The Trouble with Sauce Read online

  ‘Are you looking up my skirt?’ she said.

  ‘No.’ Nathaniel laughed. ‘Are they nylon?’

  ‘Yeah, so?’

  ‘I’m going to show you what they’re made of.’

  Nathaniel lifted the cans to reveal two jars of clear liquid.

  ‘Poo!’ A chemical smell wafted over the class. It was a day for strong smells.

  ‘Yeah, that’s definitely what Anastasia’s tights smell like!’ Boris said and everyone laughed.

  Nathaniel didn’t mind. He could see they were all paying more attention to him than they had ever paid to Mr Needham.

  ‘This is a hexamethylenediamine solution,’ he said, holding one jar away from himself as he poured. He’d put some food colouring into the liquid to turn it blue.

  ‘Ooh long word! Thanks, Brainiac,’ Mike said and nudged Boris.

  ‘Shhh,’ said someone behind him. Nathaniel grinned.

  ‘And this is sebacoyl chloride.’ He poured the liquid from the second jar into the first, where it sat on top of the blue. The class leant forward to see better.

  Nathaniel breathed deeply. This was the hard part. He picked up the tweezers, dipped them into the jar and plucked at the layer in between the two liquids. With his other hand he held the paint roller by its handle. Lifting the tweezers slowly, he drew a thread out of the liquid and placed it on the fluffy cover. Putting down the tweezers, he took the edge of the paint roller and began to turn it round, winding up a thread out of the liquid.

  The class was rapt as Nathaniel carefully wound up more thread. ‘And that’s how nylon is made,’ he said. The class pressed in closer as the thread of nylon kept appearing like magic out of the two liquids.

  ‘That’s so cool,’ someone said.

  Boris couldn’t believe that they would get so caught up in stinking chemicals. ‘Yeah, right. You’re watching Brainiac make a pair of tights for himself. What next — lipstick? Nail polish?’

  Nobody laughed; they ignored him.

  Boris wasn’t going to stand for that. He pushed hard at the back of the group and they all jolted forward and knocked the bench, rocking the front legs and tipping it up. The jars toppled over. Nathaniel leapt back as the chemicals sprayed everywhere. He jumped as far as he could, but the liquids splashed over his pants.

  ‘Oh look,’ said Boris, ‘Brainiac’s wet himself!’

  Everyone shrieked with laughter. Boris grinned. For a moment the class had been Nathaniel’s, but now he had taken them back. He liked the sound of laughing.

  ‘Remove your trousers immediately!’ Mr Needham was worried about his safety.

  Nathaniel closed his eyes. He couldn’t believe that his experiment had gone so horribly wrong.

  ‘This instant!’ Mr Needham shouted.

  Without opening his eyes, Nathaniel undid his pants and removed them. The class howled and whistled. Mr Needham grabbed the pants, threw them into a sink and turned the taps on.

  Nathaniel stood in front of the class in his underwear, watching his pants get soaked. It was a complete disaster.

  ‘You can wear these.’ Mr Needham handed him a pair of footy shorts that had been left in the lab weeks ago. They were about four sizes too big and almost reached his small knees. Nathaniel had to pull the string tight and tie a massive bow.

  The rest of the period was taken up with Mr Needham shouting at people to get them to be quiet. Using a whiteboard, he tried to explain the experiment, but no one was interested. Nathaniel sat silently on his stool, looking down at his white legs. It was a relief when the bell finally went for lunch and he could hide somewhere to eat his sandwich in peace.

  As everyone charged out, Nathaniel saw Jonty. He was wearing his shorts, too. After crawling through the garbage, he had chosen to put his soccer shorts on instead of his stinking pants.

  ‘Snap,’ said Jonty with a grin.

  Nathaniel couldn’t see anything to grin about. They didn’t look the same at all. Jonty had big strong legs and looked like he was born to wear shorts. Somehow they even looked good with his shirt and tie, whereas Nathaniel just looked stupid.

  CHAPTER 4

  MISERY MALL

  Other than the noise of the kids, the main sounds you could hear at lunchtime were the rings and pings of all the mobile phones. The students weren’t allowed them in class, but the minute class was over, the whole school was desperate to see what messages they’d got.

