12 Match

Match

I always loved it when September came along. Not because the sweltering summer sun had finally buggered off to somewhere else. That was me being “ironic,” as I live in Scotland, which is not Papua New Guinea or Torremolinos. A hee-hee moment! No, I loved September because it was the time of the year that men became men and all the girls did arts and crafts. September was when THE SOCCER SEASON started in school. And I, Dylan Mint, was a first-on-the-team-sheet key member of the Drumhill School Soccer Team.

First game: local rivals Shawhead.

Bring it on.

If you didn’t want to do arts and crafts or pretend-reading in the library, students could watch the game and cheer like maddies for the Drumhill boys. It was that silly bugger Amir who egged me on to ask Michelle Malloy if she wanted to watch me playing the game.

“It’s perfect,” Amir said.

“Not sure, amigo—the whole soccer thing wasn’t part of my master plan.”

“‘Put my master plan into action,’ you said, so time to get them out.” Amir wiggled his fingers, all ten of them, in front of my face, like he was planting his thoughts in my brain.

“Amir, she’ll see my legs.”

“So?”

“So there’s no hair on them.”

“That’s ’cause you’re a white boy.”

“She’ll think I’m, like, twelve or something.”

“Twelve isn’t so bad—you know what they say about twelve-year-olds . . .” Amir winked and smiled.

“No, what?”

“Erm . . . I do-do-don’t know, really.”

“You’re not helping, Amir. It’s okay for you—your legs are like an orangutan’s; girls like seeing those, not two baldy wee twigs like mine.”

And then, without any strategy or an Action Jackson plan, the chance came.

Location: outside the Senior Toilets.

Activity: I’d just done my biz (pee). Michelle Malloy was just going (hopefully for a number one. The image of Michelle Malloy doing a number two was mega distressing and a potential deal-breaker).

Heart condition: my heart didn’t have much time to think about it, but torpedoed into action as soon as I spied her.

Hands: moist.

Hair: okay. I fixed it in the bogs’ mirror, pulling it over my eyes. I was trying to get it cooler, like some of the dudes at the normal school. Twitching shifted my hair away from my eyes. No hands! One–nil Tourette’s.

She came toward me without any warning. Like an angel out of the mist.

“Hi, Michelle.”

“What are you up to, Mint?”

“Erm . . . noth—”

“Hanging around the bogs, are we now?”

“No . . . I was . . . I was . . . DOIN’ A SHITE . . . NO. I wasn’t, Michelle, honestly. I was doing a pee. I was only doing a pee. BIG GIANT SHITE.” It blasted out of my mouth. I couldn’t stop it happening.

“Okay, so you’ve done your piss, now piss off.”

I laughed at Michelle Malloy’s joke. “Piss off, that’s good,” I said.

“What planet are you on, moon man?”

“Erm, planet Earth.” I felt for Green in my pocket and rubbed him as hard as I could.

“What in the name of fuck are you doing there, Mint?”

“What? Where?”

“There!” Michelle Malloy pointed to the pocket where Green was. “Mint, if you’re fiddling with yourself in front of me, I swear to God I’ll cut that fucker off and shove it and you back up your mother.”

Wow! I didn’t know how she’d do that, but it sounded painfully sore for everyone involved.

“No, it’s my stone, Michelle. Look, it’s only a wee stone. See?” I took Green out of my pocket.

“You better get that fucking thing out of my face, Mint, if you want to keep your nose.”

“I was just wondering if you’re going to watch the first game of the season next week. We’re playing Shawhead. DICK-CHEWER SHITE-DOER . . . Shit, sorry, Michelle.”

“You want me to watch you playing soccer, Mint?”

“Yes.”

“Mint, I’d rather wank a sheep.”

“A . . . sheep?”

“Now, get out of my way.” She made her way to the toilets.

“BIG GIANT SHITE,” I shouted, then whooped a few times and then headed back to class in a massive daze. No Way, José was Amir getting wind of that chat.

We kicked off.

Ping.

The Barcelona of the spazzie world.

Goals galore.

A dodgy penalty decision.

Criminal refereeing.

Then it really kicked off. “Kicked off” is a soccer phrase clever-clog people use instead of “fight” or “scrap.” The thing was, we were playing soccer at the time—mad or what?

