Now avaliable from Young Adult author Rebecca Bloomer:
Foley Russel and That Poor Girl
EXCERPT
A Freaky Coincidence
“What the hell are we doing here?” As usual, my best friend Shay says the stuff I only ever think. Most of the time I wish he wouldn’t. Especially at school. At school he gets us in trouble. There’s a fine line between being honest and being rude, or so my mum tells me. Shay is yet to find the line. And so, even though I say nothing to encourage him, Shay just keeps on talking. “Seriously man, this is a total rip off.”
Given a choice, a library would never be my first pick of places to go on an excursion. It wouldn’t be the last either. In fact, if you asked me for a list of places my class was likely to visit on excursion, a library would never make it into my head. I would pick Dreamworld, Seaworld, Australia Zoo, even the beach, but I would never pick the library. I never visit the library, I don’t borrow from it, I don’t even think about libraries. Never ever. Imagine how disappointed I am then, to find myself lined up outside Bicton’s public
Library on our only scheduled excursion for the
semester.
Shay vocalises our disappointment. If I don’t shut him up, he’s going to keep on until I agree with him. “Geez, give it a rest would you? Probs she’s got a whole freaking
pizza party happening in there. You wouldn’t complain about that would you?”
It’s safe to grumble at Shay. He’s the happiest person I know and seems to find me funny when I get annoyed by him. Shay is built like a tank. He’s a FOB, which means ‘Fresh Off Boat’. That’s what we call the Thursday Islander and Samoan kids who’ve actually lived on the islands. It sounds racist but it’s actually more a sign of affection. FOBs are legitimately different and we like them for it.
Shay is from Samoa. Standing next to me—a short, weedy blond kid with square glasses—Shay looks totally mean. But he’s not. And pizza isn’t his favourite food. He doesn’t have favourites, he likes all food. He doesn’t like it when people make him feel bad about liking food though. I know that, so I’m not surprised when he fights back with a low blow of his own. “You wouldn’t say that if you weren’t like totally in love with Miss D.”
Embarrassment doesn’t look good on me. I go red in the face and burn up until my head feels like it might explode. I live in Bicton, in Northern Queensland. It’s always hot in Bicton anyway, so there are moments when I blush, that I worry I might burst right into flame. It’s called spontaneous combustion. I read that a person can actually burst into a raging ball of fire without a single moment’s notice. It’s about to happen to me, I can feel it…
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