Free Belly Flop by Morris Gleitzman

those days. You were only three and a bit but you had galvanised-iron lungs. Your mum was tuckered out and your dad was hopeless, so I used to come over and tell you a story. About Doug, your guardian angel.’
    She reached over and gripped my arm.
    Her fingers were really strong for a senior citizen.
    â€˜Mitch,’ she said quietly, ‘mate, it was just a story.’
    I stared at her and waited for my mouth to stop twitching.
    So I could tell her that she’d got it wrong.
    That you’re not a story, Doug, you’re true.
    She’d said so herself.
    Night after night.
    I clenched my teeth and pointed this out to her and started reminding her of some stuff.
    How you saved me from the Malleys.
    Twice.
    Then I realised she couldn’t hear a word over the coughing fit she was having.
    I slapped her on the back and poured her a beer and I was just about to start again when Mum came in with half-open eyes moaning about the racket and sent us both back to bed.
    â€˜If you wake Dad,’ she growled at me, ‘after what you put him through earlier tonight, you’re dingo bait.’
    â€˜Sorry,’ I mumbled.
    Gran grabbed me outside my room.
    For a sec, Doug, I thought she was going to tell me she’d been having a lend of me and that you were as real as the yellow stains on her fingers.
    She didn’t.
    She just gave me another hug, which was sweet of her even though it nearly dislocated my ear.
    â€˜We don’t need angels, old mate,’ she said. ‘We can look after each other, en?’
    I looked at her crumpled ancient face and realised what’s happened.
    It’s tragic, eh Doug, when old people start to lose their grip.
    I should have spotted it earlier.
    Gran’s been putting her lipstick on wobbly for some time now.
    Jeez, she gave me a scare, but.
    Imagine if you were really just someone she’d made up?
    If you didn’t exist?
    I’d be on my own.
    Just me and dog poo for my birthday and a dad people won’t help even when he’s up to his axles.
    Just thinking about it’s making my eyes go drippy.
    I hate it when brains do this.
    Get flooded with scary thoughts late at night.
    It’s OK, Doug.
    I know you do really exist.
    That’s why I’m just sniffling a bit.
    If I was really on my own I’d be sobbing much harder than this.
    My tears’d probably fill the town pool.

 
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    Yes!
    Yes!
    Yes!
    Yes!
    Yes!
    Go Doug!
    Yes!!!!!
    I deserve to be tied down in the scrub with jam on my big toes and heaps of signposts so the ants can find me.
    No, Doug, I do.
    It’s what I deserve.
    For not having more faith in you.
    For doubting the double-best guardian angel in the whole universe.
    Give us a D!
    Give us an O!
    Give us a U!
    Give us a G!
    What does it spell?
    GENIUS!
    I dunno how you did it, Doug, but thanks. If God ever retires, I reckon you should get the job, no argument.
    When the shouting woke me up my heart nearly dived out of my chest.
    We don’t usually get big crowds in town that early on a Saturday, so for an awful sec I thought it was farmers with guns coming after Dad.
    I think Dad did too.
    When I came out of my room he was crouched behind the kitchen table.
    Though that might just have been because he’d stubbed his toe on the fridge again.
    â€˜Don’t worry, Dad,’ I said, ‘I’ll check it out.’
    I peered out the front door ready to duck bullets.
    Then I realised the shouting wasn’t angry and murderous, it was happy and excited.
    When I got down to the main street, half the town was milling around.
    There were plenty of farmers, and I could tell they’d just driven in fast because their dogs were still in the back of their utes. A dog won’t go onto a bonnet till the engine’s cooled a bit.
    The farmers weren’t loading guns and muttering things about Dad, they were yelling questions at each other and pointing out along the highway.
    For a sec I