Pie-holed

By MARLENE POTOURA – 17 December 2018, Keith Jackson & Friends: PNG Attitude

Do you have a favourite food you love eating for lunch? Is there a kid in school who annoys you, their presence disturbs you and you cannot stand them? Can your favourite food team up with the pest in school and get you suspended? Sebastine is off his head. Can we blame him for what happened? A story from my book, ‘6 Whacky Tales’

I LOVE meat pies. I eat them for lunch every day. I love the sweet savoury fillings and the crusty pastry on top. Oh boy!

And I like my pies hot, real hot, a bit burnt on the sides with the lumps of flavoured beef overcooked and tasty.

Today I am at home, not in school. I will stay home for a week.

I have been suspended.

It was because of the meat pie yesterday.

It was lunchtime and I went to the school canteen to buy my pie.

“Hi Sebastine. You want it hot and a bit burnt, yes?” Mrs Morha asked me. She was fat and every day she wore long black skirts with brightly coloured blouses.

“Yes Mrs Morha, the usual, thanks,” I smiled at her.

After a minute she gave me a brown paper bag with my hunger remedy inside. The brown paper bag was hot because of the delicious savoury munchkin.

“Hey Sebs,” someone called.

I knew that voice.

It was that skinny Konas kid who eats oily yellow flour balls.

His afro hair was yellow as well, just like the flour balls he eats every day for lunch.

The Konas kids all have yellow hair. There were four of them at our school, all sponsored by the City Mission, something to do with underprivileged children.

I can’t stand Kenton Konas, also known as KK, yellow top, yellow mop and sun top. He always stares at me, every single lunchtime.

He stares at my pies.

I never give him any, but let him watch me eat the flavoured beef and with every bite I take he swallows a dollop of saliva or two.

Once I punched him for staring at me and I was called to the principal’s office. So, after that I just let him watch me eat.

After KK eats four flour balls, he drinks from the school bubbler, while I drink canned drinks – Coke most of the time, but pineapple Fanta once in a while.

I cannot stand KK.

Even his three sisters hover everywhere in the playground with their yellow tops, bobbing here and there. The Konas kids are like flies that you try to swat, but never seem to go away and keep hovering at the tip of your nose. 

“Sebs, wait up,” KK called and ran after me as I quickened my pace to go over to the guava tree shade to eat my pie while it was still hot.

I kept walking.

Now, who was he to try to stop me when I have a routine I repeat every day.

Canteen, hot pie, hurry, eat.

Pathetic little fool, I was not even his friend but a classmate. So why was he telling me to stop?

I quickened my pace. But he was quicker and he finally caught up with me.

“Hey Sebs, how much is that pie?” he asked me, panting.

Oh, I was so mad, I turned around and nearly trampled him.

“Yellow Top! Am I the canteen keeper? Go and ask Mrs Morha, dingdong,” I hissed at him. Real stupid nerve, stopping me to ask the price of a pie in the middle of the field.

“Was just asking, Sebs,” he grinned ear to ear, following me.

“Look Yellow Top, my name is not Sebs to you, okay?” I yelled, my eyes bulging.

“Hey, we always call you Sebs in class. Even our teacher calls you Sebs,” he was smiling.

“Well, smarty pants, they all can call me Sebs. But you can’t!” I said angrily.

He was looking at my brown paper bag. Well, he had his eyes on it the whole time, the saliva swallowing hound.

“What are you staring at?” I raged. I was mad, madder than the mad hatter.

“Just looking, Sebs. Don’t be mad,” he grinned guiltily.

“Yellow Top, my question is: what are you staring at?” I poked his forehead with my pointer. I didn’t care any more. I didn’t care if I ended up in the principal’s office again and got suspended. I didn’t care if I flattened Yellow Top. He was driving me to insanity. 

“I am just looking,” he said softly.

“Just looking? Are you out of your pea brain mind? You cannot realise in your thick head that you are annoying me? Are you so stupid that you cannot get that?” I poked his forehead with my pointer again.

I really wanted to flatten Yellow Top once and for all. This kid annoyed me every single day, staring at me eating my lunch.

And today of all days, I wanted to escape to the guava tree shade and he was after me, annoying the sanity out of me. With my size, I could flatten KK with just one punch.

I don’t want to know this kid or his siblings, with their annoying hair design. Nor did I want to be friends with him or his kind. I only wanted to be left alone while I ate my lunch in peace.