  Except for Prune. She didn’t have a mobile. Her parents believed they exposed the brain to harmful radio waves.

  ‘A mobile is a form of mind control, believe me,’ her mother had said the last time Prune asked for one.

  Prune sat on the long steps outside the school library with her lunch on her knee: a small tub of sprouted mung beans with organic tomato and tofu cut up into it. She wasn’t allowed to eat the food in the canteen. Everyone else at the school thought the canteen food was horribly healthy, but not Prune’s parents. It wasn’t nearly organic enough.

  Most of the canteen food ended up as weapons. She watched as blood bombs hurtled past — bread rolls squashed into balls with tomato sauce squeezed into the middle. Whenever a bomb hit anyone, the bread fell apart and splattered them with sauce. Prune had worked out that the library steps were the quietest part of the school grounds. Nobody liked sitting there, so she could relax and avoid being a target. She watched two of the other girls in her class, Anastasia and Miranda. They stood there, texting on their phones as they shared Anastasia’s earbuds and nodded in time to a Pink track.

  In the blur of footballs, frisbees and canteen items flying around, Boris Brockman launched a blood bomb from the other side of the yard. Without thinking Prune leapt up and sent her own lunch scattering over the steps.

  ‘Look out!’ she shouted, but the girls were too busy singing to Pink to pay attention. She lunged at Anastasia, pushed her out of the way and the bomb missed — but splattered onto Miranda’s leg instead.

  ‘Yeuch!’ Miranda tried to shake off the red gooey mess on her knee. ‘What did you do that for, you stupid cow?’ she yelled at Prune.

  ‘And you hurt my shoulder!’ Anastasia added.

  ‘I shouted, but you didn’t hear me. Boris Brockman threw a blood bomb.’

  ‘Newsflash. I think we know that already!’ Miranda pointed to her leg.

  ‘Sorry,’ Prune mumbled, but she brightened up quickly. Perhaps the girls would be interested in the group after school. After all, who wouldn’t be interested in auras? ‘You coming to the Auras Interest Group after school?’ she said.

  Anastasia sighed and tossed her hair as if she was trying to shake Prune off. ‘I have no interest in auras. I don’t even know what one is,’ she said.

  ‘It’s a colour that hangs round your body, like an energy field,’ Prune explained. ‘They can tell a lot about your personality, but only a few people can see them.’

  ‘Yeah, well the only things I can see hanging around your body are the horrible split ends on your hair. Go away!’ Miranda snapped.

  Prune went back to the library steps and looked at what had been her lunch. She decided to get a salad roll from the school canteen. Her mother wouldn’t like it, but her mother probably wouldn’t even notice if she came home with a Big Mac stuck to her head. Thinking about her mother’s reaction, Prune let the taste of the salad roll cheer her up and then went off to History.

  She didn’t care whether Anastasia and Miranda were coming to the Auras Interest Group. When she thought about it, she really didn’t want them to be there. She didn’t even like them. As she sat in her place, she breathed slowly, centred herself and meditated for a minute on the reason she was trying to please people she didn’t like. The only answer that popped into her head was that she was lonely and wanted some friends. She shrugged that answer off. Who in their right mind would want to be friends with Anastasia Micklethwaite?

  ‘That’s it. I won’t bother next time,’ she said to herself.

  ‘I wasn’t aware you ever bothered,
Ms de Luca!’ said Mr Woffinden, the History teacher. He had arrived and begun the class during her meditation. Prune resolved to make sure she didn’t say her thoughts out loud again.

  When the bell for the end of the day finally went, Prune rushed off to the Auras Interest Group. The announcement said that anyone interested should be at the café in Misery Mall at 4.15.

  Misery Mall was the school’s name for the local shopping centre because it was such a dump. Kids hung out there because there was nowhere else to go after school, but they all said they hated it. There was a Coles supermarket, a Bakers Delight, a stinky butcher’s, a boring old ladies’ clothes shop called Sue Sue C Lady Fashion and a two-dollar shop. There was a café, but no one from the school would be seen dead in there. It was full of the old ladies who bought the clothes in Sue Sue C Lady Fashion. The organisers of the group had probably chosen the café because it would be empty and quiet.

