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  And Bungles would reply, “No idea, mate. You tell me!”

  9

  BEST FRIENDS

  In year 8 we have Eddy “Bungles” Moore and Terrence “Roo” King. Bungles’ parents, Bevan and Tanya, were born in Ballarat and had left to take up contracts with a mine in Western Australia. Bevan landed a job as superintendent of the workshop for the huge coal trucks that needed to be serviced on site at regular intervals, and Tanya was employed in the despatch office. They had both come from farming families but many years of drought had dwindled away the size of their parents’ properties; most of the farmers in the area had pushed their kids away from farming to save them the heartaches that they had faced.

  Bungles had an older brother and sister who attended Monash University, and although mining jobs pay well it was still tough coming up with the costly fees that Bevan and Tanya were paying for their kids’ education. Both of Bungles’ parents worked 12-hour shifts with nine days on and five days off and when on site they stayed at well set up camps. They had two properties, one in Perth and the other the family home in Ballarat.

  Bevan and Tanya would fly home once a month to spend time with the kids, and if they couldn’t get back during school holidays due to extra shifts then Bungles would either spend the holidays with Roo or at home with his brother and sister. They had a key to the house and made sure Bungles was well-catered for. Before Bevan and Tanya took up their positions with the mining company they ran their own business doing mechanical repairs for heavy duty trucks and farm machinery. Bevan was an A-grade mechanic and Tanya would take the bookings and work the accounts.

  Bungles loved spending time with his dad and tinkering around on the machinery, and his father was astonished at how quickly he picked it up.

  He would always be saying to Tanya, “The boy’s a natural. It won’t be long before he’s as good as me.”

  And she would reply,’ “As good as you! With the time you’re spending teaching him your skills he’ll be better than you before he turns 18.”

  There was no doubt that Bungles was well on the way to achieving those skills and that was one of the reasons why the club had selected him for membership. We almost didn’t pick him initially because he was often bringing attention to himself – which could also bring attention to our club, and that was something we couldn’t afford. It wasn’t that he purposefully drew attention to himself, but his nickname explains it all. Bungles would trip over anything and everything and accidents were a way of life for him. However, his loyalty and outstanding abilities got him through and he became a club member.

  Roo, Bungles and another year 8 by the name of Talbert Tucker were best mates, and both Roo and Talbert had tried out for the local basketball team, the Ballarat Bandits. Roo grew up on his uncle and aunt’s farm just outside of Ballarat and had learnt to drive tractors and operate farming equipment at a very young age. He adored his Aunty Candice and Uncle Alan and they had been a constant source of encouragement to him.

  His Aunty Candice loved rubbing his jet-black hair, saying, “Well done, mate! Good job!”, although this had become harder and harder as Roo in year 8 stood at 6 feet 2 inches and was still growing. He was definitely a man’s man but the girls in his class absolutely adored him and often commented on his deep brown eyes and dark complexion. They also loved the small horse-shoe shaped scar on his right cheek which he received from the horn of a prize bull he was parading at the local show. The wind had blown the Stetson hat from his head and as he bent to pick it up the bull shied and caught him on the cheek with the tip of its horn.

  Roo received his nickname when the PE teacher had been watching him do lay ups at basketball and commented in front of one of the students, “That’s unbelievable. He can leap like a kangaroo!”

  After that the kids began to call him “Roo Boy”, which eventually became just “Roo”.

  Roo was selected for the Bull Ants Club because he was multi-talented and a jack-of- all-trades. There wasn’t a thing he couldn’t drive and if it broke down he could fix it as well. He was also mature for his age and stronger than anyone I knew, including adults, but there was no doubt his future outside of the club and school lay in his natural ability at basketball. He had three leather basketballs: one at school, one in his room at the boarding house, and one that he kept in the club rooms that he often misplaced. The reason Roo was often losing his basketball in the club rooms was because he wasn’t allowed to take it into certain parts of the club due to him breaking several things while bouncing it off the walls. (These included: one monitor, three light bulbs, one coffee mug, one glass and several ornaments.) As a result, whenever he was where he shouldn’t be with the ball and he heard someone coming he would hide it and later forget where he’d put it.

  Roo’s mother and father, Danielle and Herbert, lived in Lakes Entrance, a small fishing town almost a day’s drive from Ballarat. They wanted Roo to have the best possible education they could give him and Danielle and her sister Candice had attended Benworden as students and knew it was a quality school. Candice and Adam had tried without success to have children of their own so they were only too happy to have Roo stay with them for as long as required and they treated him as if he was their own son, while still respecting his parents’ wishes. Roo often joked to other members of the club that if his mum or aunt knew what was below them when they were at Benworden he doubted that he would have ever attended the school or the boarding house.

  As for Talbert Tucker, his father owned a trucking company just outside of Melbourne and he had made his first million at the age of 35. James was a tall, solid man and was known throughout the region as “Big Jim”. Talbert’s mother, Samantha, had been Big Jim’s childhood sweetheart and had helped build their trucking empire.

