyres. It was alarming. I knew that girls started to grow breasts at about this age and to my horror, I seemed to be doing the same thing. I was worried that I’d brought it on myself by dressing up too often. Now I was developing the figure to go with my grandmother’s old clothes.
It was natural for Lou to presume that undressing in front of her wouldn’t pose a problem. We’d seen each other naked hundreds of times before. We’d often taken our baths together and we also had this ritual of running round the house naked, to dry off, after a swim at the river. However, it was the middle of winter. We hadn’t been swimming for over four months. Aunt Evelyn had outlawed us having our baths together round the same time. Since then, something else had happened, something that was even worse. I had sprouted a couple of hairs down below. I desperately didn’t want Lou to know. Inevitably, she’d make a big fuss about it, tell lots of people and warn me I was going to end up like Roy Schluter. He was the new boy at school, who seemed to be developing hair just about everywhere: above his lip, all over his legs, under his arms and probably between his legs as well. Or at least that’s what everyone speculated.
I desperately wanted to keep my clothes on. The thought of disrobing was making me sweat and pant more than ever. I wondered if l might simply expire on the spot. It would be fatal but it would be my salvation. Lou was well ahead of me. I stopped. Perhaps I could merely pretend to expire. I collapsed with an elaborate sigh and rolled under a nearby matagouri bush, getting badly scratched in the process. I waited for Lou to come and rescue me. She didn’t. She was so intent on getting to Dragonland first, she hadn’t noticed my collapse or bothered to check that I was still following her. It was at least five minutes later before I heard her coming back down the sheep track looking for me. She was calling out to me by my real name, instead of Judy. That was a bad sign.
‘What are you doing under there?’ she demanded when she came upon me.
My eyelids fluttered. I could see her standing over me, hands on her hips, an impatient grimace on her face. I moaned as if in agony, trying to win a bit of sympathy. But instead she kicked me. ‘Get up,’ she said, ‘or I’ll shoot you. That’s what they do in the movies to horses that give up the ghost.’
‘I’m not a horse. I’ve sprained my ankle, John.’
That was an inspiration. I didn’t actually know what spraining your ankle entailed but it was a common occurrence in The Famous Five adventure series. Anne was always spraining her ankle at inopportune moments near the climax of the adventure.
‘John,’ I moaned. ‘Help me, John.’
Lou loved being called John.
‘Come on then,’ said Lou a little more gallantly. ‘The dragon’s waiting for his sacrifice.’
‘John, I can’t walk any further.’
Lou sighed. Though she grumbled and complained, she loved coming to my rescue. She bent over me and helped me to my feet. ‘Come on,’ she said, ‘lean on me.’
I leant upon her heavily and together we hobbled a few steps up the sheep track. Suddenly, I sprang away from her, laughing, and started running down the hill. Lou yelled after me, protesting, but I called back to her that I’d race her down the hill. That was one thing Lou couldn’t pass up, a challenge to a race. She always had to come first. She dashed past me effortlessly and had soon disappeared from sight into a gully. I stopped running and began to plod down the hill instead. The moment of revelation had been averted. But I knew it was likely to arise again and prove just as difficult to avoid. It wasn’t easy keeping secrets, especially from Lou. I was going to have to become good at it.
5
Chapter 5
Aunt Evelyn gave me the nickname that plagued me throughout my last months at primary school. She bestowed it quite unwittingly and would’ve been horrified if she’d ever realised what she’d precipitated. But she failed to realise. As the days passed and the name calling showed no sign of abating, my faith in Aunt Evelyn dwindled away, leaving a rancorous blame to mount up in its stead.
I drew away from her. I avoided her Shakespeare recitals. Refused her invitations for duets on the piano. I made a show of not listening to whatever she said, whether it was one of her theatrical anecdotes or a command to do a chore for her. I derived a malicious pleasure that she seemed hurt and bewildered by my behaviour. I began to treat her the way Lou treated her, as a pest who was best ignored.
She knew I was brooding over something. She had to realise she had done something wrong. I waited for her to ask what the matter was but she never did. Instead she remarked loudly to my mother one day that teenagers were awfully moody.
By estranging myself from Aunt Evelyn, I deprived myself. I had adored our play-acting times together and she had always encouraged me. But there was another, even greater loss. I never had the opportunity to ask Aunt Evelyn my burning question. What was acting the poof? She had been the person most likely to provide the answers, but after what she started, no matter how much I wanted to know, I couldn’t bring myself to ask her. I felt betrayed.
She said it at Lou’s twelfth birthday party in front of the entire school. That sounds like a lot of guests to invite to a birthday party but the school roll was actually only eighteen. It wasn’t because Lou was friends with everyone that the whole school was invited. In fact, Lou had such a fearsome reputation that she couldn’t truthfully be described as popular. It was Aunt Evelyn who had insisted on inviting everyone. She liked to ‘set the standard’ and for everybody to recognise her accomplishment.