  When Prune arrived at Misery Mall, a couple of Year 11 boys were being marched out of the supermarket by the security guard. He had caught them scattering a pack of frozen prawns on the ground and kicking them under the shelves so they’d get completely rotten. The guard was being jeered by the boys’ mates. Prune put her head down and walked quickly past them and into the café. There was one old lady at the front slurping a cup of tea very loudly. Someone else was sitting right at the back, behind one of the dusty fake pot plants. Prune was sure neither of them was there for the Auras Interest Group. She slipped into a seat and suddenly felt embarrassed. If anyone from her class saw her in the café, there would be no end to the abuse. She grabbed the big plastic menu, set it up on the table and hid behind it.

  After a few minutes she looked to up to see if anyone else had arrived. Just one other person had come in and was hiding behind a menu. It had to be the organiser. Prune peeked around the side of her menu to check that no one was looking. Then holding it in front of her face, she shot over to the table and sat down with her face still hidden. ‘Is this the Auras Interest Group?’ she asked.

  ‘No, I’m here for the new Advanced Physics Study Group,’ a boy replied. The voice sounded familiar.

  She lowered her menu slightly, just as Nathaniel Bennett looked over the top of his.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ they said, both dropping their cover. The second the menus hit the table, they heard a chorus of cheers and applause in the mall outside.

  They looked at each other, gulped and turned bright red. They had been set up. Someone had sent Nathaniel a MySpace notice about the Physics group. They both turned to look at the crowd of kids in the mall. It seemed like half their year was there. And right in the middle, pointing and laughing, were Boris Brockman, Jonty Townsend and Mike Higgins.

  Boris was almost hysterical. ‘Ooh look, the Brainiac and the Wrinkle are on a date!’ he screamed. ‘Just think of the baby they’ll make. It’ll be able to count how many wrinkles it’s got before it’s a month old!’

  ‘This is feeble-minded cretinism,’ Nathaniel declared. His words caused even more laughter.

  ‘Sorry we’re not clever enough to understand!’ Boris shouted.

  ‘Come on,’ Nathaniel muttered to Prune. She seemed to shrink even further into her long hair.

  ‘Just follow me.’ They walked smartly out of the café and through the crowd of kids in the mall.

  ‘Is that your girlfriend?’ someone called out.

  ‘Got her pregnant, have you?’

  ‘Go on, hold his hand!’

  Prune stared down at the ground as she walked out, looking up just enough to see Nathaniel’s feet. He was still wearing the large shorts from Science class and his small thin legs had gone red, as if his whole body was flushed with embarrassment. Once outside, they looked at each other. Nathaniel sighed. Prune knew exactly how he felt. They said nothing and headed off in opposite directions.

  CHAPTER 5

  TWO DOLLARS

  ‘That was awesome!’ Mike punched Boris on the shoulder. ‘Haven’t laughed so much in years!’

  ‘I couldn’t believe they fell for it.’ Boris laughed.

  ‘Yeah, amazing,’ Jonty added. He waited for Boris to acknowledge that it had been his idea in the first place. He didn’t. It didn’t really matter. It had been Jonty’s idea, but they had created the MySpace interest groups together and sent the notifications out — so they’d both had a share in the stunt.

  As they were thinking about what they’d do next, a major problem appeared. The crowd of students started to move off and in the distance there was Henry the Octopus, the guy whose ball Jonty had kicked through the science lab window. He was looking for trouble and he had his mates with him.

  ‘We’re stuck,’ Boris muttered. The only way out of the mall was past Henry and his gang.

  ‘Quick! The two-dollar shop,’ Jonty said. ‘We’ll hide there till they go away.’

  The three of them bolted inside.

  ‘Are you planning to buy something?’ the shop owner shouted after them. ‘This isn’t a playground, you know!’

  Ignoring him, they charged down the aisle to the left and hid at the end by the children’s toys.

  ‘Get down,’ hissed Jonty.

  The three of them ducked down, sure that they were well hidden.

  ‘Did they see us?’ Boris asked.

  ‘Dunno,’ said Mike. ‘Maybe.’

  Crouching as low as they could, they waited.

  ‘I wish this was a real hammer.’ Boris took a plastic toy off the shelf.

