Scrambled (3 page)

‘As far as that,’ he said, pointing at the crag.

Froggy started them off, but Lyndon cheated anyway. After a bit he got cocky, and turned round, flicking the wide Vs at Davidde. He hit a pothole and veered across Davidde’s path. Davidde expertly avoided him and took advantage, reaching the Black Rider two lengths ahead of Lyndon. Lyndon took it very badly.

The Black Rider beckoned Davidde over. Davidde rode over and stopped.

The Black Rider slowly raised the visor.

All was dark.

As it opened, Davidde could see that amazingly, instead of two eyes there were two…

‘Scotch eggs! Dai, I got us some scotch eggs. For a change, like.’

It was his father back with some tea.

4

It was Assembly. The head was on stage before anyone arrived. He stood behind the lectern as the hall filled and as everyone sang the hymn.

‘Thank you, Mr Mantovani, for that lovely rendition of ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’, and thank you, Year 10, for that memorable dubstep breakdown halfway through. We shan’t forget that in a hurry.’

He leaned over with his elbows on the lectern and his right hand on his chin while Year 10 unplugged the drum machine and put down their recorders.

‘They tried their best. And that reminds me a bit of Wilfred Sprocket. He was a hell of a boy was Wilf, up to allsorts. And he had a gift. Like Year 10 by there. Except he wasn’t a musician, he was
a dancer. To be exact, he was a tap dancer. Now I know what you’re thinking – how on earth do you dance on a tap?!’

Nobody was thinking that, especially the staff, who rolled their eyes as one.

‘Well, I’ll tell you. Tap dancing is a special kind of dancing where you have a metal piece on your shoe, and it makes a sound like this.’

He moved from behind the lectern and flicked his right foot. It made a clop sound on the stage. Then he flicked his left foot, and that also made a clop sound.

‘Watch this now,’ he said.

He started by slowly clip-clopping around the stage, flicking his feet and waving his arms energetically. Then he got faster and Miss Jones and Mr Graves, the Games teachers, exchanged glances, shaking their heads slowly with their mouths wide open in horror. Their mouths gaped even more as the Head approached the lectern and pulled out a cane which he held over his head, and then tapped on the stage as a part of the performance. After two minutes of energetic hardcore tap, the Head clapped his hands and stopped with his arms spread, breathing heavily
through his sweaty face, eyeballing his audience, waiting for the applause.

When there was none, he put down his cane, wiped his face with his hanky and took his place back behind the lectern.

‘Tough gig,’ he mumbled, and went back to his notes.

‘Now, even though Wilf had a gift, he didn’t have it easy. In school all the boys who liked football and rugby used to make fun of Wilf, especially as he had sold his togs so he could buy tap shoes, and he had to wear these in Games lessons. Well, you can imagine, can’t you…’

The Head mimed Wilf acrobatically slipping over in the mud.

‘It was like Bambi On Ice. And as if it wasn’t bad enough being picked on by the other boys, he was picked on by the staff as well. Teachers then weren’t as nice as they are now. They didn’t know what to do with a boy that wouldn’t stop tap dancing.

‘Anyway Wilf left school and joined a local dance troupe, then he got noticed and taken to Cardiff. He danced all over Wales, and then started dancing in London. He was the talk of the town – no one danced like our Wilf!

‘Now, I know what you’re thinking – where could he go from there? What happened to Wilf?

‘Wilf got invited to dance in New York, in Harlem, the capital of tap. He would sail over in a cruise liner and amaze everyone with his remarkable butt-leg coordination. What could possibly go wrong? What indeed?

‘I’ll tell you what. The cruiser he was travelling on was the Titanic and he drowned. He did manage to get into one of the lifeboats, but nerves got the better of him and he started tap dancing in fright and went through the floor – it was only made of balsa wood. Nobody ever saw him again, but his memory lives on, and I think he can be an example to us all – not in the way he effectively killed himself and everybody else on the lifeboat – but in how we should all use our gifts to achieve our potential. Which brings me to this young man here…’

The Head pointed at a stranger no one had noticed before. He was standing at the side of the hall where the staff watched over their form groups.

‘I’d like to ask him to the stage, because he has an announcement that could help some of
you achieve your potential, like Wilf. Hopefully without drowning…’

The man made his way to the front.

He didn’t just walk, he swaggered, rolling his shoulders and pouting his lips. He had a pork-pie hat on and shades, even though it was belting down with rain outside. He was wearing the skinniest possible jeans, so tight that he clearly found it hard to bend his legs. With his massive trainers, it looked like he was walking on two mutant golf clubs. He was carrying an expensive smart phone which he tapped as he walked. He carried on tapping on the stage while everyone waited for him. He finished, looked at the phone, laughed at what he had written then put it in his pocket. He wore a crumpled suede jacket, and a shirt under it that was open just above the belly button. He didn’t look like he was from the area.

‘Hi. I’m Nathaniel Grimes, yeah?’

He didn’t sound like he was from the area either. Almost everything he said was a question.

‘You all like television, yeah? The telly, the TV, the goggle-box, whatever you call it in this hole, yeah?’

Some nodded.

‘Well, I’m from TV, yeah, and I’m gonna put one of you on it.’

He took off his shades and started chewing one of the arms.

‘Who wants to be on telly, yeah?’

Many hands went up.

‘But not just anyone. Who likes singing?’

Loads of hands went up, including Eira Scoggins, her eyes wide with excitement. She’d auditioned for a TV talent show before. She was convinced that the only reason she didn’t get selected was that she’d bitten one of the other contestants for looking at her funny.

‘That’s great. But I’m not looking for singers.’

Eira Scoggins pulled back her lips and bared her wonky teeth at Grimes. He put his shades back on.

‘Who likes dancing, yeah?’

