Free Wild Song by Janis Mackay Page A

cream.’
    I frantically looked round for Hannu, but he was gone. Next moment we were in the canteen. It was bright and noisy. The boy gripping me steered me up to a table, already crowded with boys, and plumped me down on a bench then slipped in next to me.
    I had special one-to-one treatment. Apart from the crazy breakfast times I didn’t even eat with the others. I only ever spoke to Riku – Scarface – and was never so close up to the other boys. Scarface wasn’t at this table, and I could feel my heart kick in my ribs. ‘Hey, see who I got to come to the party,’ this boy was yelling and boasting to the boys around the table. They just stared at me.
    We were all considered bad, but I guess, apart from Scarface, I was the worst. I had homemade tattoos and a pierced eyebrow and I think they thought I couldn’t speak. I could stare anybody down. I was the one who punched, kicked, spat and doled out the evil eye. I never mingled with the others. I knew no one. I trusted no one. Right now, I hated sitting at the table with these boys squashed all around me, but I wasn’t going to show I was scared. Anybody dared look at me and I glared at them. I could see how freaked some of them were. Good. The staff member at the table didn’t look too comfortable either.
    ‘Great to have you join us,’ the staff member said unconvincingly. ‘Isn’t it?’ he added, looking round at the other boys who too quickly, too eagerly, nodded their heads.
    I glowered at them all and said nothing. But the older boy by my side, the one who had grabbed me in the first place, kept it up. I looked around for Riku, but couldn’t see him. ‘Yeah, really good to have you join us. I mean, you’re going to have to put up with us for company now. No special—’
    ‘Jaakko, that’s enough,’ the staff member cut in. A tremorof tension ran round the table. ‘Right, who’s for chicken soup?’ he piped up. ‘Hey, Niilo, how about you?’
    I was starving after all the swimming, but hemmed in like this my appetite had gone. I squirmed on the wooden bench. I had Jaakko on one side and the staff member on the other. The young boy opposite started making clucking sounds and was told to shut up. I pushed my empty bowl away and shook my head. Inside, I was working really hard not to start screaming, stand up, push the table back and run out.
    ‘You sure?’ the staff member went on, dangling a soup ladle in the air.
    I nodded. There was a basket of crusty bread in front of me so I reached out, grabbed a chunk of bread and bit into it. A zing of tension ran round the table.
    ‘Hey! We haven’t started yet,’ the clucking boy said. ‘We start together. Look at him! Look!’
    ‘It’s okay,’ the staff member said. ‘We’ll let it go this time. Niilo doesn’t know how we do things. We haven’t had the pleasure of his company much.’
    ‘Will soon.’ Jaakko grinned.
    I crammed the bread into my mouth, my brain working feverishly. What did this Jaakko fool mean? I was going to have to put up with them for company now? It pounded in my head like a war drum. What on earth did he mean ?
    ‘Soup, Jaakko?’ the staff member asked, a bright strain to his voice. I swallowed the chunk of bread and grabbed another piece.
    ‘Yeah, sure, I’ll have chicken soup.’ Jaakko flashed a look round at me and his nostrils flared. His blue eyes had that shine of triumph about them, or madness. With my mouth crammed with bread I gripped my hands into tight fists under the table and watched the man next to me dish out soup. It slopped into Jaakko’s bowl and looked like puke. The staff member pushed the bowl in front of me. I felt sick. I shook my head, then pushed the bowl away and brown liquid sloshed over the rim and onto the tablecloth.
    ‘Hey, you’re messing the table up,’ the clucking boy said. ‘I don’t like mess. I hate mess. Mess really gets me upset.’
    ‘Chickens died for us,’ another boy said, and giggled. The boy clucked again.