Short Story / Sliding off the Red Roof
Footsteps no longer echoed from the tiled, mosaic floor that fashioned the main passage of Paringa Hall. From the doorway we moved across the hall, checking once again for a Marist presence before entering Mr Brown’s office. The door was always unlocked, even on weekends. Dean’s hands passed over the hooks until he came upon the tower key, nervously laughing at the ease of our escapade. Tip-toeing back over the faded floor, we pretended to be heading to the billiards room, before veering left towards the stairs. This would be the point of greatest exposure. The staircase up to the Brother’s rooms was made of generously measured marble, with rich, wooden banisters crafted in humble grandeur. We moved swiftly now, ignoring our magnificent surroundings.
Upstairs was still. Danger rippled over our skin as we scrambled towards our next objective – the tower door. With unusual stealth we made it safely to the other side, then up less pretentious steps, though we stopped short of the tower. On the landing, we opened a half door that led into the roof cavity of the great, white Hall. This inhospitable space was the original boarding house of Sacred Heart College. Dean and I shuddered at the thought as we foraged for interesting old books that lay scattered in the ceiling. Tiring of this labour, Dean located the manhole and carefully slid it back, spreading a beam of sunlight that illuminated the dank interior.
Dean went first; out onto the red, galvanised roof and disappeared. I struggled through the opening and looked for him. Dean was perched on the crest of the roof, “Follow the nails, Harold,” he told me, as I tried to imitate his steps. I gathered my courage and gained my balance, then I spoke up.
“This is so cool”.
We stood together and took in the view: extending over the whole school, surrounding Brighton and out to sea.
“Over there.”
Dean pointed to a spot above the music room where we could sunbake out of sight, shoot the breeze and stay giddy.
Dean spoke often, and with great affection about his childhood. He was from the outback-mining town of Broken Hill; an alienated place on the border between South Australia and New South Wales – it belongs to neither. Dean’s father, with his bright eyes and moustache, looked a little like Gomez Addams. Dean’s dad worked, in what is now known as Human Resource Management. During the week he fired employees as the mine went through restructuring, then on weekends he umpired football.
“How’s that for unpopular?”
Dean would confer.
Many of Dean’s stories started with ‘Me and Ben Dixon’. I’d sigh, as Dean would begin.
“Me and Ben Dixon, we use to play this game, you throw a dart at each other, about twenty metres apart then try and catch it holding a block of wood. You should try it.”
I looked at him in amazement.
“What if it hits your fingers?”
Dean held back a wry smile.
“Oh, it never does.”
It was my second year at boarding school; I was looking forward to the new arrivals. Brad made an instant impression, something more than his enormous golf bag and that eagle nose that bridged his forehead. Music was our first connection – I was always curious. Dean would be lying on his bed listening to something on his beat-up old Walkman.
“What ya listening to?”
I’d go and annoy him. The answer was usually The Violent Femmes or The Psychedelic Furs. In a community where conformity and conservatism were the shackles that held us together, Dean was dangerous and exciting. “There’s this punk band called A.N.L., Anti Nowhere League.”
Dean once enthused.
“My sister has them on vinyl. One song is just a single ‘Bam’ on the drums for ten minutes!”
On Saturdays, at the boarding house lunch was a selection of pies and pasties. The weather was still warm, so I had arranged for Dean, myself and another goofball named Nick Northcott to take a trip to Magic Mountain, Glenelg’s premier water- slide facility. Dean, as always, ate his pie up side down, with a thick coat of sauce covering the base. We finished lunch and began our journey. Magic Mountain wasn’t that memorable, but the three of us can definitely trace back our friendship to that day.
On the walk home along Broadway, two large, bare-chested men rode past us on painted bikes, with streamers running through the spokes. Fifty metres past us I just couldn’t resist.
“Nice Bikes!”
I yelled out. As they circled back our hearts began to spasm.
“Keep walking,”
Dean instructed us.
“Who said that?”
They repeated in searing tones, pushing and harassing us to test our metal.
I couldn’t get a word out, overcome by guilt. Nick pleaded, his voice cracked and breaking.
“We don’t want any trouble.”
We hoped they’d tire of torturing three, meek Year Eleven boys. But they continued, uttering the immortal line.
“How would you look with a broken elbow up your arse?”
Expecting a response, Nick could only manage.
“Not very good?”
All this time Dean said nothing; he walked steadily, looking down, so as not to make any eye contact. Finally, they rode away uttering some stupid threat.
”If we ever see you poofs again . . .”
The three of us began a desperate run back to the boarding house. Once we were safe in our confines, Nick and I foamed up like shaken soft drinks, opening up to anyone who’d listen to our ‘legendary’ story of near death and comradeship. Dean had sprinted back with us, but had decided on some golf practice rather than joining us in our hyped up grab for glory.
Dean spent a lot of time on the Brighton Road Oval. He hit the golf ball prodigiously, often from one goal-square to the other – and occasionally onto Brighton Road. Sport was the currency of Sacred Heart, so these accounts of Dean’s golfing prowess kept the wolves from the door.
Acronyms were always a source of joy for Dean. He wrote his initials everywhere: D.I.P., Dean Igor Patton – always with messy, red pen. Dean’s handwriting was wild, just like his thoughts and words. His mind stretched like a rubber band through a clockwork orange.