A few hands went up uncertainly.

‘Yeah? Well, that’s so last year I can’t believe you’d admit to it. Sad.’

He took his shades off again, now that Eira had put her teeth away.

‘Now, I know there’s something you guys like, something real, something now. Who likes bikes?’

Hands went up again.

‘I’m not talking about sissy pushbikes here. Anyone can ride one of them. I’m talking about off-road, I’m talking about scramblers, I’m talking dirt-bikes, I’m talking Motocross!’

Lyndon and the boys looked at each other. Slowly Lyndon raised his arm, and as he did so the rest of his boys did the same.

‘That’s it, yeah, the real men!’

Davidde felt that he shouldn’t really put his hand up. He’d only had his bike a little while, and wasn’t really used to riding it. He worried what the teachers would think now that he had a bike, and he worried that others would think he was trying to fit in.

But then he thought again. He’d bought the bike, it was his, he rode it, so he was into scrambling. Everyone had to start somewhere. He was fed up of worrying what everyone else thought. He was going to put up his hand.

So he did.

Straight away he was aware of Lyndon looking over and saying, ‘Look at Dai’, and sniggering, but Davidde didn’t care. He was committed.

‘That’s great, lads, yeah? Now, I can’t say too much about it at present, but next week we’re
having a race, and whoever wins is going to take part in the show. Come and see me after assembly, yeah, and I’ll give you the details, yeah? Yeah.’

The Head walked on and said, ‘Thank you very much Mr Grimes, yeah?’

He was very impressionable.

After assembly Lyndon and his boys crowded around Grimes and bombarded him with questions. They were normally so quick to make fun of people who volunteered to do things for school that not many people volunteered to do anything at all. Davidde thought about how they were usually so keen to look cool, and yet here they were acting like five year olds. Davidde would have been warmed by the spectacle if he hadn’t been afraid they were going to turn around and beat him up.

‘Guys, guys, yeah, like I said I can’t say too much about it. Just read the flyer, yeah, and I’ll see you next week, yeah? Yeah.’

He handed out glossy postcard-sized flyers to all of Lyndon’s gang, and to others standing around, and as he made his way to the yard he put one in Davidde’s hand.

Davidde read the flyer.

The flyer was snatched out of his hand. It was Lyndon.

‘He’s gorra scrambler and now he thinks he’s hard, boys.’

They all laughed. They’d stopped being five year olds and started being a danger again.

‘I might have a go next Friday, why not?’

‘I might have a go next Friday,’ mimicked Lyndon, using a girl’s voice. ‘Tell you what, Dai, I’ll give you a race tonight, boy, see if you’re up to it. After school, down the Rec.’

Davidde felt himself blushing, but he had to meet the challenge.

‘OK, why not?’

Lyndon moved closer to him, raised his hand and tapped Davidde’s face three times, then held his cheek between his thumb and finger.

‘I’ve heard your old man was a bit good in his time.’

Davidde looked down at the floor, nodding, feeling his eyes stinging.

Lyndon moved in even closer so he only had to whisper.

‘But you don’t ride like him. Do you know who you ride like, butt?’

Davidde shook his head.

Lyndon got so close Davidde could smell his faggy breath.

‘Your mother. Your dead mam.’

Their eyes met, then Lyndon pushed Davidde’s face away and laughed as it bounced off a double-glazed window. The others looked at Davidde with disdain as they all dispersed and went to first lesson.

Davidde went to English with Mr Rastud. When he saw Kaitlinn flouncing up to the teacher with two sides of perfect handwriting he realised he hadn’t done his homework. This was a new sensation for Davidde and he feared the worst.
Mr Rastud had set the work at the end of the last lesson. It had been a disjointed lesson that had started on poetry, then went into a twenty-five minute rant about the misuse of the word ‘decimate’. He used pictures of stickmen on the board and covered the front row in spit as he went red with furious anger. He clenched his fist and grimaced as he slammed the board. He would have continued, but caught sight of his watch. He fell back into his chair and put his head in his hands.

‘Do me a story. Eight hundred to a thousand words. By Thursday.’

‘What about, Sir?’ someone asked.

Mr Rastud looked out of the window for a long time.

‘How can I tell you what your story’s about? It’s your story.’

‘I’m rubbish at stories, Sir.’ It was little Matthew Pie. ‘Can you give me a title or topic or something?’

‘Ducks.’

‘Ducks?’

Matthew’s face crinkled with confusion.

‘What kind of ducks?’

‘Hopeless ducks. They’ve forgotten how to swim and fly. They are rubbish.’

‘Why have they forgotten?’

‘They’re always drunk.’

‘Why are they drunk?’

‘Look, I could tell you, but I’d have to decimate you after. Work it out for yourself.’

Next lesson Matthew seemed to have worked it out quite well. Mr Rastud asked him to read out his story. It turned out that the ducks lived near a brewery and it was leaking beer. Because of their erratic behaviour they became celebrities in the town, and then got taken on a tour. But because they were away from the factory they weren’t drunk anymore, so people got bored with them. The evil man who’d taken them on tour decided that he could get his money back by selling them to be eaten, but they escaped in the nick of time and flew into duck rehab. The story was called Cold Turkey for the Ducks.

Davidde and the class had been lulled by Matthew’s story and it got a well-deserved round of applause. Mr Rastud went round a few more people, listening to opening paragraphs, or in some cases the whole story. Davidde tried to make himself as insignificant as possible. He thought that if Mr Rastud didn’t call his name
out, he could slip away at the end of the lesson and say he forgot to hand it in. He was scared Mr Rastud would find out he hadn’t done his story, and he’d have a row, and get detention, and have a letter home (not that his father would be that bothered, it was just the shame of it). There would be countless awful things if Mr Rastud found out that he hadn’t done his homework.