What followed was two hours of practising/rehearsing/playing/messing and time-wasting. Sumo fought off make-believe old men/young men/kids/women with prams/aliens/ogres and even a knight. He always shouted to them that he had pepper spray, but in none of the scenarios where he was forced to fight did he even pretend to spray the can. Walker decided that Jim Roland’s granny was a pincher. When I tried to tie him up, he pinched me really hard and told me I was a cheeky pup in a croaky old voice. After that she was a kick-boxer, a stuntwoman and a ninja. It was really annoying. He made it impossible to tie him up with all his jumping around. We fought about it.
‘Take it seriously!’ I shouted.
‘I am taking it seriously. I’m supposed to make it difficult,’ he said.
‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘but not impossible. She’s an old woman – there’s no way she can do the Karate Kid kick!’
Charlie picked up a book and threw it at Walker’s head.
‘Ouch!’ he screamed, rubbing his head.
‘Next time I’ll knock your block off,’ she said to him before turning to me. ‘Now practise tying him up. You have to secure him without hurting him. She’s an old woman after all.’
I nodded. It annoyed me that she was so bossy, but I was also kind of impressed. She went back to practising opening her dad’s locked box. It was similar to the one in the back of Rolands’. She opened it, poured the money into a bag, ran to the door. She kept doing it over and over again. It was weird to watch. She seemed happy when she did it in less than ten seconds.
‘Don’t know about the rest of you, but I’ll be in and out,’ she said.
We split up at six. I walked up my road and saw Johnny J leaving my house with his guitar slung on his shoulder. I ran to catch up to him.
‘How did it go?’ I asked.
‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ he said.
‘OK.’
‘You?’
‘Well, if we get chased by aliens or Jim Roland’s granny turns out to be a ninja it won’t be a problem,’ I said.
‘Should I be worried?’ he said.
‘Nah.’ He should be. I was. My stomach started to gurgle loudly. We both ignored it. ‘We’re going to meet in the forest after dinner, on our bikes, to cycle to Rolands’ and back and time it.’
‘Good idea. I’ll be there.’
Rich had asked Johnny J to rehearse again after dinner, but Johnny J told him to stuff it, and as he had nothing to bribe Johnny J with, he smiled and told him he’d see him tomorrow morning. Poor Johnny J.
‘Are they still as bad?’ I asked when we got to his door.
He just shook his head sadly.
‘See you later,’ I said, and I ran home because I suddenly felt an intense need to go to the loo again! Oh no! I ran with my legs closed, knees together and my bum pinched tight.
‘You all right, son?’ my dad asked as I pushed past him in the hallway and held the seat of my pants as I ran upstairs.
‘No,’ I shouted. I tried to open the toilet door. It was locked.fn1
‘Noooooooooooo!’ I screamed. ‘Get out, get out, get out!!!’ I banged on the door with both my fists.
I could hear Rich laughing from inside the bathroom.
‘Guts at you again, Jeremy?’ he sang out sweetly as I banged and screamed and cried a little as I felt the red-hot lava fall into my pants and dribble down my leg.
‘You better get up there, Debbie,’ my dad shouted. ‘Jeremy’s destroying himself again.’
My mam was up the stairs like a bullet. ‘Get out of the bathroom right this second,’ she screamed at Rich. He opened the door, smiling. I stumbled in, pulling at my trousers. My mam stood outside while my insides fell into the toilet. The smell was horrendous. Trying to take my jeans off without getting poo on my legs was horrific. I was crying loudly by the time I was showering it off. All the while my mam was outside the door saying things like, ‘OK, son, you’re all right now, Mammy’s here. No panic.’ At one point she sang ‘You’ve got a friend’, which was her favourite song to sing at parties. When I appeared in the doorway, she took one look at me.
‘You’re very pale.’ She felt my forehead. ‘You don’t have a temperature.’
‘I’m fine,’ I mumbled, conscious that my dirty jeans and pants were in the bath. I tried to wash them but I kept gagging.
‘Are you stressed?’ she said, and I couldn’t admit to that because if I did she’d ask me why I was stressed and I’d crack and tell her everything.
‘No. I think I ate something bad at Sumo’s,’ I said.
‘Not that Spam rubbish?’ she said.
‘Yeah, Spam,’ I lied.
‘Oh God!’ she said. ‘Go to bed. I’ll open a bottle of 7Up.’
‘Ah no, I’m grand,’ I lied, genuinely fearing my own death. The stuff that came out of me!!!!
‘You are not grand,’ she said, marching me to my bedroom. ‘But don’t you worry – everything will be fine. Some flat 7Up will sort you right out by morning.’ In case of emergency, my mother always kept an open bottle of flat 7Up in the fridge.fn2
I couldn’t go to bed and drink flat 7Up all night. I had to meet the lads in the forest and time a test route to Rolands’ Garage, but my mam had me in my pyjamas before I could argue and tucked up in bed sipping flat 7Up. Escaping from my room would be as hard as escaping any jail in any country in the world. It was a disaster!