The more conscientious Year Eleven students were trusted to study in the back room of the Library, known as The Annex. One evening Dean instigated an argument about circumcision. Pretty soon he had the whole room divided, thriving in this hasty arena of oratory. Then, somehow, his love for acronyms permeated through these two tribes. One side took on the motto of A.C.D.C., or All Cocks Deserve Circumcision. Nick, in response suggested A.F.R.O., (The Anti-Foreskin Removal Organisation) as the opposing side’s slogan. Dean’s proposal was rejected, despite his insistence that P.W.A.E.T.M.E.S.O.T.H., or People With An Extra Two Millimetres Each Side Of The Head was somehow superior. The circumcision debate fell into disarray as we all started concentrating on even more ridiculous acronyms.
Dean believed that Law was the most appropriate career for someone with skill, cunning and determination in the art of argument. If caught out in ordinary conversation, Dean would chant.
”You’re a fool, a national fool!”
His fiendish cackle then plagued you for hours. His ability to continually argue a point, based on false assumptions, was both astounding and infuriating. Often his powers of persuasion were also less than upstanding. . .
“Harold, coming for a swim?”
He’d begin after school.
“It’s freezing cold, Dean.”
I’d replied, trying to escape the bitter winds in the towel warming room, “C’mon, Harold.”
Then the threats . . .
“I’ll make you, you know I will.”
“The water’s freezing.”
I’d retort in vain . . .
Dean prided himself on always winning these wars of attrition, wearing me down with relentless solicitation. We’d go swimming and my body would turn purple and orange from the lack of circulation. Still, I partook in these mad swims almost every month of winter.
Come spring, the icy waters of Brighton were forgotten and we made our first venture onto the roof of old Paringa. As we sat back, feeling the timeless joy of friendship and the sun’s embrace, the sounds of a piano began to drift up from the music room.
“I used to play, I got to the seventh grade.”
He remarked nonchalantly.
“Really, do you still play?”
“Na.” he whined, “I’ve almost forgotten everything now”.
After Year Twelve our results finally came in. We met at enrolment day for Science at Adelaide Uni. Sitting on the lawns on North Terrace we both pined for the Arts subjects that filled another section of the 1989 Calender. Dean chose a more ambitious workload, hoping to transfer into Arts, and then onto Law.
Maths and Physics proved to be difficult. Dean, however, found comfort in his introductory philosophy class; and his pet subject, Astronomy. By week five his first assignment was due, so without proper research Dean embarked on a thesis that proposed that the Earth was at the centre of the Galaxy, basing his argument on the equal amounts of blue shift that was detected from quasars. Dean showed us his completed masterpiece, sprawled out in glorious red pen.
His lecturer, Roger Clay, returned Dean’s assignment back a few weeks later with the appropriate grammatical corrections. The final comment, in steady, blue biro was direct and simple,
“Utter Rubbish.”
The following year Dean did transfer to Arts, taking on a full load of philosophy. Over time, though, Dean’s interests had begun to fall more heavily into bike riding and drug taking. Even so, Dean was somehow able to combine these two activities surprisingly well, spending many afternoons getting stoned and bike riding through the Adelaide hills, enhanced by his new found taste for Death Metal – blasting through his headphones.
Eventually, Uni fell away and Dean took up a more decadent life style, while working in a nursing home to make ends meet. I use to visit him at his inner city locale. We were still firm friends. In his room one afternoon I noticed some needles and other injecting paraphernalia.
“It’s okay, Harold.”
Dean assured me.
“It’s just for speed, I’m not doing heroin”.
“Oh.”
I answered, and then Dean made his pitch.
“You can try it if you want to. Fucking amazing rush”.
At least with drugs, Dean was never, ‘Come on, Harold, I’ll make ya!’
Over the following years we drifted apart. Girls had always been attracted to Dean, but only now had he entered a relationship with Penny. This kept him occupied. Later, Dean returned to Uni. This time at Flinders, studying a lot of Feminism subjects. I don’t know if he finished his degree. The last time I spoke to him was just before New Years, 2000. He’d finally succumbed, purchasing a car and was working in a wood processing plant. He told me that he had taken up golf again.
Still, every time I see a cyclist on the road I look for Dean’s face. I wonder now if there are other people out there, haunted by these lost souls in Lycra at the traffic lights. I no longer have his number.
On the roof that day we sunbaked for a while, then Dean became bored and we crawled to the edge of Paringa’s roof and looked down. Other boarders milled back and forth, using the telephones or going to the ‘Recky for a Dart’ (The Smoker’s Room). We made strange noises and yelled out the names of passers-by, chuckling as they looked around hopelessly. No one could imagine anyone getting up on the roof of Paringa. Eventually, we grew tired of this as well, wandering around some more before deciding to make the return journey.
We promised not to tell anyone.
“We can do this every weekend!”
Dean enthused.
“Sure thing”, I replied.
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I was really drawn into the character sketch despite myself. If only because I know someone like Dean (and honestly I think everyone needs to know someone like Dean)
However, the only thing I noticed is that the piece felt more like a character sketch than an actual story. (Unless it’s a memior piece and then it felt like that). I think there are a lot of good ideas floating through the piece that you could draw out into a story. Or combine a couple of them into a story (such as sneaking up on the roof, or the incident with the bikers).
Beyond that I just have some nitpicky stuff.
Try to cut back on the adverbs unless they are neccesary. I noticed this in particular at the beginning of the piece. For example:
”Brother’s rooms was made of generously measured marble, with rich, wooden banisters crafted in humble grandeur”
What is generously measured? Is it two feet, or three feet (1m) tiles. Is it as long your arm, or shorter than your foot.
The other consideration with this section is multiple adjectives modifying the same noun. I would say trim it down. For instance, the rich, wooden banisters seems a bit much. I would suggest rephrasing it.
If you have any questions feel free to ask. Write on.
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