It actually all started because Snot Rag (a.k.a. Terence Trower) had to dash like a crazy man into the hospital for emergency kidney stuff, which left Drumhill’s soccer team without a first-choice goalie.

Holy Moly, no goalie! What were we to do?

I came up with a quality eureka moment: tell the bold Amir to hit the sticks.

I pushed for him to get the nod because cricket skills equal catching balls at sonic speed, a top-notch asset for any goalie to have.

It wasn’t.

He was rank rotten.

Worse than rank rotten.

Pish.

Pure pish.

Pure heavy yellow pish.

We lost 7–4 to Shawhead. Total redneck at this level. The majority of the Shawhead team was full of proper spazzies too. And I mean spazzies who struggle to walk, so playing soccer for them was, like, a miracle. Yet they did manage to rap seven past Amir. Utter, total, complete, scarlet redneck.

It all kicked off like a Ross Kemp program.

With the score at 6–4 Shawhead got a butter-soft penalty. One of their club-foot guys fell over in the box, and the ref, Mr. Comeford, pointed to the spot. It was so obvious to everyone that the guy just lost his balance and keeled over; Comeford blew out of pity more than anything. Shocking decision.

“If you don’t save this, I’m going to boot your Paki balls up your arse,” Doughnut screamed at Amir.

“Eh?” Amir asked.

“You’d better save this or else,” Doughnut shouted. Amir looked at me all confused face. “You couldn’t catch syphilis in a Paki brothel.”

“Wha-wha-what?” Amir asked again. I wanted to say “What?” too, because I had no idea what syphilis was—or what a Paki brothel was.

“Are you deaf, Pak-man?”

“No, I’m n-n-not deaf.” Amir didn’t really get these types of questions. His answer threw Doughnut’s brain cells into a tizzy. Doughnut got confused quickly when his mind was thrown into a tizzy, meaning his anger grew to mercury level. You should see Doughnut in class when teachers ask him mad hard questions—he’s like an exploding space hopper.

“Just fucking save it or you’ll be shitting your balls along with your curry tonight.” I could tell that Amir didn’t have a clue what all this meant, as he was still coming to terms with everyone (including me) shouting and screaming at him for being the crappiest goalie the world of soccer had ever seen.

“Okay, I’ll try,” he said, as if Doughnut had made a proper soccer request.

This huge Shawhead player with a mega limp ran up (or limped up) and blootered the ball toward Amir’s goal. The ball blasted off the underside of the bar, scudded Amir on the back of the head, and bobbled into the net. Amir hadn’t the foggiest what had happened. Comeford blew for a goal. The Shawhead players celebrated. And Doughnut headed straight for Amir.

“You’re one proper Paki fanny.” Doughnut was seething mad, with steamy ears and nostrils.

Amir half ran away.

“Come here,” Doughnut said, walking after him, ready to do a hate crime.

“No,” Amir said.

“Don’t make me chase you, Pak-man.”

“I didn’t d-d-do anything,” Amir said.

“Exactly, you dick. Come here.”

Doughnut was within an arm’s reach of Amir, while I was within an arm’s reach of Doughnut.

“Leave me alone.”

“Yeah, leave him alone. He hasn’t done anything wrong,” I said. Bad move. Major bad move.

“You stay out of this, Tic Tac, or I’ll knock you into the middle of next week.”

I hated that name. Amir shook and growled, which made me shake and growl too. It was like we had that weird twin thing going on between us. Twin dogs. Twin dingo dogs. Doughnut grabbed Amir by the neck, shoving him to the ground. Then, I swear to the baby Jesus, he was setting himself up to take a penalty kick into Amir’s napper.

“WANKER FUCKER!”

“Arrrrrrrhhhhhhh,” screamed Amir. The sound was like a newborn baby wailing, and it made everyone turn toward the incident.

“BASTARD FUCKER.” The next thing I knew I was on Doughnut’s back, arms curled around his neck, tugging him to the grass. “FAT CUNT NUTTER.” I couldn’t hear what anyone was saying or shouting at all. What I heard was a ssszzzhhhooooooooooo sound ringing in my head, like a washing machine spinning dead fast trying to get the thick dirt out of the muckiest clothes from the muckiest town in the muckiest country in the world.