  The trucking business had become so large that both Big Jim and Samantha could have had anything their heart desired, except happiness, but sometimes making money and being powerful becomes such an obsession that the real reason for obtaining that sort of lifestyle is forgotten. Happiness, however, is too important to forget.

  Samantha had asked Jim to sell the business because she could see that they had very little time for each other any more and they had begun to grow further and further apart, but Big Jim loved the power that the business gave him and wasn’t ready to budge on the issue.

  Big Jim was a gentle giant and that’s what Samantha loved about him. He had never raised his voice or a hand to her or Talbert, but one day he was in a bad mood after he had had to lay off one of his workers who had been stealing from the company. Jim was devastated. He had known the guy for many years and he was the last person Big Jim would consider to be dishonest, so he was definitely in no mood for the discussion Samantha had planned on his arrival home.

  He had just walked in the door when Samantha said to him, “Jim, I need to talk to you about where we’re going in life. And I need to know if you’ll ever consider giving up the business.”

  She paused and was about to speak again when Big Jim roared at the top of his voice, “Enough! It’s not going to happen, so get over it. And if you can’t accept it, leave!”

  Samantha was stunned and stood there in silence for what seemed like an eternity. Her eyes welled with tears and she turned and walked away. Jim wanted to say he was sorry but his pride got caught in his throat and he remained speechless.

  After a while he felt so uncomfortable in the house that he couldn’t stand the silence anymore, so he headed down to the local drinking hole to try and drown his thoughts. Back at the house Samantha was packing Talbert’s and her bags. This was the last thing she wanted but knew if she stayed things would only get worse.

  Jim and Samantha owned a small hobby farm 40km outside Ballarat and Samantha felt that this would be a good place to raise a young boy. Talbert was six when they moved there and from that time he felt something missing in his life. He was constantly overwhelmed by a need to belong and had no idea of what he needed to belong to, but he always believed th
is craving would be fulfilled one day. All through junior school Talbert joined every sporting and social club he could in order to find that connection but it continued to evade him. However when he knew he was heading off to boarding school he had asked himself, “Could this be what I’ve searched for, or am I just chasing something that doesn’t exist?”

  Talbert got very little sleep the night before his induction into Benworden but that didn’t stop him being up at the crack of dawn. He did his normal chores and fed the dog and the chickens. He thought about how he would miss his daily routine but it couldn’t be helped because he would only be home on weekends now. Talbert’s dog Sam, named after his mum, knew there was something going on and followed him everywhere he went that morning. Even the chickens weren’t their usual clucky selves, but nothing could deter Talbert from his positive frame of mind.

  He wasn’t the only one beginning a new phase in life: his mother had realised that once he was in boarding school she was going to be lonely so she began applying for jobs. It wasn’t long before a tourist company saw her potential and had her promoting their tours all over Australia. She had become so involved in her position that she unintentionally began to neglect Talbert.

  Like his mother and father Talbert loved it when opportunity came knocking and he was going to give boarding his best shot. He was right: this was a new beginning for him and it wasn’t long before he met his two best friends Roo and Bungles. Life had new meaning and his confidence kept growing through year 7, and year 8 proved to be even better. Talbert’s mother and father remained good friends and Talbert, who was forever the optimist, continued to believe that some day they would make a go of it again. This was quite possible as neither of them had taken on a new relationship.

  10

  MOVIES, MOLECULES AND MENTORS

  Last but not least in our club that year were our year 7s, Brian “Star” Martins and Sean “The Professor” Derricks. Brian’s parents lived in Melbourne. His mother was a doctor and his father a fashion designer. Brian’s mother wanted him to be a doctor too but his dream was to become a big star in Hollywood. He was a tall boy for his age and had short, blond, wavy hair and sapphire-blue eyes, and always dressed immaculately.

  When we read through his file we found that he had an IQ of 135, and if that wasn’t enough he also possessed a photographic memory. Once we knew this we could see he would learn quickly from all the other club members as he progressed through the years at Benworden.

  Brian was in awe of Carla and the Hollywood stars she knew. He spent as much time around her as possible, constantly listening to her stories about one star or another which he got her to repeat over and over again, while she would ask him about the latest fashions that were about to hit the market. Brian asked his father to send some photos from recent fashion parades and Carla would get one of the stars to send an autographed photo with remarks like: “To my special friend Brian” written on them. She was like a big sister to him and it not only helped him with his social skills but also contributed to the new life Carla was building for herself.

  Brian was so into acting and fashion that he rarely gave us a glimpse of his intellect, except for the day that Sean was in the science room at school and was about to do something that had got him into trouble fin the past. He was mixing chemicals before properly calculating the effect they may have when combined. We had asked Brian to keep an eye on him during these classes and it turned out that this had been a very good decision.

  Just as Sean was about to pour the contents of one beaker into another Brian stopped him in the nick of time by saying, “You do realise that if you do that most of us in this room will be asphyxiated, don’t you?”

  Sean, still holding the beaker and ready to pour, looked up at Brian and said, “You’re kidding, right? What would you know about chemicals? You’re an actor!”

