Benworden by Neal Davies Page A

boys headed straight to the shelter shed where two paint guns and camouflage sheets were hidden on the roof. Brian cupped his hands and boosted Sean up to grab them and then they headed off toward the football ground. At the same time Carla and Bonnie had collected four boxes filled with pigeons that they had rented for $50 off one of the other students and had stashed under a bush on the opposite of the oval to Brian and Sean.
    We all knew Wally and his boys (except for one) would be at the ground having a smoke so it was the perfect place for Brian and Sean to set their trap. The boys crawled like combat troops to their positions on high ground where they couldn’t be seen lying under the cover of their camouflage sheets.
    Brian whispered to Sean, “Are you ready, mate?”
    Sean leant forward with his eye focused down the barrel of the gun and replied, “Ready as I’ll ever be.”
    Brian clumsily reached into his blazer pocket and pulled out his mobile phone and then texted a message to Carla which simply said, “Go.”
    He then immediately lay back down to take aim.
    Within seconds Carla and Bonnie had set the pigeons on their way across the ground and toward the gang. As they flew directly over Wally and his mates, the boys opened fire with the paint guns and in a very short time each of the bullies had been hit by a paintball carrying its putrid substance.
    Wally and his crew had no idea it was anything but the pigeons that had bombarded them. They were sent home from school that day due to the stench coming from their hair and clothing which was making quite a few of the other students physically ill.
    We thought the gang may have learnt a lesson from all of this but they came back to school even worse than before. Soon some of the younger students were again handing over their lunch money or walking around holding back the tears due to the thumping they had taken at the hands of these thugs. Enough was enough. The final stage of our plan needed to be put into action.
    During one recess, Carla approached the gang armed with the camera pen inside her top blazer pocket and gave Wally one of those smiles that a young man can’t resist. She said, “Hi guys. How are you going?”
    Wally was keen on any girl who gave him a smile or for that matter even talked to him, so he replied, “Hello gorgeous. I’m good. How are you doing?”
    He panned his eyes over his crew and gave them a smile and winked. They all grinned back in a sleazy way and began saying things like: “Go Scar,” “Smooth”, and “You’re the man.”
    With the boys urging him on, Wally puffed out his chest like a rooster in a henhouse and said, “So what’s up, sweet lips?”
    Carla hung her head a little and then brought her eyes up tomeet his. She had a sad expression on her face when she said, “I just needed to talk to someone and you look like the type of guy that would understand what someone like me is going through.”
    At this point you could almost see his brain ticking over by his expression. Not only was a girl talking to him but she was vulnerable as well. Wally grinned and nudged Andrew Humphries a couple of times as if to say: “I’ve got this one in the bag.” He put on a face that was supposed to show concern, but it looked more like a goldfish blowing bubbles, and he replied in a voice that resembled someone talking to a baby. “Is someone giving you a hard time? Do you want us to take care of it?”
    Even though he was creeping her out Carla gave him another starry-eyed look and said, “No. It’s ok. It’s just Mr Gowdy. He’s picking on me a lot lately and although you guys seem to be able to deal with almost every situation this one is way out of your league.”
    The trap had been set for the rat to put his head in it and Carla had the perfect bait – Wally’s pride.
    All of a sudden the smirk left his