Ssszzzhhhooooooooooo.

Then the spin cycle slowed right down to a

stut

stutter

stut

tut

int

Mint

Mint . . .

“MINT!”

“MINT.” Mr. Comeford ripped my soccer jersey as he pulled me off Doughnut. It was A-okay, though, because it was the school’s soccer shirt. “STAND OVER THERE, MINT, AND DON’T BLOODY MOVE,” he snarled at me, pointing to the goal Shawhead had just scored into. “THOMPSON, YOU GET YOUR BLOODY CARCASS UP OFF THE GROUND AND STAND OVER THERE,” he said, pointing to a part of the field that was far away from where I was. “MANZOOR, STOP ROLLING AROUND IN THE GRASS LIKE A BLOODY STUPID STRAY DOG AND GET ON YOUR FEET, SON.”

I heard him say, “Fuckin’ ******” under his breath as Amir was getting up. I wasn’t 100 percent sure if the “******” was “Paki,” “darkie,” or “spazzie,” but I was almost 85 percent sure that whatever it was, it was a shocker word. A word like that could have made the papers, coming from a teacher. I don’t think Mr. Comeford cared that much for the students at Drumhill.

“GAME OVER,” he shouted into the air, then blew his whistle really loud.

The Shawhead teacher shook his head as if this were a ploy to have the game abandoned. But the game was abandoned for real. Would that mean we wouldn’t lose the points?

As the Shawhead team was hobbling off to get the bus back to their school, Doughnut dished out some flying kung fu kicks to any Shawhead player near him. Skittle and Snot Rag weren’t too far behind him, but they were just dishing out pretend kicks, as if they were playing the Keeping Up with the Joneses game. Being a lover and not a fighter, I decided to do no violent acts.

But I couldn’t stop me being me.

“FUCKING SPAZZIES . . . SHAWHEAD SPAZZIES.” My hands were hurting because of all the tight fist-clenching. “KNOB SUCKER,” I screamed at Comeford. My knees hurt from the banging; two wee twigs crashing against each other, sore as hell. “KNOB NUZZLER.” It was painful, but the words kept coming.

“YOU, GET INTO THE SCHOOL,” Comeford said, pointing his finger at me and wiggling it toward the school building. “NOW, MINT.”

And I sprinted there like a young Allan Wells (who won the gold medal for Great Britain in the hundred meters at the Moscow Olympics in 1980 with a time of 10.25 seconds, which is a rubbish time that wouldn’t even get him into the semis nowadays. And he only won gold because all the good sprinters boycotted the games—well, their countries did—because the Soviet Union in 1980 was a place for mentalists). When I got into the school building, I didn’t know what to do or where to go or who to speak to. The place was silent. I took myself to the nearest corner and stood really close to the angle of the corner’s V shape, counted to ten, said all the consonants in the alphabet, then tried to say an animal beginning with each consonant, did my breathing exercises, and played a tune from the air that was streaming out of my nose. The William Tell Overture. We do that in music with Miss Adams—well, we try to, but we end up sounding like the Bonkers Orchestra for the Deaf. I wished I had Green to move between my fingers, but it was in my blinkin’ school trousers.

No one came for ages. I was on the letter X.

Tap.

I was on the letter X for ages.

Tap.

I couldn’t think of an animal with the letter X. Or a word.

I thought of Michelle Malloy, because X reminded me of the word “sex,” and Michelle Malloy reminded me of sex.

Tap on the shoulder.

Woman smell gusted up my hooter: makeup and perfume mixed together.

Boy, was I glad to see Miss Flynn. So glad that I flung my arms around her neck, like when I score a goal. But there was no goal joy. I belted it all out into her chest. Which was mega weird because I could feel her boobs against my own boy boobs and I was worried in case my willy was going to get angry, but this took my mind off the incident with Doughnut. I continued to bubble, though. Just in case. I wanted to be in Miss Flynn’s office sitting on her big comfy chair, listening to the groovy tunes she played to “soothe” me. She also put up these wacky posters to get us “reflecting” and help us feel better. “That which does not kill us makes us stronger” by some dude called Friedrich Nietzsche was my numero uno. Friedrich Nietzsche’s job was to sit around THINKING about all this pure mad stuff.

Bonkerinos!

