I can count the friends I’ve made on two fingers. The rest may as well be from another planet. The Martians, I call them – they talk with plums in their mouths, walk with brooms up their bums, and look down on boys like me from the wrong side of town. They don’t need to work hard to get ahead – they’ve got their inheritances to fall back on.
Just because someone’s got more money and lives in a big house that’s not rented from the Church of England, doesn’t mean they’re a better person, even if they are what Mum calls a ‘better class of friend’. I don’t get this whole ‘class’ thing. There are poor people and rich people, and a whole lot in between trying either to get rich or to just put food on the table and make ends meet.
Mac is one of my new mates. His family lives in a mansion on Sydney Harbour with a housekeeper, gardener, swimming pool and a car. Mac never brags about being rich; he seems more embarrassed about it. He’s not like the Martians at all.
Teddy Foster is my other new mate. He’s really different to anyone else I’ve ever met. He comes from a cattle station in Queensland and isn’t used to going to school, wearing shoes, or sitting still on a chair for very long, unless of course he’s eating. Teddy loves food. He even eats my leftover tripe and then looks around for more. He’d much rather be sitting in a saddle and rounding up cattle than sitting behind a school desk all day.
Teddy, Mac and I sleep three in a row in the dorm – just like the Three Bears. That’s what the Martians call us because we always stick together. Teddy’s the tallest and Mac’s the shortest, so I’m in the middle. We walk together, talk together, eat together, pray together, study together and play sport together. We were on the same cricket team until Brother Thomas, who’s also the cricket coach, split us up for talking too much. I couldn’t bat or bowl properly with my arm in plaster but I could catch a ball, no problem, with my left hand.
One afternoon behind the sport shed, Mac, Teddy and I pricked our fingers and exchanged blood – we were officially blood brothers. I’d do anything for Mac and Teddy, and they’d do anything for me.
There’s a common study area at the end of our dorm where we have desks and are supervised by Brother Sebastian every afternoon and evening, before and after dinner. Mac’s a whiz at Arithmetic, Spelling and Latin, and is only very good at every other subject. He always finishes his homework while I’m still stuck on the first page of sums. But since we’ve become blood brothers, Mac’s been ‘helping’ me with my Arithmetic. When he finishes his work, we check to see that Brother Sebastian isn’t looking then swap our exercise books. Mac can write numbers just like me, and just like Teddy as well. We’ve worked out some hand signals to use in class, like deaf people do. It’s too risky to try and swap exercise books in Arithmetic because Brother Felix would be onto us straight away – he has eyes in the back of his head.
Mum and Dad are going to be very impressed with my Arithmetic marks if we can manage to keep this up. I’d get Mac to do some of my other homework as well if I could. The trouble is – his handwriting is worse than mine.