I’d heard my mother discussing the party on the telephone with Velda Pile. ‘I can’t believe that Evelyn has to prove something with a child’s birthday party as well. She already has the newest house, the biggest garden, her own car, the most frequent hair appointments, to go with Arthur having the biggest farm in Mawera. Where will she draw the line?’
Aunt Evelyn was famous for organising innovative party games that culminated in the eating of something sweet. The first game that particular year was the licorice strap race. Everyone was commanded to pair off into boy-girl couples. Lou rebelled, declaring that all the boys were too dumb. She insisted on choosing her best friend Susan
Scott instead. Aunt Evelyn smiled grimly but was forced to demur. Being Lou’s birthday, she was entitled to flout the usual etiquette of obeying when being told what to do.
There were equal numbers of boys and girls, so Lou’s rebellion ruined the obvious symmetry of things. It meant two of the boys had to pair up as well. I being Aunt Evelyn’s nephew and more subject to her authority than anyone else, was instructed to pair with Roy Schluter. He was the new boy at school who everyone was still wary of, on account of his outlandish name, his strange clothes and the damage adolescence was wrecking upon his face and body. He was older than me by six months. His recent arrival had stripped me of the honour of being the oldest pupil at school. Strange things were happening to Roy. He had the vague shadow of a moustache above his mouth that everyone at school was always whispering in awe about. All over his forehead, he had what Arch Sampson described as ‘a crop of pimples’, with additional plantations threatening to sprout down the planes of his face. It was also rumoured that his penis was as big and as hairy as anything our fathers possessed. Arch claimed to have seen it after rugby practice the previous week. He’d offered Roy a look at his Penthouse if he’d show him, but Roy had told him to go away and that he had nothing special to display.
I had a particular aversion to being paired with Roy. I didn’t want to get too close to his pimples. They looked contagious. Unfortunately, I had to do as I was told.
The licorice game was always over in a flash. Each couple had to stand facing one another with a licorice strap connecting their mouths. When Aunt Evelyn shouted ‘go’, the idea was to chomp through as much licorice strap as possible until you couldn’t go any further, unless you were game to stick your tongue into your opponent’s mouth to retrieve what they’d already claimed.
Roy Schluter and I faced one another. I was something of a champion at the licorice game but on this occasion when Aunt Evelyn shouted ‘go’, I nibbled forward tentatively. I’d only claimed about an inch when Roy’s face seemed to loom horribly close. I bit through the licorice, surrendering the game. I loved licorice but those things on Roy’s face were enough to make you lose your appetite. I waited for Roy to suck the strap up into his mouth triumphantly. He didn’t. He just stood there with it dangling, like he didn’t understand what to do next. He looked up at me quizzically. ‘You won,’ I said, wishing he’d just eat it and stop staring at me.
But he didn’t eat it. Instead, he tore the licorice strap in two and held out half to me, his eyes wide, watching me, waiting. The way Roy stared made me uneasy. I snatched the licorice and stuffed it in my mouth all at once. As I chewed, a slow satisfied smile spread across Roy’s face. There was something about that smile that made me stop chewing for a moment. It seemed to intimate something. I had the sinking feeling that he thought we were friends now.
There was no way I wanted to be friends with Roy. He was already the most mocked kid at school. To even be associated with him would mean inviting ridicule upon oneself. Luckily for me, no one noticed Roy’s overture of friendship. Everyone was watching Lou and Susan. The game was over but Lou and Susan’s mouths were still locked together furiously. ‘Susan and Lou are kissing,’ squealed someone.
‘No, they’re not,’ said Aunt Evelyn coldly. ‘They’re merely being overly competitive.’
Aunt Evelyn quickly announced that it was time for the treasure hunt. Lou abruptly broke away from Susan. She’d spied on her mother as she’d laid out the clues. Aunt Evelyn gave Lou a handkerchief. She had licorice all over her chin. The treasure hunt wasn’t a success. Lou and Susan Scott disappeared at the start of the hunt and weren’t seen again until fifteen clues later, sitting where the treasure was supposed to be, but wasn’t.
Aunt Evelyn banned Lou and Susan from the next game. The chocolate game. This was a particular favourite of mine as it involved my two favourite things. Dressing up and eating. The object of the game was to roll a six on the dice, once that was achieved you earned the right to throw on some silly dress-up clothes and then eat as much chocolate with a knife and fork as possible, before someone else threw a six on the dice and foisted you out of the clothes and away from the chocolate.
Luck was on my side. I threw five sixes, though only actually got the knife and the fork to the chocolate three times. Resplendent in Uncle Arthur’s gumboots, an old church hat of Aunt Evelyn’s and a pair of Lou’s witches britches, I lopped off a whole row of chocolate, speared it with the fork and got it into my mouth, two seconds before Gina Turner threw a six. It was always a very exciting game and soon everyone had forgotten the disappointment of the treasure hunt. Aunt Evelyn had generously allowed two king size blocks of chocolate and also kept a few squares in reserve for those children who missed out altogether.
