Читать книгу Forest Secrets - David Laing - Страница 10

My cousin, Snook, didn’t look too good. He was sitting directly across from me next to his best mate, Skinny Watson. Our year 10 teacher, Mr Winterbottom – we all called him Stormy for short – was pacing the floor telling us about the destruction of the dinosaurs and how an asteroid had wiped them out. I was only half listening. I was watching Snook; something was bothering him. His usual lopsided, cheeky grin had disappeared, his face was a sickly grey skeleton colour, his eyes were wide and kinda goofy-looking and his mouth was hanging slack like a busted balloon.

Stormy had noticed Snook’s unusual behaviour; Snook was strangely quiet, for a start, not yacking to Skinny or fiddling with something or other. No, he was the model student. Except for his sickly look, that is. Not having to yell at Snook was probably worrying Stormy as well. There’d been no Settle down Kelly! or Behave Kelly! coming from his mouth at all.

A short, nervy man, our teacher liked lessons that went smoothly. He didn’t appreciate interruptions or anything that was different, like Snook was now. Looking a bit anxious, Stormy strode over to the whiteboard, picked up a marking pen and, as if trying to use up his frustrations, began to scribble notes madly, and then, as though he had eyes in the back of his head, he said, ‘Sit up, Snook Kelly and stop slouching.’ At last, I thought, he’s told Snook off for something. He’ll be happy now.

It was a mystery to me though, and everyone else, how Stormy could do that – see out of the back of his head. I’d often thought about it, but up until now I hadn’t come up with an answer. At any rate, as always, Stormy was right. Snook was slouching. In fact, at that very moment, he was sliding off his seat and disappearing under the desk. Stormy must have heard the slither for at that moment he turned away from the whiteboard and said, ‘What’s wrong with you, Kelly? What are you up to now? In a different world, are we?’

As one, the rest of the year 10s turned to see what was going on. They must have wondered when Snook’s mouth, peeking above the desktop, began to open and close like a bullfrog. His eyes too, were roaming about his face like a mad man. I thought I’d better say something. ‘He’s not well, Mr Winterbottom,’ I called out. ‘Perhaps he should go to the sickroom.’ It was pretty obvious Snook wasn’t well. He was in a different world. The blank, vacant stare and the croaking frog noises coming from his throat told me that.

‘Is that right, Kelly? Do you feel sick?’

No real answer, just a slight shake of the head. Shaking his head too, Stormy continued with the lesson. ‘As I was saying,’ he went on, ‘the theory is that the dinosaurs became extinct about 65 million years ago.’ He looked at his watch. ‘We’ll look at the effects of that in the next lesson where I’ll explain about huge waves, freak winds, wild fires and exploding volcanoes.’ Placing the whiteboard marker on his desk, he looked up. ‘You may go. Have a good weekend.’ He glanced over at Snook who was pushing himself free of the desk. ‘And you, Snook Kelly, had better go straight home.’

Gee, I thought, Stormy does care. A little bit anyway. I looked at the clock on the wall out front. It was half past two. He was even letting us out early because of the long weekend.

I caught up with Snook in the hallway, just outside the class-room. He was looking a bit better, but I could see he was still not back to normal. His grin hadn’t come back. I had to ask him. ‘What was wrong with you in there? It was like you’d seen a ghost.’

‘Maybe I did,’ he said, hoisting his school bag over his shoulder and then walking out into the school yard towards the bus line. ‘It sure felt like it.’