I started walking over to the guava tree shade. Yellow Top was right on my tail again, as if we were together, going for a special lunch, to eat and chat like best friends.

Some kids are just born stupid, aren’t they? Real pests.

I quickened my pace.

He quickened his pace beside me.

I quickened.

He quickened.

Suddenly, anger overcame me.

I turned and threw a punch at him and the skinny annoyer ducked like a wobbly giraffe and I missed him by an inch.

“Hey Sebs, cut it out!” he looked confused and upset, as if he was arguing with a best friend.

A best friend who was out of control.

Well, from a distance, onlookers would think that I was out of control, right?

But the truth remains that Yellow Top was the culprit.

“Cut it out, huh. You are the most annoying foolish one in this school. Every lunch time you stare at me. I punched you once and ended up in the principal’s office. Then I was warned that if I did it again, I would be suspended.

“Are you doing this on purpose? What is your problem Yellow Top?” I fumed at him shaking with the brown paper bag in my hand.

He just stood there looking at me.

Real senseless. No words came out of his mouth.

“You know, I’m going to flatten you here and colour your yellow crown black with this play ground soil,” I warned him. He inched backwards.

“Where are you going Yellow Top?” I pulled his afro yellow mop with my left hand while I held my precious hunger eraser with my right hand.

“Hey, what is going on there?” a familiar voice boomed.

With my left hand still grabbing onto KK’s yellow mop, I turned and saw Mr Quinto, the principal.

In no second at all, the playground duty teachers and the principal were standing around KK and me.

I slowly let go off KK’s hair. Actually, I wasn’t scared of the teachers or the principal. I was so fed up with Yellow Top, I wanted to flatten him right there.

“What is going on here Sebastine?” the principal roared.

“Sir, this kid is annoying me.”

“This kid has a name Sebastine. He is Kenton. You must learn to respect other people,” right from the start the principal was making it my fault.

“You hit Kenton once and you were going to do it again.”

“Yes sir, I was about to knock him off because he kept following me around, annoying me about my lunch,” I told the principal.

“Well, this poor kid is on a special scholarship. Sometimes it is good to share with the less fortunate,” he told me and looked around at the teachers who nodded in agreement.

He held Kenton’s hand and made a long speech about kindness and generosity. He only stopped when the first lunch ‘time is over’ bell chimed on the intercom.

I looked at my watch.

Drat, it was 1.50. Just ten minutes to the final bell.

Still holding on to Kenton’s hand, the principal and the teachers started walking to the office.

I was left there, as if the whole situation was my fault.

I quickly opened the brown paper bag and took out my pie.

I couldn’t believe it!

The pie was as cold as a dead man’s foot.

I was so mad, I lifted the pie over my head and threw it, aiming for Kenton’s yellow mop.

The stupid kid had wasted my time and the pie was cold and yucky.

I watched the pie fly across the field and, as it was about to land on Yellow Top, Mr Quinto turned around – still holding Kenton’s hand – to shout at a student.

And the pie, landed right into his wide open mouth. He fell backwards, dragging Yellow Top with him to the grass.

The principal is not a skinny man and I felt the earth shake.

Well, that’s why I’m home.

I’ve been suspended for a whole week – the reason being that the principal swallowed the pie, choking and coughing so hard that he ended up in emergency at the private hospital. That’s what my mum told me the ‘before dinner session’ about my misbehaviour.

As soon as the principal fell, I ran the other way to the classroom but was called to the office by the deputy principal after the principal was rushed to emergency.

I sat in the deputy principal’s office waiting patiently as he conferenced with dad and mum. I was suspended at 2.45 on the same day the pie was holed.

I returned to the 6 Red classroom and packed my books under the watchful eye of Miss Gray. I really wanted to crush KK as he sat there acting innocent.

Miss Gray walked me to the car park and I drove home in silence with mum and dad.

One week suspension and my parents also grounded me for two weeks.

Triple jeopardy.

Yep, like a three layered cake. Suspended, grounded and grounded.

But, believe it or not, I can’t wait to get back to school because, this time I am going to well and truly flatten Kenton Konas – even if it means I will be terminated.

My dad will chase me away from home.

But I have a plan.

I will stow away on my uncle’s container ship and migrate to Surfer’s Paradise and work in a pie shop.

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