  Brian held both his hands at shoulder height displaying his palms to Sean and said, “Hey, no offence, but you have two choices: you can either read my notes and make your own deductions from them or you can go ahead and do what you want. But do me a favour, will you?”

  “What’s that?” Sean replied.

  “Just give me a few minutes to get out of the room before you do it, ok?”

  Sean thought Brian was playing a practical joke on him at first but then realised he was deadly serious. He put down the two beakers and said, “Ok, let me have a look at what you’ve got.”

  Brian grabbed the papers from his desk and handed them to Sean and Sean began to peruse them.

  “Hmm, hmm, hmm, interesting. Oh. I see.”

  Brian, still relaxed, said, “Well, what d’you think, brains?”

  Sean slowly lifted his eyes from the papers and said, “You’re much cleverer than you pretend to be, Brian, and I think I’ll consult with you on further projects if you’ll let me. Oh, and by the way, you’re right. We may have needed an ambulance if I’d continued. As much as I hate to say it, thank you.”

  Brian agreed to go over Sean’s notes in the future and incidents like the one that had almost happened never did.

  These sorts of incidents had been a common thing in Sean’s past and he would never have qualified for induction at Benworden if his parents hadn’t called in some favours that were owed to them by some very influential board members at the school.

  He had almost been expelled on several occasions from a very elite private junior school for the intellectually gifted. This wasn’t because he had a “bad boy” reputation, but because of his quest for knowledge and how he went about pursuing it. He was always inventing new gadgets and dabbling in chemistry and he liked to note down the reaction when he mixed two or more chemicals together, sometimes without initially considering possible outcomes.

  Like his fellow year 7 club member he had a very high IQ. In fact, it was higher, and it wasn’t hard to figure out why once you knew his father was a highly noted scientist and his mother an astrophysicist. We all joked about the type of conversations we thought his family might hold around the dinner table of an evening; it’s hard to imagine it to be an average family’s banter.

  Mr Gowdy warned Sean’s parents that if there was the slightest sign of him blowing up the science room or burning holes in tables as he had done in the past, it would mean instant expulsion, but we could see nothing but positives in enlisting Sean as a club member. With the other well-trained minds in the club he would get all the mentoring he required.

  The good always seemed to outweigh the bad at Benworden and most of the teachers there were very helpful and easy to get along with, especially Miss Cathie James and Mr David Neals. They were everyone’s favourites and whenever there was an issue they were always approachable and easy to talk to. More importantly, they would listen non-judgementally and although they didn’t know about the club they could see that Mr Gowdy had it in for all those who were members. I’m not sure if it was some kind of instinct that old Gowdy had for sniffing out our members or whether we unknowingly showed some sort of distaste for the way the man treated people. Either way the feeling was mutual.

  It was plain to see that Miss James and Mr Neals had feelings for each other but they were both too professional to allow this to interfere with their work.

  Miss James taught music and had the voice of an angel. She had thought of becoming a psychologist before she became a teacher and had completed a degree in that subject, but music was her real love and being a music teacher combined both of these talents harmoniously.

  Mr Neals was a science teacher and had been a mining engineer before accepting a teaching position. He was born in the mining town of Emerald in Queensland. His father had been a powder man working with explosives for a local mine site and the two generations before him were also miners. He had always hoped his son would follow in his footsteps.

  When Mr Neals was young, he attended a local boarding school in Rockhampton which was just under 300km from where he lived, and then he went on to Sydney University to do his Master
s in engineering. This was a turning point in his life. While in Sydney he had grown fond of the busyness of the city and when he returned to Emerald to work in the mines with his father he couldn’t adjust back to the isolation and slower country life and longed for the city again.

  His best friend Paul, whom he had met in university, had gone home to Ballarat and had opened up a drilling and machinery business. Mr Neals would fly down for a visit whenever it was possible. He loved Ballarat as it had that home town country feel yet was only under a 100km from Melbourne. When he found out about a position being advertised at the local school he rang to ask them what qualifications they required for him to be eligible. He was pleased to hear that because of the qualifications he had already accumulated there was very little he needed to do to be appointed a position. The other pleasing thing was the school told him they would hire a “fill in” until he had achieved the necessary requirements. Although his father was disappointed he knew his son needed to follow his dreams.

  11

  THE BULLIES OF BENWORDEN

  Like any school, Benworden has its share of bullying, and Wally “Scar” Freeman was the bully at ours. Wally never had a scar but he thought the nickname had a gangster feel to it so he made all his crew call him that. If that wasn’t enough he also made his gang members take on aliases as well.

  He wasn’t very tall. In fact, he was only 5 feet 6 inches and was built like a barrel. He had red hair that looked like tangled string and his face was covered in freckles. Wally’s favourite pastime was walking up the corridor and slamming some poor unsuspecting year 7 or 8 kid into a locker and then giving his freaky mates a high five. The so-called Scar was in my class but rarely picked on anyone the same age as himself, and if he did it was only when he had the backup of his four henchmen.