I could do a job like that.

Mom was lying on the couch with two cucumber slices covering her eyes. I could have eaten a scabby dog, because playing a high-energized performance sport does that to the body. What I needed was carbs. Or some Cup Noodles. But I could have quite easily dived on Mom and eaten her cucumber eyes, I was so Hank Marvin. I wasn’t sure if she was sleeping or not. She didn’t move a muscle. Her belly went up and down, so I knew she wasn’t dead.

Phew!

The TV was on. Some guy was making a pasta dish with eggs and bacon. My belly rumbled, making a noise like a little embarrassed fart.

“There’s soup in the pot,” Mom said, without even looking up or removing her cucumbers. She must have heard my belly fart. I didn’t want soup.

“Mom, why do you have cucumbers on your eyes?”

“I was tired, Dylan.”

“Did you sleep with cucumbers on your eyes?”

“My eyes are tired. Cucumber helps.”

“Does it soothe them?”

“Yes.” It was ultraweird talking to Mom while she was like this. It was what I imagined Martians to be like. “I really need some sleep, Dylan. You can heat up the soup and have that for your dinner. It’s tomato. There’s some bread in the cupboard.” At least it was tom-tom soup.

“Did the school phone?” I asked.

“They might have, but I didn’t hear anything.”

“Okay.”

“Why would the school be phoning?”

“Erm, just . . .”

“Have you been in trouble?”

“No.”

“You better not have been.”

“I wasn’t.”

“I’ve got enough to worry about.”

“I wasn’t in trouble, Mom.”

“Okay, so go and have your soup and let me sleep.”

“Do you want me to bring you fresh cucumbers?” I asked. I felt guilty about lying.

“No, it’s fine, Dylan, but if you have tea don’t throw the tea bags away.”

“No problem, Mrs. Mint.”

I saw her belly make a wee shudder, like a chuckle. Tom-tom soup is class. No other word for it.

Class.

Well, you could say fandabbydozie.

Amir wasn’t allowed to have anything out of a can; his mom made everything from scratch and used all-fresh produce that you could only get in special supermarkets, which ponged like a super skunk that had pished itself. He didn’t know what he was missing, though. Nor did Mrs. Manzoor. Scooby-Doo would have been proud of me, the way I licked and licked the bowl. Crystal clean. If Mom had been there, I would have told her not to bother putting it in the dishwasher. Then the phone rang, making me jump out of my hickory dickories.

“Hello, 426258 . . . Hello?”

The person on the other end didn’t say hello back. Rude. Maybe they were deaf as a post.

“Hello, 426258.”

Still nothing. So I said nothing for a bit as well.

“Dylan Mint speaking . . . Hello?”

I waited.

Zilcho.

I put the phone down because I had made a jumbo blunder. I had only gone and told the person on the other end my name. My full name. If this person on the other end was a murderer or someone who wanted to ride teenage boys, they knew how to get hold of me now. What an eejit. I went back to the kitchen. Then it rang again. My heart went thump, thump, scud, scud. I didn’t want to wake Mom. And I certainly didn’t want to get murdered or ridden. I couldn’t work out which was worse.

It kept ringing.

Flippin’ heck.

I slapped my head before I picked it up.

“Hello.”

No voice arrived.

“Hello. Who is this please?”

I could hear breathing. Not pervert breathing—normal breathing.

“State your desire. I know you’re there. This number can now be traced, my friend. The CIA will be all over this. My dad has this phone tapped.”

Still no reply.

“CHILD FUCKER,” I screamed in my other voice—but I didn’t mean it to be so loud—before slamming the phone down.

“Dylan!” Mom shouted. “Was that the phone?”

“I think so.”

“What do you mean, you think so? Was it the phone or not?”

“Suppose so.”

“Yes or no?”

“Yes.”

“Who was it?”

“They didn’t say.”

“Who didn’t say?”

“They didn’t say anything.”

“Who?”

“The person on the other end.”

“What person on the other end?”

“They only breathed a wee bit.”

“Breathed?”

“No words, just breathing.”

“Did you not ask who was speaking?”

“I did, but they didn’t reply.”

I could hear Mom muttering to herself. Not like a mad mentalist; more like she was raging bull about something.

“Go and get me some used tea bags, Dylan.”