After the chocolate game, it was time for birthday tea. Lou had devised the menu in unsolicited consultation with me. There were Cheerios with tomato sauce, sausage rolls, fairy bread, potato chips, two whole pavlovas and a two-tone jelly. Lou sat at the head of the table and I made sure I sat in close vicinity to one of the pavlovas, which were lavishly decorated with chocolate chips and sliced Chinese gooseberries. Aunt Evelyn hovered about, making sure everyone was helping themselves and not feeling shy. She saw me take my second piece of pavlova and promptly moved the plate down the other end of the table. Luckily, I’d had the foresight to take the largest piece on the plate.
Once everything had been eaten, Aunt Evelyn turned off the lights and dashed into the kitchen. A few seconds later she reappeared bearing the birthday cake with twelve candles burning tentatively. She set the cake down in front of Lou and kissed her on the cheek. Then she began to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ in her commanding voice. Everyone else was so in awe of Aunt Evelyn’s volume that they all just mimed their way through the song.
I could see Lou cringing. She hated it when her mother sang. She always complained that she sang too loudly and drew too much attention to herself and that it was showing off. I could see what she meant. After all it was only ‘Happy Birthday’ and not the finale of The King and I.
When Aunt Evelyn had finished, everyone chorused for Lou to make a wish. She blew the candles out so forcefully that several of them were ejected from the cake. It was a lamington cake which I had advised Lou to request. Aunt Evelyn miscalculated cutting it up and ended up with three extra slices. After everyone had disposed of their first pieces, she offered around seconds. I was first to stick out my plate. I had been waiting for her to offer.
Aunt Evelyn looked at me doubtfully. ‘No, Billy,’ she said firmly, ‘I think one piece is plenty for you. You don’t want to go putting on even more weight.’
I was stunned. I had never been refused food before. No one had ever told me in my entire life that I shouldn’t eat something. In fact, it was quite the opposite. I was always being told I was a growing boy and urged to eat as much as I possibly could. I was so surprised. Then someone giggled and the first flush of humiliation began to creep into my face. I put my plate down and stared at the table cloth. Luckily, everyone was so busy jostling for the last pieces of cake that no one was paying any attention to me. By the time the commotion had passed, I had stopped crying and wiped my eyes on my party hat.
After the cake, Arch Sampson pulled me aside. ‘You gotta help me, Fats. We’re gonna ambush Roy an’ pull his pants down an’ find out what he’s got down there.’
I didn’t like the new name that Arch had come up with for me. I knew I should refuse to help him if he was going to call me names but I was curious to see this man-sized thing between Roy’s skinny legs. ‘Okay,’ I said.
Everyone ran outside to play a game of kiss-tig as the sun went down, before the mothers arrived to collect their sons and daughters. Roy loped along with the others. ‘You lure him over near the drive, behind the hedge,’ instructed Arch. ‘Then I’ll grab him in a headlock an’ you sit on his chest an’ I’ll pull his pants down.’
I sidled up to Roy and told him I’d saved some chocolate for him. ‘Come over by th
e hedge, so no one else sees and grabs it,’ I said.
Roy grinned and I quickly looked away. I felt so treacherous, seeing him so easily pleased and knowing it was a trick. But those finer feelings were a mere twinge, quickly overcome by a more urgent emotion, the thrill of anticipation at what we were going to find. As soon as we got near the hedge, Arch sprang out from within it, tackling Roy rugby style who crashed heavily to the ground. ‘Sit on him Fatty, sit on him,’ Arch yelled.
I plonked myself down on Roy’s chest. I was relieved I didn’t have to look at his face registering this betrayal. Arch pulled down his grey shorts. Underneath he was wearing pale blue briefs, with an iron-on transfer of a leaking tap over his crotch. ‘Water works’ it said. I studied his underwear, wishing my mother would buy ones like that for me. There did seem to be a fairly sizeable bulge in them too, though I couldn’t see any tell-tale hairs creeping over the top of the elastic.
At first Roy stuggled and kicked, but Arch told him to knock it off and surprisingly, he did. I was intrigued. Roy was older than both of us and bigger and shouldn’t have done what two younger boys told him to. It went against the natural hierarchy of things. But it seemed Roy didn’t under stand that. Or perhaps because Mr Schluter worked for Arch’s father, maybe he thought he had to obey Arch the way his father obeyed Old Man Sampson. Roy lay still and Arch yanked down his briefs and let out a whoop. Sure enough he did have a man-size one and a real thatch of pubes. I couldn’t believe that a thirteen year old could have pubes like that. Even Robert Sack, the centre for the Glenora rugby team who everyone was scared to tackle because he was so big, only had a few wispy ones he proudly displayed in the changing room after matches.
Arch jumped up and ran off to tell everybody. I could hear him yelling, urging everyone to hurry up and come and take a look. We were alone. Roy didn’t push me off or punch me. As I stared at what he had down there, I realised I wanted to touch it. I grasped his cock. It lolled there in my hands. I was impressed by its size. It didn’t seem possible that it could get even bigger when it was stiff. I patted it encouragingly and Roy whimpered, a sad little cry.