Underdogs by Markus Zusak Page A

group at Lumsden Oval, on that day that seemed decades ago now. There were a few girls like her there, I remembered. Same real hair. Same real legs. Same … It all made sense. She was local, and pretty, and real.
    Dale Perry.
    I almost mentioned that he’d nearly burned my ear off just over a year ago but held it back. I didn’t wanther thinking that I was one of those completely jealous guys who hated everyone who was better than himself — which actually was exactly the kind of guy I was.
    “My best friend reckons he likes me, but I don’t know….”
    She went on talking but I couldn’t bring myself to listen. I just couldn’t. Why in the hell was she telling me this anyway? Was it because I was just the plumber’s son and I went to an old state school while she most likely went to a Saint something-or-other school? Was it because I was the kind of guy who was harmless and couldn’t bite?
    Well, I came close.
    I almost stopped her to say, “Ah, just go away with your Dale Perry,” but I didn’t. I loved her too much and I wouldn’t hurt her, no matter how much I myself was hurting.
    Instead, I asked if she knew Greg. “Greg Fiennes or something?”
    “Fienni.”
    “Yeah, I do. How do you know him?”
    And for some reason, all these tears started welling up in my eyes.
    “Ah,” I said. “He was a friend of mine once,” and I turned away, to keep working and to hide my eyes.
    “A good friend?”
    Damn this girl!
    “My best friend,” I admitted.
    “Oh.” She looked through my back. I could feel it.
    I wondered if she was getting the picture here. Maybe. Probably. Yes, probably, because she left then with a far too friendly “Okay, bye-ee.” Had I heard that before? Of course I had, and it gashed my throat with reality.
    The whole altercation didn’t drive me through the day like the disappointment of last week had. No, this time I limped through it.
    I felt something awful in me.
    Limping on.
    Dad saw me and gave me a serve for being so slow, but I couldn’t pick it up. I tried like you wouldn’t believe, but my back was broken. My spirit was crushe
    I had the chance to tell her off.
    I could have hurt her.
    I didn’t.
    It was no consolation.
    As I worked, I constantly had to pull myself together and it was such a struggle. It was like every step was out to get me. Blisters on my hands started opening up and feeling kept creeping into my eyes. I started sniffing at the air to get enough in my lungs, and when the day was over I struggled out from under the house and stood there, waiting. I really wanted to collapse to the ground, but I held it together.
    I felt itchy, dirty, diseased — by simply being me. What was wrong with me?
    I felt like the dog that’s got rabies in this book I was reading in school,
To Kill a Mockingbird.
The dog, it’slimping and slobbering all over the road and the father, Atticus, he surprises his son by shooting it.
    I’m walking along top a fence line that seems to stretch for an eternity. Somehow, though, I know that it will stop at some point. I know it will last as long as my life.
    “Keep walking,” I tell myself.
    My arms are out to keep me balanced.
    On either side of me, there is air and ground, trying to get me to jump down into it.
    Which side do I jump?
    It is early, early morning. It’s that time when it’s still dark but you know the day is coming. Blue is bleeding through black. Stars are dying.
    The fence.
    Sometimes it’s stone, sometimes it’s wood, and sometimes it’s barbed wire.
    I walk it, and still, I am tempted by each side that flanks it.
    “Jump,” I hear each side whisper. “Jump down here.” Distance.
    Out there, somewhere, I can hear dogs barking, although their voices seem human. They bark and when I look all around me I can’t see them. I can only hear barking that forms an audience for my journey along this fence.
    Purple in the sky.
    Pins-and-needles legs.
    Shivers down my right side.
    Concussion