  ‘How much do you think it is?’ Mike whispered. The other two clapped their hands over their mouths and pressed their lips together. Their favourite game in the shop was taking something up to the counter and asking how much it was. The answer was always two dollars. Whoever took the most things up and asked the price without bursting out laughing was the winner.

  The last thing they needed now was a fit of the giggles. Suddenly they heard someone in the next aisle.

  ‘This shop’s pathetic. What are we doing here?’ The giggling stopped. It was Henry the Octopus.

  ‘Those Year 7 brats. I saw them come in here.’ That was one of his mates.

  After that — nothing. No words; no movement. Jonty and his friends waited and waited, but still couldn’t hear anything. Had Henry walked out?

  Jonty looked at his friends. ‘I’ll go and check,’ he mouthed at them. Boris nodded.

  Jonty crawled on his hands and knees to the end of the aisle and to the next corner. He peeped around and jerked his head straight back, but it was too late. Henry the Octopus was waiting for him. His arm shot out and grabbed Jonty’s collar. One of the other boys yanked his tie around and held it out like a leash for Henry to take.

  ‘Good boy!’ Henry said and dragged him along the aisle to the art products. Henry’s mates pounced and pinned Jonty to the ground.

  ‘Ooh, pretty!’ Henry announced and tipped a giant bottle of two-dollar pink glitter all over Jonty’s thick brown hair.

  ‘Good little doggy!’ Henry rubbed the glitter hard into Jonty’s scalp, but Jonty didn’t move or speak. He could probably have fought them off, but it wasn’t worth it. Besides, the longer they focussed on him, the better chance Boris and Mike had of escaping. Jonty hoped they’d had the sense to sneak out of the shop while all this was going on.

  ‘Walkies!’ Henry tugged at Jonty’s tie and made him walk over to the counter on his hands and knees.

  ‘Hey, you kids, I’ve called Centre Security. Get out of my shop now!’ The owner glowered at Henry and held his phone up.

  ‘What are they going to do?’ Henry sneered.

  ‘They’ll throw you out for a start and break some bones while they’re at it, I hope!’

  The big boys looked at each other. It wasn’t worth the risk.

  ‘C’mon!’ Henry shoved Jonty against the shelf and ran outside, followed by his mates.

  Once he was sure Henry had gone, Jonty stood up. He shook his head and sent a shower of glitter everywhere. He was
sore and covered in scratches, but Boris and Mike had managed to escape. That was something, anyway.

  He shuffled over to the exit.

  ‘Hey, you better pay for that glitter!’ The owner came out from behind the counter and stopped him.

  ‘But —’

  ‘No buts! Your school is a disgrace. You’re like animals, you kids. You’ve got no discipline. Someone’s going to pay for that glitter and you’re the only one left.’

  Jonty shrugged. ‘How much?’ he asked with a sly smile.

  The owner scowled and snatched the two-dollar coin from his hand.

  Jonty walked out of the store and back towards the mall entrance, shaking his head to get rid of all the glitter. Most of the kids had gone home now, so at least no one would see him with this pink stuff in his hair.

  But as he walked past the café, one person did see him. The man who had been sitting right down the back. When Prune and Nathaniel left, he had moved forward to get a better view of the two-dollar shop.

  And he had seen everything that went on. He knew exactly what was going to happen, after he did the usual monitoring of his students on MySpace. Mr Foster, the Mannington High principal, always liked to know what they were up to.

  He took his glasses off and stroked the long hair of his eyebrows. Year 7 were playing up. Their behaviour was atrocious and they could well be the worst Year 7 Mannington High had ever seen.

  He put his glasses back on and smiled. ‘Perfect,’ he said to himself. ‘Absolutely perfect.’

  CHAPTER 6

  TAKING STEPS

  The teachers stood with their arms folded, waiting for the principal to walk in and start their staff meeting. It was Friday and they were exhausted. Through the windows they could hear the sounds of the children as they arrived for school. Already there was screaming, crying and arguing and it was getting louder. In the staffroom there was the repeated sound of tutting — the teachers were fed up. The behavior in this school wasn’t good enough.

  Suddenly there was a loud smash and those near the window jumped and covered their heads as a rugby ball flew in and glass shot everywhere.